AQUINAS ON THE PRELIMINARY

I

GRASP OF BEING

I

N NUMEROUS PASSAGES, which are to be found
scattered throughout his works, Aquinas repeatedly insists that that which is first apprehended or conceived
by the intellect is being (ens) .1 But from these statements an
initial problem immediately arises. When Aquinas affirms
that being is that which is first apprehended or conceived by
the intellect is he talking about a priority which concerns the
logical order or the psychological order? I shall first of all
explain what I mean by these two expressions.
By the " logical order " I intend to refer to the order of
priority and posteriority which holds between different concepts on the basis of the relations of necessary inclusion and
exclusion that hold between the contents of these concepts:
between the rationcs that these concepts express. Certain concepts contain as a necessary part of their content the contents
of other concepts which therefore need to be understood before they themselves can be understood: these other concepts
which precede them in this manner are prior to them in the
logical order. 2

1 See In I Sent., d. 8, q. 1, a. 3 c. and ad 3; In I Sent., d. 19, q. 5,
a. 1, ad 2 and ad ult.; De Ver., q. 1, a. l; De Pot., q. 9, a. 7, ad 15; S.T.,
Ia, q. 5, a. 2; S.T., q. 16, a. 4, ad 2; S.T., Ia-Hae, q. 55, a. 4, ad 1; S.T.,
Ia-Hae, q. 92, a. 2; In I Met., 1. 2, n. 46; In IV Met., 1. 3, n. 566; In IV
Met., 1. 6, n. 605; In X Met., 1. 4, n. 1998; In XI Met., I. 5, n. 2211; Sup.
De Causis, Pr. VI, I. 6, n. 17 4.
2 "Dupliciter
enim dicitur aliquid non possit intelligi sine altero. Aut ita
quod non possit intelligi si non ponatur alterum esse . . . Sive ita quod
quandocumque intelligitur unum, intelligitur alterum, sicut quicumque intelligit hominem intelligit animal. Et hoc modo "esse" potest intelligi sine
vero, sed non e converso: quia verum non est in ratione entis, sed ens in
ratione veri ... sed numquam potest intelligi intelligibile, secundum hanc
rationem, nisi intelligatur ens. Unde etiam patet quod ens est prima conceptio intellectus." In I Sent., d. 19, q. 5, a. 1, ad 2.,

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MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

By the " psychological order " I do not intend to refer to
the order of the temporal genesis within individual consciousnesses of particular concepts-as it might be studied, for example, by the developmental psychologist. This is a purely
empirical matter and one which might well vary greatly from
individual to individual. As such, I do not consider this perspective, whilst of great interest in itself, 3 to be of direct relevance to the present consideration. Rather, by the "psychological order " I intend to refer to the order of priority and
posteriority which necessarily holds between the various intentional conditions of possibility which must be realized if an act
of understanding or intellectual cognition, considered in general, is to be carried out at all.
If we now return to the initial problem its import will be
immediately evident. After all, Aquinas would hardly identify
the logical and the psychological orders, as I have characteried them, and what holds a certain position in one order might
well turn out to hold a wholly different position in the other.
Nevertheless, as will be seen in the course of this discussion, it
seems that for Aquinas being is that which must be attained
first in both the logical order and the psychological order.
It must be noticed, though, that this primacy or priority
which is attributed by Aquinas to our attainment of being in
both the logical order and the psychological order only rarely
seems to be discussed by him within the one and the same
context. Each context where Aquinas affirms that being is that
which is first attained by the intellect needs to be considered
separately and to be closely scrutinized if one is to arrive at a
correct determination of whether the cognitional priority of
being which is affirmed in that particular context concerns
the logical or the psychological order.
Those passages 4 which affirm that being is that which is
s See, for example, J. Farrelly, O.S.B., "Developmental Psychology and
Man's Knowledge of Being," The Thomist, XXXIX [1975], p. 668-695.
concipit quasi notissi4 For example, "Illud autem quod primo intellectus
mum, et in quo omnes conceptiones resolvit est ens ... Unde oportet quod

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557

first known or understood by the intellect in the logical order
-ens est primum intelligible secundum rationem-present no
great difficulty of interpretation. These contexts simply indicate that being, taken in the sense of the content of the
concept of being in general (ens commune) which expresses
the "nature" of being (ratio entis) and which is the direct
object or proper subject matter of metaphysic, must be understood before it is at all possible to attain a properly metaphysical understanding of the contents of certain other concepts-for example, the transcendentals, the transcendental
perfections, and even the categories-when these are understood metaphysically as opposed to the pre-metaphysical understanding of them which is operative in natural science and
in everyday life. That is, these various concepts, if they are
to be understood in accordance with their properly metaphysical significations, are all posterior in the logical order to
the grasp of the " abstract " concept of being in general; and
this, because they can only be so understood insofar as they
are " grounded " by the intellect, by means of the operation of
additio, 5 in the ratio entis.6
On the other hand, those passages which seem to affirm that
being (ens) is that which is first grasped or apprehended by
the intellect in the psychological order-ens est primum quod
cadit in apprehnsione intellectus-give rise to a far more complicated problematic. As I have already intimated, it is clear
omnes aliae conceptiones intellectus accipiantur ex additione ad ens." De
Ver., q. 1, a. 1, "Ens secundum rationem est prius quam bonum. Ratio
enim significata per nomen, est id quod concipit intellectus de re, et significat
illud per vocem; illud ergo est prius secundum rationem, quod prius cadit in
conceptione intellectus. Primo autem in conceptione intellectus cadit ens:
quia secundum hoc unumquodque cognoscibile est, inquantum est actu .•.
Unde ens est proprium obiectum intellectus, et sic est primum intelligibile ... " S.T., Ia, q. 5, a. 2. Notice how in this second text Aquinas moves
from the priority of being in the logical order to its priority in the psychological order and grounds the former in the latter.
5 For a discussion of the operation of additio see De Ver., q. 21, a. 1.
s For the additio of the transcendentals and the categories see De Ver., q. 1,
a. 1. For the additio of the transcendental perfections [ vivere, intelligere]
see Sup. De Oausis, Pr. XII, 1. 12, n. 281.

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MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

from many passages, 7 that Aquinas is convinced that we must
have a certain preliminary grasp or original apprehension of
being if we are to understand or know anything whatsoever.
But it is precisely at this point that the difficulties commence.
As Cornelio Fabro has remarked in this regard:
A first clarification concerns the origin of the notion of ens:
·everyone realizes at once the importance of the problem. But it
is just as necessary to recognize that the texts of St. Thomas are
quite sparing of indications. If St. Thomas, as we have seen, is
from beginning to end firm in the position that ens is the primum
in every intentional sphere, he says on the other hand, almost
nothing on how the human mind grasps such a notion ... how the
ratio entis arises in the mind is not mentioned and one does not
see how.8
Furthermore, one could well argue that it is precisely this situation that has been responsible for the state of affairs of which
Joseph Owens has written:
... the current approaches to Aquinas in the knowledge of existence are at radical variance with one another. The divergencies
cannot be explained away by patient comparison of the various
ways in which each uses the same terms. They lie rather at the
roots of the vital metaphysical thinking in each interpreter ... 9
Just what is the set of problems that emerges from the situation indicated by Fabro? I would suggest that it can be formulated quite succinctly in terms of two questions.
1 For example,
"Primo enim quod cadit in imaginatione intellectus, est
ens, sine quod nihil potest apprehendi ab intellectu; sicut primo quod cadit
in credulitate intellectus, sunt dignitates . . ." In I Sent., d. 8, q. 1, a.
3; " ... dicendum quod id quod primo cadit in intellectu, est ens: unde
unicuique apprehenso a nobis attribuimus quod sit ens ... " S.T., q. 55, a.
4, ad 1; "In his autem quae in apprehensione omnium cadunt, quidem ordo
invenitur. Nam illud quod primo cadit in apprehensione est ens, cuius intellectus includitur in omnibus quaecumque quis apprehendit."
S.T., IaIIae, q. 94, a. 2.
s C. Fabro, C.S.S., "The Transcendentality of Ens-Esse and the Ground
of Metaphysics," Internationai Phiiosophical Quartedy, VI ( 1966), pp. 423424.
9 J. Owens, C.Ss.R.,
"Aquinas on Knowing Existence," The Review of
Metaphysics, XXIX ( 1976), p. 690.

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559

The first question is whether the content of the preliminary
grasp or original apprehension of being, which according to
Aquinas must be first in the psychological order, is simply to be
identified with the content of the concept of being in general
(ens commune; ens inquantum ens) which is the direct subject
matter of metaphysics. 10 But, surely, this could not possibly
be the case. According to Aquinas the "abstract" concept of
being in general has a content which expresses the ratio entis:
" ratio autem entis ab actu essendi sumitur "; 11 " ens dicitnr
quasi esse habens "; 12 " ens autem dicitur id quod finite
participat esse ". 13 As such, this concept has a content which
is not at all either readily orimmediately seized by the intellect.14 Rather, it has a content which, if it is to be seized
at all by the mind, requires the performance of a highly sophisticated process of resolutive reasoning 15 a process of reasoning which involves, as its specific and constitutive element, the
exercise of that properly metaphysical, third kind, of" abstraction " or distinctio which is the negative judgment of separation.16
The reply that I have just given to the first question gives
immediate rise to the second question. If the content of this
10 "Unde
oportet quod ad eamdem scientiam pertineat considerare substantias separatas, et ens commune, quod est genus, cuius sunt praedicta
substantiae communes et universales causas. Ex quo apparet, quod quamvis
ista scientia praedicta tria considerat, non tamen considerat quodlibet eorum
ut subiectum, sed ipsum solum ens commune." In Met., Prooemium; " ... est
quaedam scientia de ente inquantum est separabile; non enim solum pertinet
ad hanc scientiam determinare de ente in communi, quod est determinare de
ente inquantum est ens ... " In XI Met., 1. 7, n. 2259.
11 De Ver., q. 1, a. 1, ad 3.
12 In XII Met., 1. 1, n. 2419.
13 Sup. De Oausis, Pr. VI, 1. 6, n. 175.
14 "Unde scientia, quae de istis rebus considerat, maxime esse videtur intellectualis, et aliarum princeps sive domina." In Met., Prooemium.
15' Metaphysica, in quantum considerat ens et ea quae consequuntur ipsum.
Haec enim transphysica inveniuntur in via resolutionis, sicut magis comunia post minus communia." ibid.
rn "The best discussion of this theme still remains: L.-B. Geiger, 0.P., Abstraction et Separation d'apres S. Thomas," Revue des Sciences Philosophiq1tes
et Theologiques, XXIII (1947), pp. 3-40.

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MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

preliminary grasp or original apprehension 0£ being, which
we must have if we are to understand or know anything whatsoever, cannot possibly be identified with the content 0£ the
concept 0£ being in general, with the ens commune which is the
object 0£ metaphysics, just what is it then? Is the content
0£ this preliminary grasp 0£ being at all susceptible to conceptualization? Just what are the details 0£ the process
whereby the intellect first grasps or apprehends this content?
We are, in effect, back at the problem as it has been formulated by Fabro, but with the addition 0£ the all-important
clarification that the content 0£ the preliminary grasp 0£ being
is in no way to be confused, let alone identified, with the content 0£ the concept 0£ being in general which is the subject
matter of metaphysics. 17 There is indeed a wide, though by no
means discontinuous, chasm between our original apprehensiion
0£ being and the metaphysician's conceptual seizure of being in
general a chasm which can only be bridged by the transition
from everyday, pre-metaphysical, thinking to explicitly metaphysical thinking through a process 0£ resolutio secundum
rationem 18 as well as secundum rem, which can only be effected
by means of the negative judgment 0£ separation.
17 " This first concept of being is not the being of the science of meta·
physics, but rather the most imperfect, confused, potential of all concepts."
M. A. Glutz, C.P., "The Formal Subject of Metaphysics," The Thomist,
XIX (1956), pp. 64·65. "That our first knowledge of being is not the being
of the metaphysician is surely a point of common agreement. St. Thomas
stated this as his position on many occasions. Furthermore, it is agreed that
mediation is necessary if we are to arrive at a knowledge of being as being,
of that common being which is the subject of metaphysics." J. Reichmann,
S.J., "Transcendental Method and the Psychogenesis of Being," The Thomist,
XXXII (1968), p. 456.
18" Ratio enim ... Quandoque vero procedit de uno in aliud secundum
rationem ... resolvendo autem quando e converso, eo quod universalius est
simplicius. Maxime autem universalia sunt, quae sunt communia omnibus
entibus. Et ideo terminus resolutionis in hac via ultimus est consideratio
entis et eorum quae sunt entis in quantum huiusmodi." In Boet. de Trinitate,
q. VI, a. 1.

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561

n
If one is even to attempt to resolve the issues that arise
within the second question, I would suggest that it is imperative to notice that Aquinas, to the very limited extent that
he does so, almost always discusses the preliminary grasp of
being, which is first in the psychological order, within contexts where he is primarily concerned with another, but intimately connected, matter. This is the problem of the genesis
in the mind of the knowledge of the first principles of the
understanding. For Aquinas, knowledge of the first principles
is itself necessary as a condition of possibility in the psychological order. They also must be known if we are to understand or know anything at a]l. Furthermore, their emergence
in the intellect is founded upon, or derived from, the content
of the preliminary grasp of being .19
In several places Aquinas tells us that our knowledge of the
first principles, and, by implication, of the content of the preliminary grasp of being from which they are derived, is attained naturaliter. 20 The epistemological status of the propositions which .formulate the first principles is that of being
per se nota, or self-evident, to the intellect: in the terminology
of modern and contemporary philosophy we would say that
they are all " analytic " propositions. 21 The truth of the first
principles is self-evident to all who comprehend the meanings
of the terms which appear in the propositions which formulate
19 "Naturaliter
igitur intellectus noster cognoscit ens, et ea quae sunt
per se en tis inquantum huiusmodi; in qua cognitione fundatur primorum
principiorum notitia, ut non esse simul affirmare et negare, et alia huiusmodi.
Haec igitur sola principia intellectus noster naturaliter cognoscit ... " 0.G.,
II, c. 83, n. 1678.
20 For example, ". . . primas
affirmationes quae naturaliter intellectus
cognoscit, ut sunt dignitates ... " In I Sent., d. 19, q. V, a. I.
21 " Ex hoc enim aliqua propositio est per se nota, quod praedicatum
includitur in ratione subiecti ... si igitur notum sit omnibus de praedicato
et de subiecto quid sit, propositio illa erit omnibus per se nota: sicut patet
in primis demonstrationum principiis, quorum termini sunt quaedam com·
munia quae nullus ignorat, ut ens et non ens . . ." S.T., Ia, q. 2, a. 1.

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them. First and foremost among these terms is the term
"being" ("ens"). Clearly, the meaning of the term" being",
which we must know if we are to have any knowledge of the
first principles and their truth, corresponds to the content of
that preliminary grasp of being with which this discussion is
concerned.
When Aquinas characterizes as naturaliter our manner of
knowing the first principles, and the content of the preliminary
grasp of being that they presuppose, does he mean that this
knowledge is either innate to the intellect or, in some way or
other, a priori to the operation of sensibility·--at least in the
sense that it is not derived from it? Is it a knowledge that the
intellect, on the occasion of the operation of sensibility, derives from itself and imposes upon, or at least actualizes within,
the synthetic sensible image, or "phantasm", which is the
product of the cooperation between the external and the internal senses? In other words, is, for Aquinas, the content of
our preliminary grasp of being and the knowledge of the first
principles derived from it, something akin to a Kantian a
priori, purely formal, category: a necessary, "transcendental",
condition of possibility which must be postulated if we are
to give any satisfactory account at all of the fact that we can
perform acts of understanding and knowing?
As is well known, this question has been much discussed in
contemporary Thomistic circles. Yet, in a way, it is somewhat bewildering that this situation ever came about. Certainly there are a few texts, which are to be found exclusively
in the earlier works of Aquinas, which, at first reading, might
lend themselves to being so construed as to enable one to
argue for a "transcendental" interpretation of the thought of
Aquinas on the issue of the original apprehension of being.
But do they do so at all at a second, and closer, reading? Let
us consider some representative texts:
1. ... just as from the truth of the divine intellect flow into the
angelic intellect those innate species by which it knows all things;
so from the truth of the divine intellect proceeds in an exemplary

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563

way into our intellect the truth of the first principles by which
we judge everything ... (De Veritate, q.l, a.4, ad 5) 22

Now, no matter what might appear to be the case at first
sight, and no matter what some authors have made of this
text, 23 it hardly supports any kind of "transcendental" interpretation. To see this, it suffices to recognize the precise import of the term e;vernplariter which is used to describe the
manner in which the truth of the first principles proceeds
from the divine to the human intellect. The point, of course,
is that everything in creation may be said to proceed in an
exemplary way from God 24-and this quite irrespective of
the actual manner of generation in the natural order proper
to any one thing in particular. If we bear this in mind, then
it becomes obvious that in this context Aquinas is not really
telling us anything at all about the actual process whereby
the first principles, and the preliminary grasp of being from
which they are derived, emerge in the intellect. An argument
for a "transcendental " interpretation which bases itself on
this text simply carries no logical force at all.
Quite possibly all that Aquinas is doing in this text, by the
use of exemplarist terminology, is to attempt a degree of reconciliation, on the purely verbal level, with the various illuministic explanations of the first principles which were widely current in his time and were ultimately Augustinian in inspiration.
It is interesting to note that this text presents an accommodating exegesis of a text of St. Augustine. 25 It is even more interesting to notice that this seems to be invariably the case with
22 My translation.
For an alternative, freer, translation see, St. Thomas
Aquinas, Truth, transl. R. W. Mulligan, S.J., Chicago: 1952, p. 19.
2s See for example, J. Donceel, S.J., "Editor's
Preface" to E. Coreth, S.J.,
Metaphysics, New York: 1968, p. 8.
24 "Deus est prima causa exemplaris
omnium rerum ... Manifestum est
autem quod ea quae naturaliter fiunt, determinatas formas consequuntur.
Haec autem formarum determinatio oportet quod reducatur, sicut in primum
principium, in divinam sapientiam, quae ordinem universi excogitavit, qui in
rerum distinctione cons is tit. Et ideo oportet dicere quod in divina sa pientia
sunt rationes omnium rerum ... " S.T., Ia, q. 44, a. 4.
25 See De Ver., q. 1, a. 4, ob. 5.

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MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

similar early texts where exemplarist terminology is applied
to our knowledge of the first principles. 26 I would suggest that
an analogous situation holds with respect to the frequent use
made by Aquinas of innatist terminology in the tenth question
of the Q. D. De V eritate,21 a terminology which simply does
not appear in Aquinas's later, and less occasional, works.28
2. The same is to be said of the acquisition of scientific knowledge;
that certain seeds of the sciences pre-exist in us, namely the first
conceptions of the intellect which are known immediately by the
light of the agent intellect through species abstracted from sensible
objects, be they complex, as the axioms, or simple, as the notion
of being, of one and the like, which the intellect apprehends immediately (De Veritate, q.11, a.I) .29
3. Indeed, some men thought that the agent intellect does not
differ from our habitus of indemonstrable principles. But this cannot be the case, because we certainly know indemonstrable principles by abstracting them from singulars . . . the agent intellect
must exist prior to the habitus of first indemonstrable principles
in order to be the cause of it. Indeed, the principles themselves are
related to the agent intellect as certain of its instruments, because
the intellect makes things actually intelligible by means of such
principles ... (Q. D. De Anima, a.5) .80

Both of these texts lend themselves even less to a " transcendental" interpretation. Certainly in the first Aquinas
affirms that the content of the preliminary grasp of being and
the first principles praexistunt in the intellect. But this preexistence is not meant in any absolute sense. Rather, it is a
relative pre-existence: they pre-exist in the intellect only with
2a See for example,

Q. Quodlibet., q. X, a. 7.
example, De Ver., q. 10, a. 6, c. and ad 6.
2s I would suggest that it is important to notice that the text of De Ver.,
q. 10, represents the report of a live disputation held in Paris in 1257-58 (see
J. A. Weisheipl, O.P., Friar Thomas d'Aquino, New York: 1974, pp. 362-363.
To what extent is Aquinas's innatist terminology an expression of not only
the Augustinian theme with which this question deals but also a desire to
employ a terminology acceptable to his co-disputants?
29 My translation.
ao Cited from St. Thomas Aquinas, On the Soul., transl. J. P. Rowan, St.
Louis: 1949, p. 62. See also, Q. D. De Anima, a. 4, ad 6.
21 See for

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565

respect to the acquisition of scientific knowledge. In this context Aquinas is simply affirming what we have already recognized: they are prior in the psychological order. Thus, in the
second text, we are told that the agent intellect both precedes
in existence and is the cause of the knowledge of the first
principles and, by implication, of the preliminary grasp of
being. Furthermore, in both texts, we are told a little as to
the manner whereby we attain the first principles and the
content of the preliminary grasp of being: " cognoscuntur per

species a sensibilibns abstractas "; " abstrahendo a singularibus ." Once again, though, Aquinas tells us nothing about the
details of this process. Just how do they come to be abstracted
from singulars? But on one point there is no doubt. Whatever might be the manner of their emergence in the intellect
they are certainly not furnished by the intellect itself, and
from itself, in the manner of an a priori formal category.
Somehow or other they are derived from, and not just imposed upon, the data furnished by sensibility.
4.... all the consideration of the speculative sciences is reduced
to certain principles that man does not necessarily have to learn
or find out, lest he be thereby bound to an infinite process. But
of these principles he has a natural knowledge and of this order
are the indemonstrable principles of demonstration . . . also the
first concepts of the intellect as those of " being " and of " one "
and the like ... objects of this natural order of cognition are made
manifest to man by the light of the active intellect, which is natural
to man, by which light things are manifested to us only inasmuch as through phantasms they are made intelligible in act ...
phantasms, moreover, are received from the senses, wherefore
the source of our knowledge of the aforesaid first principles is
from sense and memory ... (In Boet. de Trinitate, q.VI, a.4) .31
5. . .. it is not acquired by demonstration or by any similar

method, but it comes in a sense by nature to the one having it
inasmuch as it is naturally known and not acquired. For first principles become known through the natural light of the agent intel31 Cited from, St. Thomas Aquinas, The Trinity and the Unfoity of the
Intellect, transl. R. E. Brennan, St. Louis: 1946, p. 195.

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MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

lect, and they are not acquired by any process of reasoning, but
by having their terms become known. This comes about by reason
of the fact that memory is derived from sensible things, experience
from memory, and knowledge of those terms from experience. And
when they are known, common propositions of this kind, which
are the principles of the arts and sciences, become known (In IV
Met., 1.6, n.599) .32

In these last two texts that I shall consider we are told,
first of all, precisely what Aquinas means when he characterizes
both our original apprehension of being and our knowledge
of the first principles as taking place naturaliter. By this term
he intends to do no more than to insist that they are attained
immediately in the sense that their seizure by the mind cannot be the result of a process of demonstrative, or in any way
syllogistic-deductive, reasoning. There is no question of either
innateness or any other kind of subjective a priori. To see this
it is important to notice his extremely cautious terminology:
"quasi per naturam "; "quasi ut naturaliter ". Secondly, in
both texts we are told just a little more about how we come
to know the meaning of the term " being " from which the
first principles are derived. We acquire this knowledge by
means of an experiential procedure which relies on the interaction of the senses and memory. Nowhere else in his works
does Aquinas treat this crucial matter in any greater detail.
But just why did Aquinas fail to pay more attention to this
issue? The answer, I suspect, is that he was convinced that
there was no real need to do so. This, not so much because
his philosophical preoccupations were so different from those
of our own (post-Cartesian and post-Kantian) times, as because, for him, there might well have been something supremely
obvious about that original grasp of being whose content corresponds to the meaning of the term " being " from which we
derive our knowledge of the first principles. But if this is
indeed the case, what is it that has been neglected and has
s2 Cited from St. Thomas Aquinas, Commentary
on the M etaphysios
Aristotle, transl. J. P. Rowan, Chicago: 1961, vol. I, p. 242.

of

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thereby brought about the endless controversies over this
issue which have so occupied, and so divided, contemporary
Thomists?
I would suggest, at least as a tentative hypothesis which
can serve as a point of departure for discussion, that the problematic concerning the preliminary grasp of being has arisen
because of the quite understandable desire, on the part of
twentieth century Thomists, to defend, against competing
philosophies, the validity of the Thomistic doctrine of the
total abstraction of the universal from particulars. This amply
justified concern with the vindication of total abstraction
might well, nonetheless, have caused too much emphasis to
have been placed on one particular epistemological perspective
with respect to the sensible object. That is, the sensible object might well have been considered, quite correctly but possibly far too exclusively, only insofar as it appears to sensible
consciousness through the phantasm as potential with respect
to intellection.
What might have been neglected, if not altogether overlooked, is that the potentiality which characterizes the sensible
object is a wholly relative one. The sensible object is only
to be characterized as potential with respect to the understanding, by the possible intellect, of the quiddity or nature which
is realized within it. A nature becomes actually capable of
being understood only insofar as it is abstracted from the
phantasm by the agent intellect which impresses it (as the
species intelligibilis impressa) on the possible intellect which,
once actualized and informed by it, is rendered actually capable of understanding it through the formation of the universal concept (the species intelligibilis expressa or verbum) .
But the actually perceived sensible object, as such and of itself,
which appears to consciousness through the phantasm, is not
at all merely potential but actual. 33 It is this actuality, this
being-in-act, of the perceived sensible object as such which, in
the psychological order, first confronts the intellect and which,
33 " •••

sensus fit in actu per sensibile in actu." B.T., q. 79, a. 3.

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MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

indeed, "moves" it. 34 What is first encountered by the agent
intellect through the phantasm is not the sensible object as
endowed with a potentially intelligible quiddity but, rather,
the sensible object as actual in sensibility: primum enim quod
cadit in imaginatione intellectus est ens.
The first encounter between the intellect and extra-mental
reality-or, more correctly, between the intellect and any
part of that reality of which it is itself a part-is not an encounter with a mere potentiality. It is an encounter between
two actualities: 35 the agent intellect and the perceived sensible object in act. Could it not be that it is precisely the grasp
of this actuality, this entitas rei,36 which pertains to the perceived sensible object as such and of itself, and before it is in
any way quidditative by intellected, which constitutes the content of our original apprehension of being? Could it not be
this very actuality, 37 this being-in-act of the perceived sensible
object, which is first excised by the agent intellect and by it
impressed on the possible intellect as its primary actualization
or informatio-as the very "dawn" of its cognitional vitality,
a primary " information " whose content corresponds to that
initial and most primitive meaning that the term " being"
does and can have for the intellect, a meaning which, no matter how rudimentary, still enables the agent intellect to derive
from it those first principles of the understanding by whose
instrumentality it can then abstract the potentially intelligible
aspect of the sensible object-its quiddity or specific nature.
If this is indeed the case then there is no great difficulty in
seeing just why Aquinas, in the texts that I have considered,
repeatedly insists that our original apprehension of being is
34 " ••• phantasmata se habent ad intellectivam
partem animae, sicut sensibilia ad sensum. Unde sicut sensus movetur a sensibilibus, ita intellectus a
phantasmatibus." In III De Anima, 1. 12, n. 770.
as Is not this the "Prima ergo comparatio entis ad intellectum est ut ens
intellectui correspondeat ... " of De Ver., q. 1, a. 1?
36 De Ver., q. 1, a. 1.
cognoscitur per id quod est in actu et ideo ipsa
37 " ••• unumquodque
actualitas rei est quoddam lumen ipsius." Sup. De Oausis, Pr. VI, 1. 6,
n.168.

AQUINAS ON THE PRELIMINARY GRASP OF BEING

569

derived from sensibility. Nor is there any great difficulty in
seeing just why, as I suggested, the entire matter was no great
problem for him.

Ill
I shall now present, in the form of a number of points, some
general conclusions and a few further reflections which seem
to me to follow from the interpretations that I have proposed
of the texts that have been considered:
1. There most certainly is, for Aquinas, a preliminary grasp
or original apprehension of being. Upon its content is founded
our immediate, "natural", knowledge of the first principles
of the understanding. Both this content, which corresponds
to the most primitive meaning of the term " being ", and the
knowledge of the first principles which is derived from it are
necessary conditions of possibility for the performance of any
act of understanding or knowing whatsoever. They are thus
first and second, respectively, in the psychological order.
2. These two necessary conditions of possibility are presupposed by all instances of reasoning-no matter whether
it be reasoning in the theoretical sciences, in the practical
sciences, in the mechanical arts, or in any aspect of everyday
life. Most significantly, as indispensable preliminaries to the
mind's performance of its two most fundamental acts of simple
apprehension and judgment, 38 they are presupposed by the
various types of "abstraction " or distinctio which are constituted by the dynamic interplay of these two acts: the
operations of total abstraction, formal abstraction, and negaas" .. , cum duplex sit operatio intellectus: una, qua cognoscit quod quid
est, quae vocatur indivisibilium intelligentia: alia, qua componit et dividit:
in utroque est aliquod primum: in prima quidem operatione est aliquod
primum, quod cadit in conceptione intellectus, scilicet hoc quod dico ens, nee
aliquid hac operatione potest mente concipi, nisi intelligatur ens. Et quia
hoc principium, impossibile est esse et non esse simul, dependet ex intellectu
entis ... ideo hoc etiam principium est naturaliter primum in secunda
operatione intellectus, scilicet componentis et dividentis." In IV Met., 1. 6, n.
605.

570

MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

tive separation which are operative within, and specific to
insofar as they alone can yield to them their proper objects,
the theoretical sciences of physics, mathematics, and metaphysics.89
3. Neither the content of the preliminary grasp of being nor
the knowledge of the first principles derived from it is in any
way some kind of " transcendental " formal element, analogous
to a Kantian subjective a priori, category, that the intellect
derives from itself and imposes upon, or at least actualizes
within, the phantasm. Rather they emerge in the mind, in a
non_,demonstrative manner, as the primary actualization of
the possible intellect which results from the agent intellect's
first encounter with the actuality of the perceived sensible
object as such. An actuality, or being-in-act, which manifests
itself primordially through the phantasm which presents the
sensible object to consciousness.
4. The content of the preliminary grasp of being is not as
yet explicitly metaphysical. One is neither a metaphysician,
nor is one engaged in metaphysical thinking, solely in virtue
of this original apprehension of being which is common to all
men. 40 This is because the content of the preliminary grasp
of being does not correspond to, and cannot simply be identified with, the ratio entis which is expressed by the concept of
being in general (ens commune)--which is the object of
metaphysics and can only be attained through negative sepof every man
aration. In other words, the apprehensio
must be kept quite distinct from the conceptio entis achieved
by the metaphysician. 41 Now, undoubtedly, the content of
the preliminary grasp of being will serve as the point of departure for that process of resolutive reasoning whereby the
39 See

In Boet. de Trinitate, q. V, a. 3.

quaedam communia quae nullus ignorat ... " S.T., la, q. 2, a. I.
a contrary opinion, "Non senza ragione l' Angelico usa indifferentemente i termini apprehensio ( che sta per percezione intuitiva) e conceptio."
L. Bogliolo, S.D.B., "Realismo Moderno e Realismo Tomista," San Tommaso
e ii Pensiero Moderno (Studi Tomistici, 3), Rome: n. d., p. 46.
40 " •••
41 For

AQUINAS ON THE PRELIMINARY GRASP OF BEING

571

metaphysician is enabled to seize that concept of being in
general which is the object of his science-but this matter is
beyond the scope of the present discussion.
5. The preliminary grasp of being does not involve any
strict conceptualization of being. Its content represents no
more than what might be designated as a vague and confused
notion of being. That imprecise notion of being which is common to all men who, despite its lack of clarity, make constant
use of it as is indicated by their ready utterance of the term
" being ". This vague and confused notion of being corresponds
quite simply to the everyday meaning of the term " being "
when it is taken as having the grammatical form of a nouna meaning which, for obvious reasons, cannot be formulated
precisely but can only be indicated descriptively by such
phrases as: "that which is present"; " that which is given ";
"the factual "-and, most commonly," that which I can touch
and see and smell ... "
6. Being, as it presents itself to the mind through the vague
and confused notion which is the content of our preliminary
grasp of it, reveals itself as endowed with a certain intrinsic
structure. It discloses itself as questionable or analyzable in
terms of the two acts of simple apprehension and judgment.
These two acts represent the intellect's initial response to this
intrinmc 42 structure rather than operations whereby the intellect would impose upon particular instances of being initially
empty categories which, somehow or other, it derived o.f itself.
Of particular instances of being the intellect has no hesitation
as to the possibility of addressing them in terms of some initial
questions: what is it?-how is it?-is it, does it exist? The
first question is answered through simple apprehension which
grasps the quod qitid est, or "whatness ", of any particular
42 " ••• duplex est operatio intellectus.
Una, quae dicitur intelligentia indivisibilium, qua cognoscit de unoquoque, quid est. Alia vero, qua componit
et dividit, scilicet enuntiationem affirmativam vel negativam formando. Et
hae quidem duae operationes, duobus, quae sunt in rebus, respondent."
In
Boet. de Trin., q. V, a. 3.

572

MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

instance of being. The second question is answered by the
judgment which, in its formal-copulative or "predicative"
employment, either affirms or denies certain attributes of any
particular instance of being. The third question is answered
by the judgment which, in its existential employment, either
affirms or denies existence or being of any particular instance
of being. It must be noticed that this affirmation or denial
of being of particular instances of being is in no way tautological. It represents the affirmation or denial of being, in
the sense that the term " being " has when it is taken as
having the grammatical form of a participle 43 (the vague and
confused notion of being taken dynamically), of being in the
sense that the term " being " has when it is taken as having
the grammatical form of a noun 44 (the vague and confused
notion of being taken statically).
7. The point that must be stressed at this stage is that, as
long as the particular instances of being which confront the
mind are understood merely in terms of the vague and confused notion of being which is the content of our preliminary
grasp of it, the answers which will be given by the mind in
simple apprehension and judgment will be of little, if any,
explicitly metaphysical import. That is, no matter what these
answers will later, from a metaphysical point of view, be discerned as having implicitly attained, simple apprehension and
judgment, carried out solely in the light of the vague and confused notion of being, are just not capable of yielding to the
performer of these acts anything more than merely everyday,
pre-metaphysical, grasps of " whatness ", attributes, and existence.
For example, the nature or " whatness " grasped, as pertaining to any particular instance of being, will not as yet be
seized as the essence which is related as potential to, and is
really distinct from, the participated esse ut aotus essendi
43 " •••

ens ... ab esse quod pertinet ad quaestionem an sit." Q. Quodlibet.,

q. II, a. 3.
44 " •••

ens secundum quod importat

rei cui competit huiusmodi

esse."

AQUINAS ON THE PRELIMINARY GRASP OF BEING

573

which it receives, determines, and contracts. Similarly, attributes or properties will not as yet be fully understood as
accidental forms which inhere in, or adhere to, the substance
which is the composite of essence and the actus essendi. Finally,
and most importantly, the existence or being (in the sense
indicated by the term "being" taken as a participle-the
vague and confused notion of being taken dynamically) which
is affirmed by the judgment in its existential employment will
not as yet represent the seizure, on the part of the performer
of the judgment, of the actus essendi in the full richness and
originality of its properly. Thomistic understanding. 45 At this,
pre-metaphysical, stage the judgment in its existential employment will simply not be capable of yielding to its performer
anything more than existence in its everyday sense of " givenness", "presence", "facticity "-as that which will later,
foom a properly metaphysical viewpoint, be recognized as being
no more than mere esse in actu, existentia. 46
In other words, as long as being is understood solely in terms
of the vague and confused notion of being which is the content of our original apprehension of being, it is simply not
possible to attain any properly Thomistic metaphysical insights. Their attainment requires much more than that preliminary grasp of being which is readily accessible to, and the
common possession of, all men. The attainment by the mind
of these insights will only be possible after the seizure of that
concept of being in general (ens commime) which, by being
" grounded " in the profounder appropriation of esse commune,
can do full justice to the ratio entis.
To conclude, I should like to insist upon the point that the
very viability or possibility of the science of meta.physics, as
it was conceived by Aquinas, does not depend merely on
example, De Pot., q. 7, a. 2, ad 9.
the authentic notion of Thomistic participation calls for distinguishing esse as act not only from essence which is its potency, but also
from existence which is the fact of being and hence a "result" rather than a
metaphysical principle." C. Fabro, "The Intensive Hermeneutic of Thomistic
Philosophy," The Review of Metaphysics, XXVII (1974), p. 470.
45 See it, for

46 "Thus

574

MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.

whether we do or do not have a preliminary grasp of being.
For Aquinas, that this is indeed the case and that this original
apprehension of being is derived from sensibility, and is not
furnished by the intellect from itself in some a priori manner,
is really beyond reasonable dispute. It can be confirmed by a
straightforward appeal to the experience of any man. Rather,
the very possibility of the Thomistic science of metaphysics
will be dependent upon whether, by means of a process of
resolutive reasoning effected by negative separation, the mind
can have access to that concept of being in general which is
the object of this science. But I shall not consider this matter
in the present context.
MICHAEL TAVUZZI, O.P.
Yarra Theologiaal Union
Melbourne, Australia

IS GOD ESSENTIALLY DIFFERENT FROM HIS
CREATURES? RAHNER'S EXPLANATION
FROM REVELATION

I

INTRODUCTION

N THIS PAPER we shall discuss two questions concerning the doctrine of God in the theology of Karl Rahner.
What is it? On what is it based? In the process, we shall
critically examine the relationship between the doctrine of
God and Rahner's view of Christian revelation, focusing on
the nature of theological method. Analysis will proceed in
two ways: comparison of Rahner's method with what I see
as the method of scripture (faith seeking understanding) and
with that of traditional Thomism as represented by Etienne
Gilson.
In Foundatians of Christian Faith, Chapter
"Man in the
Presence of Absolute Mystery," Theological Investigations,
volume 4, "The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,"
and Theological ln1Yestigations, volume 11, "The Experience
of God Today " Rabner develops his doctrine of God from
his concept of absolute mystery which is drawn from human
experience of reality according to his transcendental method.
This method itself establishes the foundation for answering
the first question, as we shall see. In answering the second
question it is important that we examine carefully the foundation and determining element for any concept of God and
of the creature's relation with God. The following issues will
have to be discussed also: the nature of and need for Christian
revelation, the role of faith and the kind of relation which exists
between the Creator God and creatures. We shall discuss
how Rahner deals with the free grace of God's revelation and
presence in history while synthesizing creaturely self-tran575

576

PAUL D. MOLNAR

scendent experience with grace and revelation according to his
transcendental method. Such synthesis perceives the reality
of God according to the constructs of natural theology and
eliminates any practical need for revelation and faith in the
triune God as the only true God. Moreover, we hope to show
that the starting point for Rahner's transcendental method
[human experience] is the very £actor which causes irreconcilable conflicts for a theology which claims to be a theology
based on revelation.
Rahner's analysis of experience is profound and has been
useful for many in describing the creature's relation with the
Creator. But as long as it is thought that our self-transcending
experiences provide a point of departure for knowing the true
God, Christian theologians will always have difficulty actually
distinguishing God from their ideas about Hirn. For scriptural
faith the point of departure for knowing the reality of God
was and remains God's own free self-manifestation in His
historical interventions within the realm of experience. As
we shall see, this very point is what Rahner seeks to uphold.
But in fact his method causes him to be inconsistent. While
he would insist that this historical intervention is what happened in Israel, in Christ and in the Church; his method cannot a11ow him to hold consistently that the only point of departure for knowing the truth about our experiences is the
Word of God revealed and active in Christ and the Spirit.
Thus, true knowledge of God for Rahner is simultaneously
ascribed to the grace of God and to our innate knowledge of
absolute being. This claim is actually indebted to the Cartesian method and, as we shall see, it causes logical and
theological problems for a theology that claims to be a theology of revelation.
Concerning Rahner's doctrine of God, then, we return to
the opening questions: What is it? On what is it based? Following Rahner's own outline in Fottndations of Christian Faith
these questions can only be answered together by tracing the
development of his own logic based upon the transcendental
experience of our" horizon." Rahner's doctrine of God begins

RAHNER'S EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

577

from the assumption that an experience of one's "horizon "
is an experience of God. And this assumption dictates what
it is. Therefore, in Rahner's thought, these two questions cannot in fact be separated.
Rahner provides no other foundation for this assumption
than the idea that man must think and act in light of this
horizon. Instead of pointing beyond the circle of human experience to show us that he has in fact spoken about a reality
which totally transcends it, he directs us back to our experiences. While Rahner knows God is totally transcendent, his
method ascribes even to the philosopher a knowledge of God
which would follow a recognition of God's grace revealed in
Christ. So, instead of consistently holding scriptural faith
as the norm of his theological ontology, Rahner holds that
being as experienced within and without the bible is "graced."
My suggestion is that a scripturally grounded theology begins and ends in faith. It would allow God the freedom to be
the originator as well as the one who completes the process
of true knowledge. This would explain why theology has been
described as fides quaerens intellectum. 1 Faith in the triune
God would be a necessary prerequisite to philosophical reflection for this kind of theology. For Rahner it must be said
that, in all three pieces under consideration, the word faith
rarely appears. 2 And the idea that the truth of human knowl1 Perhaps the most renowned theologian to use this expression was .Anselm.
Karl Barth's book entitled Anselm: Fides Quaerens Intellectum: Anselm's
Proof of the Existence of God in the Context of his Theological Scheme,
(Richmond: John Knox, 1960) displays a continued interest in this expression as it relates to theological method.
2 See, for e.g., K. Rahner, "The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology,"
Theological Investigations.
Vol. 4. (Baltimore: Helicon, 1966) 36-73, p. 60.
This series, which now includes 20 volumes with several different publishers,
hereafter will be abbreviated TI; the publishers, where different, will be indicated. Where Rahner does mention faith, the meaning of the word is defined
by his transcendental method. Thus, its biblical meaning is distorted. Since
Rahner deduces the meaning of faith from the "primordial mystery" which
everyone always experiences (our term or whither or absolute being) he
thinks that we must nnderstand biblical faith too as pointing to this experience and not to something outside it. This, of course, distorts the very

578

PAUL D. MOLNAR

edge is determined solely by the object of the Christian faith
would be unworkable in his system. In fact, Rahner's identification of the immanent and economic trinity 3 illustrates his
meaning of biblical faith, since what determines truth for Rahner is our
experience of our "whither" and faith in it as something that is always
present. What determines truth for Paul (whom Rahner cites here) is the
risen Lord alone. For Paul faith is true faith when it points to Him alone.
Cf., e.g., 1Cor.12:3.
a Rahner, "The Concept of Mystery," pp. 70-71. For more on the dogmatic
problems involved in this identification see Paul D. Molnar, "Can We Know
God Directly? Rahner's Solution from Experience," in Theological Studies,
vol. 46, no. 2, pp. 228-61, pp. 230ff. and 248ff.
A recent article by Leo J. O'Donovan, S.J. "A Journey into Time: The
Legacy of Karl Rahner's Last Years," Theological Studies, vol. 46, no. 4, pp.
621-646 raises several objections to an analysis of Rahner's method, presented in my article in TS. His basic objections rest on the assumption that
philosophy and theology indeed investigate the same object. What is demonstrated in that article, however, is that Rahner's dogmatic identification of
the immanent and economic trinity, his definition of transcendental revela·
tion and his theory of quasi-formal causality all compromise any true dis·
tinction between philosophy and theology in the traditional sense. All of
these terms follow from Rahner's method and in effect claim a direct relation between Creator and creatures which I have argued is excluded by the
scriptural revelation. The author did not realize that Rahner's theology of
the symbol, which, according to his own presuppositions, is put forward as
an instance of an application of a general principle of being without restrictions (TI 4: 226-8) actually is the very factor which forces Rahner to reduce the trinitarian self-revelation to an instance of the general pattern of
being necessarily expressing itself in se and ad extra. The problems with this
thinking are analyzed extensively in that article.
O'Donovan also cites "Numerous other inaccuracies of interpretation," of
which he is only able to present three-all three of which are themselves
inaccurate representations of what I actually stated in the article. The
first asserts that I hold that the Trinity may be "defined." The point of
the article clearly states that, although Rahner insists that God, in his
transcendence always escapes definition he does in fact define Him according
to the philosophical category of the nameless and in that way blurs the distinction between the immanent trinity and " absolute being." The second
asserts that "the idea of 'pure nature' has no practical significance." The
word practical in this context clearly means what Rahner means by "existential." And since Rahner holds that in existential reality man never exists
without grace it is not at all inaccurate to interpret Rahner to mean that,
practically speaking, "man ... is not ... pure nature ... but is mixed
up with trace elements from actual nature, and hence its state of grace, (Tl
4: 187, "Nature and Grace"). The third asserts "that a symbolizandum

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

579

synthesis of the Christian God with the idea of God drawn
from the self-transcending experience of Christians. Accordingly, what determines truth is the idea of God drawn from
the experience of man's term, i.e., absolute being.' Rahner's
method assumes that the Christian doctrine of the Trinity confirms this experience and the knowledge derived from it. In
this paper we hope to show that wherever this assumption is
at work, a scriptural theology of revelation cannot be held
consistently and a clear distinction between philosophy and
theology cannot be attained.
A. God
Rahner's presupposition for knowing God precludes dependence on the free revelation attested in scripture as I have
described it above at the outset. Since he is a being who is
" entrusted into his own hands and always in the hands of what
is beyond his control," 5 Rahner assumes man is " a being
oriented towards God." 6 Probably no one would deny that we
and its symbol are ' identical.' " If the actual quote is read in context it is
quite clear that the meaning of the word identical is the meaning Rahner
himself attaches to the word when he describes the immanent and economic
Trinity as strictly identical. It is clearly a symbolic ontological identity of
essence which is distinct from but mutually determined by its appearance.
Insofar as Rahner " identifies " the immanent and economic Trinity then it
is perfectly appropriate to speak of symbolic identity since it is his theology
of the symbol which provides the framework for understanding the nature of
this " identity."
4 See, e.g., Rahner,
" The Concept of Mystery," p. 49 where Rabner
writes: "we begin ... with the finite spirit's transcendence, which is directed to absolute being." On p. 50 Rahner calls this "whither" of transcendence God. On this point see also Tl 11, "The Experience of God Today,"
(New York: Seabury, 1974), pp. 149-165, pp. 149-53ff.
5 K. Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith: An Introduction
To The Idea
of Christianity.
(New York: Seabury, 1978), p. 44. See also TI 4: 52 where
Rhaner writes: " The Whither of transcendence is at no one's disposal. ... "
TI 11, p. 151 expresses the same idea. By experiencing himself this way
man is placed into "that mystery which reduces us to perplexity, which controls us and is not controlled by us." For more on this see Foundations of
Christian Faith, hereafter abbreviated as Foundations, p. 42.
6 Rahner, Foundations, p. 44. See also Tl 4: 49 and TI 11: 153.

580

PAUL D. MOLNAR

are all in some sense in the hands of what is beyond our control. But the fact that there are always things in life we cannot control neither proves that there is a God nor that we are
oriented to this God rather than opposed to Him. By this
assumption Rahner is compelled to describe knowledge of
God as an orientation of human being according to his transcendental method. The meaning of the term God, for Rahner,
is neither taken from scriptural revelation nor from dogmatics
but from "this orientation to mystery." 7 This is why, for
Rahner, "At this point theology and anthropology necessarily
become one." 8 For Rahner, knowledge of God represents man's
explication in reflection of "what is already present in his
transcendentality." 9
p. 44. See also TI 4: 49 where Rahner writes:
7 Rahner, Foundations,
"We inquire therefore into man, as the being who is orientated to the
mystery as such, this orientation being a constitutive element of his being
both in his natural state and in his supernatural elevation."
s Foundations, p. 44. Rahner works out the logic of this insight in his
Christology TI 4, " On The Theology of the Incarnation," pp. 105-20, p.
116. Rahner writes, "And if God himself is man and remains so for ever,
if all theology is therefore eternally an anthropology ... man is forever the
articulate mystery of God." See also TI 9, "Theology and Anthropology,"
(New York: Herder & Herder, 1972), pp. 28-45, p. 28 where Rahner writes,
"anthropology and Christology mutually determine each other within Christian dogmatics if they are both correctly understood."
9 Foundations,
p. 44. As usual the same idea is repeated in all of Rahner's
pieces. See e.g., TI 4: 50 where Rahner writes: "All conceptual expressions about God, necessary though they are, always stem from the unobjectivated experience of transcendence as such: the concept from the pre-conception, the name from the experience of the nameless." On this point see also
Tl 4: 57. See also TI 11: 149 where Rahner writes: "The so-called proofs
of God's existence . . . are possible . . . only as the outcome of an a posteriori process of reasoning as the conceptual objectifications
of what we
call the experience of God, which provides the basis and origin of this process
of reasoning." Thus, for Rahner the task is to "reflect upon an experience
which is present in every man . . ." (TI 11: 150-51). Since this is so
theology means "we can only point to this experience, seek to draw another's attention to it in such a way that he discovers within himself that
which we only find if, and to the extent that we already possess it." (TI
11: 154). See also Foundations, p. 21 where Rahner writes: "The knowledge
of God is always present unthematically and without name, and not just
when we begin to speak of it. All talk about it, which necessarily goes on,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

581

Now, i£ God is free in the scriptural sense described above,
Rahner's claim that knowledge 0£ God is always present in
man's striving for " being as such " 10 illustrate the problem
of harmonizing reason and revelation according to his method.
According to such presuppositions man's very nature forces
him to continually transcend his present experience toward
something beyond. While there is no reason to doubt this
experience, any claim that this is true knowledge 0£ God compromises the freedom of the Christian God; for this God is
especially free in relation to such necessary strivings. We hope
to show a real conflict between reason and revelation here
which is solved only by revelation. 11
Rahner begins analyzing the term God by analyzing man's
experience 0£ himself, and concludes: " The mere fact that
this word exists is worth thinking about." 12 What does the
word mean? " The present form 0£ the word reflects what
the word refers to: the ' ineffable one,' the ' nameless one ' who
does not enter into the world we can name as part 0£ it ... it
expresses the whole in its unity and totality ... It means that
which really is wordless." 13 Thus, Rahner writes " the word
' God ' which no longer refers by itself to a definite, individual
experience, has assumed the right form to be able to speak
to us 0£ God." 14
For Rahner, the term God signifies the "single whole of
reality" and "the single whole" of man's existence. 15 And
this is a significant insight. For it leads Rahner to conclude that
" If the word ' God ' really did not exist, then neither would
always only points to this transcendental experience as such, an experience
in which he whom we call ' God ' encounters man . . . as the term of his
transcendence ... " For Rahner's explanation of his method see Foundations,
pp. 24-39.
10 Foundations, p. 35.
11 See text, infra, passim.
12 Foundations, p. 45.
13 Foundations, p. 46. For the same idea see esp. Tl 4, pp. 50·5lff. and Tl
11: 157, 160.
14 Foundations, p. 46.
15 Foundations, pp. 47-48.

PAUL D. MOLNAR

those two things exist any more for man, the single whole of
reality as such and the single whole of human existence in the
mutual interpretation of both aspects." 16
The word God " asks about reality as a whole and in its
original ground." 17 Rahner does not rigorously distinguish
between the reality of God and the word God. The fact that
the word exists gives it a reality all its own. " This word exists,
it belongs in a special and unique way to our world of language
and thus to our world. It is itself a reality, and indeed one
that we cannot avoid." 18 Indeed "We should not think that,
because the phonetic sound of the word ' God ' is always dependent on us, therefore the word ' God ' is also our creation.
Rather it creates us because it makes us men." 19 What creates us and makes us men? Apparently it is the synthetic
word-reality which is "the totality of the world and of ourselves." 20 "This real word confronts us with ourselves and
with reality as a whole, at least as a question. This word exists.
It is in our history and makes our history. It is a word." 21
Rahner continues, "It is our opening to the incomprehensible
mystery . . . it is itself the final word before wordless and
worshipful silence in the face of the ineffable mystery." 22
B. Knowledge of God
For Rahner, then, knowledge of God is really inseparable
from one's transcendental experience of the world. It is a
posteriori in the sense that it " is an a posteriori knowledge
16 Foundations,

pp. 47-48.
p. 49. Because Rahner believes this he identifies ontology
with natural theology and natural knowledge of " absolute being" with
knowledge of God, TI 4: 52. For more on this point see TI 1: 79-148,
"Theos in the New Testament," esp. pp. 81-83 and 133. Compare Rahner,
Hearers of the Word, (New York: Herder & Herder, 1969), hereafter abbreviated as HW, pp. 8ff. and pp. 53-68.
18 Foundations, p. 50 and TI 11: 160.
19 Foundations, p. 50. How or why a word can create us is not explained.
20 Foundations, p. 50.
21 Foundations, p. 51.
22 Foundations, p. 51 and TI 11: 160.
11 Foundations,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

583

from the world." 23 This is what Rahner describes elsewhere
as categorical knowledge of revelation. 24
On this view "man's basic and original orientation towards
absolute mystery," constitutes an experience of God. 25 And
this experience is a " permanent existential of man as a spiritual
subject." 26 Any conceptual proof for God is therefore simply
a reflection on this "orientation towards mystery." 27 What
proves the existence of God here is the fact " that speaking
of God is the reflection which points to a more original, unthematic and unreflexive knowledge of God." 28
Foundations, p. 52.
Karl Rahner and Joseph Ratzinger, Revelation and Tradition.
Quaestiones Disputatae, 17. Tr. W. J. O'Hara (New York: Herder &
Herder, 1966), pp. 13-21. For a similar idea see also HW, pp. 114-15. See
also below, pp. B4-B7 and Foundations, pp. 153ff.
25 Foundations,
p. 52 and TI 4: 42ff., 49ff., and TI 11: 155-56. Rahner ap·
peals to the Vorgriff (prior apprehension) as the factor which guarantees
this (p. 155). On this point see also HW, pp. 53-68, esp. p. 59. See also
pp. 66-67. Cf. also K. Rahner, Spirit in the World, Tr. William Dych, S.J.
(New York: Herder & Herder, 1968), hereafter abbreviated as SW, pp. 142·
44 and 156ff.
26 Foundations, p. 52 and TI 4: 49ff.
21 Foundations, p. 52 and TI 11 : 152ff.
2s Foundations, p. 52. Of course Rahner thinks this way because, in addi·
tion to categorical revelation, he presumes the existence of what he calls
transcendental revelation, Revelation and Tradition, pp. 13-21. Transcendental revelation refers to man's direct experience of the ontology of God himself
via the incarnation and grace. For Rahner it is God's quasi-formal self.
communication to man which accounts for man's "' entitative' divinization,"
i.e., "a transcendental divinization of the fundamental subjective attitude,
the ultimate horizon of man's knowledge and freedom, in the perspective of
which he accomplishes his life" (Revelation and Tradition, p. 16). This,
for Rabner, is man's grace given supernatural existential. Thus, for Rahner,
the visio beatifica is the direct apprehension
of God, given by God
himself.
In reality it is the object of man's initial dynamism of
spirit which recognizes being in general (TI 4: 60-61). Thus, Rabner describes grace as "an inner, objectless though conscious dynamism directed
to the beatific vision" (TI 4: 61). And this insight leads directly to Rahner's
explanation of the Creator/creature relationship in terms of a quasi-formal
alteration in the knowing subject. See e.g. TI 4: 65-67ff. and p. 54, and
61 and also TI 1: 319-346 "Some Implications of the Scholastic Concept
of Uncreated Grace," pp. 328-31. See also Foundations, pp. 118ff. and Chapter
5 where Rahner works out the logic of this theory of quasi-formal causality
23

24 See

584

PAUL D. MOLNAR

Rahner insists that knowledge of God does not mean knowledge of something new coming from without but that "We
are oriented towards God." 29 And because " This original
experience is always present" everyone already knows God
as he or she knows himself or herself. 30 "This unthematic
and ever-present experience, this knowledge of God which we
always haV'e ... is the permanent ground from out of which
that thematic knowledge of God emerges ... in philosophical
and the change in the structure of the creature, esp. at p. 149. See also
Paul D. Molnar, Theological Studies, pp. 240ff. It is Rahner's quasi-formal
explanation of the Creator/creature relationship that goes beyond the traditional distinction between nature and grace and ascribes true knowledge of
God directly to man in his self-knowledge. That is why Rahner feels free
to describe God's grace as a conscious dynamism of the creature whereas in
fact, if one were to distinguish clearly nature and grace, one could never
describe any creaturely activity as anything more than a creaturely activity.
Leo O'Donovan, S.J., Theological Studies, p. 625 misses this point by assuming that Rahner's quasi-formal explanation of the operation of God's
redemptive grace preserves this distinction, p. 626. It does not in fact even
recognize it. Of course the real problem here which the author does not address is whether one can describe creation after the Fall as intrinsically open
to God at all without becoming Pelagian in one's doctrine of God.
29 Foundations, p. 53, TI 4: 54, 61, 65-67ff., and TI 11: 156.
so Foundations, p. 53. See also TI 11: 155, 161. This is why, for Rahner
revelation has its existence in man's consciousness and is indeed subject to
the structures of the knowing subject. " It [revelation] has its existence in
man's own conscious thought and hence is subject to the a priori structure
of human knowledge" ( 11: 91, "Reflections on Methodology in Theology") .
.And this leads directly to the idea that knowing ourselves means knowledge
of God. See TI 11: 154 and TI 13: 122-32, "Experience of Self and Experience of God," pp. 124-5ff. For Rahner "experience of God constitutes the
enabling condition of, and an intrinsic element in the experience of self ... "
Therefore " The experience of self is the condition which makes it possible
to experience God" (p. 125), It is Rahner's concept of the luminosity of
being which allows him to think this way. (See HW, pp. 39 and 43 and TI
4: 49. For Rahner there is an original unity between knowing and being.)
See e.g. Foundations, pp. 149ff. for more on this idea of luminosity.
Rahner writes of Revelation that it is " a modification of our transcendental
consciousness produced permanently by God in grace. But such a modification is really an original and permanent element in our consciousness as the
basic and original luminosity of our existence. .And as an element in our
transcendentality ... it is already revelation in the proper sense" ( p. 149).
See also Foundations, p. 132 for more on this.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

585

reflection . . . we are only making explicit for ourselves what
we already know implicitly about ourselves in the depths
of our personal self-realization." 31 At this crucial stage in the
development of Rahner's doctrine of God it is clear that while
Rahner believes God is free, his method of synthesizing natural
and revealed theology causes him to believe that any proof
of God's existence stems from an experience of ourselves. This
methodological assumption compromises God's independence
in relation to human experience and reflection. Thus, " The
meaning of all explicit knowledge of God in religion and in
metaphysics . . . can really be understood only when all the
words we use there point to the unthematic experience of our
orientation towards the ineffable mystery." 82 According to
his method this is the foiindation for the doctrine of God.
Everyone has an experience of an horizon that cannot be controlled which Rahner calls an experience of the reality of the
transcendent God. Thus, when one is oriented towards what
philosophy recognizes as mystery or absolute being it can
legitimately be assumed that one is speaking about the scriptural God. Eventually Rahner claims that this "being" is
identical with the immanent Trinity. 33
31 Foundations,

p. 43, emphasis mine. Also, pp. 2lff. and TI 11: 154-55.
p. 53. Emphasis mine. This same idea is expressed in
TI 4 using the category of the " whither," pp. 50ff. and again in Tl 11: 149
and 150. For example Rahner writes: "But surely both together, the initial
experience and the subsequent reflection, make it justifiable to speak of the
'experience of God today' ... " ( p. 150, emphasis mine). Cf. also TI 11:
159 where Rahner writes: "What is meant by God is to be understood on
the basis of this experience . . ." (emphasis mine). " This experience is
no mere mood, no matter of mere feeling and poetry carrying no conviction
... For it is present irremovably, however unacknowledged and unreflected
upon it may be, in every exercise of the spiritual faculties even at the most
rational level in virtue of the fact that every such exercise draws its life
from the prior apprehension [Vorgriff] of the all-transcending whole which is
the mystery, one and nameless. It is possible to suppress this experience, but
it remains ... " ( 11: 159). Please Note: All that Rahner has offered here as
proof for God as an independent entity confronting us, is our experience of
ourselves in relation to our innate apprehension of an all-transcending whole.
33 Tl 4: 71-2. Why?
Because "The three mysteries, the Trinity and its
two processions and the two self-communications of God ad extra in a real
32 Foundations,

586

PAUL D. MOLNAR

According to this description we do not have to wait upon
God to reveal Himself at particular historical moments because it is assumed that this orientation to "mystery," which
orientation and mystery can be adequately described by the
metaphysician, and therefore what " we call God " 34 is truly
the totally other, the God of Christianity.
Now, how can Rahner say that God is truly transcendent
and free and that both philosophers and theologians know
Him in this way? In other words, the obvious question here
is: if God is really transcendent (in the scriptural sense),
then why does He not transcend this orientation, experience
and definition as well? While Rahner would say it is this
scriptural God we know, his very method renders such a God
totally unknowable. 35 Indeed Rahner's presupposition is that
formal causality corresponding to the two processions, are not 'intermediate
mysteries.' They are not something provisional and deficient in the line of
mystery which comes between the perspicuous truths of our natural knowledge and the absolute mystery of God, in so far as he remains incomprehensible even in the beatific vision. Nor are they as it were mysteries of the
beyond ... behind the God who is for us the holy mystery." Obviously this
is all true for Rahner because he really believes that what natural theology
calls God and what Christians call God are one and the same thing. This,
because of the luminosity of being. In fact, of course, the only way this
could be true is if God were not free but subject to the a priori structures of
the knowing subject. See also, Tl 4: 228.
34 Foundations, p. 54.
35 Cf. TI 11: 159.
Our Vorgriff would not innately correspond with it.
See text infra. See also SW where Rahner maintains that if God is an
"absolutely 'unknown,' something 'coming from without' in every respect,
[he] is not knowable at all to a human subject according to Thomistic principles" (p. 182). Such a God would not be subject to the a priori structures
of the human mind since there would in fact be no original unity between
knower and known. This insight would destroy Rahner's concept of luminosity as applied to God. Rahner could not hold his important insight that man
is (via the species impressa) entitatively assimilated to God (Tl 1: 327-8).
His entire theory of quasi-formai causality is based on this insight. Rahner
cannot actually maintain a real distinction between philosophy and theology
because of this. So in his philosophy of religion he maintains that man cannot prejudge whether revelation has occurred (HW, pp. 173-4). This view
apparently maintains the freedom of God's revelation as unmerited and incalculable grace. But how do we know of this grace? Because we must reckon
with God's silence. And here is Rahner's problem. There cannot possibly be

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

587

no reality at all, including God, transcends the limit of experience accessible to the metaphysician. Such a reality, says
Rahner, could never be known. 36 Thus, being in general is
the limit of Rahner's doctrine of God. God's being cannot
transcend this. And of this "being" man always does have a
"prior apprehension " (Vorgrifj) against which he interprets
his experiences.
So while Rahner the theologian insists that God is free,
Rahner the philosopher assumes that the true 1iotirce of our
knowledge of God is-" the transcendental experience of our
orientation towards the absolute mystery." 37 In fact, because
experience of orientation is the determinant here, Rahner's
approach cannot conceive God actually existing apart from
human experience: " we can speak of God and the experience
of God ... only together." 38 Thus, " a radical distinction between a statement about ' God in himself' and ' God for us'
is not even legitimate." 39 Identifying the immanent and ecoa real divine silence on this view since Rahner has already presupposed that
his philosophy of religion, by which he knows this silence, is a " condition
that is itself created by God's speaking" (HW, p. 174). And the fact that
this is not a real possibility for God is confirmed by Rahner's belief that if
God did not speak, man by nature could hear at least his silence (HW, pp.
16, 172, 175). This confusion of course invalidates any real distinction between what philosophy discovers as revelation and what the Christian believes is God's free revelation.
36 Foundations,
p. 67. Being in general is the limit of all knowledge for
Rahner. Rahner writes: "Our proposition about the comprehensibility
of
being in itself did indeed arise from the fact that in the first question about
being every possible object of cognition is already anticipated under the
aspect of being in general. There can, therefore, be no existent thing that
does not automatically and objectively fit into the context of being in general.
For this very reason every thing is comprehensible" (HW, p. 96). The same
ideas are expressed in Foundations, pp. 24ff.
37 Foundations, p. 54 and TI 11: 159-60ff.
38 Foundations,
p. 54. Also TI 11: 159 and TI 4: 50-1. This follows from
his belief that being and knowing form an original unity, thus, "The question as to the ultimate cause of the possibility of subsisting-in-oneself is thus
identical with the ultimate cause ... " (HW, p. 57).
39 Foundations,
pp. 54-5. This is why Rahner has to insist on the identification of the immanent and economic Trinity-TI 4: 79-2. On any other view
we would have a merely formal reconciliation of natural and revealed theology,
i.e., of " one and three" (TI 4: 71) .

588

PAUL D. MOLNAR

nomic Trinity is necessary for Rahner because he cannot conceive of the permanence of the humanity of Christ in any other
way, and because our " experience of the incarnation and
grace " 40 make it impossible that the being of God which man
knows by reflecting upon himself be different from the being
of God revealed.
Because the starting point for knowledge of God is our experience of "mystery," 41 Rahner describes a "more original
unity" 42 among 1) natural theology,
revealed theology
and 3) knowledge of God attained from "experience of existence," perhaps from mystical experience or visions. 43 This
derives from historical experience itself. And knowledge of
it "contains elements which subsequent theological reflection
will appeal to as elernents of grace and revelation." 44 Moreover, "Everything which we say here about knowledge of God
... refers to a more original experience." 45 Rahner says this
is not "natural philosophical knowledge of God" though in
part it is.46 His point is that this experience of mystery (God)
is what he will appeal to as the validation of his doctrine of
God. 47
1. Revelation-Grace
To the extent that Rahner includes grace and revelation as
" elements " in our experience it is impossible to distinguish
clearly between philosophy and theology, reason and revelation, and ultimately between nature and grace. Thus, for
Rahner, "There is no knowledge of God which is purely
natural." 48 And grace is not defined only as the free charis
40 TI 4:

68 and 72.
TI 11: 155:
42 Foundations, p. 56.
43 Foundations, p. 55.
44 Foundations, p. 56. Emphasis mine.
45 Foundations, p. 56.
46 Foundations, p. 56.
47 Cf. also Tl 4: 53-4.
48 Foundations,
p. 57. Obviously this is true for Rahner because "grace
pervades the essence of man from his very roots with divine influence, and
41 Cf. also

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

589

of God revealed in Jesus, 49 but also as our orientation towards
" the immediacy of God." 50 This means nothing other than
thereby gives him the possibility of acting positively for his own salvation,
and so implants in him a free and active tendency towards his own consummation" (TI 10: 273-289, "Immanent and Transcendent Consummation of the
World," p. 280). It is precisely because the creature is endowed with this
modality that " the difference between 'inner and outer' breaks down at this
point. The orientation towards the self-bestowal of God as most radically
different from the creature is the innermost element of all in it ... " (TI
10: 281). Thus, for Rahner's descriptions of experience, "it is no great loss
if the analysis of man as potentia oboedientialis is not a ' chemically pure '
presentation of pure nature but is mixed up with trace elements from actual
nature, and hence from its state of grace" (TI 4: 165-188, "Nature and
Grace," p. 187; also TI 9: 28ff.). See also Foundations, Chap. 4. Because
Rahner maintains that nothing but this "holy mystery" by which man always lives "even where he is not conscious of it" (TI 4: 54) is the true
God ["He would not be God if he ceased to be this holy mystery" (TI 4:
54, emphasis mine)] Rahner concludes that "Grace and the beatific vision
can only be understood as the possibility and the reality respectively of the
immediate presence of the holy mystery as such" (TI 4: 55). "Grace ..•
makes God accessible in the form of the holy mystery and presents him
thus as the incomprehensible"
(TI 4: 56). Thus, for Rabner, even God's
grace cannot be different from the "absolute being" we all know and experience and define as God based upon our self-experience. Grace and glory for
Rabner manifestly mean that we cannot control the horizon of our own
existence. And this may be so. But this uncontrollability hardly means we
have seen or recognized grace as an act of a God existing independently of
this experience. From all this Rahner concludes that knowledge of God
"has always been familiar to us" and indeed is "self-evident " (TI 4: 57;
also 11: 161). Furthermore "Mystery is already there with the very essence
of the natural and supernaturally elevated being of man" (TI 4: 59).
It is clear that, having insisted that the being of God conform to what
natural theology discovers as God on the basis of experience, Rabner must
insist that graoe, i.e., knowledge of God revealed, is present all along "with
the very essence of the natural ... being of man." Thus, there is no real
distinction between nature and grace at this point. Indeed Rahner finally
concludes that grace is "an inner, objectless though conscious dynamism
directed to the beatific vision" (TI 4: 61). And the beatific vision is just a
term that Rabner applies to the highest possible description of an immediate
experience of God.
49 Cf. Ex. 33:
19, Mt. 10: 8, Rom. 11: 5f., Eph. 1: 5f. Grace is the
incomprehensible free gift of God's turning to the creature which we cannot
merit. It implies forgiveness of sin. See also Ex. 34: 9, Rom. 5:20 and
Ps. 103: Bf.
50 Foundations, p. 57.

590

PAUL D. MOLNAR

our " orientation towards absolute mystery." 51 " We call this
orientation grace and it is an inescapable existential of man's
whole being." 52
This clear synthesis of nature and grace is no mere accident
of Rahner's thought. It is the unavoidable consequence of his
method. At one and the same time he believes he can know
the scriptural God, revelation and grace and also deduce their
meaning from the experience of" not being at one's disposal." 53
This he assumes is an experience of" mystery" which he terms
the experience of God. 54 So he thinks that when we experience
our inability to control all this we are actually experiencing
God. 55 "The transcendence in which ('y0d is already known ...
may not be understood as an active mastering . . . of God
himself ... By its very nature subjectivity is always a transcendence which listens, which does not control." 56
Rahner then makes his distinction between nature and grace
identical with the distinction between our finiteness (being
grounded in mystery) and the experience that this is not at
one's disposal. This is described as the " unity between transcendence and its term." 57 The terrn or goal of this orientation or transcendence Rahner calls God. 58 It could have "a
51 Foundations,

p. 52 and TI 4: 6lff.
p. 57, emphasis mine, and also pp. 25 and 34.
53 Foundations,
pp. 57-59, 43 and 75-76. See also TI 1: 156. See also TI
4: 51 where Rahner writes: "The whither of transcendence is at no one's
disposal," and TI 4: 53 where he writes: "For the Whither ... the nameless being which is at the disposal of none and disposes of all ... we can
call ' holy' in the strict and original sense."
54 TI 4: 54. " If man himself is therefore
to be understood as the being
of the holy mystery, it also follows that God is present to man as the holy
mystery."
55 TI 11: 156, 160 et al.
56 Foundations,
p. 58. This would have been a strange insight especially
for the Johannine community or for Paul to accept.
57 Foundations,
p. 58. Note that this is an exact rendering of the ontological principle of luminosity as Rahner has understood this.
58 Foundations,
pp. 59-60. TI 4: 62. See also TI 11: 153 and 156. Rahner
writes: " God is present as the asymptotic goal, hidden in itself of the experience of the limitless dynamic force inherent in the spirit endowed with
knowledge and freedom" ( p. 153). See also TI 13: 123.
52 Foundations,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

591

thousand other names." 59 It could be "' absolute being' or
' being in an absolute sense ' " or the " ' ground of being ' which
establishes everything in original unity." 60 Rahner calls it
"the holy mystery." 61 His ultimate goal is to show that the
term or source of our transcendence is " identical with the word
' God ' ... We must first describe the experience and the term
together before what is experienced can be called God." 62
From this series of presuppositions it is perfectly logical for
Rahner to conclude that God is experienced whenever we experience our term, horizon or the nameless and indefinable.
Rahner contends that because the horizon (the term of transcendence) is infinite, it is not only not at our disposal, but
it cannot be given a name. 63 In this way Rahner attempts to
preserve God's freedom and transcendence.
There is, however, a very serious and frequently overlooked
problem with this position. If it were truly impossible to
name this term-if it [the term] were truly transcendent and
free-then it actually could not be conceptualized. Rahner,
however, does name this term of experience the "nameless."
It should be noted quite clearly that the idea of the "nameless " serves a very definite function in his thought from the
very beginning. It is our experience of our horizon which is
the basis, foundation and norm of knowing God. Thus, this
term is not really unnameable. It is quite able to be categorized
-but as that in human experience which is not at our disposal.
This is an extremely significant point. Because Rahner conceives Creator and creatures under the dialectically necessary
umbrella of an original unity between knower and known
59 Foundations,
p. 60. It really makes little difference to Rahner what we
name him since the term God refers to an experience on the basis of which
that which we all experience (the term) is what "we call God" (TI 11:
159.). See also n. 127 below.
60 Foundations, p. 60.
61 Foundations,
p. 60, TI 4. 53.
62 Foundations,
p. 61.
63 TI 4: 37, 42, 53, 60. "The name God is the nameless infinity"
(TI 4:
60). Also 11: 159. God, for Rahner, is "the all-transcending whole which is
the mystery, one and nameless " (TI l l : 160).

PAUL D. MOLNAR

(horizon, term, nameless, mystery), his presuppositions do
not permit a God who is free in the scriptural sense described
above. So when he describes what is wrong with pantheism
and dualism in a Christian doctrine of God he is unable to
escape the pantheist dilemma. Against dualism Rahner writes,
The difference between God and the world is of such a nature
that God establishes and is the difference of the world from himself, and for this reason he establishes the closest unity precisely in
the differentiation. For if the difference itself comes from God,
and, if we can put it this way, is itself identical with God, then
the difference between God and the world is to be understood quite
differently than the difference between categorical realities ... God
to be sure is different from the world. But he is different in the
way in which this difference is experienced in our original, tmnscendental experience. In this experience this peculiar and unique
difference is erperienced in such a way that the whole of reality
is borne by this term and this source and is intelligible only within
it. Consequently, it is precisely the difference which establishes
the ultimate unity between God and the world ... 64

If God alone establishes and maintains the world in existence then the difjerence between God and creatures must be
grounded in God alone. But then it could not be said that
" God is the difference of the world from himself," since, as
other, He alone establishes and maintains the world in its
difference without ceasing to be God. Then, Rahner would
have to admit, however, that we truly cannot experience our
radical dependence on a transcendent other simply by experiencing our horizon since we are identical with our horizon
and not with God. Thus, to experience our distinction and
union with our term may be necessary. But it is not necessarily an experience of God. In fact, according to the scriptural
view, nothing in creation is identical with God. And so, in a
Christian doctrine of God where the method was dictated by
this fact, one would have to acknowledge a continuing difference of essence between Creator and creatures. This would
mean that faith in the Creator would be necessary to perceive
64

Foundations, pp. 62-3.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

593

and to maintain a clear and sharp distinction here without
falling into pantheism or dualism. Rahner makes many distinctions since he knows that the Christian God is free, but
he makes no such distinction and cannot because, according
to his method he assumes that God and man are already one
in intellectu. Thus, while Rahner insists that God is free to
be silent, his method causes him to describe a God who is not
really free to reveal himself or not. 65 Indeed, for Rahner," God
is the most radical, the most original, and in a certain sense
the most self-evident reality." 66
The important point here is that Rahner's definition of
mystery is an ontological definition of man's relation with his
horizon, which horizon is necessary as the condition of conceiving or experiencing anything. 67 This term is mystery
because, logically enough, it is " nameless " and " not at our
disposal ". 68 This terrn or mystery cannot be defined, even
65 See also TI 6: 71-81, "Philosophy
and Theology," p. 75. Rahner writes
that Revelation "presupposes as a condition of its own possibility the one
to whom this revelation remains unowed." Also HW, p. 168. Rahner writes:
"there would be no word of God were there no one who was at least intrinsically capable of hearing it." See also HW, p. 92 where Rahner writes:
" In virtue of his nature as spirit, man constantly and essentially hears a
revelation from God." Since, for Rahner, revelation occurs as a transcendental necessity of man's spirit which includes grace Rahner even writes:
"revelation occurs of necessity," (HW, p. 93; see also HW, pp. 20, 94-6
and 147ff. See also Foundations, p. 172.
66 Foundations, p. 63 and TI 4: 57. See text, infra.
67 For more on this see HW pp. 66-7 where Rahner writes: "A revelation
from God is thus possible only if the subject to whom it is supposed to be
addressed in himself presents an a priori horizon against which such a
possible revelation can begin to present itself in the first place." Thus, for
Rahner, "God does not for his part initiate the relationship; he is already
implicit in the openness of this relationship ... " (HW, p. 66, no. 9). This,
of course, is why Rahner maintains that man by nature can come to terms
with revelation and can perceive it (Tl 1: 83). This, because the whole of
nature has always been " imbedded" in a supernatural context (TI 1: 81).
Obviously that is why, for Rahner, natural knowledge of God and theological
knowledge based on revelation cannot contradict each other.
68 Foundations,
pp. 64-5. Obviously Rahner did not just invent this idea.
He got this from the fact that " man experiences himself as being at the
disposal of other things, a disposal over which he has no control," Founda-

594

PAUL D. MOLNAR

by the Vorgnff Rahner insists. But the conflict which I have
tried to illustrate here is that he has already defined it conceptually by the terms nameless, horizon, condition of the
possibility, absolute being and holy mystery. This inconsistency is traceable to Rahner's starting point for his doctrine
of God as noted above: one's unthematic experience of the
absolute. He is unwilling to begin his transcendental method
solely by acknowledging the normativity of the scriptural
revelation. Instead, Rahner insists that this terrn is not only
a mystery which can be described philosophically; but it is a
"holy" mystery which we must worship. 69 And this synthesis
of the object of philosophy and of theology represents the
conflict of his method once again. It becomes even clearer
when Rahner's thought is compared with Kant.
Q.

Rahner and Kant

Rahner neither wishes to ignore Kant's critiques of pure and
practical reason nor does he wish to leave us purely on the
level of ideas. So, he insists that all of this is not just something going on in the mind of man because if this were true
then we " would lose all connection with the original experience." 10 Does this assertion really overcome Kant and actually
ref er us to God (a true transcendent other independent of us) ?
Does this assertion point to anything beyond a regulative idea
drawn from practical reason (man's experience of self-trantions, p. 42. Now this experience can hardly be disputed. But as a proof for
the reality of God who transcends such an experience it presupposes what
is not proven and is thus inadequate. This inadequacy follows from Rahner's
method. He thinks he has discovered the being of God by examining man'g
term. Thus, he writes: "there is and can be only one proof: in the whole
questionable nature of man seen as a totality ... " TI 9: 127-44, "Observations on the Doctrine of God," p. 140. See also TI 11: 149.
69 Foundations, p. 66. See also TI 4: 61 and 67. On p. 67 Rahner writes:
"We can therefore affirm at once with certainty that the two mysteries of
incarnation and grace are simply the mysteriously radical form of the
mystery which we have shown to be the primordial one, from the point of
view of philosophy of religion and also of theology: God as the holy and
abiding mystery ... "
10 Ji'Qitnd«tions,r· 67 and TI ll : 159-60,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

595

scendence) ? I do not see how these questions are answered
by this assertion. In faithfulness to his method Rahner assumes
that the universality of the experience proves that it cannot
be just an idea. "For this term is what opens up and makes
possible the process of transcendence. Transcendence is borne
by this term, and this term is not its creation." 71 Yet, on the
crucial question of what proves that this idea of a term determining the validity of our experiences, actually corresponds
with a real and true " being," a Ding an sich, Rahner passes
over the question and assumes that because we cannot describe
our experience without this idea of a term or horizon-it must
be real.
So, while Kant asked metaphysicians to prove this connection between idea and reality, Hahner simply assumes it and
by making that assumption he never really answers him. Thus,
Rahner concludes: "The affirmation of the reality of the absolute mystery is grounded for us, who are finite spirits, in the
necessity with which the actualization of transcendence as our
own act is given for us." ' 2 Because the foundation for and
validation of knowledge of God is a " self-validating" experience of one's horizon, Rahner, once again, does not conceptualize any independent freedom for God. "The basic and
original knowledge of what 'being' is comes from this act of
71 Foundations,

p. 67 and TI 11: 160.
p. 67. Emphasis mine. The foundation for all of this in
Rahner's thought is what was described above as the luminosity of being.
Because Rahner assumes an original unity of the knowable and its cognition (HW, pp. 40-1) he argues that they "must derive from a single origin"
(p. 41). Thus, the problem of objectivity for Rahner is solved by his assumption of this original unity between subject and object which necessarily must
be deduced from the knowing subject. It is precisely on the basis of this insight that Rahner develops his notion of the pre-concept (Vorgriff)
(HW,
pp. 53-68) as part of man's subsisting-in-himself
which is self-validating.
Rahner assumes it is self-validating because of his assumption of the original
unity between knower and known. So for Rahner our experiences are selfvalidating. And if you don't have one you simply cannot know what he is
talking about, according to him. He writes: "We must experience here what
mystery is, or we shall never understand its true and perfect sense" (TI 4:
53).
12 Foundations,

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

transcendence, and it is not derived from an individual existent
which we know. Something real can encounter us only in
knowledge, and to state that there is something real which is
a priori and in principle inaccessible to knowledge is a selfcontradictory statement." 73 And according to his method
that must be so. But the only way this can be true is if man
possesses innately knowledge of every possible reality. Yet
this possession is just what Kant called into question. If God
is not an individual existent which we can know, then there
is no real knowledge of God in his uniqueness and otherness
as one who loves. And indeed if he is not an e3.:istent which
truly is inaccessible to human insight, then he is not a real
transcendent other at all; since he is accessible necessarily and
always as we must affirm him as the term of all our transcendental acts.
It should be stressed that by assuming that knowledge of
God is a universal experience of man as he is. Ra:hner has
precluded any real transcendence or freedom for God independent of what human experience ascribes to him. Thus,
while it is clear that Rahner has profoundly indicated that
we cannot leave the sphere of experience and reflection to
know the transcendent God, he has not shown that knowledge of God is a free human response of faith to God's confrontation of His creatures in Christ and the Spirit as expressed
in scripture. Rather, " In the act of transcendence the reality
of the term is necessarily affirmed because in this very act and
orily in it do we experience what reality is." 74 Here is the
crux of the matter. It is here that the creature either needs
God, grace, revelation and faith or has them as part of his
ontology; in which case theology will never escape the appearance of redefining God, revelation, grace and faith as elements
which can be seen and described without the need to choose
between a strict philosophical and theological method.
73 Foundations,
p. 67 and TI 11: 150. On p. 160 of TI 11 Rahner insists
that this kind of God does not exist today.
14 Foundations, p. 68. Emphasis mine. Cf. also TI 11: 155-6, 159.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION

FROM REVELATION

597

3. Pantheism
The hallmark compromise of the divine freedom implied by
the creatio ex nihilo is the fact of mutual conditioning which
determines Rahner's thought in significant ways. For Rahner
there can be no God without man as there can be no man without God. This is because Rahner identifies knowledge of God
with the necessity of affirming our horizon. Again, Rahner
would certainly insist that God is free precisely because He is
nameless. But the question I have raised here is whether the
term of our experience which Rahner has described truly is
nameless. For if it were, God would then be inaccessible to
human insight. We would not be able to know him by experiencing ourselves. As I have suggested above, however, Rahner's
method begins precisely by naming the nameless because he
assumes there is an original unity between knower (man) and
known (God). "We have discussed both the holy mystery,
which exists absolutely and which we call by the familiar name
'God,' and our transcendence to this holy mystery together. In
the original unity of this transcendental experience, the two
are mutually dependent on each other for their intelligibility." 75 And indeed they are. But what has Rahner described
here? According to his own presuppositions he has described
man's original experience of his unity with the one and all of
created being. We do not have to believe in the God of scriptural revelation to describe this mutually dependent relation.
75 Foundations,
p. 68. For an example of Rahner's statement regarding
proofs for the existence of God see Foundations, p. 69 where he writes: "That
which does the grounding is itself grounded, as it were, and what is present
in silence and without a name is itself given a name." Because Rahner thinks
this way he actually maintains that "God confers on man the power to make
a genuine answer to his Word, and so makes his own further Word dependent upon the way in which man does in fact freely answer" (Tl 1: 111).
This follows again from his assumption that "In any act of cognition it is
not only the object known but also the knowing subject that is involved"
(Tl 11: 87). Indeed "It [knowledge] is dependent not only upon the object,
but also upon the essential structure of the knowing subject . . . they
mutually condition one another" ( p. 87, emphasis mine). See also Tl 4: 49
and HW, 39-41, 43.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

Thus, this description of God does not result from faith seeking understanding. In order to describe the Christian God
there would have to be a clear statement that His particular
freedom precludes the idea that He can be described in revelation and grace as mutually dependent in this way. Faith in the
Creator means knowledge of one who freely acts for us. This
implies that He is dependent on no one and nothing to be and
to be our God ad extra.
Rahner's identifying knowledge of God with the necessity
of affirming one's horizon then prevents him from speaking of
God as an individual existent confronting man at specific points
in history. And yet it seems to me that this is exactly the
kind of act which scripture envisioned when it referred to God's
grace and revelation. Whereas in scripture God is the Lord
of Israel and the one who is revealed in the events of the cross
and resurrection, for Rahner He is the " inconceivable and incomprehensible single fullness of reality. This fullness in its
original unity is at once the condition of the possibility both
for knowledge and for the individual thing known objectively." 76 Thus, the proofs for the existence of God express
this experience of union and distinction between oneself and
the ground of this experience, i.e., the term (horizon) .77 The
metaphysical principle of causality itself comes from the same
experience. 78 Thus, this principles too proves to Rahner that
in his analysis of the experience of transcendence and its term
he has truly described the Creator-creature relationship. Yet
this is possible because Rahner has actually synthesized both
Creator and creature under a metaphysical notion of being
drawn from an experience of " absolute being." 79 Thus, all
proofs of God spring from this " same transcendental experience." 80
76 Foundations,

p. 69.
Foundations, p. 70.
78 Foundations, p. 70. Rahner insists that causality should not be inter-

11

preted as in the natural sciences but in terms of experience of our term.
79 Foundations, p. 71.
so Foundations, p. 71.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

599

4. Analogy of Being
Rahner also re-defines the analogy of being using the transcendental method. We do not learn about God "from something which does not have much to do with God." 81 Because
" transcendental experience is the condition which makes possible all categorical knowledge of individual objects, it follows
from the nature of transcendental experience that the analogous statement signifies what is most basic and original in
our knowledge." 82 Thus, for Rahner, analogy cannot mean a
similarity between two utterly different beings [Creator and
creature] which do not exist in an original ontological unity.
It must mean " the tension between a categorical starting point
and the incomprehensibility of the holy mystery, namely, God.
We ourselves, as we can put it, exist analogously in and through
our being grounded in this holy mystery which always surpasses us." 83 Here, as elsewhere, Rahner seems to maintain
God's freedom and human freedom by distinguishing our categories (human freedom) from the holy mystery which always
surpasses us (divine freedom) . But, inasmuch as this "holy
mystery" has already been categorized as part of the very
structure of created being and mutually determined by our
experience of it, the problem of how to envision God's freedom remains. If this holy mystery is the Creator God existing utterly in Himself and in whom we can only believe, then
it cannot logicaily be described as the necessary term against
which all human knowledge takes place, i.e., the metaphysical
idea of absolute being. This assumption by Rabner allows
him to think he can describe God as the absolute instance of
a general principle of being. Thus, when Rahner defines God
as person he writes: "The statement that 'God is a person'
... is true of God only if, in asserting and understanding this
statement, we open it to the ineffable darkness of the holy
81 Foundations,

p. 72.

s2 Foundations, p. 72, emphasis mine.

sa Foundations, p. 73.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

mystery." 84 When asked where our philosophy receives its
content Rahner would say: " from our historical experience." 85
Consequently, while he intends to do a theological ontology,
his method leads him to make the experience of self the foundation, norm and source of understanding God, revelation
and grace. 86
The rest of Rahner's doctrine of God simply works out the
logic of this "transcendental" reflection on experience. "Man
implicitly affirms absolute being as the real ground of every
act of knowledge ... and affirms it as mystery. This absolute . . . which is always the ontologically silent horizon of
every intellectual and spiritual encounter with realities, is
therefore always infinitely different from the knowing subject." 87 While this may be true I would say we cannot therefore leap to the conclusion that this absolute being is the
Christian God. For in a Christian doctrine of God we speak
of one who is of a completely different being and nature from
the absolute being conceivable as the" single whole of reality."
5. Creatio Ex Nihilo

At this point in his discussion in Foundations of Christian
Faith Rahner explains the creation "out of nothing." 88 It is
a clear expression of the fact that for the Christian theologian
creation can in no sense be seen or described as necessary to
God without denying God's freedom. But the conflict between
philosophy and theology surfaces here once again. Though
Rahner intends to maintain God's freedom in se and in revelation and though he states this eloquently, he does not realize
that his method, which distinguishes us from God by distinguishing us and our term, cannot actually preserve the freedom he describes as a theologian. So while he writes: " God
84 Foundations,

p. 74.
p. 74.
86 Foundations, p. 75. None of this is contradicted
in volume 4 or volume
11 (text 18ff., and 3-15 pp. supra). Both articles insist on the same point.
87 Foundations, p. 77 and also TI 4: 50.
88 Foundations, p. 78.
85 Foundations,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

601

does not become dependent on the world, but remains free
vis-a-vis the world and grounded in himself," 89 his thinking
does not bear that out consistently. Attempting to preserve
human and divine freedom, Rahner says God does not become an object of categorical knowledge, which knowledge
always involves mutual necessity between cause and effect
and presumably leads to the definition of causality envisioned
by natural science but which is inapplicable here. 90 Thus,
Rahner is faced with the problem of explaining how we (in
our categories) actually know God while maintaining His
freedom. Instead of turning to the God of scriptural relevation he answers from his method by saying that God is the
" absolutely distant term of the transcendence within which
an individual finite thing is known." 01 And this answer demonstrates again the logical and theological problem involved in
synthesizing natural and revealed theology as in the following
dilemma.
Either Rahner may argue that we have no categorical knowledge of God since he is free. This would preserve creaturely
and divine freedom and point us to revelation as that which
authenticates our concepts. Our concepts would be limited
and would point beyond that limited range only when God
intervened to enable it. But then, of course, Rahner would
have to maintain that we have no real knowledge of God by
reflecting on ourselves apart from scriptural faith in the triune
God. Or he may argue that knowledge of our term. (which of
course has to involve categories-the nameless being a category too) is real knowledge of God; in which case he has in
fact denied his own description of God's freedom. But he
cannot logically argue both that God is free (that we have no
categories for him) and that we know him as the "term" of
our spiritual dynamism. What is it that leads Rahner to believe he has maintained God's freedom here? Clearly, it is
89 Foundations,

p. 78.
Foundations, p. 70.
91 Foundations, p. 78. Emphasis mine.

Do

602

PAUL D. MOLNAR

the idea that God is the horizon we all experience necessarily
as that which is " not at our disposal." 92 So, by conceptually
making this" term" not just remote but" absolutely distant"
Rahner believes he is maintaining the freedom of the Christian
God. But the problem here is that no matter how distant this
term may be, Rahner and any philosopher can still describe it
(categorically) as the holy mystery, absolute being, the nameless or as Rahner himself stated " by a thousand other names,"
and indeed as the Creator God of Christianity, without ever
believing in the triune God. Insofar as this is thought possible, the freedom of God implied by the Christian creatio ex
nihilo recedes into the baokground since the transcendental
method must claim a true knowledge of God as part of an
experience of one's horizon. And whenever this assumption
is the starting point of a doctrine of God, Christian revelation,
which sees the scriptural word as its only norm for truth,
becomes more a conclusion than a starting point for reflection.
Onoe this happens it is hard to see why we would need Christian
revelation in any practical way.
6. Categorical-Transcendental Revelation
By removing knowledge of God from the realm of the categorical and placing it into the realm of experience Rabner
posits an original unity between Creator and creatures. 93 Thus,
this cannot be understood without an experience of freedom
and responsibility. At this point Rahner applies his method
to the scriptural understanding of God, revelation and grace.
We know God " in a transcendental experience in which the
subject ... is experienced as being borne by an incomprehensible ground . . . the absolute mystery which is not at
our disposal ... Creatureliness, then, always means both the
grace and the mandate to preserve and to accept that tension
of analogy which the finite subject is ... " 94
92 See text

pp. 6ff. and TI 11: 159-60.
Foundations, p. 79. This is the more "primordial
he presumes exists and defines in TI 4: 38ff.
94 Foundations, p. 80. Emphasis mine.
93

unity of the spirit "

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

603

The same procedure takes place in Theological Investigations, volume 4, " The Concept of Mystery in Catholic Theology," and again in volume 11, "The Experience of God Today." And the results reveal once again how difficult it is to
describe vevelation and grace as free acts of God calling for
faith seeking understanding once it is assumed that experience
can be a starting point equal to scripture in this matter.
The transcendental method excludes the idea that a special
inconceivable act of God within experience is the sole source
of truth. Thus, the key to interpreting lectures two and three
of Theological Investigations, volume 4, " The Concept of Mystery ... " is to realize that what dictates Rahner's view of
incarnation, grace and glory and his identifying the immanent
and economic Trinity is not a special inconceivable act of God.
It is not the revelation of something previously hidden as it
might be in scholastic school theology. Rather it is the fact
that he believes each of these represents the radical proximity
of God to creatures in their self-transcending experiences. That
is why Rahner's distinction between nature and grace, reason
and revelation and philosophy and theology can be perfectly
clear in one description and become quite obscure in another.
Each of these " supernatural " mysteries is taken by Rahner
as a truth confirming one's unity and distinction with absolute
being (mystery'-term-horizon)
which one always experiences.
Thus, incarnation, grace and glory are not truths that reveal
something totally beyond the sphere of human experience.
Rather they simply confirm that the holy mystery is indeed
always present as the term of our experience is present. Consequently, the immanent and economic Trinity is identical and
God's radically close relation with creatures can only be expressed in terms of quasi-formal causality. 95 While Rabner
the theologian insists that truth is grounded in the triune God,
in Christ and in grace, he is led increasingly away from a specifically Christian interpretation of those concepts as he applies
his method. The operative principle of his method asserts
that theological and philosophical truth can be known from
95 See Molnar,

TS, pp. 240ff., 245-Sff. for more on this problem.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

man's experience of and interpretation of himself. The problem
here is that the triune God, Christ and grace tend to become
instances of his general transcendental principles.
In volume 11, "The Experience ... " Rahner writes:
The experience of God to which we have appealed ... is not necessarily so a-Christian as appears at first sight. On the contrary ...
it is precisely Christianity which makes real this experience of God
in its most radical and purest form, and in Jes us Christ achieves a
convincing manifestation of it in history . . . This experience of
God ... really constitutes the very heart and centre of Christianity
itself and also the ever living source of that conscious manifestation
which we call ' revelation.' . . . Through this experience of God
Christianity itself simply achieves a more radical and clearer understanding of its own authentic nature. For in fact in its true
essence it is not one particular religion among others, but rather
the sheer objectivation in history of that experience of God which
exists everywhere in virtue of God's universal will to save all men
by bestowing himself upon them as grace ... 96
Why should Christianity and not other religions possess this
obj,ectivity? If the experience of God exists everywhere as this
statement indicates then why should Christian experience
be any more authentic than any other religious experience?
Rahner intends to preserve Christianity's uniqueness but again
his method explains that uniqueness as an instance of his
general principle of being applied to human experience. Consequently, as a Christian theologian Rahner maintains Christianity is the " pure form " of an experience of God which all
religions describe. Yet, this creates more problems than it
solves. For if truth is contingent on anyone's experience of
God then any statement that Christianity is the " purest "
expression of religious experience can only make it appear that
Christian experience is somehow inherently better than other
religious experience.
The problem which I have tried to present in this paper
surfaces here once more. Any attempt to explain the objective
uniqueness of Christianity by pointing to our subjective experience interpreted philosophically or religiously will always
96 TI 11:

164. Emphasis mine.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

605

describe grace and God's universal will to save as properties of
creaturely being. Yet if scriptural faith and revelation are
normative, then it is clear that the objective uniqueness of
revelation never resides in anyone's religious experience, but
in the uniqueness of the Christian God acting ad extra in free
revelation and free grace. Rahner's argument would have been
more convincing had he held that a Christian's experience is
not one among others because it is tied to Christ alone. Instead he argues it is not one among others because it is a
more radical form of what everyone experiences.
Thus, Rahner believes that Jesus is a "convincing manifestation" of our self-experience in history. Yet, if this is so, it
is hard to know why he was crucified and not installed as king
of Israel or heralded as the solution to the philosophical problems of the Greeks. 97 If Rahner's norm here had been the
word of God revealed he would have realized that Jesus (as
true God and true man) brings us all that we, in our religious
experiences cannot procure for ourselves, i.e., God's inconceivable act of revelation and salvation manifested in his life,
death and resurrection. The prophets and apostles were witnesses to that truth. He would have realized that describing
this self-sufficient revelation of a free God as a "conscious"
or unconscious manifestation in ourselves compromises the
very objectivity he sought to maintain. Instead of presenting Christianity as the purest or most radical form of religion
he would have been more able to show that everyone, including Christians, depends always upon God's free grace for
salvation and for objective verification of these truth claims.
Christians cannot point to any religious experience or set of
experiences as the pure or true form of religion any more than
anyone from another religion can do it. This, because God's
grace al,one makes "religion" true existentially and theoretically. Thus, Christians are those who actively live this truth. 98
97 Cf., e.g., 1 Cor. 2:

8.
Acts 11: 26. The word Christians was first used at .Antioch to refer
to the disciples who accepted the teaching of the apostles. Rahner's difficulty
98 Cf.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

Rahner's conclusion really goes beyond the limits of theology
to the extent that the principles of his method dictate the
solution to this problem. He writes: "It is, therefore, a task
precisely rfor Christianity itself to point ever anew to this basic
experience of God, to induce man to discover it within himself, to accept and also avow his allegiance to it in its verbal
and historical objectivation; for, in its pure form and as related to Jesus Christ as its seal of authenticity, it is precisely
this that we call Christianity." 99 Is it now the task of Christians to point out to other Christians and non-Christians that
they can achieve knowledge of God in this way and that their
allegiance is to their experiences of " absolute being " which
being can well be explained as a universal human manifestation without faith in Jesus and the Spirit and thus without
employing a strictly theological method of faith seeking understanding? Again, it is another question entirely whether Christianity is the " pure form " of this experience at all since Christ
actually points us away from any existential or conceptual
self-reliance to complete dependence on Him. Thus I would
say that biblical revelation is at variance with Rahner's conclusion as we are told that 1ve cannot really achieve knowledge
of the true God in this way since we are dependent only on the
One Mediator-to whom alone we owe allegiance.100
7. Mediated Immediacy
Returning to Foundation of Christian Faith Rabner assumes
once again that " grace " is embedded in the world of experience 101 and recognizing that leads to the truth of the Christian
here is that he assumes that God's "universal will to save" is identical with
grace as a constituent element in human experience. It really is not. And
as long as grace is conceptualized in this way there can be no clear distinction between God's will and human experience which in fact is not structurally altered by the incarnation as Rahner thinks. Humans exist in relation to God's salvific act in Christ and the Spirit-not in identity with it.
99 TI 11: 164·5, emphasis mine.
100 See, e.g., Edward Schweizer, Jesus, (Atlanta,
1971), pp. 89-90. This is
exactly what happened in Gnosticism.
101 Foundations, p. 81.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

607

doctrine of God. It is worth examining this final assertion by
Rahner of how to find God in the world using the transcendental method.
Rahner has established two things thus far in Foundations.
1.) · "As ineffable and incomprehensible presupposition, as
ground and abyss, as ineffable mystery, God cannot be found
in his world." 102 This is his way of insisting that God is free.
Yet all religion, including the Christian religion, "declares
phenomena existing within our experience as definite and exclusive objectifications and manifestations of God." 103 This
is his way of insisting that we, as creatures, can know God. Examples of these phenomena are the pope (as vicar of Christ)
and Jesus himself; "in this way God as it were appears within
the world of our categorical experience ... " 104
In relation to this theological problem, namely, that God is
the ineffable silent term of all knowledge and that religion
claims a categorical knowledge of God, Rahner proposes his
theory of "mediated immediacy." 105 This theory basically
articulates the unity and distinction between ourselves and our
horizon or term as discussed above. The conflict between
reason and revelation is evident since at one and the same
time Rahner affirms indirect knowledge of God through created symbols and experiences and direct knowledge of and
experience of God through grace and revelation. It is, of
course, this latter affirmation which I believe is excluded by
God's freedom (creatio ex nihilo). While Rahner holds the
creatio ex nihilo as any theologian would, his philosophical
and theological explanations of it categorize grace and revelation as elements within human consciousness-as existentials
of man as he exists in the world.106
p. 81.
p. 81.
104 Foundations, p. 81.
105 Foundations, pp. 83ff.
102 Foundations

103 Foundations,

10s The reason he thinks this way is that within his system it is completely
impossible to conceive of God acting in the incarnation, grace and glory (Tl
4: 66-72) while rema.ining absolutely other than the creature as the naturally

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

Yet, if Christian revelation means God freely reveals Himself in and through history without becoming dependent on
known efficient cause. Thus when God acts (imparts himself) in the incarnation, grace and glory, this must take place via quasi-formal causality (TI
4: 67) because this signals the kind of entitative divinization of the transcendental subjective attitude necessary for Rahner's natural theology. Quasiformal causality means that "God imparts himself immediately of himself
to the creature" (TI 4: 66) He must do this. Rahner writes: " God as his
own very self must penetrate into the non-divine region of the finite" (TI
4: 67, emphasis mine). This, because the triune God can be none other than
the holy mystery Rahner discovered as efficient cause from his philosophy of
religion (natural theology).
As efficient cause, God creates another. God does not act this way in relation to creation. He is "formal " cause acting in creation. The problem here
is that the Creator God is not merely an efficient cause naturally known. In
fact the Creator God, as efficient cause, is no less than the efficient cause acting
in the form (creation). But Rahner cannot conceive of such a God and such a
transcendent divine action on and in the creature. This is the case because he
insists that revelation of the immanent Trinity cannot contradict the fact that
the absolute holy mystery (the efficient cause) is the reality of God revealed.
Thus, for Rahner there is no triune God transcending the concept of mystery
drawn from experience. That is why, in his trinitarian doctrine Rahner can
only conceive of God in his proper reality as the unoriginated origin, while
in the incarnation, grace and glory we meet something less than this, i.e.,
the Real Symbol (Christ) ('PI 4: 228ff, and 237-241).
As an example of Rahner's difficulty here consider this statement taken from
TI 4: 67 "It is simply contradictory that something should belong completely to the order of creation, by being created, and still belong to the
strictly divine order, by being strictly supernatural. Supernatural reality and
reality brought about by the divine self-communication of quasi-formal, not
efficient type, are identical concepts." This is a clear and necessary synthesis
of supernatural and natural reality which must follow from Rahner's method.
Rather than thinking of God's grace as his incomprehensibly free act on and
in the creature-the act of the efficient cause (the Creator)-Rahner thinks
of it as the quasi-formal alteration of the knowing subject, i.e., the reality
"brought about" by God's immediate communication of himself to the creature in grace and glory. In fact this is a denial that the incarnation is a
mystery of faith as " Scholastic " theology saw it. Isn't that the very mystery
of our faith, i.e., that Jesus, being true God and true man, belongs to the
creaturely sphere and yet is truly supernatural-no
less God than the
Creator-the efficient cause? And isn't the real problem of knowing God truly
solved only by the fact that in Jesus we have the revelation of the Father
(efficient ca use) only be ca use God has acted and does act freely (grace)
on our behalf in Jesus and the Spirit?
For Rahner's explanation of quasi-formal causality see also Tl l: 329ff. and
Foundations, pp. 119-20ff.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

609

history then we really have no direct knowledge of God and
any such claim would make our experience more than human
or God less than transcendent in order to explain incarnation,
grace and glory. The main point of New Testament Christianity is that we, as creatures, can know God truly when our
thinking in faith points to his sovereign intervention in history. Sign and thing signified, though seen as related in faith,
would not be synthesized. While Rabner continually insists
on the distinction between sign and reality, he also synthesizes
them to the extent that grace and revelation [what is signified]
cannot transcend being in general which we experience and
know from philosophy. 107 The New Testament view seems
closer to the concept of mystery which Rabner rejects as Scholastic "school theology," since he believes that this view maintains that mystery is obscured and veiled and only accessible
to faith. 108 Rabner cannot go along with this because, for him,
ratio is a spiritual entity of absolute transcendence and therefore is the very faculty by which the presence of mystery is
assured. 109 That is why Rabner asserts that God (as unknown)
is included essentially in every act of cognition. 110 The comprehensive concept of mystery which Rabner has in mind 111
107 See text, p. 36, n. 17, p. 38, n. 33 and esp. p. 39, n. 36. For the same
idea see also TI 4: 221-252, "The Theology of the Symbol," pp. 234-5 where
Rahner writes: They [the principles of symbolic ontology] arise because the
concept of being is 'analogous', that is, displays the various types of selfrealization of each being, and being in itself, and hence also the concept and
reality of the symbol are flexible. But because these are necessarily given
with the general concept of beings and being-as the 'unveiled ' figure of
the most primordial 'truth' of being-the symbol shares this 'analogia
entis' with being which it symbolizes." Rahner's explanation of God, Christ,
Church and sacrament all bear the mark of this thought. For him " the
symbol is the reality, constituted by the thing symbolized as an inner moment
of moment of itself, [sic.] which reveals and proclaims the thing symbolized,
and is itself f'uU of the thing symbolized" (7'I 4: 251, emphasis mine). This
is why he thinks there is a mutual causal connection between the sacramental signs and God's grace (p. 240). See also K. Rahner, The Church
and The Sacraments, Quaestiones Disputatae 9 (New York, 9163), p. 38.
10s TI 4: 38-40.
109 TI 4: 41.
110 TI 4: 4lff., 49-50.
111 TI 4: 48ff.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

derives from his consideration of man in his natural and supernaturally elevated state as "oriented toward mystery." 112
This analysis follows from his method. It asserts that man
can have a self-validating experience of God, and in that assertion the real need to depend on God's special intervention
in history either in Israel, Christ or the Church or by awaiting the coming of the Holy Spirit can no longer be stated with
the same clarity and consistency as in the New Testament
and in the tradition. For our orientation already contains
what scripture and the tradition claim we can only receive
as free gift.
Rahner clearly recognizes the problem here and states that
God could be said to play an indirect role as the " primordial
ground" of experience. Or, he says, a person might worship
nature as divine or make scientific truth the answer thinking
in this fashion. Nonetheless, despite the fact that "it is very
difficult to distinguish clearly here between nature and supernatural grace in their mutual relationship " 113 this can be
called "natural religion." 114
Here Rahner turns to Christian revelation again to explain
God's transcendence and immanence. He says that categories
such as sacrament, church, revelation and scripture only point
to the " transcendental presence of God." 115 But how can
he describe these in terms of "mediated immediacy"? His
answer is clear. If God is to remain infinite while encountering
us in religion " then this event must take place on the basis
of transcendental experience as such." 116 This means that this
presence must be a modality of this relationship. Since transcendental experience of absolute being allows for an immediacy of God, it must be true. Again Rahner is consistent
in his method by holding that Christian categories do not point
to ·specific interventions of God in history which can be seen
112 TI 4:

49.

11s Foundations,

p. 85.
p. 85.
115 Foundations, p. 85.
116 Foundations, p. 85.
114 Foundations,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

611

only in faith. Rather they point to the " modality of this
transcendental relationship." 111 Of course, for Rahner, this
modality is man's supernatural existential which he frequently
describes in terms of quasi-formal causality. 118 And this explanation is ultimately traceable to his philosophy of the symbol which assumes fusion and mutual dependence of sign and
thing signi:fied.119 But, in connection with his doctrine of God,
this means " immediacy " to God " must be embedded in this
world to begin with." 120 And this follows since he has already
assumed that experience of our term (God-the single whole
of reality-absolute being) is an inherent experience of man.
Thus, religion simply is a moment in and modality of our
transcendental and " mediated immediacy to God." 121 But
what kind of God can be known directly by knowing the
medium (religion) and God embedded in the religious medium?
A God who " as the transcendental ground of the world has
from the outset embedded himself in this world as its selfcommunicating ground." 122 Rahner clearly intends to say
that the Christian God has been involved with the world since
the very beginning. But as he explains how we interpret experience of the Christian God according to his method, he cannot really conceive of a God truly existing independently of
the world (i.e. an immanent Trinity) .
The significance of all this highlights the problem I have
sought to clarify in this paper. Because our self experience is
both starting point and norm for the question of God and his
activity in the world, Rahner believes that the " categorical
presence of God " is simply the religious subject objectivating
his religious experiences. And as such they [categories-objectivations] perform a" valuable role." Actually" The role indeed
111 Foundations,

p. 85.
us See text, pp. 18 et al. and esp. p. 44, n. 105, p. 37, n. 28, and pp. 389 n. 35, et al.
119 See, e.g., TI 4: 236 and above, n. 106. Also TI 4: 228ff.
120 Foundations, p. 87.
121 Foundations, p. 87.
122 Foundations, p. 87.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

really belongs to those phenomena in themselves." 123 This
attempt to speak of a God who is and remains free in the scriptural sense ascribes too much to created phenomena. It assumes that all religious experience points to the reality of God
insofar as it points to the horizon (term) of human experience.
But this is the very assumption which causes Rahner to compromise the scriptural and the traditional distinctions between
God (the true God) and his free grace and idols and existentials which might lead us away from the true God and not
toward him. Rahner concludes his treatment in Foundations
by defining God's intervention in history with an example of
what validates our "good idea " which we think corresponds
with God's intervention.
"The moment I experience myself as a transcendental subject in my orientation to God and accept it, and the moment
I accept this concrete world in which ... the absolute ground
of my existence unfolds historically for me and I actualize it
in freedom, then within this subjective, transcendental relationship to God this 'good idea' [his intervention] receives
objectively a quite definite and positive significance." 124 Perceptively, Rahner aisks what is to prevent me from calling
anything an intervention of God arguing in this fashion? His
answer is: "Why, then, may this not be the case?" 125 How
this question is actually answered can be a matter of no small
concern to philosophers and theologians.
Following the position for which I have argued, i.e., that the
God of scripture is truly free even in his involvement in human
experience, we would have to say that this may not be the
case because God himself is not in any way dependent on anyone or anything to be God in himself or God for us ad extra.
123 Foundations,
p. 88. Cf. also Tl 4: 221-252. Symbols must have this
function for Rahner because being and appearance are intrinsically and
essentially related so that one cannot really exist without the other. See pp.
230-lff. All of this is true for Rahner because he believes that symbols
possess an " overplus of meaning" ( 225). See also above, n. 106.
124 Foundations, p. 88. Emphasis mine.
125 Foundations, p. 89.

RAHNER'S EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

613

This insight would preclude arguing, as Rahner does, that
our orientation to God contributes objectively to the positive
significance of our ideas about his intervention in history. The
only way Rahner's insight could be true is if the Christian
God were in fact " embedded " in the world as a " ground of
being " recognizable by the metaphysician and the philosopher
of religion as well as by the theologian, thinking within the
biblical faith.
This is not to say that God cannot be conceptualized as a
"ground of being." Obviously, insofar as we all actually depend upon God for our being He is the " ground of being."
The question raised here is what specific object determines the
truth of our metaphysical concept of God's being? If it is the
immanent Trinity acting ad extra in Christ and the Spirit,
then we cannot actually begin thinking about Him outside
of faith in the Father, Son and Spirit. This would mean that
we could not begin thinking about God truly as the " ground
of being " prior to an acknowledgement of the unique being
of God revealed in Christ and the Spirit. Any attempt to
define God as the " ground of being " before believing in the
immanent Trinity might lead directly to the conclusion of the
Deists, i.e., that Christ is unnecessary really to know God.126
Interestingly, the position which I am questioning here is
exactly what must be stated in a philosophy of symbolic
reality. 121 But it is just this idea which obscures philosophical
and theological investigation.
126 Etienne

Gilson, God and Philosophy, (New Haven, 1979), pp. 104-5ff.
above, nn. 106 and 121 and Molnar TS, 46, pp. 238ff. and 25lff. See
also TI 4: 225ff. Rahner believes that " in the long run everything agrees
in some way or another with everything else," (225). Thus, for Rahner,
symbols are related essentially with what is symbolized and the two are
intrinsically and mutually dependent. All of this is true because what is
symbolized " passes over into the ' otherness ' of the symbol " ( 240) . In
other words, in a symbolic philosophy, signs and things signified are embedded in one another in such a way that no clear and sharp distinction between them can be made. Clearly, this cannot apply to knowledge of God who
is and remains different from the creature in his encounter with creation.
This symbolic thinking is exactly what leads to Rahner's insistence on a
quasi-formal explanation of the Creator-creature relationship once again (pp.
121 See

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

The philosopher can indeed bypass Christ and attempt to
know God. He or she may always discover a " supreme being"
but that is the most that can be discovered thereby. The
theologian of revelation cannot bypass Christ [and by implication the Old and New Testaments] and attempt to know
God. Thus he or she will know that the unity and Trinity of
the Christian God would preclude any attempt to define God
as a supreme being without allowing Christ and the Spirit
the sole freedom to determine the truth of the concept. Then
a clear and sharp distinction between the immanent and economic Trinity would be maintained since it would be very clear
that the being of God revealed (the immanent Trinity) actually
transcends and is different from the being of God recognized
by the philosopher apart from biblical faith (supreme being
recognized as the term of our experiences of self-transcendence).
Because he is faithful to his method (attempting to harmonize natural knowledge of God with revealed knowledge)
Rahner is actually unable to resolve this theological problem.
Thus, he must maintain that what is categorized, i.e., "the
holy mystery," is not conceptually beyond the religious phenomena which, in themselves, are supposed to convey God's
grace. On this view the theological question of how we really
know that this or that " concept " of God's intervention is true
is left ambiguous. For Rahner, of course, the answer resides
in his assumption that transcendental experience of one's
horizon is a real experience of God simply because people experience themselves this way. And their experiences are selfvalidating. Thus, what "we call" God and his intervention
ultimately depends not on God alone but on God as well as
the strength of our transcendental experiences. I am arguing
that this mutual coordination of God's action in history with
245ff.). The whole problem here centers on the fact that in a Christian doctrine of God-God is and remains ontologically different from his creatures
even in the incarnation, grace and glory. There is in fact no original
ontological unity between Creator and creatures as there must be for a
symbolic ontological explanation of absolute being in relation to finite
being.

RAHNER'S EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

615

our historical self-experience compromises the unique objectivity and freedom of God envisioned by the scriptural revelation.
Furthermore, this assumption by Rahner actually subverts
the real need for Christian revelation as an independent source
of truth coming to us from something other than our selfexperience. One does not need to believe in God's special presence in history in his Word and Spirit if one already possesses
this truth in the experience of his orientation toward the absolute, which absolute may well have little or nothing to do with
the eternally triune God of Christianity. 128 In Rahner's doctrine of God then we are told that we need this God. But his
method ends exactly where it began, i.e., with man's experience
of himself which he" calls" God. 129 And this leads to his theory
of anonymous Christianity in which he spells out the implications of this position by maintaining that everyone can know
and experience what Christians know and experience in faith
simply by having these transcendental experiences. 130 Though
128 See, e.g., Gilson, pp. 105ff. and L. Feuerbach, The Essence of Christianity,
(New York, 1957), pp. 50-58. The god of the Deists (cf. Gilson) and the god
of Feuerbach are not the Christian God but an apotheosis, a mythological
human invention.
129 See Foundations,
pp. 53-4 and K. Rabner and K. Weger, Our Christian
Faith: Answers for the Future (Crossroad, 1981), pp. 13 and 25.
130 See, e.g., Tl 12: 161-178, "Anonymous
Christianity and the Missionary
Task of the Church." On p. 161 many additional references to Rahner's treatment of this topic of anonymous Christianity are given. Rahner's position
that Christianity is present in everyone in an incipient state (Tl 12: 164)
simply confirms the fact that he is consistent in carrying through the logic
of his method. If he did not say this he would have to deny that we could
know God by knowing our term and that grace was embedded in creation.
Ultimately he would have to deny his theory of luminosity and his philosophy
of symbolic reality. Because human being is already changed ontologically
( obediential potency and supernatural existential) in virtue of the incarnation Rahner believes that people don't have to hear about Christ to be
Christians. Rather, in deciding for or against themselves they already decide for or against God and Christ. The problem with anonymous Christianity
is the same problem that is apparent in Rahner's doctrine of God. He never
really shows us that we are believing in and knowing anything which truly
transcends us and exists in reality apart from our experience and interpretation of that experience. Thus, God, grace, revelation and faith are simply

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

Rahner certainly wished to present a more open view of salvation in this theory, the net effect renders Christianity less
rather than more necessary. This, because the pivotal factor
which determines the truth of Christianity on this view is to
have significant human experiences, beginning with the exqualities of man's experience interpreted philosophically and theologically
for Rahner. As long as that is the case we really don't need to believe in
Jesus and the Spirit before knowing the true God. And as long as this is
the case we shall never answer the theological question of whether what
we "call" God, grace, revelation and salvation are true as realities coming
to us from a real God independent of us. For Rahner we don't need the
grace of God revealed in Christ to explain " reality " to ourselves and
others. God merely confirms our transcendental experiences and our interpretations of them. Thus, for Rahner, everyone is a believer whether he or
she knows it or not. This, simply because everyone has unthematic experiences of absolute being in order to continue to exist meaningfully in the
world. (On this see TI 7: 211-226, "The Eucharist and Our Daily Lives,"
p. 223). Rahner writes: "there may be many who face up to life bravely ...
yet who do not regard themselves as believers at all. But . • . in their
calm acceptance of their lives they actually achieve, implicitly and in principle what the conscious and professed believer does explicitly ... "
On this same point see TI 5: 3-22, " Thoughts on the Possibility of Belief
Today," pp. 12-13. And this leads to speculation like that of the 'questioner ' who poses for Rahner the assertion in Our Christian Faith " that
everyone who lives their world-view with determination and co=itment will
find that this world-view proves true" ( 19-20). In fact the answer to the
question of which " world-view" is true cannot be answered by examining
anyone's determination and commitment to it. And this is the predicament
of Rahner's method-be begins and ends his thought about truth with the
determination and commitment of one's transcendental experiences. See also
pp. 12-13 of Our Christian Faith where Rabner insists that a person is a
believer in the " unreflected core of their existence " as long, as he loves, is
loyal and committed to the truth. The problem with this assertion is that
on his presuppositions Rahner cannot tell us whose version of "truth " is
really true, since we can in fact know the truth without knowledge of Christ.
That is because what actually determines the truth of his doctrine of God is
our reflection on this "unreflected core of existence." For this reason belief
in God, for Rahner, means belief in mystery or human existence or reality
as a whole. It ciinnot mean belief in the Christian God who transcends
humanity and confronts people who experience him in judgment and grace
according to the Old and New Testaments. It is obvious that one can live
and be committed in fact without acknowledging the truth of Christianity.
Paul's analysis of his own position in Galatians and Romans would provide
a good example of this. Cf. also TI 6: 231-249, "Reflections on the Unity of
Love of Neighbour and the Love of God," p. 232 and pp. 238ff.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

617

perience of our horizon. Any real dependence on Christ in the
New Testament sense would demand faith and action with
respect to Him alone.
To sum up. We have seen what Rahner's doctrine o:f God
states and we have seen that it is based on "transcendental
experience." We have contended that this starting point compromises God's freedom and the consequent need to believe
in the triune God before being able to make sense of the Creator/creature relationship. We have contended that this leads
to Rahner's synthesis of nature and grace and to the idea that
God's free grace and free revelation can be described as "elements" or modalities by the philosopher of religion as well as
the theologian.
C. Revelation as An Act of God-Innate Knowledge of Truth
Now we must make this analysis and critique more precise
by focusing on the nature of and need for Revelation in a
Christian doctrine of God. Here we shall contrast the traditional Thomist view of Gilson with the transcendental Thomist view of Rahner. In addition, we shall draw out the implications of the scriptural revelation for theological method. In
his book, God and Philosophy, Etienne Gilson develops the
question of the proper relation between philosophy and theology by analyzing revelation and innate knowledge of the
truth. It is clear that each problematic aspect o:f Rahner's
thought mentioned above centered on how to understand the
freedom of God in himself (the immanent Trinity), in his
revelation (the economic Trinity), and on how we know him.
We have seen that Rahner's starting point and theological
method claims that everyone always has an experience of and
knowledge of God. He equates this with experience of and
knowledge of absolute being which he defines as mystery. This
knowledge is innate and unavoidable, though it can be ignored.131 We have contended that it is this claim itself which
compromises the scriptural portrayal of revelation in its free131 See text, passim.

618

PAUL D. MOLNAR

dom, obscures the traditional distinction between philosophy
and theology, nature and grace, and finally fails to distinguish
adequately between God in himself (the immanent Trinity)
and God for us (grace, incarnation and glory) ,132
1. Philosophy and Theology

Gilson sets up the question as follows. He argues that while
Greek philosophy sought to identify the ultimate origin of the
world with a first philosophical principle, the Greeks could
not actually show that the first principle was anything independent of the world which could actually relate with the
world. Thus, he concludes that philosophy could not solve
the question it had set for itself. 133
Then, he states that the answer was found in God's revelation to Moses. This is significant. For the solution to the
philosophical problem of finding a first cause (an efficient
cause), in Gilson's eyes, is answered only by "Him who is,"
i.e., Yahweh, God Himself. 134 We shall not examine Gilson's
analysis of Augustine and Thomas in their attempts to think
about this question in light of the bible and the inherited philosophies (Plotinus for Augustine and Aristotle for Thomas).
While this is interesting and instructive we shall move directly
to modern philosophy and theology in the interest of time and
space.
Descartes
Gilson contends that Descartes confronted the same philosophical problem as the Greeks, i.e., the problem of natural
theology and whether, by reason alone (this time including
the idea of the Christian God) , man could reach the Creator
God-Yahweh who was both transcendent and immanent.
The Greeks could reason to a first principle but then this
obliterated their religion which advocated not one, but many
gods. As they held to their religion, this contradicted their
132 See text,

infra.

1s3 Gilson, Chapter

I.

134 Gilson, Chapter

2.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

619

philosophical idea of a first cause. 135 And this was indeed the
conflict they faced. If the transcendent God could be known
as a first cause (philosophically demonstrable) then he could
not really be transcendent. And if God is truly transcendent
as the one beyond the many (this world) then he cannot in
fact be immanent. Thus, any religious reliance on such a God
to save us would make little sense.
When a Greek philosopher had to approach the problem of natural
theology by a purely rational method, he found himself confronted
only with the religious gods of Greek mythology. Whatever his
name, his rank, or function, not one among the gods of Greek
religion had ever claimed to be the one ... creator of the world,
first principle, and ultimate end of all things. Descartes, on the
contrary, could not approach the same philosophical problem without finding himself confronted with the Christian God. When a
philosopher is also a Christian, he can very well say, at the beginning of his inquiry: let me pretend that I am not a Christian;
let me try to seek, by reason alone and without the light of faith,
the first causes and the first principles whereby all things can be
explained. As an intellectual sport, this is as good as any other
one; but it is bound to result in a failure, because when a man
both knows and believes that there is but one cause of all that is,
the God in whom he believes can hardly be other than the cause
which he knows. 136

This difficulty parallels the predicament Rahner faces in his
work on the philosophy of religion, Hearers of the Word, and
recapitulates the conflicts discussed above between reason and
revelation. Rahner writes: " The philosophy of religion . . .
cannot pre-judge the possible content of ... an utterance of
God. It cannot even pre-judge the question whether such an
utterance has occurred." 137 But Gilson's words regarding Descartes seem to apply here as well, i.e., the God in whom he
believes (the triune God) can hardly be other than the cause
which he knows-i.e. the term or horizon-absolute being
itself. And this is what philosophy of religion can demonstrate.
pp. 78-9.
pp. 78·9.
1s1 HW, p. 174.
135 Gilson,

136 Gilson,

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

Thus, while Rahner speaks of the triune God, and of his own
work as a theological ontology, his method compels him to
pre-judge the possibility of revelation and its content precisely
because he insists that his philosophy of religion is a " condition that is itself created by God's speaking." 138 In other
words if it were really true that a phi1osophy of religion could
not pre-judge whether revelation had in fact occurred, then
Rahner's attempt in Hearers of the Word to establish its possibility by looking at man is in vain, since we can never know
exactly what we mean by revelation. The conflict which arises
here compromises Rahn er' s own perception of the limits of
the philosophy of religion. But more importantly, it causes him
to re-define revelation according to an often unarticulated
presupposition that all philosophy stems from God's revelation (speaking) . Gilson illustrates a similar problem in Descartes's thought.
The whole problem of modern natural theology is there in a nutshell . . . Far from coming after the Greeks as though there had
been nothing in between, Descartes has come after the Greeks
with the naive conviction that he could solve, by the purely rational
method of the Greeks, all of the problems which had been raised in
between by Christian natural theology ... what he did, at least in
metaphysics, was to restate the main conclusions of Christian
natural theology as if Christian supernatural theology itself had
never existed. 139

a. Innate Knowledge of God
In line with natural theology Descartes posited that the
idea of the Christian God was innate. 140 Yet as Gilson writes:
"If we investigate into the cause why such an idea exists within
us, we are at once led to posit, as the only conceivable explanation for it, a being who is possessed of all the attributes
which attend our own idea of him, that is, a self-existing,
infinite, all-powerful, one and unique being." 141 And,
p. 174.
pp. 79-80.
140 Gilson, pp. 81-2.
141 Gilson, p. 81.

138 HW,

130 Gilson,

RAHNER's EXPLANATION

FROM REVELATION

621

When we think more attentively of God, we soon find that the
non-existence of God is, strictly speaking, unthinkable. Our innate
idea of God is that of a supremely perfect being; since existence is
a perfection, to think of a supremely perfect being to whom existence is wanting is to think of a supremely perfect being to whom
some perfection is wanting, which is contradictory; hence existence
is inseparable from God and, consequently, he necessarily is, or
exists. 142

But is this the true God? Gilson continues:
It is a well-known fact that Descartes always despised history;
but here history has paid him back in full. Had he ever so little
investigated into the past of his own idea of God, he would have
realized at once that though it be true that all men have a certain
idea of the divinity, they have not all, or always, had the Christian
idea of God. If all men had such an idea of God, Moses would
not have asked Jehovah for his name; or else Jehovah's answer
would have been: 'What a silly question! You know it.' Descartes
was so anxious not to corrupt the rational purity of his metaphysics by any admixture of Christian faith that he simply decreed
the universal innateness of the Christian definition of God. Like
the innate Ideas of Plato, Descartes' innate idea of God was a
reminiscence; not however, the reminiscence of some idea contemplated by the soul in a former life, but simply the reminiscence of
what he had learned in church when he was a little boy. 143

b. God-Necessity of Creation
Where did this decree leave Descartes's conception of the
Christian God? According to Gilson, it forced him to maintain that creation was in fact necessary to God as he had reduced "He who is " (Yahweh) to the condition of a first principle.144 Gilson writes:
Now it is quite true that a Creator is an eminently Christian God,
but a God whose very essence is to be a creator is not a Christian
God at all. The essense of the true Christian God is not to create
but to be. ' He who is ' can also create, if he chooses; but he does
not exist because he creates, nay, not even himself; he can create
because he supremely is.
142 Gilson,

pp. 81-2.
pp. 82-3, emphasis mine.
144 Gilson, pp. 88-9.
143 Gilson,

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

We are now beginning to see why, and in what sense, the metaphysics of Descartes was a decisive moment in the evolution of
natural theology. Evolution, however, is not always synonymous
with progress; and this time it was destined to be a regress . . .
What I am trying to make clear is the objective fact that, even as
a philosophical supreme cause, the God of Descartes was a stillborn God. He could not possibly live because, as Descartes had
conceived him, he was the God of Christianity reduced to the condition of a philosophical principle, in short, an infelicitous hybrid
of religious faith and of rational thought. The most striking characteristic of such a God was that his creative function had integrally absorbed his essence. Hence, the name that was hereafter
going to be his truest name: no longer 'He who is' but rather
'The Author of Nature.' .... after Descartes, he was destined
progressively to become nothing else than that. Descartes himself
was too good a Christian to consider Nature as a particular god;
but, strangely enough, it never occurred to him that to reduce the
Christian God himself to no more than the supreme cause of
Nature was to do identically the same thing. 145

God did indeed become nothing more than Nature when
Spinoza concluded that "A God who 'exists and acts merely
from the necessity of his nature,' is nothing more than a nature.
Rather he is nature itself." 146
God is the absolute essence whose intrinsic necessity makes necessary the being of all that is, so that he is absolutely all that is,
just as, in as much as it is, all that it is 'necessarily involves the
eternal and infinite essence of God.' 147

Thus, Gilson writes, " In the doctrine of Descartes, one may
still wonder if God's essence involves his existence in himself
or in our mind only; in the Ethics of Spinoza no hesitation
remains possible." 148 Gilson concludes that " Spinoza's metaphysical experiment is the conclusive demonstration of at least
this: that any religious God whose true name is not ' He who
is ' is nothing but a myth." 149 And this necessary mythologfoal
145 Gilson,

p. 89, emphasis mine.
Ethics quoted in Gilson, p. 101.
147 Gilson, p. 101.
148 Gilson, p. 101.
149 Gilson pp. 103-4.
146 Spinoza's

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

623

idea of course opened the door to Deism and the French Enlightment which saw God as the great "watchmaker." In
other words, as Gilson says, " God became again what he had
already been in the Timaeus of Plato: a Demiurge, the only
difference being that this time, before beginning to arrange
his world, the Demiurge had consulted Newton." 150 In terms
of modern philosophy, Kant really spelled the end of such naive
speculations-at least to the extent that his critiques of pure
and practical reason were not simply ignored.
3. Rahner-Descartes-Spinoza

Though there are significant differences, there are also significant ways in which Rahner's doctrine of God follows the
scheme from Descartes to Spinoza illustrated by Gilson. One
really notable difference is that Rahner's foundation is more
experience than thought. Yet there is no experience in nuce;
there is only interpreted experience. Indeed Rahner himself
expresses the opinion that although metaphysics is not the
norm for his doctrine of God, it is experience. 151 For Rahner
metaphysics directs man to the unthematic experience he already has of God. 152 In this sense Rahner clearly acknowledges
that there is no experience in nuce; only interpreted experience.
And it is in this sense that metaphysics is his criterion of truth.
His criterion is and remains being in general as objectified by
man on the basis of his experience of himself and of creation. 153
And the question here concerns what validates objectively our
always subjective interpretation of God acting within the range
of our experience. In what ways, then, can Rahner's thought
be compared to that of Descartes and Spinoza?
First, in practice Rahner maintains that we know the true
God innately. It should be noted clearly that on one level of
his theology he would deny this, while on another level, toward which he is led by his method, he actually maintains
150 Gilson,
151 Tl 9:

p. 107.

133-36.
152 Tl 9: 138.
153 See text, infra.

624

PAUL D, MOLNAR

this. 154 To the extent that he actually maintains the direct
knowledge of God implied in his concepts of transcendental
revelation and of quasi-formal causality Rahner is compelled
to identify the God of natural theology with the triune God.155
Insofar as this takes place within his system he actually subverts the centrality for Christian revelation he certainly wished
to establish theoretically. By maintaining in practice that revelation must be identical with the constructs of reason or nonexistent,156Rahner effects his belief that natural theology and
Molnar, TS, 46, pp. 245-261.
Molnar, TS, 46, pp. 240ff., esp. n. 57. Rahner's method forces him
into this position since he must see the Trinity as the highest insta.nce of
being accessible to the meta physician. Thus, he writes: " An aativities, from
the sheerly material to the innermost life of the Blessed Trinity, are but
modulations of this one metaphysical theme of the one meaning of being:
self-possession, subjectivity," (HW, p. 49, emphasis, mine). I am stating that
if God is really free-independently existing as the immanent Trinity even in
his economic actions ad extra-then he factually transcends any idea of
being accessible to the meta.physician and that the truth of metaphyiscs cannot simply be identified with the truth of revelation. In other words reason
and philosophy are not useless in the theological enterprise, but neither are
they on a par with revelation as in Rahner's thought. One's reasoning and
philosophy are true as their object has independent and objective existence
which can, within due limits, be demonstrated. Thus, I am basically arguing
for what Gilson says: i.e., "Why should not we keep truth, and keep it whole?
It can be done. But only those can do it who realize that He Who is the God
of the philosophers is HE WHO IS, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and
Jacob," Gilson, God and Philosophy, p. 144.
156 See text supra and n. 6. Rahner's statements that there would be
no word of God withotu someone intrinsically capable of hearing it (HW,
p. 168) and that revelation is " an interior quality of the concrete historical
essence of man " ( HW, p. 74) bear this out. For the same idea, see Foundations, p. 129 and Molnar, TS, 46, pp. 23lff. esp. n. 15. It would be unfair
to Rahner not to perceive the nuance of his thought. It is not that he
doesn't realize that the Christian God must be free. For he writes: " To prevent possible misunderstanding, it should be noted here that grace is the selfrevelation of God unto man. This self-revelation is the foundation and the
final goal of all revelation. But from this results the fact that revelation,
without detriment to its free origin, is an interior quality of the concrete
historical essence of man." He really thinks this concept of revelation maintains God's freedom. The problem is that once revelation is conceptualized
as part of the essence of man it factually loses the freedom for which I have
argued. So while Rahner argues that "man ... can never integrate God as
154 Cf.

155 See

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

revelation theology investigate the same object. Indeed this
is the very reason he gives for identifying the immanent and
economic Trinity. 157 If Gilson's argument presented above is
correct, however, we must say that inasmuch as Yahweh alone
is God, this thinking is questionable. A theology in which reason is subordinate to this particular God would investigate in
practice the meaning of experience in light of knowledge of
the Creator God who is totally inaccessible to human insight
apart from his free naming of himself. For this relevation to be
recognizable philosophically or theologically it would have to
be categorized as a free act on the same level a,s God's action
as Creator. For this reason a clear and sharp distinction between philosophy and theology would have to be maintaineda distinction which would not necessarily follow from an experience of "absolute being." Such a distinction would stem
not from experience or reflection but from the very nature of
the God revealed to Moses and known within the context of
biblical faith. Although we have noted that Rahner does indeed describe God as free, we have also shown that his method
forces him to be unable to make this kind of clear and sharp
a disposable element into his self-comprehension," (HW, pp. 74-5) this kind
of integration actually takes place because he believes he can deduce the
meaning of grace and revelation from examining man's spiritual experiences
philosophically and theologically. Thus, Rahner can maintain quite clearly
that God is free and at the same time write: "God is posited, too, with the
same necessity as this pre-concept," ( HW, p. 63) when speaking of human
knowledge of God and that revelation " has its existence in man's own conscious thought and hence is subject to the a priori structure of human
knowledge." TI 11 [New York: Seabury, 1974], "Reflections on Methodology
in Theology," 68-114, at 91. My point is that a revelation of God subject to
the mind of man in this way constitutes a synthesis of the objects of philosophical and theological investigation and factually denies the freedom for
God which Rahner, as a theologian, intended to maintain.
157 Cf. Molnar, TS, 46, p. 249 "He believes that this identification
avoids
a merely formal reconciliation of one and three ... Moreover, his so identifying emphasizes that the Trinity and its two processions, together with the
two self-communications of God ad emtra in a 'real formal causality corresponding to the two processions,' do not come between our natural knowledge and the absolute mystery of God," p. 249. Cf. also TI 4: 72 for this
idea.

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PAUL D. MOLNAR

distinction. This, because his doctrine of God is based on the
idea that philosophy and theology are already one in their
presumed common quest of being in an absolute sense. 158 Thus,
for Rahner, what" we call God," on the basis of our religious experience really is God. In fact, however, there is a real conflict
here which this claim overlooks, namely, that the God of Moses,
Paul, and the Johannine community and the Synoptic writers
and He alone, revealed Himself as "He who is". And the conflict ensues from the simple fact that this particular God was
not a naturally known God corresponding with our innate ideas
of absolute being.
Second, Rahner then describes the Creator/ creature relation
as mutually necessary and mutually conditioning since this is
true of any naturally known god who is in fact identical [distinct in degree, but not in kind] with the sphere of creation as
its " absolutely distant term." To that extent one does not
really need to know Christ to know the Creator God, true
revelation or God's free grace. This may be why Rahner argues
that all of these realities are " embedded " in creation in one
way or another. But as he does this Rahner cannot clearly
distinguish the " elements " one from another with any consistency and indeed he thinks of grace at times as identical
with our own human dynamisms. 159 To the extent that this
difficulty exists within Rahner's thought it is clearly concommitent with the conclusion of Spinoza illustrated above. 160
158 See text, supra nn. 30, 33, 35 and 72. He must do this of course because he is being faithful to one of the six ontological necessities he thinks
applies to the being of the Christian God in his self-revelation, i.e., "the
necessity for all being to agree ontologically with its origin," Molnar, TS,
46, p. 242.
159 See text, pp. 8, 13-25. This is why Rabner can write that grace is an
"inner ... dynamism toward the beatific vision," (TI, 4: 61). I would say
that grace may allow us to make sense of our human spiritual dynamisms in
a way that relates us to God toward whom we move eschatologically in the
present. But that very recognition would preclude describing that grace as
a dynamism which in itself remains always human and to that extent
ambiguous.
160 See text, supra.
This is also where Deism began to think about God.
See Gilson pp. 104:ff. Compare Spinoza's view with Ralmer's statement that

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

6:Z7

Third, Rahner's thought about God reaches its logical conclusion in his theories of the anonymous Christian, in his
explanation of creation as the paradigm of a possible utterance
of God,161 and in his identifying the immanent and economic
God is the " single whole of reality," above, p. 5. The rest of his theology
works out the logic of this insight. What makes Rahner's theology so difficult is his simultaneous insistence that God is really free and his various
theoretical attempts to show this. The problem to which I have called attention, however, is that once the Christian God is conceived under the metaphysical idea of absolute being an inadmissible synthesis of natural theology
and revealed theology has taken place and God's actual freedom is not
maintained.
161 See, e.g., TI 4: 115, 116; TI 11: 215-229, "Christology
in the Setting
of Modern Man's Understanding of Himself and of His World," p. 225; TI
5: 157-192, "Christology within an Evolutionary View of the World" pp.
177-8. Compare to TI 4: 23lff. This corresponds exactly with Rahner's
philosophy of the symbol. Because sign and thing signified are mutually
necessary for Rahner all of his descriptions of creation manifest the same
difficulty.
Cf. for e.g. TI 11: 220 where he writes: " ... the creation, considered as
the constitution of the non-divine 'out of nothing,' is revealed as the prior
setting and condition for the supreme possibility of his [God's] imparting
of himself." This idea is exactly what leads Rahner to draw similar conclusions regarding grace. In TI 6: 71-79, "Philosophy and Theology,'' pp. 723 Rahner writes: " Grace exists ... by being the divinising condition of the
latter [the person], and hence presupposes and incorporates into itself the
whole reality of this person as the condition of its own possibility and makes
it part of the factors of its own concrete being." Thus, for Rahner Philosophy
is a "condition of the possibility of theology" (TI 6: 71). The problem
here is that in his description of creation and of grace Rahner has denied
God's freedom. For Rahner God actually needs an addressee and recipient
of his grace: "Grace, understood as the absolute self-communication of God
himself, must always presuppose as a condition of its own possibility (in order
to be itself) someone to whom it can address itself and someone to whom it is
not owed," TI 6: 75). The same is true of Revelation: "Accordingly, it must
be said that since revelation is a moment in this free self-opening-out by gratuitous grace, it presupposes as a condition of its own possibility the one to
whom it is not owed" (TI 6: 75). In this paper I have argued that if
the God of scripture is really free then the fact that there are creatures at
all and creatures who are in fact recipients of God's revelation and grace is
and remains a miraculous creation of his free love in any given situation. It
cannot therefore be described symbolically as an instance of creaturely being
at all as Rahner believes. Similarly if Rahner had envisioned this kind of
freedom for God he could not have described creation as the paradigm of a
"possible " utterance of God. But inasmuch Rahner actually holds that

628

PAUL D. MOLNAR

Trinity. While Rahner offers lengthy and profound explanations of God's freedom, his practical explanation of creatwn
absorbs God's essence into his creative function. 162 To the extent that Rahner believes creation can be explained as a selfvalidating reality and that the Creator/creature relationship
can be described as one of mutual conditioning, it is impossible
for God really to be free to create or not, to reveal himself or
not and still be God. Again, without wishing to deny the freedom of the Christian God, Rahner's method, which attempts
a synthesis of the triune God and the god of natural theology,
leads him into the same predicament as Descartes. By actually
maintaining these two presuppositions throughout his system
Rahner certainly appears to have done the very thing for which
Gilson criticized Descartes: He reduced the God of the bible
to the condition of a philosophical principle and then reunited
his concept of the trinitarian self-revelation with this principle.
Rahner's attempt to make this synthesis more viable for
modern man than the Scholastic notion of mystery as something unknown which makes itself known to faith, reveals the
conflicts that actually exist between Rahner's reconstruction
of his concept of mystery based on an experience open to everyone and the traditional attempt to distinguish sharply the
object of philosophical (absolute being) and theological (the
immanent Trinity revealed) reflection.
On these three points we can at least say that the content of
Rahner's doctrine of God is regulated by his philosophy of
creation is the "condition " for God's utterance ad emtra, creaturely selfexperience which is thought to be self-validating then becomes the determinant
of what is possible for both God (defined as absolute being) and for creatures (defined as finite existents). And that is exactly the problem in Rahner's
doctrine of God as it concerns revelation and grace which we have tried to
highlight. See also TI 9: 134. For Rahner creation is the "condition for
the possibility," of God's revelation and the "grammar" of his self-expression ad emtra.
162 See text.
It is Rahner's claim that creation is a self-explaining fact
that leads to all his other assertions. The most obvious fact which confirms
all of this is his description of the creature and Creator relationship as
mutually conditioning, above.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION

FROM REVELATION

629

being based on experience and explained in Christian categories.
Though Rahner certainly did not intend it, the creatio ex
nihilo, the Mosaic revelation, and the grace of God revealed
in Christ become factually and existentially unnecessary to
man's self-understanding within creation. This, because these
Christian categories are merely categorical articulations of
what is already innate in our experiences of self-transcendence.
Thus, Rahner in fact re-defines the Chalcedonian unio, the
doctrine of creation, and the doctrines of incarnation, grace
and glory to conform to his philosophy of being. And by doing
this he frequently synthesizes the being of God with the innate
movements of the creature as illustrated above. His symbolic
Christology is the supreme manifestation of this. 163
163 See e.g. Tl 4: 235ff. and Rahner's
various pieces on Christology, including Chapter 6 of Foundations.
For instance Rahner writes: " The
theology of the Logos is strictly a theology of the symbol, and indeed the
supreme form of it," Tl 4: 235. The problem obviously is that since symbols
must express themselves to be themselves and because the symbol is full of
the thing symbolized there can be no real freedom for God before or after
creation or incarnation.
He, as the supreme instance of symbolic ontology,
must conform to these principles. But as this is the case, he cannot in fact
be free. On this point see esp. TI 4: 227ff. In fact, because Rahner makes his
doctrine of God and Christology conform to these principles of symbolic
ontology, he cannot even begin to distinguish creature and Creator and even
ends by confusing the humanity and divinity of Christ and Christ with
creatures (TI 4: 236ff.). The following statement is analyzed at length in
Molnar, TS, 46, pp. 248ff.: "It is because God 'must' 'express' himself
inwardly that he can also utter himself outwardly; the finite created utterance ad emtra is a continuation of the immanent constitution of 'image and
likeness' ... " (236-7). The problem with this is that he had previously
described the functions of image and likeness as necessities corresponding
with the functioning of symbols. And if God must express himself inwardly
and that function is "continued" in creation and incarnation, then God must
create and must communicate himself to the creature in grace. Thus, despite
Rahner's insistence that God is free-inasmuch as he has substituted experience of absolute being for God, it is clear that this "God" is not free
but subject to his principles of metaphysical ontology, i.e., all beings are
symbolic because they must express themselves and the symbol is essentially
constituted by what is symbolized so that they are mutually dependent. But,
as noted in the text, Rahner has only described the term of human experience in this way. He has not described the being of God, i.e., the immanent
Trinity.

630

PAUL D. MOLNAR

An obvious question which unfortunately is beyond the
scope of the present paper is: what can keep a philosophical
theologian from the difficulties encounted by Descartes, Spinoza,
the Deists, the Enlightenment generally and Rahner? 164 We
can only suggest that the answer to this predicament may
lie in perceiving that the differences between a Gilsonian
Thomist and a transcendental Thomist may arise from the
deeper question of the relationship between faith and understanding as seen in light of scripture. For Gilson the answer
was to be found in an actual recognition of God's free selfrevelation. Rahner says the same thing, but his method does
not maintain the kind of freedom for God's action that Gilson's method does. Gilson apparently meant to allow Yahweh
the freedom to determine the truth of our ideas. He did this
by never claiming that the ideas have this truth in themselves.
Not even the idea of the supernatural can guarantee that we
have spoken of a. truly transcendent other. In fact he really
meant what he said when he wrote: "Why should not we keep
truth, and keep it whole? It can be done. But only those can
do it who realize that He Who is the God of the philosophers
is HE WHO IS, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob." 165
And if this is true, then we really need to know what Yahweh
did in Israel, in Christ and the Spirit, before we can distinguish
164 It is important to note that the problem here is a methodological
one.
Perhaps this is the key difference between a Gilsonian Thomist and a transcendental Thomist. Rahner begins his treatment of mystery (TI 4) by insisting that ratio is the way mystery is assured ( p. 41) and proceeds to ascribe
revelation and grace to the knowing subject in its reflection on its term.
This appears to be what " Scholastic" school theology wished to avoid in
order not to claim that creation was a self-evident fact as Rahner does (TI
3: 24-34, "Thoughts on the Theology of Christmas," (p. 32). Rather, creation found its basis in the God of the Christian faith, i.e., "He who is." For
that reason creation really was seen as not necessary to God and it was
further seen that God could not truly be recognized by identifying the necessary movements of creaturely being with His inner being which is free.
This thought is most clearly expressed in Gilson's analysis above. I believe
this insight applies to knowledge of God as well as to knowledge of revelation, faith and grace.
165 Gilson, p. 144.

RAHNER's EXPLANATION FROM REVELATION

631

a truly divine act from our self-experiences. This would imply
that theology must be faith seeking understanding and not
understanding seeking faith if it is to be successful in truly
uniting and distinguishing the mystery of God and the mystery
of creatures.
It would appear from what was presented above that the
outcome of Rahner's transcendental method is quite similar to
the outcome of Cartesian logic. Both thinkers identify what is
known in faith (God's free revelation and free grace) with the
necessary movements of the human spirit toward absolute being which is a metaphysical construct drawn from experience.
But this proves that we need to acknowledge and to know God's
revelation first, before we can make sense of our " ultimate "
origin and end as something actually transcending both the
categorical and existential (transcendental experience) realms.
And this means that we must at least question Rahner's method
for doing theology insofar as it begins by assuming that an experience of the nameless is an experience of the true God. If
Gilson can teach anything on this point it may be that the very
nature of God revealed to faith compels us to begin and end our
analysis with faith in Yahweh alone before actually finding
the ultimate explanation of reality. For the New Testament
that same truth was found in Christ alone since he alone was
the eternal Word of God present in the flesh. The truth of
the New Testament of course rested on the fact that this revealed word did not contradict but confirmed what Yahweh
revealed previously in Israel. That is why, for Paul, recognition of the truth of our existence was tied to confession of
Christ's Lordship which confession implied reliance on him
alone and not any or all of our experiences, no matter how profound they may be. 166
PAUL D. MOLNAR

St. John's University
Jamaica, New York

166 Cf., e.g., l Cor. 12: 4ff.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

T

I

HEISM SEEMS to be caught in a dilemma. Speaking
persuasively to the surrounding culture seems to demand
hat theism sacrifice its own integrity as a significantly
distinctive world-view; affirming its distinctiveness seems to
result in moving itself to the periphery of the culture. Briefly,
then, either theism acquires relevance at the price of forfeiting
any claim to distinctiveness or it takes seriously precisely those
things that make it seem significantly distinctive and thereby
isolates itself from the rest of the culture. Such is the fate
of theism as portrayed by (friendly?) critics of theism like
Jeffrey Stout, Alasdair Macintyre, and Van A. Harvey. 1 The
main question addressed in this paper is whether or not the
theist (or his more specific variant, the Christian theist) has
a sound response to this dilemma? How, if at all, can the
Christian theist avoid the horns of the dilemma of redundancy
and irrelevance?
Stout, The Flight from Authority: Religion, Morality, and the
1 Jeffrey
Quest for Autonomy (London and Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1981), especially Part 2. Alasdair Macintyre, "God and the theo·
logians," in Against the Self-Images of the Age (London: Duckworth, 1971),
pp. 12-26; see also Macintyre's essay, "The Fate of Theism," originally delivered as one of his Bampton Lectures at Columbia University in 1966.
Macintyre's lectures were published in The Religious Si,qnificance of Atheism
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1969). For "The Fate of Theism,"
see pp. 3-29. Van A. Harvey, The Historian and the Belie1Jer: The Morality
of Historical Knowledge and Christian Belief (New York: Macmillan, 1966);
see also Harvey's essay, "The Pathos of Liberal Theology," Journal of Religion 56 1976: 382-391. For an illuminating discussion of the fate of theism,
see Peter L. Berger, The Heretical Imperatives: Contemporary Possibilities of
Religious Affirmation (New York: Doubleday 1980) .

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

633

The practical relevance of this dilemma for Christian doctrine was recently evidenced in Thomas Sheehan's review of
Hans Kiing's latest book in the New York Review of Books. 2
After summarizing Kiing's views on the Christian doctrine of
eternal life, Sheehan writes:
Kiing . . . has pushed Catholic theology to the limits of its own
language. In fact, he has brought it to the point where one can
ask what its teachings have to offer that cannot be found outside
the scope of its experience and discourse. For example, the hope
in immortality he evokes is certainly not peculiar to Catholicism
or Christianity. Nor is it an exclusively religious doctrine: we find
it in pagan philosophy from the Greeks onward, even in thinkers
who did not believe in a personal god .... On a broader scale, it
is clear that religious experience is available outside Catholicism
and Christianity; and for many people natural human experience,
with no religious or transcendent dimension, is satisfying enough.
What, then, does Catholicism claim to provide that cannot be
found beyond its boundaries? I am not asking about the subjective aspects of experience, be it natural or religious (its felt quality,
psychological genesis, personal meaning, and so on). I am asking an
objective theological question: what does Catholicism claim that
makes it unique, essentially different from non-Catholic religions
and non-religious humanisms? 3

Sheehan's answer to this last question is clear. That which
makes Christianity unique and essentially distinctive and which
traditional believers sought to clarify and defend moves Christianity to the periphery of the culture. By identifying themselves primarily with the tradition in terms of classical Christianity, no one hears what Christians have to say but themselves.
The only alternative to this self-imposed isolation, holds Sheehan, is to be intelligible to contemporary educated, secularminded men and women: in which case Christian theism may
well have interesting things to say, but these will not be significantly distinctive in any Christian sense. To put this last
2 Thomas Sheehan, "Revolution
Books, June 14, 1984, pp. 35-39.
s Ibid., p. 38.

in the Church," The New York Review of

634

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

point another way, the strategy of accommodation raises the
question why one should be Christian at all.
Some theologians have sought to avoid the horns of this
dilemma by arguing that the dilemma, as posed here, gains its
apparent force by posing false alternatives. The problem, as
defined here, imposes an exclusive choice between two poles:
first, classical Christianity and, second, contemporary structures of experience, thought, and society. But this way of
posing the problem suffers from a basic mistake, they say. It
creates the distinct impression that each of these poles is a
fixed, static point and not historical. 4 Instead, they argue that
an understanding of the Christian faith involves a theological
methodology which is sensitive to the history of its evolution
and development. Similarly, an interpretation of the contemporary structures of experience, thought, and society should
include an understanding of those various factors which led to
the formation of these structures. More exactly, a historically
sensitive, theological method will require that one distinguish
the kernel of Christianity, which can and should be detached,
from the outmoded husk. Briefly, then, to distinguish the
theistic kernel from the theistic husk is the wisdom this theological methodology offers for avoiding the horns of the dilemma. The idea here seems to be that Christian theism would
undergo an interpretative process which would be like peeling
off the outer layers of an onion in order to get at the essence
of the onion. On this view, essential aspects of classical theism
could be held onto that seem defensible or intelligible in the
vocabulary of our secular-minded culture. Presumably, then,
this theological methodology would make it possible for the
theist to secure a hearing from a secular audience without doing
violence to the central claims of Christian theism. 5
4 Many theologians have argued that the dilemma gains in apparent force
by posing false alternatives.
For a recent example, see Francis Schussler
Fiorenza, Foundational Theology: Jesus and the Church (New York: Crossroad, 1984).
5 See Stout, op. cit., p. 146.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

635

One may be excused for having doubts about the success
this approach has in avoiding the horns of the dilemma. We
must note here that the question crucially arises: How exactly does one determine when a certain layer or layers are
disposable externals or the essential inner cargo? 6 It seems
to me that in order to determine this the interpreter of traditional theism will have to engage in what sociologist Peter
Berger has called cognitive bargaining. In general, cognitive
bargaining consists of compromises with respect to beliefs between traditional and modern modes of thought and practice. 7
In the case of the interpreter of traditional theism, what this
amounts to is the following. It is the interpreter of theism,
rather than the secularist, who experiences the greater pressures
to be convincing. Accordingly, he attempts to reformulate
theism by translating, in the manner of a Bultmann or a Tillich,
traditional theistic claims into secular vocabulary. In other
words, the interpreter of theism defending himself cognitively
against his secular audience almost inevitably incorporates
elements of the latter within his own defence. Ideally, I suppose, the give-and-take should be mutual. In fact, however,
this process of cognitive bargaining operates mainly in one
direction with the interpreter of theism offering the cultured
despiser of classical theism " less and less in which to disbelieve." 8 Undoubtedly the problem which now emerges for
the interpreter of theism is the problem of just where to draw
the line. The line here represents that which he may not go
beyond without dismantling the tradition of classical theism
from within. Clearly, then, this approach does not avoid the
horns of the dilemma. If anything, it brings us back to the
fundamental issue that detrmines what Van A. Harvey has
called the" pathos of Liberal theology." Harvey writes:
s On this, see Stephen Sykes, The Identity of Christianity: Theologians and
the Essence of Christianity from Schleiermacher to Barth (London: SPCK,
1984).
1 See Berger, op. cit., pp. 99-101.
See also, Os Guinness, The Gravedigger
File: Reports on the Subversion of the Modern Church (Downers Grove,
Illinois: Inter-Varsity Press, 1983), especially chapters 10 and 11.
s Macintyre, "Fate," p. 24.

686

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

[T]he problem the liberal faces concern[s] the degree to which
Christian belief can be accommodated to modernity and remain
recognizably Christian. If the cognitive surrender is unconditional,
the theologian does achieve a remarkable harmonization, to be
sure, but only at the cost of raising the question why one should be
Christian at all. The pathos of the liberal theologian is that, if
he identifies himself too unqualifiedly with modernity, he runs the
risk of alienation from the very community his apologetic is to
serve. If, on the other hand, he defines his role primarily in terms
of classical Christianity, he runs the risk of being an obscurantist,
alienated from the modern intellectual community of which he
also wants to be a member. 9

It is interesting to note here that it is often the critics of
theism who wish theists would be more orthodox. Why do
the critics insist upon this? They believe, rightly, I think,
that there can be no serious interaction with theism beyond a
certain point if it is not recognizably theistic. As Jeffrey Stout
puts it, "One wants one's conversation partners to remain
distinctive enough to be identified, to be needed." 10 The question which can and should be asked, holds Stout, is whether
Christian theism can be both critical enough to be respected
and distinctive enough to be needed. Perhaps an even more
basic question which now needs to be asked is how did Christian
theism get into this predicament in the first place?

IT
Jeffrey Stout has recently provided us with an important
perspective on the question regarding the predicament of
Christian theism. In this paper I cannot hope, and do not
propose to try, to examine the details of the historical scenario
which he paints for us. I wish only to call attention to what I
take to be the crucial importance in his account of what may
9 Harvey,

"Pathos," p. 383.
Stout, "The Voice of Theology in Contemporary Culture," in
Religion and America: Spirituality in a Secular Age: editors Mary Douglas
and Steven M. Tipton (Boston: Beacon Press, 1983), pp. 249-261; for this
quote, see p. 260.
10 Jeffrey

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

637

be called the evidentialist challenge to religious belief.11 The
evidentialist holds, first, that religious belief is not acceptable
unless rational, and second, that religious belief is rational if
and only if supported by argument and evidence. Evidentialism has almost always, perhaps always, offered classic
foundationalism as its epistemological defence. Classic foundationalism may be understood as a doctrine about justified
belief. The classic foundationalist holds that (1) Some beliefs
are, epistemically, absolutely secure and properly basic-the
idea is that some of our justified beliefs are not held on the basis
of any other beliefs; these are the properly basic ones.
All
justified non-basic beliefs are justified wholly by the evidential
support they receive from basic beliefs, (3) Any properly basic
belief must be self-evident, evident to the senses, or based on
incorrigible reports of experience.
Now if classic foundationalism is true, then the justification
of theistic beliefs must be foundationalist. However, some
foundationalists, but not all, have argued that the theist is not
epistemically justified in holding the beliefs which he does
hold. They allege, first, that theistic beliefs are not supported
by basic beliefs, that there is not sufficient evidence for them,
and second, that a person is rational in accepting theistic beliefs only if he has sufficient evidence for them. 12 What is most
interesting here is not the claim that theistic beliefs do not fit
the foundationalist's criterion for justified belief. More interesting, but also more directly relevant to the question I am
presently addressing, is that many Christians have held,
11 This is how Nicholas Wolterstorff
refers to the challenge issued by Enlightenment thinkers when it comes to matters of religion. See Faith and
Rationality: Reason and Belief in God, editors Alvin Plantinga and Nicholas
Wolterstorff (London and Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press,
1983). For Stout's account of this challenge, see The Flight from Authority,
chapter 6. For an extensive discussion of the 5tages of development theism
underwent in the seventeenth and eighteenth century, see Hans W. Frei, The
Eclipse of Biblical Narrative (New Haven and London: Yale University
Press, 1974).
12 For a discussion
of these claims, see Plantinga's essay, "Reason and
Belief in God," in Faith and Rationality, pp. 17 ff.

688

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

whether deliberately or inadvertently, to classic foundationalism. More exactly, they have appealed to classic foundationalism in defence of what I am here calling evidentialism.
That is, in response to the question, how, if at all, do we justify those beliefs which we hold, they opt for the evidentialist
position.
To pursue this issue further, I should like to examine briefly
Stout's account of that period in British philosophical history
when Christian theism sought to meet the evidentialist challenge. Here, I think, we have a prime example of what I earlier
called, with Berger's help, cognitive bargaining. The theist
defending himself cognitively against his secular critic incorporates elements of the latter's presuppositions within his own
defence.
Stout's discussion of the evidentialist challenge to religious
belief has three phases. These phases correspond to the three
stages of development theism underwent in the seventeenth
and eighteenth century. Representative of the first stage is
the philosophical theology of John Locke
The
second stage can be seen in the controversies over Deism,
while the third can be seen in David Hume's (1711-1776)
critique of religion. There are two inter-connected issues under
discussion throughout the three stages: first, how exactly does
one identify a proposition as revealed truth (i.e., a set o:f propositions or documents regarded as containing revelation from
God) and, second, how does one decide what any such propotion means. 13 I now want to look briefly at each stage in turn.
In raising the question, how is a revealed proposition to be
identified, Locke does not doubt whether any revelation from
God can be true. As Paul Helm puts it, "Anyone who believes, as Locke did, that God is a perfectly truthful being will
assent to the proposition ' Any revelation from God is true.'
This last proposition is analytic for Locke and for all theists.
But saying this does not settle the epistemological question of
1a Paul Helm, "Locke on Faith and Knowledge," Phiiosophioal Quarterly
23 ( 1973) : 52-66. I have greatly profited from Helm's paper for my understanding of the issues that concerned Locke.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

689

how anyone knows whether or not a particular proposition is
revealed by God." 14 So we must distinguish here. Whatever
God reveals is infallibly true for l,ocke. What Locke wants to
know are the grounds upon which men can claim to know that
a proposition is revealed. In Locke's view, it is not a matter
of faith that p is a revealed truth. He distinguishes the proposition "p, a revealed proposition, is believed" from" p is a revealed proposition because it is believed to be so." 15 This distinction is crucial: it must be possible to identify p as a revealed truth independently of anyone believing it to be so.
How, then, is a revealed truth to be identified? In the Essay
Concerning Human Understanding, J,ocke writes in answer to
this question:
Whatever God hath revealed is certainly true; no doubt can be
made of it. This is the proper object of faith: but whether it be
a divine revelation or no, reason must judge; which can never
permit the mind to reject a greater evidence to embrace what is
less evident, nor allow it to entertain probability in opposition to
knowledge and certainty. 16

Reason must not only identify p as a revealed truth, but it
must also decide what any such proposition means. Locke explains:
Because the mind, not being certain of the truth of that it does
not evidently know, but only yielding to the probability that appears in it, is bound to give up its assent to such a testimony,
which, it is satisfied, comes from One who cannot err, and will
not deceive. But yet it still belongs to reason to judge of the
truth of its being a revelation, and of the signification of the words
wherein it is delivered.17

But what is reason? And, correspondingly, on what grounds
must it judge? Locke continues:
Indeed, if any thing shall be thought revelation which is contrary
to the plain principles of reason and the evident knowledge the
14 Ibid.,
15 Ibid.,

p. 52.
p. 55.

16 John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
New York, 1961), Book IV, Chapter 18, Section 10, p. 588.
17 Ibid., p. 587.

(London and

640

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

mind has of its own clear and distinct ideas, there reason must be
hearkened to as a matter within its province: since a man can
never have so certain a knowledge that a proposition, which contradicts the clear principles and evidence of his own knowledge,
was divinely revealed, or that he understands the words rightly
wherein it is delivered, as he has that the contrary is true; and so
is bound to consider and judge of it as a matter of reason, and not
swallow it, without examination, as a matter of faith .... Therefore nothing that is contrary to, and inconsistent with, the clear
and self-evident dictates of reason has a right to be urged or assented to as a matter of faith, wherein reason hath nothing to do. 18

So what is purportedly revealed truth must be consistent with
the principles of reason and the self-evident knowledge the
mind has. But Locke does not mean to claim that revealed
truth itself is self-evident; nor is it demonstratively supported
(i.e., logically entailed) by such principles and knowledge.
Locke uses such principles and knowledge as a negative criterion for identifying p as a revealed truth. Hence, while revealed truths do not consist of self-evident truths, they cannot
consist of anything that is inconsistent with what is selfevident.19
Does Locke stipulate any other criteria, besides the one I just
mentioned? Other than the criterion of not containing anything that is inconsistent with what is self-evidently true, Locke
stipulates that a candidate-revelation must measure up to two
other criteria: first, when originally given, it was accompanied
by impressive external signs (e.g., miracles) and, second, there
is an historically reliable account of the latter. 20 Yet even if
a candidate-revelation measures up fully to all three criteria,
even then it could never be known with certainty to be a
revelation from God. Accordingly, the grounds upon which
men can claim to know that pis a revealed truth are empirical,
and hence can only be probable. For the moment I think that
we have said enough about Locke. Let's go on to look briefly
pp. 587-588.
on Faith and Knowledge," p. 56.
20 Ibid., p. 56.
1s Ibid.,

10 Helm, "Locke

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

641

at the second stage in the British discussion: the controversies
over Deism.
The Deists enthusiastically endorsed Locke's dictum about
reason as the guarantor of revealed truth. In fact, they claimed
to be more consistent in its use. This resulted in the following
problem: if nothing that is inconsistent with the dictates of
reason has a right to be assented to as a matter of faith, then
assent must be withheld where it is impossible to discern what
a revealed proposition means. However, what, then, of the
mysteries of revelation such as the Trinity and the resurrection
of the dead? Under these conditions faith in these mysteries
would become an irrational belief. 21 In response to this problem, Locke went on to argue (in his controversy with Bishop
Stillingfleet) that " faith and knowledge are independent, and
that a proposition can be accepted as part of revelation even
if it is not understood." 22 Locke explains:
21 Ibid., p. 59. Hans Frei puts it this way in The Eclipse of Biblical Narrative, pp. 52-53: "The deistic controversy, at once reacting to, shaping, and
testing the notion of revelation, began a series of arguments about the credibility of special divine communication and (later on) of divine self-presentation through the medium of historical occurrences. Two issues were at stake
from the beginning. The first was of a predominantly philosophical nature.
It concerned the inherent rationality or credibility of the very idea of a
historical revelation. Was it conceivable or intelligible? Is it likely, it was
asked, that a perfectly good God should have left mankind without decisive
guidance for so long, only to grant the privilege finally to a tiny, rude, and
isolated fraction of the human race? Or is what is called revelation nothing
more than a specific instantiation of what God had made known everywhere
and all along, concerning truth and human happiness? Furthermore, is the
appeal to the 'mystery' of revelation anything other than an admission that
the idea itself is unintelligible, a token of that unwarranted intrusion of
imagination or, worse yet, sheer ignorant superstitution into matters religious which the new intellectual rigor must repel? The second question was:
Even granted the rationality or inherent possibility of revelation how likely
is it that such a thing has actually taken place? ... The immediate question
was whether there are good grounds for believing in the actual occurrence of
the miraculous events constituting the indispensable evidence for historical
revelation. How authoritative, in short, how well attested are biblical accounts, especially those of miracles, since the natural presumption in a
'scientific age' is obviously against them? "
22 Helm, "Locke on Faith and Knowledge," p. 59.

642

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

A definition of knowledge, whether a good or bad, true or false
definition, could not be of ill or any consequence to an article of
faith: because a definition of knowledge, which was one act of the
mind did not at all concern faith, which was another act of the
mind quite distinct from it. 23

And, in addition, he says:
Let the grounds of knowledge be resolved into what anyone pleases,
it touches not my faith: the foundation of that stands as sure as
before, and cannot be at all shaken by it. 24

On the face of it, this view seems wholly inconsistent with the
view Locke sets out in the Esb•ay. Be that as it may, of more
importance now is to note that the Deists were not at all convinced by Locke's reply to their problem. Stout sheds some
valuable light on their objection:
The next stage of the British discussion arrives when Deists,
marching behind Locke's dictum about reason as the guarantor of
revelation, ask why, if all evidence is to be taken into account ... ,
the content of a putative revelation should not bear more directly
upon our decision to accept or reject the proposition in question.
If the proposition itself is inherently improbable, does this not
make it less likely that the proposition is revelatory? 25

The Deists answer to this question is well known. We ought to
accept only those claims of classical theism that can be established independently as probable hypotheses. Under these conditions the claim that " p is a revealed truth but I do not understand it " is regarded as totally unacceptable. Where it is impossible to discern what a revealed proposition means, that
proposition is either improbable or redundant. "The supernatural mysteries of faith, in particular," as Stout puts it, " are
declared paradoxical and, therefore, improbable. Hence the
significance of John Toland's title Christianity not Mysterious
(1696) ." 26
2s John Locke, Works ( 1823), Vol. IV, p. 282.

24/bid., p. 147.
25 Stout,

2e Ibid.,

The Flight from Authority, p. 116.
p. 117.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

643

But there is still the third stage of development theism underwent at the hand of Hume's critique of religion. My understanding of this, pared down for my purpose here, is as follows. Hume subjected the minimal theism of Deism to the
tests of its own standards of appraisal. He, in short, claims
that their anaemic theism does not meet the standards that
Deism itself lays down. What, then, about religion with revelation? What about classical Christianity itself? Well, says
Hume, my critique of minimal theism has served the cause of
faith and true religion. For by exposing the inability of reason
to undergird the tenets of theism, I have thereby paved the way
for grace to supply it instead. 27 He concludes
that the Christian Religion not only was at first attended with
miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasonable person without one. Mere reason is insufficient to convince
us of its veracity: And whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it,
is conscious of a continued miracle in his own person, which subverts all the principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to believe what is most contrary to custom and experience.28

I have serious doubts as to whether Hume really intended
to render a service to classical Christian theism. But even
were it not so, Hume's profound influence upon certain strands
of modern philosophical theology cannot be gainsaid. (Needless to say, by influence I do not mean that certain modern
theologians hold to Hume's philosophy. I mean simply to refer
to their mode of handling problems, their fundamental assumptions in the intellectual treatment of certain problems,
and the kind of questions they ask-all this limits and disposes
the answer they give.) In a fascinating but highly tendentious
reading, Stout reconstructs the history of post-Humean theology as a story that takes Hume's accomplishment for granted
21 David Hume:
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, London
1748, Section X, par. 40. See also Terence Penelhum's essay, "Natural Belief and Religious Belief in Hume's Philosophy," Philosophioal Quarterly
33 (1983): 166-181.
2s Hume, Enquiry, sec. X, par. 41.

644

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

and does not attempt to refute him on his own terms, and asks
simply what remains possible after Hurne.
Now this is a strong claim. It would no doubt be possible
to object to Stout's claim by pointing to the broadly inductive
or probabilistic arguments developed by C.S. Lewis, E.L. Mascall, Basil Mitchell, Richard Swinburne, Wolfhart Pannenberg, and others. It seems obvious to me that these writers
have indeed sought to refute Hurnean type arguments on their
own turf, and to revive something like a natural theology by
meeting the evidentialist challenge head-on. Unfortunately
Stout fails to consider the merits of their work in his reconstruction of the history of post-Hurnean theology. Nevertheless, perhaps the real point at issue-the point which, it might
be suggested, is really at the forefront of Stout's mind-is that
any given attempt to defend theism in terms of an empirical
probability calculus is in all likelihood a hopeless task. 29 But
how could Stout know this in advance of someone's proposing
such a defence? Suppose Stout is right, however. That is,
let's suppose that the clash of probabilistic reasoning with
religious beliefs is in all likelihood inevitable. Where then,
one may ask, does the clash come? Sometimes Stout seems
to suggest that the clash arises between the different ways in
which beliefs are held: the religious believer typically gives
unqualified assent to his beliefs, while those beliefs supported
by probabilistic reasoning deserve only qualified or provisional
adherence. Basil Mitchell is admirably explicit on the dilemma
in which this places the would-be defender of the rationality
of theistic belief:
To the extent that he attempts to indicate how faith can be
rationally defended, he is led to characterise faith in a way that
fails to satisfy the religious mind; but if he portrays faith as it
characteristically operates in the life and thought of believers, he
describes something inevitably incommensurate with the only sort
of justification that is available. 30
The Flight from Authority, p. 170.
so Basil Mitchell, The Justification of Religious
Seabury Press, 1973), p. l16.
20 Stout,

Belief

(New York:

The

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

645

Sometimes he speaks, ala Hume, of religious beliefs as being
highly unlikely on empirical grounds; and, correspondingly,
that several alternative non-theistic explanations of the phenomena are nearly as good, if not equally good or better. 31
Sometimes Stout states the clash much more strongly, as
when he says that religious beliefs are, in terms of the standards
of intelligibility, paradoxes such that they are both supa and
contra rationem.
Now I would urge us to consider that all these clashes are
not the same. For example, we could find it unacceptable to
apply a probability calculus to the question of the existence
of God without rejecting standards of intelligibility such as
the law of non-contradiction. Furthermore, the notion of paradox has a wide scope of application: ranging from highly unlikely on empirical grounds to beyond the reach of our intellectual capacity to the logically inconsistent. Grace M. Jantzen
is unmistakably correct when she writes that " one does not
have to be in opposition to rationality to admit the former
two, only the latter." 32 In addition, she says, "If rationality
is defined in terms of an empirical probability calculus, then
no doubt religion will have to oppose it-but why define it
that way?" 33 Yes, why indeed? Perhaps Stout believes, following David Hume and W.K. Clifford, that a wise man proportions his belief to the evidence and that it is wrong always,
everywhere, and for anyone to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. But this contention raises the following questions. What is evidence? What sorts of propositions are
candidates for evidence? How do we determine which propositions count as evidence such that my beliefs are rational if
and only if they are evident with respect to them? I cannot
The Flight from Authority, p. 117.
M. Jantzen, "'Religion' Reviewed," Heythrop Journal 26 ( 1985):
14-25. For this quote see p. 23. Jantzen's paper is a review of Leszek
Kolakowski's book, Religion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982). I
am indebted to her for helping me to gain clarity on precisely how varied
the clash between reason and religion is.
s3 Ibid., p. 23.
31 Stout,
32 Grace

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EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

recall that Stout ever gives any argument in support of this
Humian and Cliffordian position.
Still, what Stout does not fail to make clear is just how,
and why, certain post-Humean theologies are caught in the
dilemma of redundancy and irrelevance. Classical Christian
theism, he holds, confronted by the challenge of evidentialism
and its attendant demand, must either accept this demand or
reject it.
To accept the demand is to put one's most cherished beliefs at
risk .... This would be to treat theism as a collection of hypotheses,
or rather to transform theism .... into Deism-and therefore to
accept a steady erosion of theism's traditional content. To reject
the demand is to treat theism either as something to be believed
in the face of evidence or as something to which evidence is not
really relevant-in either event as something essentially removed
from the critical rationality central to the culture. If evidence is
treated as irrelevant, then the traditional theoretical content of
theism is diminished just as radically as it would be in Deism. But
if theism retains its traditional content while being believed in
the face of evidence any genuinely critical intellect would consider a decisive refutation, it thereby sacrifices any serious claim
for attention from the culture upon which it would like to have an
influence. 34

However, it appears to be assumed by Stout that there is only
one way to reject the demand of evidentialism: by pleading
nolo contendere with respect to it. It must be confessed in
fairness to Stout that there have been some theists who have
tended, whether deliberately or inadvertently, to adopt a conformist stance regarding evidentialism-and
therefore have
surrendered the structure of rationality to the evidentialist.
Be that as it may, this stance is surely unacceptable. I believe
it is defensible to hazard the view that the evidentialist sees
the structure of rationality mistakenly. Most evidentialists
hold to a certain paradigm of rationality. They hold, as
Nicholas Wolterstorff puts it, " a certain criterion for the application of the concept rational-the criterion being that of
34 Stout,

The Flight from Authority, p. 102.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

647

classical foundationalism." 35 What Wolterstorff argues, along
with Alvin Plantinga, as I understand them, is that if ever
Christian theism is to avoid the horns of the dilemma of redundancy and irrelevance, Christian theists must be released
from their adherence to classic foundationalism. Significantly,
they argue that classic foundationalism does not live up to its
own requirements, in essence showing that it is self-referentially
incoherent, failing its own test for rationality. I will try,
therefore, briefly to present their argument against classic
foundationalism, and to suggest how it frees the theist from
the dilemma.

III
Before pursuing the main part of their argument against
foundationalism, ·it would probably be useful to clarify somewhat how Wolterstorff and Piantinga understand the dilemma
faced by the theist. I said earlier that classic foundationalism
may be understood as a doctrine about justified belief. The
classic foundationalist holds that our beliefs are divided into
those which need support from other beliefs and those which
can support others and need no support themselves. Given this
distinction, he further holds that beliefs which are self-supporting, basic beliefs (i.e., beliefs not inferred or reached as conclusions from other things he believes) are those which are
self-evident, evident to the senses, or incorrigible reports of
experience. Other beliefs, non-basic beliefs, are rational if
and only if supported by basic beliefs.
Evidentialism, we remember, is rooted in classic foundationalism. Regarding theistic beliefs, the evidentialist holds
that a person is rational in accepting theistic beliefs only if
he has sufficient evidence for them. Most exactly, he holds
that theistic beliefs are thus justified only if they consist of
basic beliefs (in the sense explained), or if they are inferred
35 Nicholas
Wolterstorff, "Can Belief in God Be Rational if it has no
Foundations," in Faith and Rationality: Reason and Belief in God, editors
Alvin Plantinga and Nicholas Wolterstorff (L-Ondon and Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1983), p. 142.

648

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

from basic beliefs which supply adequate support for them.
The story of modern philosophical theology from Hume to
the present day is a story of attempts to show that theistic
beliefs do or do not fit the foundationalist's criterion for justified beliefs.36
Theists have, by and large, not challenged the foundationalist's view regarding the structure of rationality, holds Wolterstorff. By not doing so, they have accepted, whether deliberately or inadvertently, the claim that they as philosophers,
or scientists, or, more recently, as theologians, have no right
to their theistic beliefs unless they are able to show that these
beliefs follow from basic propositions accepted by all parties
to the conversation-theist, agnostic, and atheist alike. Moreover, theists have led themselves to believe that, if foundationalism is true, they have no right, as scholars, to let their
religious beliefs function as control beliefs within the devising
and weighing of theories, i.e., with the project of exploring
and developing the implications of Christian theism for the
whole range of questions philosophers, scientists, and theologians ask and answer. 37 Finally, their conformist stance with
respect to foundationalism has resulted in accepting the presumption that, as Basil Mitchell has said, " in case of conflict
between religious and scientific or historical claims it is the
former that must give way." 38 Briefly, then, Wolterstorff and
Plantinga have argued that the adherence of Christian scholars
to classic foundationalism has debilitated their work, holding
them back, they claim, from the practice of authentically
Christian scholarship. Wolterstorff states his claim this way:
36 N. Wolterstorff,
"On Avoiding Historicism," Philosophia Reformata 45
( 1980) : 178-185.
s1 Alvin Plantinga, " Advice to Christian Philosophers," Faith and Philosophy 1 ( 1984) : 253·27 l. This is Plantinga's inaugural address as the John
A. O'Brien Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. The
points I am making in the text are, roughly, the same ones Plantinga makes
on p. 260 of his paper.
38 The quotation is from an unpublished
paper which Mitchell read to the
staff of the Philosophy Department at Rhodes University, March 1984. The
paper deals with Richard Swinburne and Nicholas Wolterstorff, and is called
"Two Approaches to the Philosophy of Religion." See p. 11 for the quotation.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED
('"

..

649

I asked myself why it is that Christian scholars are so acquiescent
in the face of scholarly claims which contradict their Christian convictions, and why they think it inappropriate, conversely, to let
their Christian convictions guide their own scholarship. My answer was that they intuitively think of knowledge and science
along foundationalist lines. That is, they hold intuitively to a
foundationalist theory of knowledge. They intuitively think of
knowledge as the goal of science. And they view the productions
of theoreticians as, by and large, achieving this goal. For if one
thinks of authentic scientiae as erecting a super-structure of certitudes on a foundation of certitudes, and if one thinks of our actual
sciences as, by and large, authentic scientiae, then of course science
will be seen as fundamentally OK as it is, and the relevance of the
faith will be confined to the practice of such strategies as application interpretation, and harmonizing. 39
Here the point, I think, is the following. Presuming classic
foundationalism to be true, Christian theists have confined the
relevance of the Christian faith " to the offering of peculiarly
Christian applications of received scholarship, to the offering
of peculiarly Christian interpretation8 of received scholarship,
and to accommodating . . . religious convictions to received
scholarship." 40 Now Wolterstorff and Plantinga believe that
a fourth strategy is available, one that does not, they maintain,
accept conformism as an overriding rule. vVolterstorff writes:
Common to the three strategies of harmonizing, setting theories
within a context, and applying them is their conformism with respect to science. They all take for granted that science is OK as
it is. In none of them is there any internal relation between Christian commitment and what goes on within the sciences. In none of
them does Christian commitment enter into the devising and
weighing of theories within the sciences.41
so N. Wolterstorff, "Christian Philosophy and the Heritage of Descartes,"
20 pp., especially p. 10. This is an unpublished paper. Wolterstorff read it
in the summer of 1979 at a conference on Locke. Descartes and the Rise of
Modern Science, sponsored by the Institute for Christian Studies in Toronto,
Canada.
40 Ibid., pp. 9-10.
41 N. Wolterstorff,
Reason within the Bounds of Religion (Grand Rapids,
Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1976, second edition, 1984), pp.
81-2.

650

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

I think we can understand Wolterstorff's proposal more
fully if we remember that neither philosophy nor science nor
theology evidences a single homogeneous structure. In many
academic disciplines controversy is endemic; academicians as
academicians disagree amongst themselves. But even were it
not so, why should Christian scholarship degenerate into legitimizations of the academic status quo. Nowadays we expect,
as Christians, that contemporary Christian social theories
should be critical of both advanced industrial capitalism and
state socialism. "VVe have learnt this and much more from recent political and liberation theologies. Correspondingly, why
then should we expect anything less than a similar critical
attitude regarding the classic foundationalist theory of knowledge and science? " Why should the Christian (or anyone
else)," asks Wolterstorff, "surrender all his critical faculties
in the face of it? " 42
Lest a mistaken impression be conveyed here, it must be
said that in putting forth this proposal Wolterstorff and Plantinga do not at all mean to suggest that Christian scholars
have nothing to learn from their non-Christian and non-theist
colleagues. Nor do they mean to suggest that Christian scholars
ought to retreat into their own intellectual ghettoes, assuming a posture of repudiation and isolation and conversing with
only those scholars of similar breeding. Surely, says Plantinga,
Christians have much to learn and much of enormous importance
to learn by way of dialogue and discussion with their non-theistic
colleagues ... We are all, theist and non-theist alike, engaged in
the common human project of understanding ourselves and the
world in which we find ourselves. If the Christian philosophical
community is doing its job properly, it will be engaged in a complicated, many-sided dialectical discussion, making its own contribution to that common human project. It must pay careful attention to other contributions; it must gain a deep understanding of
them; it must learn what it can from them and it must take unbelief with profound seriousness. 43
42 Ibid.,

p. 82.

43 Plantinga,

"Advice", pp. 270-271.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

651

So far I have referred quite generally to what Wolterstorff
and Plantinga call the classic foundationalist view of knowledge, by which they mean quite generally the view that basic
beliefs constitute the evidence in terms of which all other
beliefs are justified. But it is important for us to describe
more specifically the form of foundationalism that is being
subsumed under this genera.I label. The foundationalist supposes, we remember, that there is a set of propositions, let's
call it Es, such that my belief in God is rational if and only
if it is evident with regard to Es. He also supposes that belief
in God is not among the propositions to be found in Es. For
the foundationalist, we noted earlier, a proposition is properly
basic only if it is either self-evident or incorrigible or evident
to the senses. Now Wolterstorff and Plantinga call that form
of foundationalism which holds that Es is limited to such
propositions basis-restrictive foundationalism. It is this species
of foundationalism, which they take to be the classical view,
that they launch an attack against. For purposes of brevity,
I have decided to follow the main part of the argument set
forward in some essays recently published by Plantinga. 44 In
the main and for purposes of this paper, I shall sidestep
many of the difficult conceptual problems surrounding the
analysis of notions like self-evident and incorrigible.
The fundamental principle of classical foundationalism is:
(I) A proposition p is properly basic for a person S if and
only if p is either self-evident to S or incorrigible for S
or evident to the senses for S.
What kind of propositions are self-evident, asks Plantinga?
Well, arithmetical truths such as
(2) 2 + 1 = 3:
simple truths of logic such as
44 A. Plantinga, "Is Belief in God Rational?,"
in Rationality and Religious
Belief, ed. C. F. Delaney (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press,
1979), pp. 7-27; "Is Belief in God Properly Basic?," Nous 15 (1981):
41-51; "The Reformed Objection to Natural Theology," Christian Scholars
Review 11 (1981): 187-198; and "Reason and Belief in God," in Faith and
Rationality (see note 35) .

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

(3) No man is both married and unmarried;

and the generalization of simple truths of logic, such as
(4) For any proposition p the conjunction of p with its
denial is false. 45
With respect to incorrigible propositions, some philosophers
have taken these to consist in claims about one's own mental
life, namely, propositions which describe my immediate perceptual experience, and propositions which describe my present
sensations or feelings. Regarding the former, Plantinga gives
the following as examples:
(5) There is a tree before me,
(6) I am wearing shoes,
(7) That tree's leaves are yellow.
Propositions (5) - (7) entail the existence of such material objects as trees, shoes, and yellow leaves. But I could mistakenly
believe that there is a tree before me, etc. So more cautious
claims must go into the foundation, such as
(8) It seems to me that I see a tree,
(9) I seem to see something yellow,
or even, says Plantinga, as Chisholm puts it,
(10) I am appeared yellowly to.

Summarily stated:
(11) p is incorrigible for S if and only if (a) it is not possible that S believe p and p be false, and (b) it is not
possible that S believe -p and p be true. 46

Following this, Plantinga invites us to look more closely
at (1). It contains two elements, he says.
45 Plantinga,

"Reason and Belief in God," pp. 55-56.
p. 58. I should stress that Plantinga wouldn't take "There is a
tree before me " as an incorrigible proposition. It is, indeed a report of an
immediate perceptual experience-or at least, Plantinga would take it that
way. Such beliefs arise in us immediately.
But it's not incorrigible.
The
incorrigible ones would be those given in ( 8) and ( 9) . Nicholas Wolterstorff
reminded me of this point.
46 Ibid.,

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

653

(12) A proposition is properly basic if it is self-evident, incorrigible, or evident to the senses;
(13) a proposition is properly basic only if it meets this condition.
(13) may indeed be true, says Plantinga. But what reason,
if any, is there for accepting the proposition that a proposition
is properly basic only if it is self-evident, incorrigible, or evident to the senses? Does this proposition itself display any
of these relevant features? That is, suggests Plantinga, suppose the proposition
(14) most propositions that display these relevant features
are true itself displays one or more of these features.
Plantinga then asks:
Would that he a relevant answer to the question, what reason, if
any, is there for believing that most propositions displaying this
feature are true? It is hard to see how. The question is whether a
proposition's displaying this feature is a reason for thinking it true;
to reply that [ (14)] displays this feature is simply to invite the
question again. Here the appeal to self-evidence seems entirely
unsatisfactory. It is as if the theist were to reply to the question:
"Why believe in God?" by pointing out that God requires us to
believe in Him, and requires us to believe only what is true. This
may indeed be so; but it does not apply a reason for belief for
anyone who does not already believe. 47
But now suppose the foundationalist does accept (13) as
basic. Suppose, that is to say, that he does not accept it on
evidence provided by other propositions but instead accepts
others on the basis of it. Well, argues Plantinga, according to
(13) itself, (13)
is properly basic for F only if [ (13)] is self-evident or incorrigible
or evident to the senses for him. Clearly [ (13) ] meets none of
these conditions. Hence it is not properly basic for F. But then F
is self-referentially inconsistent in accepting [ (13)]; he accepts it
47 Plantinga,
"Is Belief in God Rational?," p. 20. Unfortunately, when
I wrote this paper I did not have access to the book where this article is
found. My page reference here is to loose copy of the article that I have in
my possession. Subsequent references are to this copy.

654

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

ns basic, despite the fact that [ (13)] does not meet the condition
for proper bas\cality that [ (13)] itself lays down. 48

conclm1cs Plantinga, the foundationalist is "hoist by
his own petard." For proposition (13) is itself neither selfcvicleni nor evident to the senses nor incorrigible. "\Vhy, then,
1ve accept such a criterion? Plantinga continues:
But suppose we waive this point for the moment and leave the
foundationalist to try to see how to achieve consistency here. Is
there any reason to believe [ (13)]? If so, what is it? [ (13)] cer·tainly does nol appear to be self-evident; it is certaintly not incorrigible. It is not er.sy to see, furthermore, that it either follows
from or is evident with respect to propositions that are self-evident
m incon<gible.
it is hard to see that there is any reason for accepting [ (13)], even from a roughly foundationalist point of view.
vYhy then should we accept it? Why should the theist feel any
obligation to believe it? The answer, I believe, is that there is no
reason at all for accepting [ (13) ] ; it is no more than a bit of intellectual imperialism on the part of the foundationalist. 19

It seems to me that Plantinga's argument has defeated the
classic foundationafot's
objection against including theistic
beliefo as part oJ' a person's foundational or properly basic benot inferred or reached as conclusions on the
liefs (i.e.
basis of other knmvn beliefs) . This argument, of course, does
not in any way prove that belief in God is properly basic. The
argument, however, is not inconsequential for Christian theism.
:Plantinga. h2s shown, I am persuaded, basis-restrictive foundationalisrn to be internally incoherent; no one would be rational
to believe it on its own understanding of rationality. But this,
<:s I hope is plain, does not imply that Plantinga has given us
a re:Json for bolding the proposition regarding belief in God
as basic. J\Tevertheless, while this argument is not a reason
for holding it, it does eliminate a possible reason for not holding
it." 0 That is, Plantinga has disposed of basis-restrictive founda"Reason and Belief in Goel," pp. o0-61.
"Is Belief in Goel Rational?," pp. 22-23.
r.o George I. Mavrocles, "Jerusalem
and Athens Revisited,"
Rationality, p. 19C.
4' Plantinga,
49 Plantinga,

in Faith and

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

tiona1ism as a reason Rgainst holding that belief in God if; properly basic. There is, then, if Plantinga is right, no reason for
denying that, if basis-restrictive foundationalism is internally
incoherent, religious beliefs may be among the propositions to
be found in Es.
In addition, it would no longer seem to be an impropriety
to make use of such beliefs as a criterion of theory-formation
and theory-appraisal. In other words, if basis-restrictive formdationaEsm is not true, it follows that theists can and should
move beyond seeing their distinctively religious beliefs as a
mere addendum to theories
on purely foundationalist
assumptions. With regard to those theories, the Christian
scholar need not be confined to finding interpretations that
will be maxim.ally acceptable from the theistic standpoint. He
can also take his religious beliefs as rm autonomous source of
logical implication capable of affecting scientific theory-formation and theory-appraisal.
Needless to say, the data, background theories, ideas, and other warrants used here in the
construction and appraisal of theories are drawn from various
be totally
valid and relevant sources. On this view, it
unsatisfactory for the theist to confine himself to theories
readily conformable to his religious heliefs. Theory-formation
and theory-appraisal must be adequate to distinguishable base
points, or points of reference. 51
We come, then, finally to the question: How would breaking the hold which basis-restrictive foundntionalism has upon
Christian theists make it possible for them to avoid the horns
of the dilemma of irrelevance and redundancy? Let us look
back once again to the dilemma's horns. Either theists will
remain within the religious closed circle, conversing with only
those scholars of similar breeding--in which case they will
01 Ernan Mc:'lfullin, "How Shouid Cosmology Relate to Theology"! ., in The
Soienoes and Theology in the 'Twentieth Century, edited by A. H. Pc-ncocke
(London: Oriel Press, 1981), p. 51. For an excellent discussion of t]1e poirts
made in this paragraph, see James M. Gustafson, Protestcwt and Roman
Oatholio Ethics (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1'178),
especially chapter 5.

656

EDWARD J. ECHEVERRIA

have no access to the public and shared epistemic criteria which
purportedly constitute the foundation of all knowledge. Or
theists will accept those criteria-in which case they may well
have interesting and important things to say, but these will
not be significantly distinctive in any Christian sense. 52
But why, Wolterstorff and Plantinga have asked, should the
theist plead nolo contendere with respect to the so-called public and shared epistemic criteria of classical foundationalism?
Why should the theist adopt a conformist stance regarding it?
Why should he surrender the structure of rationality to the
foundationalist? Does the hold which the dilemma has upon
him not stem precisely from these concessions which the theist
has made, whether deliberately or inadvertently, to basisrestrictive foundationalism? I think, with Wolterstorff and
Plantinga, that the answer to this last question must be yes.
For the apparent force of the dilemma is measured by whether
or not the theist accepts the criteria of classic foundationalism.
But, if the foundationalist sees the structure of rationality
mistakenly, it is really quite obvious that the theist need not
concede these things; conformism need not be seen as an overriding rule. The theist need not accept the presumption, as
Wolterstorff puts it, "that if ever one discerns conflict between
one's religious convictions on the one hand, and the results of
reputable science on the other, then one is obliged as a rational
person to resolve the conflict by revising one's religious convictions." 53 He may now respond differently: the theist may
offer, for example, a critique of classic foundationalism-which
would eliminate a possible reason for not holding his religious
beliefs as an autonomous source of logical implication capable
of affecting scientific theory-formation and theory-appraisal.
It is worth emphasizing that nothing I have said entails the
view that the Christian theist should not be prepared to modify,
52 This is how Macintyre,
more or less, states the dilemma in his article,
"God and the Theologians," p. 23.
53 N. Wolterstorff,
Until Justice and Peace Embrace (Grand Rapids, Mich.:
William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1983), p. 170.

THE FATE OF THEISM REVISITED

657

and in certain circumstances to abandon, his initial position
in order to take account of other positions that are inconsistent
with it, if those positions are well supported, or very much
better supported than his own. 54 It does not follow from what
has been argued here that in principle no conflict between
science and religious convictions can ever arise. Nothing I
have said should be taken to mean that I want theists to stand
still, as it were. A second point worth emphasizing is this:
We should not suppose, if the classic foundationalist sees the
structure of rationality mistakenly, that the Christian believer,
the non-Christian believer, and the non-religious humanist have
no access to public and shared epistemic criteria and beliefs.
The truth is that they do in fact have access to such criteria and
beliefs.55
Earlier in this paper, I took note of the fact that it is often
the critics of theism who wish theists would be more orthodox.
They insist upon this, I said, because they believe, rightly,
that there can be no serious conversation with theism beyond
a certain point if it is not recognizably theistic. They want,
Stout said, their conversation partners to remain distinctive
enough to be identified, to be needed. Well, if classic foundationalism is internally incoherent, as Christian theists like Plantinga and Wolterstorff have argued, then, I suggest, Christian
theism can be both critical enough to be respected and distinctive enough to be needed.
EDWARD

J. ECHEVERRIA

Rhodes University
Grahamstown, South Africa

54 B. Mitchell,
"Two Approaches to the Philosophy of Religion," p. 14.
Wolterstorff makes a similar point in chapter 13 of Reason within the Bounds
of Religion.
55 N. Wolterstorff,
"Is Reason Enough?", The Reformed Journal 31
( 1981) : 23. On this, see my essay, "Rationality and The Theory of Ra·
tionality" Forthcoming in The Christian Scholar's Review. I am grateful
to Nicholas Wolterstorff for helpful comments on ideas contained in this
paper.

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE: PERSONAL
TRANSF0l{l'11ATION AND THE GROWING
ACCORD OF THEOLOGY AND RELIGIOUS STUDIES

HAT IS IT that keeps theology and religious
studicc1 apart? And what, on the other hand, will
bring them together? It will be immediately observul that these questions are put in such a way as to imply
that theology and religious studies were things, like rockets in
orbit, " already out there now real," that continue in motion
according to the principles of their own momentum, and are
brought together through forces applied from the outside
through human intervention. Obviously this is not exactly
the case with the matter in hand. Rather it is that both theology and religious studies are in human subjects in the first
place. Some human subjects identify themselves as theologi::rns: others call themselves scholars devoted to the study
of religion. So the question might be put, what keeps them
apart, i.e., what separates the theologian from the practitioner
of religious studies? Cculd it be that the progressive transformai:ion of human subjects devoted to the study of religion,
from one or another viewpoint, brings about the gradual unification of the disciplines in which the meaning of religion is
brcmght under control? And if that is the case, what kind of
subjective transformation would promote the unification of
their objective concern? In the pages that follow these are the
questions that will be pursued.
The: proximate occasion for my setting out to write something on the topic of the relation between religious studies and
theology is the fact of being engaged in teaching in the Department of Religion at l,a Salle University. At the moment
658

CONVERSION

AND CONVERGENCE'

G50

of writing the curriculum of the department is divided into four
sections. They are labeled as follows: (1) biblical studies;
(2) theological studies; (3) historical studies; (4) religious
studies. In the first sector the focus is obviously the sacred
scriptures of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Theological studies
have to do exclusively with the Christian tradition, the community, its doctrine and its ritual. Historical dudies deal with
that same tradition, now not in terms of the entities by which
it is constituted, but rather from the point of view of the development of the tradition as a whole in this or that period,
both from within and in relation to cultural conditions that
have made a major impact on the tradition. Hence, for example, " Religion in America ". Heligious studies, finally, focus
on the great religions oi the world other than Christianity,
taking in alrn the int2r(faciplinary topic oi "Heligious .Attitudes
in Modem Literature". Significantly, under this last rubric
no mention or history is made in the section title.
In reference to this menu, moreover, it has been said that
the department is aci:uaHy doing two quite distinct things.
The question that occurs, of course, is what these two distinct
things are and hov;r they are related. Even the layperson will
discern readily that the distinction has something to do with
the difference between inatters that concern the Christian
community and the religious beliefs and practice of "others".
Therefore, under the banner of the inquiry already outlined,
and taking La Salle's setup as somewhat typical, at least of
collegiate study of religion in the context 0£ North American
Catholic institutions of higher learning, I intend a critical
assessment of this menu and its presuppositions. This makes
for a twofold purpose: (l) to make a modest contribution to
the ongoing discussion of the religious studies/theology problematic; (Q) to engage in the sort of critique just now suggested.
At the outset it should be stated too that the quite substantial contribution of Bernard Lonergan, " The Ongoing
Genesis of Methods" (recently published as part of the vol-

660

MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

ume, A Third Collection; see works consulted, in fine) is seminal
to what follows. The problem is one of method, to be sure;
but that fact does not place it in the realm of abstractions.
The questions are after all rather concrete. Is there, for example, any dynamic relationship between the study of Buddhist
spirituality and the interpretation of Pauline literature? What
might be the connection between grasping what was going
forward in the tridentine period and understanding the terms
of the Chalcedonian definition of hypostatic union? Are these
endeavors perhaps parts of one integral whole, or are they
in some sense functions or phases of a single process? Some
answers to such questions, albeit provisional, seem to be demanded, both for the forward movement of our work as
scholars and educators, and for the sake of the students whom
we serve.
A MODERN QUESTION
In attempting to do a little justice to questions such as
these, it is prerequisite to acknowledge the modernity of the
inquiry. Taking the Christian tradition as more familiar both
to myself and the typical reader, we should observe that there
are two phases in the history of the tradition in which such
an inquiry did not and could not have taken place. With
Lonergan, we may designate these two moments as the Christian tradition in the first and second stages of meaning, where
limitations in the differentiation of consciousness dictated the
conditions in which the Christian tradition was accepted and
understood. 1
In the first stage, the tradition comes into existence through
the dissemination of the message and the gift of the Spirit,
giving rise to the community. The message, the gift, and the
community are the compound focus of experience, without
being thematized. At first no attempt is made to express
either the objective concern of the community or its common
1 On stages

of meaning see R. Doran ( 1979), 75-80.

661

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

subjective experience in other than symbolic terms. When,
moreover, questions of truth do arise, they are dealt with
piecemeal, so to speak, on an ad hoc basis. 2
In the second stage of meaning, when there emerges the coherent endeavor to translate the symbolic meanings of the
Christian religion into literal meanings, theology is established
as a scientific discipline in the university setting (e.g., at the
University of Paris during the era of an Aquinas) . In that
setting the sciences are constructed according to aristotelian
canons, the various disciplines are distinguished according to
their formal objects; and so it is said in reference to theology
that its work takes place under the ratio formalis of the divine
as susceptible of being revealed. In the framework of a synthesis such as Aquinas's Summa Theologiae, one might fancifully imagine that what is thought of today as religious studies
might have been worked in as an expansion of the inquiry
concerning the virtue of religion (II II, 81-100) . Of course,
the expansion would have eventually dwarfed the original
treatise, and the methods employed in the investigations would
have been quite foreign to the mind of Aquinas. In any case,
the endeavor in that context would have been to preserve the
integrity of the discipline by considering everything under the
formal objective of divine revelation.
In our own day, as the tradition is reborn (perhaps kicking
and screaming) into the third stage of meaning, when method
has begun to supplant logic as the control for scientific inquiry, the question about religious studies and theology arises
in explicit fashion. Their integration is not at all clear, and
there seems to be good reason for thinking of them as quite
distinct endeavors. At the same time the yen for coordination
of effort, with a view toward that utility which is the aim of
all modern scientific endeavor, suggests and even promotes
the fashioning of some sort of unity.
2 cf. Frederick
E. Crowe, S.J., Theology of the Christian
Paulist Press, 1978), particularly chapters 1-3.

Word

(N.Y.:

MAURICE SCHEPERS,

O.P.

RELIGION, THE COMMON FOCUS
If religious studies and theology are to be brought together
at all, a first step might consist in relating them to their common objective, religion itself. The question might be put as
follows: what is peculiar about their respective approaches
to the same entity? These relations are clarified, moreover,
through an understanding of how religion comes to be the
common focus; and that involves an historical perspective.
In the second stage of meaning theologians affirm that the
focus or object of their study is God, and everything else as it
is related to the divine (cf. Aquinas, Smmna Theologiae, I,
I, 7), an affirmation that on the surface appears to propose
something quite different from the modern view, that religion
is what holds the theologian's attention. It is to be noted,
however, that the former affirmation has the classical view
of culture as its context, where it is assumed that the men and
women of the given culture have unique access to the one
true God, and that people of other cultures worship false gods
and cultivate religions that are quite worthless, if not downright harmful. Also characteristic of the classical view is the
absence of historical consciousness, i.e., of the awareness of
the constitutive function of meaning. 3
With the coming of the modern era, however, when the constitutive function of meaning, as regards social institutions
and cultural achievements (of which theology is a signal example), begins to be appropriated, theologians will take what
appears to be a more modest stance and, speaking about the
role of theology, will say, as Bernard J,onergan does, for example, that it is to mediate between a cultural matrix and
the significance and role of a religion in that matrix
xi) . There will then be as many theologies as there are distinct cultural matrices contextualizing diverse religions. There
is even the possibility of different theologies, based on distinct
religions, within a single culture, and, at the limit, of theological
3 On the

classical view see N. Lash (1985) with references to Lonergan.

CONVERSION

AND CONVERGENCE

663

diversity within a single religion. No a priori judgments are
made, moreover, regarding the worth of the various religions.
As Lonergan puts it, " the theologies [will] endeavor to discern
whether there is any real fire behind the smoke of symbols
employed in this or that religion" (1985, 161). In this context it makes sense to pay attention initially to religion itself,
to attempt to say what it is.

THE C01'•1POUND OF RELIGION
The rationale for the more modest stance referred to in the
previous paragraph resides in the recognition that questions
about God are on the human horizon. The thrust of human
intentionality, no matter what the cultural determinations
are, is toward a self-transcendence that is not only intelligent,
rational, and responsible, but also loving in an unrestricted
manner. The view is bolstered by the exploitation of the discovery that religious experience occurs on that level of intentionality where decisions and commitments are made, i.e.,
where consciousness becomes conscience. The actuality of
human being in love in an unrestricted manner (again, without regard for cultural conditions) is a transformation of conscience, and therefore the basis for seeing everything in a
distinct light. These items have been distinguished and unpacked with great precision in the chapter which Lonergan
devotes to the topic of religion in Method in Theology (see especially, 101-109) . What follows immediately is little more than
a re-statement of the salient points of that analysis.
To proceed from below upwards, i.e., from religious questioning to religious fulfillment, we may begin by making the
general observation that the sphere of religion is "the world
as mediated by ultimate meaning and motivated by ultimate
value" (Lonergan [1985], 161). Thus in ordinary human life,
questions for understanding and for reflection are raised in
dynamic patterns until they perhaps reach a limit, where the
questions have to do with questioning itself. So too in that
sector of intentionality where the questions are deliberative.

664

MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

The pattern is again dynamic and reaches asymptotically toward a limit, where questions may arise that have to do with
the value of the deliberative process itself. The thrust of this
entire process is toward self-transcendence, in that the cognitive process heads toward truth and the deliberative toward
value, both of which are independent of the subject. In fact
the subject finds authenticity in the affirma6on of what is
discovered and judged to be true in fact, and in decisions to
be and to do what is esteemed as of genuine value. At any
point, however, the process itself may undergo a complete
revolution through that fulfillment which is religious experience,
where all meaning is transposed and all value is transformed
in such wise that the person is grasped by ultimate concern,
and begins to see the world through the eye of love (faith)
and to value what is given in the world according to the measure
of the love which is its source.
" Our hearts are flooded with love for God by the gift of
the Holy Spirit " (Rom. 5: 5) : this is the Christian way of
describing that experience, and as a descriptive expression
it is helpful in working out the implications of the experience.
At the outset we do not lcnow the One with whom we are in
love. Significantly, therefore, the heart is identified as the
seat of religious experience. The heart, however, does have
reason which reason does not know and cannot on that
account express in its own manner. And so the expression
of the experience is largely symbolic, where the symbols that
are evoked issue from what is felt in the heart. These feelings
are intentional responses to values that are apprehended but
not yet grasped by any sort of reflective understanding. Thus
Lonergan observes that typically religions " apprehend ultimate meaning and ultimate value symbolically" (ibid.). This
is to intimate (as we have already insisted) that initially we
come into religious contact with reality on the fourth level of
conscious intentionality, so that our response is to meanings
and values revealed in feelings. The connection here is that
the decision which religious experience is, has feelings as its

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

665

correlative, giving it mass and momentum. The expression,
therefore, must be symbolic, for symbol is precisely that: sign
of something real or imaginary evoked by feeling or that
evokes feeling (Lonergan [1972], 64).
As issuing from religious experience, implanted, so to speak,
in the fourth level of human interiority, religion is seen to
be thoroughly dynamic, never a finished product, always developing, but dialectically (cf. I,onergan [1972], 110-112). Its
authenticity and corresponding authentic expressions may be
and often are marred by unauthenticity, with its myth and
magic, and this both in the personal and historical domains.
Individuals do make brave beginnings, when grasped by ultimate concern; but sustained growth is more the exception
than the rule. So too religious traditions come into existence
and flower, only to be threatened by disintegration and even
oblivion.
Although the heart does take the lead in religious conversion, to the effect that the human subject is thrust toward and
reaches out for that which is of ultimate value, it is not to be
denied that the mind, with its focus on the intelligible and
the rational, is integral to religion come to full expression.
Kierkegaard was certainly correct in affirming that faith is a
leap, but it would not be correct to jump to the conclusion
that it is a leap into irrationality. The aphorism is rather
rightly understood as affirming that faith is a leap into reason, i.e., into that dynamism which comes to rest only in the
achievement of having gotten "to the bottom of things." The
subject who is grasped by ultimate concern does as a matter
of fact desire to know the One by whom he or she is grasped.
In fact the experience of being in love in an unrestricted manner is normaily the basis of a process of development from
above downwards, which has the following stations: (1) the
flooding of the heart with love for the known Unknown; (2)
judgments of value, i.e., convictions which issue from the
heart flooded by love, which are quite beyond reason: a new
set of judgments on oneself, as loved and called to love unrestrictedly, and on the universe as an expression of love;

666

MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

(3) a more or less sustained inquiry aimed at understanding
both oneself and one's world, as transformed by love, and
the source of that transformation (fides quaerens intellectum);
(4) a daily life enriched by love, wisdom, and understanding,
i.e., a return to the data, now transformed and transvalued
through the development of the religiously grasped subject.
Such development is, moreover, dialectical, in the sense already described.
Nor does such development take place in a cultural vacuum.
And so a complete account of religion must include something
about the word, not only about the inner word through which
God replaces the heart of stone with the heart of flesh, but
also about the outer word: the word of tradition, the word of
fellowship, and the word of gospel. It is here especially that
religions diverge; for, whereas the existential experience of
being grasped by ultimate concern may be assumed to be
common and transcultural, the cognitive expression of that
experience (whether personal or traditional) will always be
culturally conditioned. This will be the case as well when the
outer word is expressive of that which issues from God's intervention in human history, to reveal what is properly characteristic of divine being and of God's design for humanity.
"\Vhere such intervention is affirmed, of course, there is the
added burden of discerning the authentic expression of it from
the unauthentic; and this would seem to be an ongoing task.
In terms that are transcultural, then, to the question, what
is one doing when one is being religious? the answer that might
be given is, one is being in love in an unrestricted manner.
That is what religious experience seems to be: a condition of
the human subject, i.e., human intentionality, wherein that
subjectivity is fulfilled. The inner experience corresponding
to such fulfillment is joy and peace quite beyond understanding. This dynamic state, moreover, as any other intentional
thrust, demands outward expression; and in this case, as Lonergan observes, the expression will be largely symbolic, for the
meaning and value, i.e., the concern, are ultimate: beyond
literal expression, because beyond comprehension.

CONVERSION

AND CONVERGENCE

667

QUESTIONS CONCERNING RELIGION
Two questions arise spontaneously out of this dynamic state:
(1) What is taking place within me? (2) Who is it that I
am loving? The two questions correspond to the subjective
and objective sides of the experience, respectively. In the
attempt to do them justice, let the Christian tradition stand
as concrete example. The answer to the first question is by
way of interpretation of the experience, giving it a name and
describing that for which the name stands. In the Christian
tradition it is said that the human heart is flooded with love
for God through the gift of the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5: 5) .
Accordingly, from a Christian standpoint, religious experience
is that flooding of the heart with joy and peace that must be
attributed to the Spirit of God as to its source. The answer
to the second question is, of course, somewhat more complex;
perhaps the simplest way of bringing it to clarity would be in
terms of one or another of the creeds of the ancient Church.
Significantly the Greek term used to name them is symbolon.
Trinitarian in structure, they are not endeavors to penetrate
the doctrine by way of understanding, but rather in a descriptive way to unfold the mystery as the ground of what the
Christian community believes to be the way in which salvation
is worked out.
Out of this message, in its objective and subjective aspects,
together with the reality of the gift of the Spirit, the Christian
community grasps its own dynamic being. Its growth in space
and time is attributed to these same factors. The quality of
its life, however, consists in the effort on the part of the community, at any given moment or place to make their personal
expression of the message authentic, i.e., intelligent, reasonable, responsible and loving. Such an effort is always limited
in its performance, and so both the personal and the traditional experssions of Christianity are compounds of the
authentic and the unauthentic. In any case, what we have
been attempting to describe in these last paragraphs is the
Christian religion in the concrete. What does it mean to be

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MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

religious in the Christian manner? The elements are: the hearing of the message, the gift of the Spirit, sharing in the life
of the community which is born of these two factors.
Now this entire movement called Christianity is at its historical source lived and experienced without being thematized.
This is to say that people's hearts are flooded with love for
God, they acknowledge God to have entered into human history through Incarnation, and they form community to celebrate both the message and the gift of the Spirit, without
engaging in formal inquiry as to how the gift, the message,
and the gathering are to be understood.
EMERGENCE OF THEOLOGY
Eventually, however, inquiry does occur. And at this point
our own discourse shifts topically from religion as such to
theology in its nascent form. In the first instance the inquiry
seems to be focused precisely on the fundamental issues: the
message as proclaiming Incarnation and Trinity; and the gift
interpreted as the Spirit, who is God, replacing the heart of
stone with the heart of flesh. How are we to understand Incarnation? What precisely do we mean when we affirm Jesus
to be the Son [Word] of God and Son of Mary? It is this line
of questioning, and its dialectical unfolding, with which Lonergan is concerned in essays such as " The Origins of Christian
Realism," and " The Way to Nicea." 4 The outcome as well as
the development is, of course, culturally conditioned, in a manner that later scholars have sometimes described as the hellenization of Christianity. What this says simply is that those
believers who were engaged in the inquiry used their minds
in the manner in which they could, nurtured as they were in
a world in which great categories were dominant in human
discourse. It is not to say that they used their minds in a way
radically different from the way in which we might use ours.
For, Greek though they were, they were nonetheless constrained
4" The Origins of Christian
Realism," in A Second Collection
phia, 1974), 239-261; The Way to Nicea (Philadelphia, 1976).

(Philadel-

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

669

to be attentive to what they saw, heard, felt, smelled, and
tasted, intelligent in their questions for understanding, i.e.,
in discerning intelligible patterns in their sense experience,
reasonable in the way in which they might bring the process
of reflective understanding to closure, and lovingly responsible
in their conduct of the entire process of inquiry. In other words,
the invariant structure of conscious intentionality was quite
as operative in that era as it is in our own.
Such is also the case with the inquiry that is aimed at clarifying the nature of the gift, most often referred to as the
Pelagian controversy. When the human heart is flooded with
love for God, what are the antecedents and the consequences?
How especially is human freedom engaged? What indeed is
the nature of the gift? As with the inquiry concerning the
message, these questions do not occur all at once, nor are they
answered without some agony. There are, in fact, accusations
and recriminations, charges of infidelity to the tradition, and
eventually the sorting out of heretical positions from those that
are labeled orthodox. Thus it is that heroes emerge and antiheroes make their appearance, to be discriminated eventually
as champions of orthodoxy and heterodoxy, respectively.
With the rediscovery of Greek thought on the part of Christian intellectuals of the western Church in the medieval period,
theology enters upon a new phase. It consists in a sustained
and coherent effort to transpose the symbolic meanings of the
message and the gift into meanings that are literal, where
literal stands for what is submitted to the control of logic.
M ythos is replaced by logos, not piecemeal, as in the patristic
period, but wholly and coherently. The great monuments of
this effort are the Summae of Thomas Aquinas. Now the
mysteries of Incarnation and Trinity are placed in the context of systematic understanding, not in the sense of being
reduced to moments in an overarching and a priori rational
framework, but rather in the sense of providing the fundamental clues for the discovery of the rationale for the relationship of the human and the divine. This permits Aquinas to

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MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

distinguish the via inventionis from the via doctrinae, to ground
his understanding of creation in the doctrine of the Trinity,
and his understanding of human growth through the sacramental life of the Church in the doctrine of redemptive Incarnation.
Theology in the modern key, which Lonergan describes as
the third emergence of inquiry concerning praxis (what are
we doing in being Christian, i.e., what do belief in and proclamation of the message really entail; what is the significance
of the gift, enjoyed and exploited as it is in the context of the
community which is Church?) ,5 is a renewal yet to achieve
its definitive status; nor is that achievement likely to take on
a form in any way simila.r to what we have known in the past.
No new system is likely to emerge, for logos is being replaced
by methodos; and the entire enterprise takes on a dynamism
that classical consciousness could not envisage. Both religion
and theology are seen as developing entities, and in each case
the development is dialectical. Progress and decline are not
restricted to personal religious histories, but belong also to
communities, Churches, theological movements and schools.
Not only are individuals lost and found, but entire traditions
founder and undergo undeserved recovery. Thus the impact
of modern science, modern exegetical and historical methods,
and modern philosophies upon modern religion and modern
theology is yet to be fully assessed; and the assessment itself
must be ongoing. As moderns we do not write final chapters,
but only essais vers ... with sketches of coming attractions.
The dialectical quality of religious and theological development, insofar as it is grasped by present-day practitioners of
the theological enterprise, is the foundation of something quite
constructive. We see the building rise in the ecumenical movement, wherein theologians of various confessional backgrounds
first scrutinize their own traditions in the light of their dialectical relations with other confessions, and then eventually subject themselves to critical scrutiny, as more or less authentic
5 1985, 16lf.

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

671

representatives of those traditions in the present. This latter
development is, of course, crucially important, as a concrete
recognition that authenticity is never to be taken for granted,
that aberrations (or a compound of the authentic and the
unauthentic) are to be as expected both in the data to be
investigated and in the investigation of those to whom the
data are delivered. There is authentic praxis in traditions
marred by unauthenticity, introduced in the past and cultivated
unknowingly in the present because of inattention to its presence. It is what J,onergan names minor authenticity. 6 There
is also unauthentic performance in traditions that are in a
state of decline; and this seems to be motivated by despair
over what is possible in terms of reform. People just give up.
As Lonergan observes, the Rule is still read but one wonders
whether or not the home fires are burning (ibid.). Finally,
there is unauthenticity on the part of those living in traditions that have undergone substantial reform, for it is quite
difficult for us to respond to the invitation to sustained development.

COMPOUND OF THEOLOGY AND
RELIGIOUS STUDIES
The unintentional effect of what has been said up to now
might be the impression that only religion and theology are
undergoing development. This is far from the truth, of course,
for they are simply elements in a much more complex cultural
evolution and differentiation. And so it might be appropriate to make some observations about the emergence of religious studies as a group of disciplines, largely historical in
their methodology, that have come into existence in the modern
world. They seem to have a double focus. First there is the
study of the religions that have been and are practised in
human communities anywhere at any time. Second there is
the application of empirical and historical methods in the study
of the Christian religion, and this in the academy of the West,
6

1972, 80.

672

MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

where heretofore the Christian religion, as an object of study,
was assumed to be exempt from such methodology. In effect
both dimensions of religious studies have complex backgrounds.
One is reminded in the first place of that passage from H.
Butterfield's The Origins of Modern Science, which Lonergan
himself cites or to which he makes reference so often:
"Since [the so-called scientific revolution,] popularly associated
with the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, but reaching back in
an unmistakably continuous line to a period much earlier still]
overturned the authority in science not only of the middle ages
but of the ancient world-since it ended not only in the eclipse of
scholastic philosophy but in the destruction of Aristotelian physics
-it outshines everything since the rise of Christianity; and reduces
the Renaissance and Reformation to the rank of mere episodes,
mere internal displacements, within the system of medieval Christendom." 1

The relevance of this citation to the topic at hand is the
application of the new methodology in the academy of religion. With the new methodology, moreover, come several
questions, among which the following seem particularly important: (1) the significance for the study of religion of the
shift in the aim of the sciences to usefulness; (2) the application in the study of religion of the demand on their part
for autonomy, i.e., self-determination in the selection of terms
and relations; (3) the assimilation in the study of religion of
modern scientific concern with things· susceptible of being
observed and experimented with, rather than with words and
logical relations (Lonergan [1985], 147-149).
Mention has to be made, of course, of another element of
the intellectual history of the West, namely, the First Enlightenment, which becomes the context for the pursuit of scientific
understanding in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries,
and where it is assumed on principle that traditional religion
belongs to the past, without qualification, and that a brave
new world can be constructed from the consistent and coherent
use of human reason. Whereas the scientific revolution as such
1

1965, 7.

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

673

seems neutral in reference to the religious tradition of the West,
this latter transition is anything but indifferent, indeed is
hostile, to the dominant role of religion in human life and of
theology in the academy.
From this hybrid stock arises the modern study of religion,
both the largely historical investigation of the religions of all
places and all times, and the undertaking of the challenge to
reassess the documents of the Christian tradition according
to the methods of the critical historical school. Insofar as the
endeavor has been inspired by the ideals of the scientific revolution, without reference to the ideology of the First Enlightenment, the results have been cumulatively and progressively
the basis of progress in our understanding of the human subject
as religious, and of the objectifications of the religious quest
and religious experience. Results as regards the documents of
the Christian religion, once thought of as the source of premises
from which deductions could be made, but now viewed as data
to be understood, are perhaps less easily assessed; but there is
no doubt that the commitment has been made on the part of
the Churches of the West to participate in the venture which
is the on-going critical examination and re-examination of the
tradition. The Fundamentalist hue and cry, whether biblicist
or ecclesiastical, in opposition to this development may be
taken as a rearguard action, bothersome perhaps but selfcorrective. In the classical style it seeks to establish norms
in some unchangeable and abstract set of principles, to which
believers and theologians alike may have recourse.
Of course this progress is marred by the ideologies, especially those that tend to reduce religion by the hermeneutic
of suspicion to the expression of either hidden psychological
obsession (in the manner of Freud) or socio-economic oppression (in the manner of Marx) . Without denying the legitimacy
of this hermeneutic, especially in the unmasking of the unauthentic in the traditions as they are lived in the modern world,
we would want to make a plea for the complementary hermeneutic of recovery (in the manner of P. Ricoeur), with a view

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MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

toward establishing the peculiarity of the word that is addressed to the human subject in religious experience.
Lonergan speaks of an asymptotic movement of theology and
religious studies toward a relationship that is overlapping
and that eventually renders them interchangeable. This is
accomplished, according to him, through the intelligent and
reasonable use of the entire battery of methods: empirical
(both those which are peculiar to one or another of the disciplines and that which is transcendental: generalized empirical method) , critico-historical, dialectical, and praxis. Let
us see how this might work out concretely, and, on that account, dynamically.
The use of generalized empirical method (GEM) might be
considered in the first place, because it is both pervasive and
crucial. At the outset, moreover, a distinction might be brought
to bear. GEM is employed in act'U exercito wherever human
subjects are attentive to data, intelligent in the inquiry aimed
at understanding, and reasonable in the assessment of what is
understood. Such is the experiment that Lonergan refers to
as taking place in the historical process. 8 In actu signato, however, GEM is operative only where a person is responding to
the challenging invitation to intellectual conversion, i.e., where
a more or less coherent effort is being made to appropriate
rational consciousness: to " catch oneself " in the experience of
experiencing, understanding, and judging; to understand what
it is to experience, understand, and judge: to make true judgments concerning experience, insight, and judgment. To do
this, and to confirm what is done by the practise of this kind
of reflexive awareness, insight, and judgment brings about a
converted rational consciousness, that is coming into possession
of its own dynamic activity, knowing what it is doing when it
is knowing, capable at any given moment of discerning the
operation that is taking place within consciousness, and knowing also the relation of what is occurring now with what preceded and what is forthcoming. Such expertise would seem
8 1985, 152.

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

675

to be a rarity. 9 So also is the complementary development of
coming to realize what it is in this dynamic process that constitutes the knowing subject precisely as a knower, and finally
the crowning achievement of discerning what it is that is known
in the process (cf. J,onergan (1972)), 13-25.
It might be hoped that all those engaged in both religious
studies and in theology would qualify as employing GEM in
both the first and the second senses. The fact of the matter,
however, is that consistent and coherent intelligence and reasonableness is not to be taken for granted, either in the sifting out of data, the interpretation of texts, the assessment of
what is going forward in history, or the dialectical evaluation
of the tradition. This is the force of the observation that we
have come to the end of the scientific age of innocence. A
fortiori is it the case that intellectual conversion is not to be
assumed. What can be done simply is to promote intellectual
conversion, both in oneself and in others, in the manner, though
certainly not with equal thoroughness, that Lonergan himself
has promoted it in the writing of Insight.
The promotion of intellectual conversion is both for the
benefit of religious studies and theology, taken singly, and
for their eventual merger. Where human subjects are lovingly
responsible in their scholarship and study, they choose to be
attentive to the data at hand for research, and therefore in
the long run will cause to appear whatever is relevant for
interpretation. In the same context responsible exegetes make
conscious choices to handle the relevant texts with careful
intelligence, conducting an exhaustive inquiry regarding their
meaning, never completely satisfied with the results, always
ready to revise where new data turn up to constitute a challenge to old interpretations. Responsible historians will assiduously cultivate and develop their method to reconstruct
the constructions of past moments in the progress and/or decline of the tradition under scrutiny. Finally, religious and
9 For a description
of intellectual
see Lonergan (1972), 238-240.

conversion that suggests its arduousness,

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MAURICE SCHEPERS, O.P.

moral authenticity will energize those who engage in dialectics
to select out of the tradition (s) those elements which are complementary and those which are contradictory. They will
invite their colleagues in the academic community to promote
the former, e.g., the complementarity of the various cultural
expressions of Christian doctrine, while engaging in the reversal of what surfaces as contradicting the thrust of the tradition. In this connection, of course, what Lonergan has said
about dialogue, as it promotes the authenticity of the investigator, as well as the reformation of the tradition that is investigated, is crucial (1985, 159) .
The introduction of the condition, " where human subjects
are lovingly responsible," indicates that intellectual conversion
cannot be thought of as being achieved in isolation from moral
and religious self-transcendence. Lonergan's position on this
is clear:
Though religious conversion sublates moral, and moral conversion
sublates intellectual, one is not to infer that intellectual comes first
and then moral and finally religious. On the contrary, from a causal
viewpoint, one would say that first there is God's gift of his love.
Next the eye of this love reveals values in their splendor, while the
strength of this love brings about their realization, and that is
moral conversion. Finally, among the values discerned by the eye
of love is the value of believing the truths taught by the religious
tradition, and in such tradition and belief are the seeds of intellectual conversion. For the word, spoken and heard, proceeds from
and pentrates to all four levels of intentional consciousness. Its
content is not just a content of experience but a content of experience and understanding and judging and deciding. The analogy
of sights yields the cognitional myth. But fidelity to the word
engages the whole man (1972, 243).

The conversions then are foundational, not merely for human
living, but even for the work of the religious scholar and the
theologian. They are the basis of the effective coordination
of the " whole battery of methods." In the presence of the
conversions this entire battery will be developed with systematic results, while without them their use will be sporadic
and the results of the sporadic use will be limited. The cmnula-

CONVERSION AND CONVERGENCE

677

tive and progressive result of the conversions is the openness
of the human subject to himself or herself as pure question; and
in the context of religious studies/theology, this implies not
only the use of dialectic, verging always toward dialogue, in
the sorting out of the authentic from the unauthentic, but also
the adoption of praxis as method, in the mediation of religion
to a given culture in its present state.
As Lonergan has stated, praxis as method is an instance of
development from above downwards: "the use of this method
follows from a decision that is comparable to the claim of
Blaise Pascal that the heart has reasons which reason does not
know" (1985, 161). In the context of religious studies, such
a decision will bring about the discernment of a distortion in
the religious situation of the world at large, namely, the adversarial relationship of the great world religions, where they
come into contact with one another. "What are [we] going to
do about it? What use are [we] to make of [our] knowledge
of nature, of [our] knowledge of man, of [our] awareness of
the radical conflict between man's aspiration to self-transcendence and, on the other hand, the waywardness that may distort his traditional heritage and even his own personal life? "
(ibid.). In the spirit of F. Heiler, it will see cooperation among
the adherents of the various religions as the preface to mutual
understanding. The promotion of cooperation will bring about
the awareness of the common convictions that underlie the
disparate objectifications of faith (the eye of love) in religious
belief. It will also provide the ground for the twofold hermeneutic: the hermeneutic of suspicion to discern the unauthentic
in the tradition as it is passed on from generation to generation and the hermeneutic of recovery to uncover the elements
of the tradition that promote authenticity in its adherents.
As regards the first of these hermeneutics, where unauthenticity
in the tradition is ferreted out, religious studies will extend
an invitation to reform.
Praxis in the context of theology will operate in an analogous
way to promote unity among the various confessions within

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MAURICE SCHEPERS,

O.P.

a single religious tradition (e.g., the denominations of Christianity) and the different theological schools in one and the
same denomination. Again the conversions are foundational
in the discernment of distortion. Authentic subjects are discerning subjects in this regard, for objectivity is the fruit of
subjective authenticity. Especially religious and moral conversion are the source of the decision to do something about
the distortion. Here we can appeal to the ecumenical movement as a typical exercise of praxis. In the approach that the
Christian Chmches have made toward one another is revealed
the success of the twofold hermeneutic; in the degree to which
they remain alienated are revealed biases which remain to be
overcome.
If on the surface it appears that, from the angle of praxis,
religious studies and theology still remain only parallel to
one another, the reason is probably that we are still viewing
the two movements as taking place on their own (like the two
rockets in space). The fact is, of course, that concretely there
are theologians and religious scholars, all human subjects, constantly being called forward to a more intensive and extensive
authenticity. Insofar as through the conversions they are
brought in touch with the reality of their own being, as oriented tovrnrd the transcendent, toward value, and toward
truth, their efforts will converge. They will see themselves
as involved in an enormous ongoing work of understanding
the religious dimension of human life, not in isolation from
other dimensions, but in coordination. Thus the convergence
of religious studies and theology, in the converted human subjects, who are the theologians and religious scholars, will eventually show the way to the unification in tension of the other
scientific disciplines, a process that needs to be catalyzed.
Perhaps in light of all this it is inappropriate at the present
juncture to get all hot and bothered about the organization of
the menus that represent the offerings of departments of religious studies, of religion, and of theology. At least on the
undergraduate level the pervasive aim would seem to he foundational. Thus, in biblical studies, the orientation is toward

CONVERSION

679

AND CONVERGENCE

initiating in the students an inquiry regarding the compound
of authenticity and unauthenticity in the developing tradition that is represented in the literature. Theologica1 studies
are concerned with the struggle for balance in the tradition
of the 'Understanding of the gift and the message, and the selfunderstanding of the community. Historical studies make
their contribution by exhibiting the radical conflict between
authenticity and unauthenticity in the future development of
a tradition, thus suggesting the need for dialectic and dialogue.
Finally, the study of the religions outside one's own tradition
manifests that self-same struggle, and promotes some understanding of the distorted situation. Being exposed to the issue
of conversion from these various angles should provide the
opportunity for reflection concerning one's own foundations.
MAURICE

SCHEPERS,

0.P.

La Salle University
Philadelphia

Butterfield, H., The Origins of Modern Science: 1300-1800.
N.Y.: The Free Press, 1965 (paperback edition of 1957
revision) . '255 pp.
Doran, R., Subject and Psyche. Washington, D.C.: University
of America Press, 1979. vi, 318 pp.
Lash, Nicholas, "Catholic Theology and the Crisis of Classicism," in New Blackfriars (June, 1985), '279-'287.
Lamb, M., " Praxis and Generalized Empirical Method," from
M. Lamb (ed.), Creativity and Method (Milwaukee:
Marquette University Press, 1981), 54-77.
Lonergan, Bernard J. F., Insight. N.Y.: Philosophical Library,
1958. xxx, 785 pp. Method in Theology. N.Y.: Herder and
Herder, 197'2. xii, 405 pp. A Third Collection. Edited by
Frederick Crowe, S.J. N.Y./Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1985.
v, '256 pp.
Riley, P. B., "Theology and/or Religious Studies: Bernard
Lonergan's Option," in Lonergan Workshop, vol. IV
(edited by F. Lawrence). Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983,
115-140.

HUSSERL ON GALILEO'S
INTENTIONAI,ITY

1J

HE PROBLEM OF THE compatibility between pheomenology and history is the unique problem characterizing Edmund Husserl's The Crisis of European
Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology. 1 Husserl attempts to resolve the pvoblem by directly investigating the
crisis of the modern sciences-a crisis which he claims begins
with Galileo. The aim of this essay is to evaluate critically
Husserl's assessment of Galileo as the originator of the crisis.
I hope to show that, given Husserl's own demands for the proper
historico-phenomenological investigation of the crisis, his conclusions about Galileo are not justified. This will be accomplished, in part, by using some of the work on Galileo done by
William A. Wallace, 0.P.
THE "ORIGIN" OF THE CRISIS
Husserl describes the crisis of European sciences in terms
of a teleological movement. The telos began with the radical
change effected by the ancient Greeks in their recognition that
reason is essential to humanity, and that reason is the entelechy
of humanity. 2 For the Greeks, one of the exigencies of reason
is a universal knowledge of what is, in which truth in itself,
episteme, is attainable. The telic character of reason is revealed in the fact that reason in its philosophical mode continually moves from latent to manifest reason beginning with
the Greeks. Husserl writes: " ... the telos ... was inborn in
1 Translated, with an introduction,
by David Carr (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970) ; abbreviation: Orisis.
p. xxxviii to the Orisis for a discussion of the
2 See Carr's Introduction
sense in which the Greeks' change was a radical one.

680

HUSSERL ON GALILEO'S INTENTIONALITY

681

European humanity at the birth of Greek philosophy-that
of humanity which seeks to exist, and is only possible, through
philosophical reason, moving endlessly from latent to manifest reason and forever seeking its own norms through this, its
truth and genuine human nature ... " 3 The search for a universal knowledge initially had a " na'ive obviousness " which
from the very beginning was not immune to transformations
that eventually would increase and achieve greater and greater
sophistication.
For Husserl, the transformations are brought about by skepticism, which, in its denial of the presence of reason in " the
factually experienced world," finally reaches the point where
" ... the deepest essential interrelation between reason and
what is in general, the enigma of all enigmas, has to become
the actual theme of inquiry." 4 This inquiry ought to be the
task for contemporary philosophy. Such a task has been recognized to a certain extent beginning with Hume and on through
Kant and beyond. What Hume and Kant attempted with regard to the Renaissance renewal of the ancient Greek ideal of a
universal philosophy, Husserl prescribes in a more radical way
for Hume and Kant themselves, indeed, for the whole of the
history of philosophy and (modern) science. 5
Husserl's immediate task will be to overcome the naive
rationalism of the eighteenth-century and the "unnoticed
na'ivetes" of the present day, so that the genuine sense of
rationalism may be established. A philosophy is needed which
would bring the entelechy of reason to its realization; this is,
Husserl explains, reason " ... fully conscious of itself in its own
essential form, i.e. the form of a. universal philosophy which
grows through consistent apodictic insight and supplies its own
norms thl'ough an apodictic method." 6 Such a task is intrinsically historical since the manifestation of reason can only
come about through concepts, problems, and methods which
s Husserl, p. 15.
4 Ibid., p. 13.
s Ibid., p. 1.
6 Ibid., p. 16.

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PETER J. CATALDO

are themselves inescapably inherited. We must proceed, then,
by "exhibiting" and "testing" the "inner meaning and hidden teleology" of philosophy's history. Husserl concludes:
What is clearly necessary (what else could be of help here?) is
that we reflect back, in a thorough historical and critical fashion,
in order to provide, before all decisions, for a radical self-understanding; we must inquire back into what was originally and always sought in philosophy, what was continually sought by all the
philosophers and philosophies that have communicated with one
another historically; but this must include a critical consideration
of what, in respect to the goals and methods (of philosophy), is
ultimate, original, and genuine and which, once seen, apodictically
conquers the will.1

This text is enormously important for resolving the question
of the compatibility between historical and phenomenological
analyses. It is a statement which contains the fundamental
elements of the synthesis of historical and phenomenological
investigation.
Husserl's parenthetical question at the beginning of the text
indicates the inextricability of the connections which are to
follow in the text; nothing else will be of help in the current
philosophical predicament because there is no need for such
help. The synthesis described is presented as the truth. Husserl
tells us that we must "reflect back" (Riickbesinnungen), i.e.
we must go back into the historical past, and we must at the
same time go back reflectively, discovering the telos of reason.
Husserl's text allows one to conclude that the very meaning of presence and origin include historical genesis. If presence is the direct experience of the subject who is free from
every prejudice, then this necessarily includes being present to
a presence which was passed, i.e. to an original experience which
is past, and which, perhaps, is an occluded one. Enzo Paci
explains this point well in his The Function of the Sciences and
the Meaning of Man:
But the living presence (the present time) also contains the past,
and retains and recollects the past that constitutes it, even if that
7 Ibid.,

p. 17-18.

HUSSERL ON GALIJ,Eo's INTENTIONALITY

683

past is occluded. The living presence contains its historical genesis,
and the historical genesis contains the living presence: the point of
arrival of the genesis, the present, coincides with the present that
I rediscover by means of the reduction. 8

Paci is quick to point out that this coincidence is never absolute, i.e. that the unity of presence as origin in the past and
the presence of the present time cannot be an absolute identity.
An origin as past is always in the origin of the present time as
a representing:
It must he borne in mind that in fact I do not return to the
past, but re-present it in remembrance, i.e., I recall (in an activity
which is in the present). If in fact I do not flow back, but instead
leap with " seven-league boots," it is because I am dealing with
the actual time of memory and not with the past of what is being
remembered. Historiography is free to skip from century to century precisely because it starts from the present, or because it
follows a new interest in which the present becomes detached from
itself owing to a new horizon. 9

Thus, Husserl must proceed in what he calls a circle; he explains this circle in the following:
Thus we find ourselves in a sort of circle. The understanding of
the beginning is to be gained fully only by starting with science
as given in its present-day form, looking back at its development.
But in the absence of an understanding of the beginnings the
development is mute as a development of meaning. 10

Paci emphasizes that in the search for the historical origin of
the crisis we cannot return to or become the past; this much
is clear from the nature of time consciousness.
However, I submit that in his zeal to be thorough in the
critical aspect of the Riiokbesinnungen, Husserl failed to come
to an understanding of the origin as past in the case of Galileo's
motivation, i.e. in Galileo's own presence now a part of our
a Translated, with an Introduction, by Paul Picone and James E. Hansen
(Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1972), p. 21-22.
o Ibid., p. 23. This point can also be understood in terms of what Paci
calls " temporal irreversibility."
io Husserl, p. 58.

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PETER J. CATALDO

origin as past. This claim is made despite Husserl's own admission that a much more exact historical analysis of Galileo is
possible than the one given in the Crisis:
... I have linked all our considerations to his name (Galileo's) in
a certain sense simplifying and idealizing the matter, a more exact
historical analysis would have to take account of how much of
his thought he owed to his " predecessors." . . . In respect to the
situation as he found it and to the way in which it had to motivate him and did motivate him according to his known pronouncements, much can be established immediately so that we understand
the beginning of the whole bestowal of meaning upon natural
science. 11

This text and the general approach which it represents beg the
question of Galileo's motivation. Husserl's position depends
on a suppressed assumption which need not be accepted. It is
assumed that " a more exact historical analysis," repeating
Husserl's words, " ... of how much of his thought he owed to
his ' predecessors,' " can be considered separately from, and
has no significant bearing upon, Galileo's own motivation, and,
hence, upon the question of Galileo's role in generating the
crisis of the sciences. Only on such an assumption can Husserl's
analysis proceed, but this assumption is the very thing which
needs proof if the argument is to be successful. For it can be
argued, as it will be in this essay, that just the converse is true;
namely, that Galileo's motivation and role in the dawning of
modern science cannot be understood apart from a careful look
at what he assimilated from his predecessors, and that such
an analysis presents a different picture of Galileo. (It is appropriate to point out at this juncture that this fallacious move
by Husserl, and his historical misconception of Galileo, would
seem to count as evidence of a more general failure in the Crisis
to reach the goal of a synthesis between history and phenomenology. However, pursuing such a question is not the aim of
this essay.)
11 Ibid., pp. 57-58.
See Husserl, p. xxxii and David Carr, Phenomenology
and the Problem of History: A Study of Husserl's Transcendental Philosophy
(Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 197 4), p. 49 for the acknowledgement that the historical analysis should be done "in great detail."

HUSSERL ON GALILEo's INTENTIONALITY

685

GALILEO'S "ORIGINAL" OCCLUSION
What, then, does Husserl say about Galileo? The answer
to this question is our present concern. Today's crisis of the
sciences has its origin, according to Husserl, in the particular
way that the mathematization of nature took place, beginning
with Galileo. Husserl points out that Galileo inherited the traditions of advanced pure and applied geometry. The mathematics of Galileo's day had, as Husserl explains it, accomplished
two basic things: first, it had idealized the world of bodies
through an " a priori all-encompassing method ... which is
not just postulated but is actually created, apodictically generated;" 12 second, through its empirical application, mathematics presents a new objectively true knowledge understood
in the form of " a methodology of measurement for objectively
determining shapes in constantly increasing ' approximation '
to the geometric ideals, the limit-shapes." 13 Husserl claims that
this sort of knowledge consummately fulfilled for Galileo the
ancient postulate of episteme in the sphere of spatio-temporal
shapes. 14
In Galileo's continual pursuit to perfect methods of measurement there is an untested presupposition that the other aspects
of nature can be " constructively determined " in the same way
as nature in its spatio-temporal aspect; hence, even the sensequalities of nature are truly known only through the corresponding" mathematical index." Husserl summarizes Galileo's
unconscious generalization in this way:
There must be measuring methods for everything encompassed
by geometry, the mathematics of shapes with its a priori ideality.
And the whole concrete world must turn out to be a mathematizable and objective world if we pursue those individual experiences
and actually measure everything about them which, according to
the presuppositions, comes under applied geometry-that is, if we
work out the appropriate method of measuring. If we do that
p. 32.
pp. 28-29.
14 Ibid., p. 23.
12 Husserl,

rn Ibid.,

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PETER J. CATALDO

the sphere of the specifically qualitative occurrences must also be
mathematized indirectly. 15

Galileo's idealization of the intuitively experienced world is
thus really a "coidealization." 16 The spatio-temporal aspect
of material bodies receives an idealization in " pure limitshapes," and the material sense-qualities, the " plena " are idealized into objects such as " tone-vibrations," and " warmthvibrations." 11
Husserl is always careful to refer to mathematization as
indirect mathematization (as is observed in the last text) since
a direct mathematization is in principle impossible. This is
so because the" empirical-intuitable world," or more generally,
the life-world, does not of itself have a" mathematizable worldform." 18
Husserl's term "indirect" also reminds us that Galileo's
mathematization of nature in fact makes a surreptitious substitution; it is,
. . . the surreptitious substitution of the mathematically constructed world of idealities for the only real world, the one that is
actually given through perception, that is ever experienced and
experienceable-our every-day life-world. This substitution was
promptly passed on to his successors, the physicists of all the
succeeding centuries. . . . It was a fateful omission that Galileo
did not inquire back into the original meaning-giving achievement
which, as idealization practiced on the original ground of all theoretical and practical life-the immediately intuited world (and
here especially the empirically intuited world of bodies )-resulted
in the geometrical ideal constructions. He did not reflect closely
on all this: on how the free, imaginative variation of this world
and its shapes results only in possible empirically intuitable shapes
and not in exact shapes; on what sort of motivation and what new
achievement was required for genuinely geometric idealization. 19
1s Ibid., p. 38.
1a Ibid,
11 Ibid.,

p. 36.

1s Ibid., pp. 34-35. Husserl describes

indirect mathematization as a result
of a regulation or guidance by "a world of idealities . . . such a world
having been objectified in advance through idealization and construction."
(p. 34).
19 Ibid., pp. 48-49.

HUSSERL ON GALILEo's

INTENTIONALITY

687

We have quoted this lengthy text because, as Husserl states,
the problem expressed therein is of the " highest importance;"
it pinpoints the origin of the crisis in today's science as a surreptitious substitution. Moreover, the text proffers three ways
in which the origin of the crisis can be ascribed to Galileo,
which are here enumerated in their logical order. (I) Galileo
did not conceptualize his mathematization in its original
ground or "meaning-fundament," and this he did by omission-an omission which is actually a closing off of the life
world, what Paci calls Galileo's occlusion. (2) This occlusion
becomes (even for Galileo) a substitution, in which, Husserl
states, "(n) ature is, in its 'true being-in-itself,' mathematical." 20 (3) Galileo did not consider why it is that mathematization can only be indirect. That is, he did not consider that
genuine or legitimate geometric idealization is possible only
when it is " ... understood and practiced in a fully conscious
way," which means two things for Husserl: (a) " ... keeping
always immediately in mind the original bestowal of meaning
upon the method, through which it has the sense of achieving
knowledge about the world," and (b) the method must be
freed from unquestioned traditions within which are presuppositions which obscure any truth the traditions may have. 21
In the next section I will argue that just the opposite of these
three points is the truth for Galileo. This will be accomplished
by reference to a thorough historical analysis such as what
is demanded in Husserl's Rilckbesinnungen.
GALILEO'S INTENTIONALITY
The historical analysis which I will utilize is in the work done
by William A. Wallace, O.P. His meticulous historiographical
20 Ibid., p. 54. These three points represent
the critical side of one and
the same historical analysis by Husserl. Carr, p. 124, puts it well:
". . . Galileo doubtless considered himself a philosopher and would probably
not have recognized the Husserlian distinction between his methodological
'proposal' and an ontological claim. But Husserl is convinced that there is
such a distinction to be made, and this reveals something about the character
of his historical reflections, namely, the fact that they are critical as well."
I agree with the second statement and disagree with the first.
21 Husserl, p. 47.

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PETER J. CATALDO

and paleographical research provides convincing evidence that
the methodology employed by Galileo in his scientific explanation was a realist methodology. Galileo was certainly
no phenomenologist, and yet it is clear that the three phenomenological criticisms cited at the end of the previous section are proven untrue to the extent that Galileo had a realist
methodology. It is not only significant that Galileo had a
realist methodology contrary to the predominant interpretations that his methodology was either Platonistic, or the precursor to the hypothetico-deductive methodology used by
modern science. I wish to draw out a further conclusion from
Wallace's thesis: namely, that in virtue of its realism, Galileo's
methodology did not generate the crisis of reason which Husserl
argues is inherent to the methodology of modern science.
I will proceed by briefly tracing Galileo's realistic motivation through his early, middle and late periods. Some emphasis
will be given to his Two New Sciences in his late period since
it is by this work that he is recognized as inaugurating modern
science, and because in this work as much as any other Galileo
does the sort of thing Husserl claims he does not, i.e. he presents his idealizations in a fully conscious way.
Wallace shows in his" The Problem of Causality in Galileo's
Science" 22 that, beginning with a course on Aristotle's Posterior Analytics in 1588 by Paolo Valla at the Collegio Romano,
Galileo subscribed to a realist notion of scientific explanation.
"Wallace has enumerated the many Aristotelian causal concepts
and methods of scientific demonstration adopted by Galileo
in the early writings (1588-15!H) of the Logical Questions,
Physical Questions and De moto antiquiora. For example,
Galileo affirms causal distinctions such as between true causes
(verae causae) and improper causes,
22Review of Metaphysics, 36 (March 1983): 607-632. For Wallace's comprehensive account of the sources for Galileo's Logical Questions and Physi·
cal Questions, and the development of Galileo's early concepts throughout his
writings, see Wallace's Galileo and His Sources: The Heritage of the Oollegio
Romano in Galileo's Science (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984).

HUSSERL ON GALILEO'S INTENTIONALITY

689

... between causes per se and those per accidens; between univocal
and equivocal causes; between internal causes, matter and form,
and external agent and end; between the four kinds of physical
cause-efficient, material, formal and final-and then between the
two subspecies of final cause, intrinsic and extrinsic; between creating and conserving causes; between proximate or immediate causes
and those that are remote; between causes in essendo and those in
cognoscendo; between causes more known to us and those more
known in themselves; between causes convertible with their effects
and those that are not; and so on.23
Such realistic aspects of nature indicate that nature is something very different from what Husserl ascribes to Galileo;
and it was a concept which remained essentially the same for
Galileo from beginning to end of his career. "\-Vallace remarks
that, "(n) ature is for him a principle of motion, and thus
different motions reveal different natures; nature, moreover,
does not tend to anything infinite and indeterminate but rather
acts for a specific end." 24 All such claims of Wallace's are welldocumented, but even a cursory glance at the pages of the
Physical Questions, for instance, exhibits Wallace's point about
nature, and about Galileo's affirmation of Aristotelian concepts;
the following is a good example:
... each element has a proper substantial form that is distinct and
different from its alterative and motive qualities. This is obvious
from its various operations and properties, which must proceed
from different forms. Finally, it follows from all the arguments
given in the first Physics proving that there is such a thing as
substantial form. 25
Wallace also reports that Galileo fully utilized the two main
types of demonstration in Aristotelian science, propter quid
23 Ibid., pp. 611-612. All of the influences in Galileo's causal explanation,
and other aspects of his thought are fully documented in Wallace's Prelude
to Galileo: Essays on Medieval and Si(J)teenth-Oentury Sources of Galileo's
Thought (Boston: D. Reidel Publishing Co., 1981).
24 Wallace, "The Problem of Causality in Galileo's Science," p. 613.
25 Galileo's Early Notebooks:
The Physical Questions: A Translation from
the Latin, with Historical and Paleographical Commentary, trans. by William A. Wallace (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1977) p.
190.

690

PETER J. CATALDO

and the quia, and that these were carried out within the procedure of demonstrative regressus, which will be treated below.
As for the notions of the propter quid and the quia, Wallace
explains that " ... the first .[propter quid] is made through proximate causes that are true and proper in essendo and these may
be either intrinsic or extrinsic; quia demonstration, on the other
hand, is from a remote cause or from an effect, the latter when
the effect is more known to us." 26
One finds in Galileo's middle works as well the same sort
of search for the verae causae in nature. For example, in the
Letters on Sunspots (1613) Galileo criticizes the German Jesuit
Christopher Scheiner for adhering
... to the theory of eccentrics, deferents, equants, epicycles, and
the like as if they were real, actual and distinct things. These,
however, are merely assumed by mathematical astronomers in
order to facilitate their calculations. They are not retained by
philosophical astronomers who, going beyond the demand that they
somehow save the appearances, seek to investigate the true constitution of the universe-the most important and most admirable
problem that there is. For such a constitution exists; it is unique,
true, real and could not possibly be otherwise. 27

Galileo explicitly shows here that he is aware of the significance
of the difference between " convenience in astronomical computations " and the integrity of nature. As a matter of fact,
if we did not know any better we would be inclined to think
that Husserl had the above quotation in mind what he wrote
the .following in the Crisis: "This actually intuited, actually
experienced and experienceable world, in which practically our
whole life takes place, remains unchanged as what it is, in its
own essential structure and its own concrete causal style, whatever we may do with or without techniques." 28
Galileo's consciousness of the meaning-fundament of the lifeworld is found in his use of demonstrative regressus and reasonThe Problem of Causality in Galileo's Science," p. 614.
and Opmions of Galileo, ed. and trans. by Stillman Drake
(Garden City: Anchor Books, 1957), pp. 46-47.
2s Husserl, pp. 50-51.
26 Wallace,

21 Disaoveries

HUSSERL ON GALILEO'S INTENTIONALITY

691

ing ex suppo.ntione. Wallace summarizes the regres.'IU8methodology stated in Galileo's Latin manuscript, Logical Questions:
. . . the demonstrative regressus . . . is made up of a two-fold
progressus or two progressiones. The first progressus is from effect
to cause and the second from cause to effect. The charge of circularity can be avoided, he (Galileo) points out, because it is one
thing to come to know a cause materialiter and quite another to
come to recognize it formaliti:;r, i.e., precisely as it is the cause of a
proper effect. The first progressus must be a quia demonstration
that concludes from a more known effect to the existence of an
unsuspected cause, which at first is grasped only in a material way.
Then, after due consideration of the mind, one sees that the newly
discovered cause properly and formally accounts for the effect
from which the first progressus started; at this point one can proceed to the second progressus that makes explicit the propter quid
explanation of the effect.29
This methodology, under which reasoning ex sitppositione is
subsumed, is used in the later works, Dialogue Concerning the
Two Chief World Systems (1630) and the Two New Sciences
(1638) . Its use in these works will serve to show that intrinsic
to the methodology is the preservation of what for Husserl is
the meaning-fundament of the life-world.
Reasoning ex suppositione dates back to Aristotle's works,
and in its classical and Renaissance meaning it did not have
the sense of simply being a hypothesis which contains probable
truth. 30 A suppositio could mean the latter but its most significant meaning was a condition or cause in nature which is
known to be true. Ex suppositione reasoning, then, can proceed from a suppositio, which has already been established
a posteriori, to its necessary cause, the vera caiwa. The reasoning involving the conjectural meaning of siippositio begins
29 Wallace,

"The Problem of Causality in Galileo's Science," pp. 614-615.
William A. Wallace, "Aristotle and Galileo: The Uses of hypothesi
( supposito) in Scientific Reasoning," Studies in Philosophy and the History
of Philosophy, Vol. 9, Studies in Aristotle, ed. by Dominic J. O'Meara. See
p. 75 where Wallace translates a passage from a letter ( 1640), in which
Galileo states that he has been a true Aristotelian philosopher in the sup·
posizioni he has used in his reasoning.
3o See

692

PETER J. CATALDO

with an unobservable antecedent condition or cause in a conditional "if p then q;" if the consequent is empirically verified, then the antecedent (the suppo.'fitio) obtains with only
probably truth (otherwise there is a fallacia consequentis), if
not, then the antecedent is false. 31 Wallace points out here
that this latter sort of hypothetical reasoning was usually distinguished as ex hypothesi. Reasoning e:r suppositione can also
be formally expressed as " if p then q," according to Wallace,
but the " p " pertains to the order of appearance where an effect
takes place always or for the most part, and the "q" designates " an antecedent cause or condition necessary to produce
that result." 32
In the case of the Two Chief World
Galileo has
Salviati criticize the conclusiveness of the Ptolemaic arguments
in the Third Day because of their merely hypothetical chararter. But in the Fourth Day, Galileo indicates, according to
my reading of the argument, that he will employ the regresstui
method to demonstrate the true cause of the tides. This is
initially apparent from his claim that, "reciprocally, this ebb
and flow itself cooperates in confirming the earth's mobility." 33
Galileo then goes on to argue in the reciprocal fashion of the
regressus. Salviati argues in the preliminary progressus from
the suppositio of the tidal phenomena to their necessary cause
in the earth's motion, albeit not known in a formal way. This
he does by recalling with Sagredo their knowledge of the tides
in different parts of the world, and by disproving previous
theories of the tides which presumed an immobile earth. His
next step is to show that the motions of a barge filled with water
are proportionate to the motions required to produce the observed effects of the tides. After this point, the second progressus is made in which there is a geometrical explanation
81 See William A. Wallace,
Causality and Scientific Explanation Vol. I.
(Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1972), p. 95.
32 Ibid., p. 95.
33 Translated
by Stillman Drake (Berkeley and Los Angeles; University
of California Press, 1967), p. 416.

HUSSERL ON GALILEO'S INTENTIONALITY

693

of the annual and diurnal motions of the earth, which are analogous to the motions of the barge; this explanation is the formal
account of the effect given in the first progressns. Aside from
the particular defects of Galileo's barge analogy, the pertinent
point is that the methodology used to prove the Copernican
theory incorporates the starting point in the intuited world
of experience as a sine qua non of the second progressus which
formally identifies the vera causa. The inclusion is a methodological one, i.e. it is conscious and deliberate.
Galileo's procedure for demonstrating " naturally accelerated
motion " in the Two New Sciences is even more revealing of his
conscious effort not to occlude the intuited world of experience,
because his argument depends on mathematical idealizations. 34
Wallace quite legitimately interprets the passage where Galileo
reports his procedure as a procedure which begins a posteriori
from experiments with a ball rolling down an inclined plane at
measured heights of fall and distances of projection (without
recording elapsed times)-this comprises the first progressus.
The second progressus concludes in the times squared law of
accelerated motion which can be verified in nature; that is to
say, the law is consciously known as the formal expression of
34 See Two New Sciences, trans. with Introduction
and Notes, by Stillman
Drake (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1974) p. 153 for
Galileo's statement of the theory: " ... it is appropriate to seek out and
clarify the definition that best agrees with that (accelerated motion) which
nature employs. Not that there is anything wrong with inventing at pleasure
some kind of motion and theorizing about its consequent properties, in the
way that some men have derived spiral and conchoidal lines from certain
motions, though nature makes no use of these (paths) ; and by pretending
these, men have laudably demonstrated their essentials from assumptions
(ex suppositione.)
But since nature does employ a certain kind of acceleration for descending heavy things, we decided to look into their properties
so that we might be sure that the definition of accelerated motion which
we are about to adduce agrees with the essence of naturally accelerated motion. And at length, after continual agitation of mind, we are confident that
this has been found chiefly for the very powerful reason that the essentials
successively demonstrated by us correspond to, and are seen to be in agreement with, that which physical experiments ( naturalia experimenta) show
forth to the senses."

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PETER J. CATALDO

how nature causes bodies to fall. 35 Galileo explicitly states
that nature is the cause of accelerated motion, the properties
of which he is investigating: "But since nature does employ a
certain kind of acceleration for descending heavy things, we
decided to look into their properties so that we might be sure
that the definition of accelerated motion which we are about
to adduce agrees with the essence of naturally accelerated motion." 36 He is also well aware that in nature there are impedimenta such as the law of accelerated motion, preventing
the law-like idealization, from ever being realized as such.
On the one hand, Galileo is looking for the best agreement
between mathematics and nature, and yet he is fully aware
that the uniformities of times and spaces in the law, as such,
have their being in the mind: "And by this same equality of
parts of time, we can perceive the increase of swiftness to be
made simply, conceiving mentally that this motion is uniformly
and continually accelerated in the same way whenever, in any
equal times, equal additions of swiftness are added on." 37
Contrary to Husserl, then, nature for Galileo was not " nature "
in quotation marks. The text quoted earlier from the Letters
on Sunspots and Galieo's statement of the theory of naturally
accelerated motion are but two examples of his use of the idea
of nature which explicitly illustrate that his idea does not conceal, as Husserl claims it does, the " universal causality of the
intuitively given world (as its invariant form) ." 38
Galileo's appreciation of the impedimenta in nature, alluded
to earlier, is yet another aspect of his concept of nature which
is important for evaluating Husserl's assessment in the Crisi,s.
Like Aristotle, Galileo acknowledged two kinds of impediments
to the application of mathematical definitions: they are, in
Wallace's words, impediments due to the "imperfections in
35 See

Wallace, "The Problem of Causality in Galileo's Science," pp. 630-

631.
Drake, Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo p. 153.
p. 154.
38 Husserl pp. 52-53.

36

37 Ibid.,

HUSSERL ON GALILEo'S INTENTIONALITY

695

the matter involved or in the deficiencies of agent causes." 39
As Wallace remarks, the fact that Galileo was not overly concerned with the deficiencies of the agents involved is a sign
that he understood the basic internal cause of falling motion
to be in nature as such, and not in its accidental causes.
There are two points I would like to make concerning Galileo's awareness of the problem of the impedimento or the applicability of mathematics. First, Galileo's clear knowledge
of this problem, and its traditions, makes the following claim
by Husserl simply false: "That this obviousness [of the applicability of the absolute, self-sufficient truth of geometry]
was an illusion . . . that even the meaning of the application
of geometry has complicated sources: this remained hidden
for Galileo ... " 40 Second, Galileo's awareness of different kinds
of suppositio and their use in regressus methodology, shows
that he actively reflected, for more than 50 years, on the problem of the applicability of mathematics. Wallace formulates
four types of suppositio which were used by Galileo:
(I) suppositio of a mathematical principle of definition that is
merely posited for computational purposes and is not true in
nature.
(2) suppositio of a mathematical principle or definition that is true
and absolute and has a valid application in nature.
(3) suppositio of one or more conditions under which a mathematical principle or definition will be verified in nature to a
determinate degree of approximation.
( 4) suppositio of one or more conditions of extraneous efficient
causes that permit a mathematical principle or definition to
be similarly verified. 41

This division of the suppositio reveals a recognition by Galileo
of the precision and refinement of meaning necessary for an
adequate understanding of the indirect and limited relation
Prelude to Galileo, pp. 147-148.
p. 49.
41 Wallace, "Aristotle and Galileo," pp. 72-73. See also Prelude to Galileo,
pp. 140-144; Galileo and His Sources, pp. 293-294, 324-325.
39 Wallace,
40 Husserl,

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PETER J. CATALDO

between scientific formalization and nature, and for an understanding of the applicability of mathematics to nature.
CONCLUSION
All of the information about Galileo's thought given in the
preceding section is evidence that just the opposite is the truth
with respect to the three criticisms cited earlier. The regressus
methodology itself entails that the immediate intuited world
as the meaning-fundament for Galileo's physics js not occluded.
On the contrary, in the regres8us methodology the meaningfundament is consciously upheld in the unity of the two progressiones. The very meaning of the second progressus includes
both its being an explanation of the first progressus, and its
derivation from the first progressus. The references to Galileo's
concept of nature, and his many meanings for suppositio are
also evidence that he did not make the substitution claimed
by Husserl. Lastly, that Galileo reflectively considered the
problem of the applicability of mathematics is evidenced in
his handling of the impedimenta, i.e. through his knowledge
of the genesis of that problem, and in his plural meaning for
suppositio.
Hence, even Galileo's celebrated statements about the book
oi nature being read ju the language of mathematics and the
quantification of sense-qualities cannot be adequately understood apart from all the aspects of his career-long realist
methodology. Moreover, Husserl seems to misinterpret Galileo's theory of sense-qualities. Galileo does not deny the existence of sense-qualities qua perceptual; rather, he is in effect
claiming something similar to Husserl's notion of kinesthesis.
Galileo's point, like Husserl's, is that the sense-qualities are a
result of a unity between consciousness and physical properties
in the living body:
Hence I think that tastes, odors, colors, and so on are no more
than mere names so far as the object in which we place them is
concerned, and that they reside only in the consciousness. Hence
if the living creature were removed, all these qualities would be

HUSSERL ON GALILEo's INTENTIONALITY

697

wiped away and annihilated. But since we have imposed upon them
special names, distinct from those of the other and real qualities
mentioned previously [i.e. physical properties such as being
bounded, or having place, etc.], we wish to believe that they really
exist as actually different from those. 42

Galileo's emphasis is that sense-qualities per se do not exist
in things; this does not entail, however, the denial that they
exist by the combination of consciousness with living bodythis much is essentially the same in Husserl's kinesthesis. 43
The evidence of the sort cited in this essay illustrates that
there was nothing surreptitious, in the sense that Husserl claims
there was, about Galileo's physics. Rather, he reflectively
brought to theoretical consciousness the very problems which
Husserl states form the origin of the crisis of European sciences. Galileo's reflections obviously did not take on the phenomenological genre; nevertheless, in just those basic ways
in which Husserl sees Galileo at the historical origin of the crisis,
Galileo's writings prove the opposite.
What can be said for Galileo's genius? Husserl claims that
it is a " discovering and concealing genius; 44 a genius which
discovered new methods of measurement but which conceals
pernicious presuppositions of the sort we have examined. Husserl describes Galileo the discoverer as a " consummating discoverer." This is quite true, but it is unfortunate that Husserl's
question-begging assumption about Galileo prevented him
from appreciating the phenomenological significance of this
truth. Because it is in this consummating asepect of Galileo's discovering genius that his own origin, his intentionality,
Discoveries and Opinions of Galileo, p. 27 4.
Husserl, pp. 106-107: "Thus sensibility, the ego's active functioning
of the living body or the bodily organs, belongs in a fundamental, essential
way to all experience of bodies. It proceeds in consciousness not as a mere
series of body-appearance, as if these in themselves, though themselves alone
and their coalescences, were appearance of bodies; rather, they are such in
consciousness only in combination with the kinesthetically functioning living
body [Leibichkeit], the ego functioning here in a peculiar sort of activity and
habituality."
44 Ibid., p. 53.
42 Drake,
43 See

698

PETER J, CATALDO

is to be historically found. What is found is a scientific intentionality which was understood and practiced in a fully conscious way, and which did not leave unquestioned the traditions
which it inherited. This same intentionality retained a realist
methodology within which, Wallace acknowledges, was " erected
a mathematical physics that has come to serve as the prototype
for modern science." 45 To the extent that Galileo formulated
this prototype, he is rightly called the " Father of Modern
Science," but he does not thereby also merit the title, " Father
of the Crisis of the Sciences."
PETER

J. CATALDO

Stonehill OoUege
North Easton, Massachusetts

4.5

Wallace, "The Problem of Causality in Galileo's Science," p. 609.

ON "KNOWING THE UNKNOWABLE GOD":
A REVIEW DISCUSSION *

D

AVID BURRELI!S Knowing the Unknowable God:
lbn-Sina, Maimonides, Aqttinas is a sequel to his
earlier (1979) study, Aquinas: God and Action, and

is best understood against that background. It represents a
coming to maturity of a consistent proje.ct on Burrell's part
going all the way back to his 1973 work, Analogy and PhiloS<Yphical Language. Undergirding this impressive effort is the
influence of Bernard Lonergan whose " turn to the subject"
is represented by Burrell in terms of contemporary language
analysis. The turn to the subject becomes in fact a turn to the
originator of language. What issues from all this is an original,
illuminating and coherent interpretation of Aquinas's philosophical theology on the question of God. Within that narrow compass at least, it rivals all other interpretations of
Thomas presently vying for recognition. At the very outset
it should be noted that Burrell understands his exercise as
" clearly a philosophical one, however theological be its goal "
(p. 3) , but one which lies at " the intersection of reason with
faith" (p. 4). The project then is one of philosophical theology
whose concern is with the conceptual clarification of a basic
belief in the sense of a W eltanschauung-or more accurately
what Wittgenstein calls eine Lebensform-not an apologetics
or natural theology reasoning its way to the Prima Causa
Enti..s. The starting point for reflection on God then is praxisnot that of the isolated Cartesian-Kantian thinking and willing self, but that of communal humanity, a praxis into which
*Knowing the Unknowable God: Ibn-Sina, Maimonides, Aquinas. By
DAVID BURRELL, C.S.C., Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1986. Pp.130. $15.95. (Cloth).

699

700

WILLIAM J, HILL, O.P.

religious tradition enters from the beginning, giving rise to an
imaginative picturing of the connection between God and
world that is neither a privileged intuition nor an arbitrary
postulation. The paint de depart then is a preunderstanding,
or what Heidegger calls" situatedness "-not knowledge-claims
already established but understandings that are taken for
granted and considered in practice as beyond the need for
justification. In the present case, that of the doctrine on God,
the preunderstanding is one of an imaginative picturing of the
relation between God and world, one in which God is seen as
the origin and end of everything else. The conceptual clarification of this turns on the real distinction between essence
and existence, and the denial of that distinction in God. Burrell views this as an intercultural and interfaith achievement.
Thus "to understand an apparently philosophical conclusion,
then, one does best to try to identify the religious strands of
which it is woven" (p. lll).
Understandably enough, one does not tend to think of the
high Middle Ages as a period that accentuated ecumenical
concerns. But this most recent volume of Burrell's highlights
a common search by an Islamic (Ibn-Sina or Avicenna) , a
Jewish (Moses Maimonides), and a Christian (Thomas Aquinas) thinker, for a way in which to conceptualize divinity in
its distinction from world. It is not so much a matter of material influence but a formal procedure in which a thinker
enters upon the way of an earlier one in the ·search for the
proper category. The process is not unlike Heidegger's "step
backward " for the sake of forward progress along the way of
thinking. What the three thinkers had in common was a conviction of the real distinction between essence and existence
in the order of finite beings, and a negation of that distinction
in clarifying speech about God. But how that distinction was
variously understood marked a genuine development in the
history of thought.
Ibn-Sina, following a lead of Alfarabi, was the first to make
capital of the distinction. He did so, however, through a mis-

ON "KNOWING THE UNKNOW ABLE GOD"

701

reading of Aristotle who distinguishes in the Posterior Analytics
(Bk. II, Chap. I; 89b33) between awareness that something
is and the awareness of what it is. lbn-Sina's Moslem faith
led him to read this as a distinction between essence and existence, whereas Aristotle meant only that it is one thing to
acknowledge that an object is something and another thing
entirely to acknowledge what kind of thing it is. What
Avicenna knew was that if one came across something as a
"given", presenting itself as "existing", this was not explainable on its own terms but due entirely to the will of
Allah. Its essence, however, manifested a kind of necessity,
in the sense for example that every triangle could not be other
than three-sided. Also at work here was the doctrine of emanationism that Ibn-Sina inherited from Neo-platonism, a world
view going all the way back to Plotinus and the early books
of the Enneads, which delivered to the Moslem thinker the
conviction that the ultimate distinction was that between
necessary being (God) and possible being (creatures). If
the latter was" found", i.e. discovered in the world as existing,
such existence was an accident of the given essence; only in
God was existence identical with the (divine) essence.
Moses hen Maimon appropriated the real distinction in
basically the same sense as did Avicenna-existence is simply
an accident of essence. Its denial in God's case explained the
clear teaching of the Torah that God was radically distinct
from everything else. Some remnant of the emanationistic
scheme remains-1\!Iaimonides speaks of ten spheres of separated intelligences mediating between God and world-but
the creationist theme, owed to the Torah and Talmud, predominates; it is God who creates the separated substances.
This led Maimonides to accentuate the identity of the divine
essence as existence to the point of a through-going theologia
negativa which precluded the application to God of any positive attributes; God was indeed wise but not by wisdom.
Aquinas's thought moved along similar lines but resisted the
radical agnosticism of Maimonides and opened itself instead
to another influence coming from Pseudo-Dionysius which al-

WILLIAM J. HILL, O.P.

lowed that creaturely names could be used to designate the
Creator in an improper and totally relative way. The basis
for this was the causal relationship which established at least
a minimal resemblance of effect to cause (not of cause to effect,
however) , so that an affirmation about God preceded the immediately following negation. God was said to be good before
denying that he was good in the manner of anything finite.
This turned for Thomas on the distinction between the ratio
significata and its modus significandi. The latter was necessarily some noun or verb form conveying either composition
(whatever existed concretely was composed of its elements)
or temporality, neither of which could be attributed to God.
But it was possible for human understanding to negate the
mode of signifying while continuing to affirm the perfection
intended which was in God "eminently", that is to say in
some modeless manner beyond our conceptual powers. But
all of this was a way of clarifying what it meant to understand
the identity of essence and existence in God. Acknowledging
that distinction in the finite world and negating it of God manifested a distinctively Christian component, namely the revelation of God as creator of everything, including matter, ex nihilo.
What was distinctive for Aquinas in all this is the insight or
discovery of existence as actus essendi, as esse meaning the
act of " to be ". God exclusively then was the cause primo and
per se of whatever existed by way participating in being. The
earlier triad of Avicenna and Maimonides: emanation, essence,
and reception (of the intelligible species for understanding)
was replaced by that of Aquinas, namely: creation, esse, and
judgment (as the consummation of knowledge by way of abstraction) .
All this is well known to students of Aquinas and has been
rehearsed frequently and richly. Burrell's treatment, however,
is a reinterpretation whose originality has to be taken into
account as an attempt to carry the discussion forward. Methodologically, Burrell, as already noted, views his project as
one of philosophical theology, whose concern is with conceptual
clarification, something different from natural theology, espe-

ON " KNOWING THE UNKNOW ABLE GOD "

703

cially in the pejorative sense that phrase acquired in the early
19th century, and from apologetics. This presupposes an imaginative scheme which is elaborated but not established,
which Burrell characterizes as " picturing the connection" between God and world, as one in which the former is the source
and destiny of all else. This delivers the identity of God as
the One whose essence is identical with his existence, and the
further insight that existence is the act of essence, the act of
" to be"; the relationship of essence to existence then is an
extrapolation of Aristotle's potency to act relationship. But
Burrell's originality takes him one step further allowing him to
envisage the analogy for act in God as human intentional activity, scil. knowing and loving, more specifically the act of
judgment. By this he is able to say that existence does not
simply come to essence any more than truth comes to the statement; truth is rather established in the very act of judgment.
Judgment then supplies the analogy which enables us to speak
of God's existing, i.e. his actus essendi, as constituting his very
essence.
Pivotal to all this is Burrell's conviction (developed in detail
in his earlier Aquinas: God and Action) that Thomas presents
us not with a doctrine of God at all but with the proper way
to go about talking of God. The issue is not whether our concepts apply to God but how they might be used in discourse
about deity; thus he notes with approval David Kolb's remark about an Aquinas who "looks more like Wittgenstein
than Avicenna" (p. 37) . What is not infrequently referred
to as Thomas's "agnosticism" looms large here in what is less
Christian theology than theology in a Christian mode. Theological reflection is seen here not as science, nor as transcendental reflection, nor even as hermeneutics, but as skill in the
discriminating use of language about God, clarifying what
can and cannot legitimately be said of God. Thus Burrell finds
no neat theory of analogy in Thomas but a sensitivity to the
:flexibility and even the ambiguity of language when it is deployed in thought about the transcendent, with meaning emerging from the usage to which language is put. Perfective terms

704

WILLIAM J, HILL, O.P.

undergo an a.Iteration of meaning as they are placed in differing contexts. It follows from this that analogy always retains
a dimension of metaphor.
Distinguishing God from the world then is a matter of how
to formulate the essence/existence distinction and its denial
in God's case, so as to safeguard God's unknowability and at
the same time, paradoxically, to indicate how he may also be
known. The distinction in short, is found in the world but is
not of the world. Denying it of God means that we can employ expressions that are legitimate as long as we do not pretend to know what they mean. He who is the pure act of" to
be" must lack all limitation, all mutation, all temporal measure;
God is thus spoken of as simple, as immutable, and as eternal.
These are not precisely attributes (such as living, wise, merciful, etc.) but " formal features '', i.e. negative ways of saying
that God is his very act of existing. Burrell does not discuss
in any detail what these expressions might mean to us but he
does note (by way of citing W. Norris Clarke) that God is
responsive to the initiatives of his human creatures and that
this does not call into question his unchangeableness since intentional interaction is not change but the responsiveness of
knowing and loving (pp. 105-106). Also, he spells out clearly
how eternity is something more than timelessness, closer perhaps to timefullness. That we cannot formulate the relationship between time and eternity " argues its transcendence,
not its incoherence" (p. 104). It is precisely in attempting
such a formulation that the scientia media comes to grief, misconstruing God's eternity and conceiving" of God as knowing
what will happen from within a temporal perspective " (p.
105). Even God cannot know what lacks all knowability because it lacks all existence-apart from a purely speculative
knowledge of something as a mere possibility.
Two initial caveats may be felt on the starting point of this
brilliant and illumining study of Burrell's, namely his imaginative picturing of the connection between world and God which
is neither a privileged intuition nor an arbitrary postulation,
and which philosophical theology seeks to clarify. First, it can

ON " KNOWING THE UNKNOW ABLE GOD "

705

be asked if this takes with sufficient seriousness the radical
secularism of the contemporary world, at least the Western
world which no longer feels the need of recourse to God as a
working hypothesis. Secondly, this thesis tends to suggest
the sort of fideism associated with the thought of Wittgenstein:
the world is a mere factual " given " which determines the
grammar that can be deployed in speaking about it; the rules
of such discourse (like those of chess) are neither true nor false
but only govern what can and cannot be said in the particular
language game. Yet Burrell fends off this criticism by acknowledging that religious tradition unavoidably enters in from the
very beginning in forming the imaginative schema, moveover,
the schema that is entertained is not a matter of merely postulated belief but of a primordial experience that grounds belief.
God is only the mysterious and unknown origin and end of the
known world. Fergus Kerr, in paraphrasing Wittgenstein,
clarifies and supports this view of things: " It is because people
exult and lament, sing for joy, bewail their sins, and so on, that
they are able to have thoughts about God. Worship is not the
result but the precondition of believing in God" (Theology
after Wittgenstein, p. 183) .
Quite simply, Burrell is interpreting Thomas's treatise on
God not as a metaphysics of faith but as a metalanguage. It
does not dispel the question as to what or who God is; it rather
supplies us with a grammar governing our talk about God
so that such talk does not deteriorate into what E. J-iingel
calls a " garrulous silencing of him ". The grammar is of course
for Aquinas that of analogy which Burrell views as carrying
meaning, not on the basis of any preconceived theory, but on
the basis of the flexible use of language by the speaker.
Theology is of course talk about God as even its etymology
makes clear. The nerve of such speech for Aquinas is analogy,
which he views as a matter of "naming"; this is the rubric
under which he treats analogy in Question 13 of the Prima
Pars of the Summa Theologiae. Such naming can originate
only from our knowledge of creatures: Non enim possumus

706

WILLIAM J. HILL, O.P.

nominare Deum n?si, ex creaturis (Art ..5) . Yet this does not
imply any commonality between God and world in the sense
of some third thing to which they can bear differing proportions, not even to being. The sole possibility then is one of a
direct proportion whose underpinning is the principle of causality: Quidquid dicitur de Deo et creaturis, dicitur secundum
quod est aliquis ordo creaturae ad Deum ut ad principium et
causam (Art. 5). First of all, then, we are enabled to say, e.g.,
that " God is good " because he is the cause of goodness in
things. But this tells us nothing about what divine goodness
might be like. It is merely the origin of the words we can use
in speaking of the unknown. In a second step, we then deny
that God is good in any of the creaturely senses of the wordthus we arrive at the via negativa of Maimonides. But there
remains a crucial third step: beyond relational and negative
names are others that designate God 811bstantialiter. Some do
so only figuratively (e.g., in the instance of J,uther's singing
"a mighty fortress is my God") because the meaning of the
name cannot be distinguished from its creaturely instantiation;
here the likeness between God and creature is only one of
effect, and so leaves us with a use of language that Maimonides
views as equivocal and that Tillich understands as symbolic
only. But there are other perfective words in which meaning
can be distinguished (not separated) from the mode of signifying that always remains finite. And the former can be
said of God literally (proprie) though never univocally. Indeed, the ratio signifwata is predicated of God primarily and
of the creature only in a derivative sense; the perfection is
said to belong to God eminenter, that is transendently, which
means escaping our powers of understanding or representing.
The difference, then, between metaphorical and analogical
terms as said of God is the causal basis of the latter (though
much more is being said in the latter case than that God is
the cause of the perfection in question). Ultimately, however,
the concern here is with the causality of being as such. This
requires only that God be in act and that the creature exist
in real dependence upon the divine actus essendi. Nothing

ON " KNOWING THE UNKNOW ABLE GOD "

707

needs to be added to God to render him the sole source of
finite beingness-just as nothing needs to be added to the
fire which burns the log other than the proximity of the log
to the fire. Burrell points out that this notion of finite existence
is in fact a new understanding of contingency. Contingency
means not merely that something exists in such wise that it
need not exist (Avicenna's understanding), but that for things
to exist is for them to be in a state of real dependence upon the
Creator. From this it follows that God knows all individual
existents not simply as instantiations of the species but in
their proper individuality. Thus does God call each of us by
name (as Maimonides understood but failed to explain). The
divine knowledge at work here is practical in kind, a knowledge
that precedes the thing known and calls it into existence. This
solves at one stroke the problem of God's knowledge of the
future; he knows everything that exists in the very act of
calling it into existence. What lacks all existence is thus simply unknowable, other than as a possibility of the divine omnipotence, and granting his eternity nothing is future for God.
One final conclusion drawn by Burrell is less clear, namely
that God's creating ex nihilo is an act of divine freedom but
not in the sense of choosing among the infinite possibilities
open to him. The creative activity is not canvassing alternatives and selecting among them. The failure to grasp this is
one of the origins of such explanation as the scientia media.
Burrell is seeking for a more radical notion of divine freedom.
But this must be protected against collapsing such freedom
into the spontaneous self-diffusion of goodness and the consequent retrogression to emanationism.
The upshot of all this is that theology is indeed a metalanguage; its concern is with the process of naming, and we
cannot speak of the transcendent in such wise as to despoil
it covertly of its transcendence. (Moses sees only the back of
God as he passes, and Wittgenstein cautions us to be silent
about that of which we cannot speak) . Burrell's strong point
is his trenchant affirmation of this. Thus, the incomprehensibility of God remains uncompromised; perfective terms said

708

WILLIAM J. HILL, O.P.

literally of God do not enable us to grasp the mystery of God
in himself anymore than do the terms we use only in a metaphorical sense. Such language merely provides a vector in
whose direction we can signify God without representing him.
"It is the knowledge we have of creatures that enable us to
use words to ref er to God, and so these words do not express
the divine essence as it is in itself" (Q. 13, a.I) . But even such
language is ultimately determined by reality in its objectivity,
by what we encounter as recalcitrant to any imposition of
meaning on things by the mind. Ultimately, it is not language
that structures the world of which it speaks, but reality that
offers itself to the mind in such wise as to give birth to the
language event. Aquinas after all does not develop his thought
in the ambiance of a William of Ockham. The metalanguage
at work here does not displace metaphysics but presupposes
it; it does not cease to be an object language for all its finite
and so imperfect mode of signifying. This is not at all incompatible with Gadamer's insistence on the role of preunderstanding which the knower brings to the act of knowledge
and whose content is linguistically mediated. We do think
linguistically and so language does not alienate us from reality
but is the only way we achieve meaningful contact with what
is real.
If Burrell's earlier work, Aquinas: God and Action, seemingly overstated his case in suggesting that language grounds
metaphysics rather than vice versa, this present volume moderates that stance by dispelling any notion that theology,
philosophical or otherwise, treats language about God as formal
and grammatical entities without material content applicable
to God himself in a known unknowing. What continues to
be true is that theology remains incapable of any proper concept of God and so functions as a metalanguage in discerning
what can and cannot be said about an unknowable God. Burrell of course is aware that he is calling our attention to an
intelligibility that is only latent in Aquinas's thought never
explicitly exploited by him. What Burrell has achieved here is

ON " KNOWING THE UNKNOW ABLE GOD "

709

a retrieval of Aquinas's thought on God, in dialogue with Avicenna and Maimonides, that allows it to appear in all its illuminative power. H contemporary theological thought chooses
to pursue the search in different directions-e.g. with an antimetaphysical bias that collapses being into time and historicizes
God himself, with a reduction of divine eternity into what is
rather an infinite temporality, with the " new orthodoxy"
of a suffering God, etc.-studies such as this one remind us
of how much we are shaped by the past. In our human historicity we continuously reinterpret that past thus contributing
to its outcome. But our response to the past out of present
concerns, both theoretical and practical, cannot treat it as an
antiquarian deposit of irrelevant facts. Rather, what Heidegger
calls the " step back " must be a retrieval of the past in its
authenticity. Only thus can we dialogue with the subject
matter in such wise as to make possible the " linguistic event "
that represents genuine advance in understanding.
WILLIAM

The Catholic University of America
Washington, D.O.

J. HILL, O.P.

BOOK REVIEWS
The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics, III: Studies in Theological Style: Lay Styles. By HANS URS VON BALTHASAR. Translated
by Andrew Louth, John Saward, Martin Simon, and Rowan Williams. Edited by John Riches. San Francisco : Ignatius Press, 1986.
Pp. 524.

In this third volume of the Ignatius Press translation of Herrlichkeit,
von Balthasar examines the more significant developments within the tradition of theological aesthetics-as ancient as Irenaeus-from the failure of
" clerical " theology in the late medieval period down to the early twentieth century. He treats here of Dante, John of the Cross, Pascal,
Hamann, Soloviev, and Peguy, finding in each of them a relatively freestanding and harmonious exploitation of themes emerging from the coincidence of free historicity and lucid rationality which is the splendor of
the Christian revelation, of the f orma Christi. Von Balthasar's interest
in these "lay " theologians focuses upon their failure or success in providing an aesthetic resolution of the problems posed by the fact, no longer
capable of being ignored or transmitted, of human solidarity. This
solidarity, in sin and in redemption, challenges the very possibility of a
theological aesthetics, for it requires an aesthetically satisfying integration of the divine justice and the divine mercy, of the human community
as simul justus et peccator, redeemed and yet capable of damnation. This
is finally the problem of reconciling divine and human freedom, and no
theology which fails to face it is worthy of the name. The theologians
under discussion in this volume did face it, however unsuccessfully for
the most part, and their having done so constitutes their interest.
Other issues provide a variable framework for the posing of this
radically Christocentric question: the relation of grace and nature, the
sinfulness or not of the Church, the tension between a Platonizing reading
of the Pauline marital symbolism and the covenantal content of that
symbolism, the debate with the Reformation's refusal of theological
aesthetics, and a rationalist reduction of beauty to formal necessity. It
is also notable that the aesthetic stress of these theologians upon the concrete individual tends to locate them in the Neoplatonic-Augustinian
hermeneutic whose ontological expression is a universal hylemorphism, in
which matter and form express the paradoxical dichotomies of being
rather than its logical integration as in the Aristotelian-Thomist hermeneutic governed by the act-potency analysis. In fact the rejection of the
710

BOOK REVIEWS

711

sterility of the essentialist logic of the latter hermeneutic is a frequent,
.even an insistent, theme among these theologians.
Perhaps the identification of the fundamental problem of theological
aesthetics as the aesthetic integration of our solidarity with the damned
is most evident in the first and last authors discussed, but even in John of
the Cross, whose refusal of historical content to the faith is almost
Bultmannian, the emphasis upon the experiential dimension of our appropriation of the revelation is maintained, and therefore, at least by implication and in the breach, the question of the experiential or aesthetic
synthesis of God's redemptive love with his justice is in issue.
The theological problem which emerges with clarity in this profoundly
instructive inquiry is more properly that of our human solidarity in sin
and in redemption, in the first Adam and in the last. This emphasis is of
course a Pauline inheritance, whose initial exploration by way of the
theological aesthetics of Irenaeus is the beginning of Christian theological aesthetics, but the task of integrating the dialectic of our human
solidarity, as at once in the sin and death caused by the disobedience of
the first Adam, and in the redemption and resurrection worked by the
obedience of the last Adam, constitutes now as then the permanent because fundamental question before any theology which would be responsive, as an aesthetics, to the "ancient beauty, forever new," whose aesthetic integration von Balthasar considers to be the single responsibility
and therefore the hallmark of any adequate Christian theology.
The perennial attempts to meet this responsibility have forced Christian theology to abandon the cosmological preoccupations inherited from
Plato and Aristotle as the price of loyalty to the free historical context
which is alone possible for theology whether it be labelled systematics or
aesthetics. Von Balthasar here echoes the impatience and disillusion of
theologians from the fourteenth century to our own day with a predominantly Aristotelian metaphysical tradition which could not or would
not free itself from the timeless, static cosmos of the Greek philosophers,
and which since Scotus's dismissal of the need for illumination has supposed the immanent, unillumined structures of a rationality henceforth
autonomous to be adequate to the knowledge of God. The aesthetic tradition in theology has preferred another sort of rational coherence or intelligibility, in which the rational articulation of thought is a priori responsive not to the immanent necessities of a determinist and moribund
Aristotelian universe, but rather to the Truth which as freely human reveals itself to be at once beautiful and Triune.
Irenaeus, inspired by Paul, developed that free spontaneity of the
truth as beautiful by tracing the redemptive recapitulation of fallen
humanity in the last Adam, the Christ. The later Augustinian tradition,
perhaps influenced also by Plotinus's insistence upon the coincidence of

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BOOK REVIEWS

necessity and freedom, has increasingly focused upon what Pascal called
the cor rectum, the " organ " by which this beauty is known and appropriated, and thus upon what Anselm had termed the rectitudo, and
Pascal the esprit de justesse, that marks the graced existence which is in
Christ.
Over the centuries, this stress upon the inner " rectitude " (whose exquisite precision of free and concrete articulation in history transcends
all cosmological necessity, and so can only be pointed to by the category,
now seen to be theological, of the beautiful) of this existence in Christ
has forced the discovery of the incompatibility of the old cosmological
aesthetics with the historical freedom, the gratuity, of our relation to
God-which is at once our redemption in Christ and our judgment by
him. In the six authors examined by von Balthasar in this volume, the
passage from cosmology to history (von Balthasar prefers to speak rather
of the shift to anthropology, using the term in the sense of a humanity
specified by its common recognition of mankind's existential transcendence
of all innercosmic categories of necessary causality) demanded by this
implicitly Christocentric aesthetic has entailed a rejection of all "natural
theology " in the sense of an achievement of a supposedly autonomous
rationality, and a correspondingly explicit Christocentrism whose scope
becomes ever more universal. This Christocentrism is paralleled by a rejection also of the classic problematic presented by the old cosmologicallycontrolled theology of nature and grace in favor of an exploration of
the historical dialectic involving the Old Testament, the New Testament,
and the Kingdom, a dialectic whose contemporary exposition by de Lubac
is the most important speculative development by Catholic theology in
this century.
In close association with this Christocentrism, J ohannine as well as
Pauline in its inspiration, is a theological re-entry into the inseparable
Adam-Eve marital symbolism of the New Covenant, increasingly understood in the historical or non-Platonized terms of marital love rather than,
as by most of the patristic sources, as an allegory of the non-historical
(because taken to be cosmic and structural, not covenantal and free) relation between God and the soul or between God and humanity. This historical emphasis is also upon the free reality of the historical individual
rather than upon the necessities of ideal human essence or nature; it is
incidentally underwritten also by the universal hylemorphism of Augustinian theology, at least since Duns Scotus's development, perhaps compensatory for his denial of illumination, of the intellectual intuition of
the haecceitas of the singular. This stress upon the free intelligibility of the
individual corresponds to a recognition of the theological significance of
sexual differentiation which the Aristotelian and Thomist metaphysics had
ignored, and reinforces the growing tendency to find in the marital union

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(not organic or physical, as St. Thomas supposed) of Christ and the
Church the free historical integration of humanity which can displace the
nonhistorical essences and ideal forms of the cosmological speculation still
dominating the clerical metaphysical theology well into the twentieth
century, even in the thought of a Teilhard or a Rahner.
Integral to this development of theological aesthetics is the recognition of the prius of theological aesthetics, which is to say, the a priori of
our .experience of God in Christ. This prius is the free concrete historicity, the unique Christocentricity, of our relation to God, and the essays
at such an aesthetics reviewed in the present volume manifest a growing
impatience with the cosmological prius which would divide as between
nature and grace, cosmos and history, the unity of that aesthetic relation. Now and again there is a more or less fugitive recognition of the
primordiality of the Christ, an ancient insight renewed in this century
especially by Rousselot. We see that Dante knows a pre-existent Church,
however deficient his Christology, while Pascal and Hamann know a preexistent Christ, and the Christological prius which informs Bonaventure's
theological aesthetics also informs Hopkins's theological poetry.
This recognition has its correlative in the rediscovery of the illumination by, or intellectual intuition of, the Truth, a light which Irenaeus as
well as Augustine knew to be indispensable to our understanding, but
which at the end of a long journey can now be seen to be no timeless
cosmological structure but quite simply the utterly radical gift, given
universally, the historical gratia Christi, the first of all His gifts, identical
with creation in Christ, without which we are nothing, but with which we
can appropriate in freedom the splendor of the Son's free revelation of
the Triune God.
Von Balthasar requires of any aesthetic synthesis the integration of the
dialectic heretofore described; this integration has not been achieved by
any of the authors whose work he examines in this volume, as it was not
in the 'clerical styles' of theological aesthetics to whose examination he
devoted the previous volume. The question is thus raised as to the reality
of the claimed advantage of the aesthetic theological project over the
metaphysical theological project of the Thomist schools. While it is too
early to judge the matter, it may be that the intractability of the aesthetic
problem thus far encountered is rooted in the pervasive tendency to
visualize its elements in cosmic terms of structure rather than those of
free historical event, a tendency as manifest in Peguy's work as in
Dante's. Tillich observes somewhere that Hell must be understood existentially, viz., as an actual threat, not as a place where we may, in virtue
of an usurpation sub specie aeternitatis of a divine judgment, locate our
acquaintances. This perhaps rather obvious statement corresponds to the
far more profound dictum of Augustine that the same vision of the risen

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Christ is both beatific and damnific: as you know him, so you have him.
The point of such an observation may be that the theological synthesis
must be a human one, and that it must not presume to include the divine
judgment: it must be historical if it is to be aesthetic. The aesthetic integration of humanity is in Christ, and it is not and cannot be simply
eschatological as the theologians so far examined tend to suppose. As de
Lubac, in congruence with the entir,e patristic tradition, points out, the
one theological synthesis is that which joins the Old Testament, the New
Testament, and the Kingdom of God under the three senses of Scripture,
as type, as antetype, as fulfillment. These must be held in their actual
unity, for it is the unity of Scripture, of history, the unity of man, whose
solidarity in the first Adam is understandable only in terms of solidarity
with the second Adam, Christ the King. This synthesis is that of a sacramental humanity, a sacramental history, whose unity is at once covenantal,
Christocentric, historical, and Eucharistic: that of the interrelated sacramentum tantum, res et sacramentum, res tantum of the Augustinian analysis. This is the unity of the Christus totus, whose splendor is the sole
subject of theological aesthetics. Taken seriously, it bars, as infected
with a cosmological prius, much of the usual statement of the problem,
out of which the classic errors of apokatastasis and predestination have
emerged.
The cosmological reversion which tempts all Christian theology consists in the rationalizing attempt to transcend the obscurity of our fallen
historicity, and the theologians examined in this volume show the mistake
to be as possible to a theological aesthetics as to a theological metaphysics.
Von Balthasar has done more than any other contemporary Catholic
theologian with the possible exception of de Lubac to lead theology beyond cosmology, and in this as in many other things we are all in his
debt.
(A small number of misprints mar this edition, notably on pp. 355 and
417.)
DONALD J. KEEFE,

S.J.

Marquette University
Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Old Testament Theology in a Canonical Context. By BREVARD S. CHILDS.
Philadelphia: Fortress, 1985. Pp. 255, incl. Index.
Brevard Childs has already written two major books detailing a canonical criticism approach to reading the Bible: .An Introduction to the Old
Testament as Scripture and .An Introduction to the New Testament as
Scripture. These are landmark studies of the last decade which have

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effectively challenged the undisputed reign of the tradition-history approach which emphasized the tracing of the different strands of tradition
in all their stages of development, in order to understand how Israel or
the early Christian Church came to its final biblical expression of faith.
Canon criticism insists that biblical theology focus on the received text
of the Scriptures, and not merely on the events and development behind
the texts. The concrete shapes and order of all the books influence the
further reading of any individual book; and the tradition of how the
books have been and are to he read gives essential clues to why they
assumed the shape and order in which we find them in the canon. To
neglect this aspect is to risk reducing biblical theology to a history of
religion in the Old Testament and New Testament.
In this present volume, Childs continues his work by sketching a program for doing Old Testament theology according to a canonical approach. It is not really a full theology, but contents itself with identifying problems and discussing canonical method while providing a loose
framework of major themes and some sample texts to illustrate the proper
use of that method. The author is also at pains not to reject the fruitful results of the historical-critical method. Indeed he defines Old Testament theology as precisely the theological reflection on a received body of
;;cripture whose formation was the result of a lengthy history of development (p. 6). He firmly maintains that Old Testament theology is a Christian discipline that deals with the problem of interpreting and appropriating the two testaments in relation to faith in Jesus Christ. But the task
of Old Testament theology is not to Christianize the Old Testament by
identifying it with the New Testament witness, but to hear its own theological testimony to the God of Israel whom the Church also confesses to
worship.
At the beginning, he acknowledges his debt to his teachers, the great
German tradition-critical scholars, Eichrodt, von Rad, and Zimmerli-and
his appreciation for and use of their methods shows throughout his book.
Yet, in treating each theme, Childs usually subjects his masters to critical evaluation. He often faults von Rad and Eichrodt for not pursuing
the literary effects of juxtaposed texts, and Zimmerli for not doing more
with the results of canonical combining, before he himself draws out what
he considers a more adequate description of the theological shape of a
given body of material. As in his Introduction to the Old Testament as
Scripture, this leads to a rather impressive command of the history and
message of each major literary collection in the Old Testament, as well as
numerous strong individual insights into single passages and their meaning. Examples of the latter include his remarks on the book of Leviticus,
Ezekiel 20, and the concept of sedeqah (righteousness) in the Psalms.
Other strengths in Childs's presentation are (1) his excellent bibliogra-

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phies for each section (20 in all); (2) the summaries of major conclusions at the end of many chapters; (2) the explanations of how one body
of texts (or its traditions) has been re-read (i.e., re-worked) by later
texts; and (4) how one body of texts (e.g., the Psalms), provides for
understanding a certain perspective other parts of the Old Testament
(e.g., the Pentateuch).
Some shortcomings are evident. He relies heavily on the prophets for
guiding insights, while law, priesthood, temple, and blessing play minor
roles. Is this really faithful to the canonical shape of the Old Testament
in its pre-Christian
I find particularly inadequate the treatment of purity laws (p. 86) and priestly roles (pp. 150-53), and suspect
the author needs to apply a hermeneutics of suspicion to his own Protestant
presuppositions! In a similar way, the decalogue gets extended attention
because Childs sees its theology as relevant to modern questions of violence,
war, etc.; but he never seriously wrestles with those counter-passages
whose theology encourages a divine warrior or a conquest motif. A similar
problem arises when he ends the book with the theme of "Life under
Promise." This is a judicious choice for the summarizing theme of the
Old Testament and includes treatment of judgment versus salvation,
.eschatology, messianic hope, the promise of the land, and eternal life.
But it lacks any reference to liturgy and temple as symbols of hope, the
book of the law, or the commandments of Torah, and no mention at all
of the " blessing " theology of P that informs the whole Old Testament
from Genesis 1 onwards.
Clearly Childs has begun an important project, but much more clarity
and balance is still needed in his continuing work during the years ahead.
LAWRENCE BOADT, C.S.P.

Washing ton Theological Union
Silver Spring, Maryland

Divine Omniscience and Omnipotence in Medieval Philosophy: Islamic,
Jewish and Christian Perspectives. Edited by TAMAR RUDAVSKY.
Dordrecht, Boston, Lancaster: D. Reidel Publishing Co., 1985. Pp.
ix + 299. $54 (cloth).
Since this book originated from revised papers and commentaries presented at a conference (held at the Ohio State University on March 3
and 4, 1982.), it is not surprising to find that the completed edition displays
wide variety both in its subject matter and in the quality of the chapters.
The chapters reflect the quality of papers very often presented at conferences-some are excellent, others are not. In addition, some chapters deal

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717

with problems and solutions which help significantly to advance medieval
scholarship, while the problems and solutions raised in other chapters do.
not add much to medieval research; indeed, some chapters seem to present arguments lacking both in plausibility and in an understanding of
the dominant spirit of medieval thought. The book is divided into three
specific parts which deal with Islamic, Jewish, and Christian authors
respectively, and the chapters in each part are arranged in historical
order. There is also an introduction and an extensive bibliography.
In chapter 1, Calvin Normore gives a helpful, but tediously written,
introduction and overview of the logical and epistemological problems
which were involved in medieval discussions of divine omniscience and
omnipotence. Chapter 2 focuses upon Boethius's account of the nature of
contingency, and adopts a view which i;e:fl.ects a misunderstanding both of
Boethius and of the theological spirit of medieval thought in general.
Ignoring sage comments from Richard Sorabji (see p. 49, footnote 68),
Norman Kretzmann argues that for Boethius free human choice is the
source of all contingency. How the Christian, Boethius, could so badly
confuse human choice with divine choice, Kretzmann fails to explain.
Chapters 3-6 constitute Part Two of the text and contain some of the
most scholarly research in the book. In chapters 3 and 4, Josef Van Ess,
rightly noting the juridical foundations of Mu'tazilite thought, examines
wrongdoing and divine omnipotence in the fragmentary work of Abu
Ishaq An-Nazzam. His discussion is particularly helpful in its treatment
of the Islamic understanding of God as not physei agathos, but good
merely by doing what is good. This understanding is a necessary element
for any sound grasp of the treatment of divine omnipotence and omniscienc.e in Islamic thought.
In chapter 4, Richard Frank c-0ntinues and amplifies the discussion
initiated by Van Ess by contrasting the position of An-Nazzam with that
of the Basrian school of the Mu'tazila. Michael Marmura follows this
discussion in chapter 6 with an excellent analysis and summation of the
views of Alfarabi and Avicenna on divine omniscience and future contingents. Barry Kogan adds a further dimension to the preceding examinations by treating of the problem of future contingency not only
in Alfarabi and Avicenna but also in Averroes.
The excellent selections contained in Part Two are followed by discussions of Judaic themes focusing mainly upon Maimonides and Gersonides.
Seymour Feldman begins Part Three by centering a number of Jewish
formulations of divine foreknowledge around the story of the Binding
of Isaac. Feldman's study is helpful and enlightening for the most part,
in general because it locates the discussion within its proper medieval
theological context. Nonetheless, both he and Jeremy Cohen (chapter 8)
seem not to comprehend the distinctive manner in which medieval theologians studied the works of philosophers for purely theological ends.

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Both seem to think that Maimonides and other Jewish "philosophers"
were engaged in the philosophical study of the Bible rather than in the
formally religious study of the philosophers for uniquely religious goals
(see pp.129and135).
Neither Feldman nor Cohen, however, confuses philosophy and theology
as much as is done by Alfred Ivy in chapter 8. According to Ivy, Maimonides, it seems, was a closet Neoplatonist who considered God's intellect
to be essentially impersonal, functioning out of necessity ( p. 152). In
Ivy's view, in addition, Maimonides was " irrationally set against matter," considering it to be basically a necessary evil (p. 148). Furthermore,
for Ivy Maimonides restricted God's knowledge to universals, despite his
frequent assertions to the contrary (p. 149). Such interpretations of Rabbi
Moses seem to be nothing short of outrageous.
Tamar Rudavsky returns the book to more sober ground in chapter 10
by giving an interestingly written analysis of divine omniscience and
prophecy for Gersonides. She discusses, in particular, the difficulties
which confronted Gersonides in attempting to reconcile prophetic human
knowledge and an indeterministic view of divine foreknowledge of future
contingents.
Part Four ends the book with a flurry of solid scholarship by Ivan Boh,
John Wippel, and William Courtenay dealing with medieval Christian
writers. In chapter 11, Ivan Boh examines the development of the problem of divine omnipotence in the early Sentence literature. In chapter 12,
John Wippel turns in his typically lucid performance by analyzing the
views of Thomas Aquinas and Henry of Ghent with respect to divine
omniscience. William Courtenay concludes the book in chapter 13 by tracing the development of the distinction between the absolute and ordained
powers of God from the mid-eleventh century through the fourteenth
century. Courtenay's work is excellent. It is, perhaps, the best article in
the book from the standpoint of sound scholarship, clarity, and potential
fruitfulness for generating problems of major importance requiring further scholarly examination. In particular, his work throws light upon the
dependence of later political disagreements regarding absolute and ordinary power of popes and kings. This chapter, by itself, establishes the
worth of an otherwise somewhat shaky collection of articles as a text
containing valuable research material.
The book, in general, is a good work. In those areas where it is weak,
it is seriously flawed. In those areas where it is solid, the scholarship is
admirable. To sum up, it is a mixed bag which can be a valuable research
tool for many contemporary scholars.
PETER A. REDPATH
St. John's University
Staten Island, New York

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719

Metaphor and Religious Language. By JANET MARTIN SosKICE. Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, 1985. Pp. 191. Cloth, $25.00.
This book combines two excellent studies: the first is a critical analysis
of theories of metaphor and topics in contemporary philosophy of language which are especially relevant to theories of metaphor; the second
is an examination of the way in which models and the metaphorical language based on them are understood in a critical realism concerning scientific explanation, and so can support the possibility of a critical realism
in theology. The second study is premised on the first, but the first
(Chapters I-V) can be read independently and is valuable in its own right
whether or not the reader has theological concerns.
Though the author's ultimate aim is to provide a defense of the
"theist's right to make metaphysical claims" (a defense of "theological
realism") by arguing for the "conceptual possibility" of a referential
religious language (148), she is well aware that any adequate account of
religious language has to be informed by a proper understanding of the
variety of forms (literal and non-literal) our non-religious language
takes. In particular, "no philosophical account of religious language will
be either complete or sufficient if it fails to take account of the way forms
of figurative discourse, like metaphor, function in the task of saying that
which cannot be said in other ways " ( 63). The first five chapters of the
book then are devoted to a detailed and comprehensive analysis of metaphor in ordinary language, beginning with classical accounts (Ch. 1), distinguishing metaphor both from non-linguistic entities and from other
figures of speech ( Chs. II and IV), and critically examining standard
theories of metaphor (Ch. III) and issues concerning' metaphorical meaning,' 'metaphorical truth,' and the irreducibility of metaphor (Ch. V).
Soskice begins (and ends) by defining metaphor as a "figure of speech
whereby we speak about one thing in terms which are seen to be suggestive of another" (15, 49) and argues for an "interanimative" account
of metaphor (which is presented as a refinement of the insights of I. A.
Richards). In relatively small compass she presents a formally comprehensive survey and critical analysis of competing theories of metaphor.
The criticisms are simple, straightforward, and radical. For example, she
concludes that, at bottom, emotive accounts are inadequate because " there
must be some guiding cognitive features which the emotive response is the
response to" (27). (This sort of consideration later figures in her criticism of accounts which see a merely affective role for models.) She argues
that theories which see the heart of metaphor in a self-contradictory at-

BOOK REVIEWS

tribution ignore those acknowledged metaphors which do not imply logical conflict, those metaphors which are such only because of context or
intention; however, they fail adequately to distinguish such logical conflict from nonsense ( 32ff). Substitution theories and comparison theories
fail to see that " the very thinking is undertaken in terms of the metaphor" (25)-there are not two things antecedently known. Here begins
her criticism of a thesis-the 'two subjects' thesis-which underlies much
theorizing about metaphor. The criticism is an important and sustained
one; it is addressed to sophisticated versions of the potentially promising
"interactive " accounts of metaphor, like Black's ( 46ff), and comes into
play '..:1 her analysis of Ricoeur's work on metaphor (Ch. V). Though I
have only pointed in a sketchy way to the kind of criticism the author
offers of the major theories of metaphor, I should emphasize that her
criticism is detailed, careful, and cogent, and engages in illuminating
give-and-take with contemporary philosophical discussions of metaphor
and related linguistic issues (a la Davidson, Searle, et al.). It is, moreover, presented with such clarity and helpful examples as to make it
both an excellent introduction to the topic and a useful study for those
with some familiarity with the contemporary debate.
The " interanimative " theory of metaphor which Soskice proposes
holds that metaphor is in an important sense 'two ideas for one,' though
it does not involve a duality of reference. Metaphor is not generated
simply by " conflict of meaning" or by " interaction of two subjects," out
rather is a "form of language use with a unity of subject-matter . . .
which yet draws upon two (or more) sets of associations, and does so,
characteristically, by involving the consideration of a model or models "
( 49). There are not two subjects, but there must be "at least two different
networks of associations " : " while duality of associative networks is
integral to metaphor, a duality of reference would undercut the whole of
what makes metaphor interesting" ( 51). But in addition to the tension
between associative networks, there must be as well a " reliance on an
underlying model " in terms of which we are enabled to ' go on ' extending attributions to the subject. A model is an object or state of
affairs which is taken to be such-that is, "when it is viewed in terms
of its resemblance, real or hypothetical, to some other object or state of
affairs" (101)-and metaphorical language is what we speak on the
basis of a particular model. The exploration of the relation between
model and metaphor is, for Soskice, an integral but inadequately appreciated element in a discussion of metaphor: it is the potential of the
model which accounts for the richness of metaphor; moreover, the model
guides metaphorical extension-it is not an arbitrary open-endedness.
In Chapter V Soskice provides some much-needed clarity on issues of
' metaphorical truth,' 'metaphorical meaning,' and the demand for re-

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721

ducibility of metaphor. She argues against those who claim that metaphors
are necessarily false or that there is a duality of truth or meaning or
reference (literal vs. metaphorical}. "The metaphorical format," she suggests, "is neutral between the truth and falsity of the claim made" (for
example, as with a ' gnawing pain') (90). Moreover, the reference of
such a metaphor is not problematical. The tie between model and metaphor surfaces in the treatment of the challenge that, unless metaphors
are reducible to literal expression, they lack cognitive force. She writes:
No metaphor is reducible to a literal equivalent without consequent
loss of content, not even those metaphors for which one can specify
an ostensive referent. When we speak of the camel as 'the ship of
the desert', the relational irreducibility of the metaphor lies in the
potentially limitless suggestions that are evoked by considering the
camel on the model of a ship: the implied corollaries of a swaying
motion, a heavy and precious cargo, a broad wilderness a route
mapped by stars, distant ports of call, and so on. Saying merely
' camel ' does not bring in these associations at all. . . . ( 94-5)

The discussion of these sorts of issues, addressed to those critics who
maintain that metaphor (unless reducible) lacks cognitive force, does not
yet begin to address those who suggest that, though some metaphors have
cognitive force or refer, the metaphors of the theist are peculiarly problematical precisely because of the problem of reference to what is transcendent. The author faces that particular challenge in the remaining
three chapters of the book.
Chapter VI initiates an examination of the possibility of cognitively
meaningful talk about God, of religious language that refers, by considering the use of models and metaphor in science. The suggestion that
religious thought can be best understood in terms of the models within it
is not new (she refers to work by Ramsey and Ferre, for example},
but Soskice adds precision to the discussion. She argues against the conflation of the categories of 'model' and 'metaphor' often found in the
literature on religion, noting that models, unlike metaphors, can be nonlinguistic, and that metaphorical language is what we speak on the basis
of a particular model. She points to superficial comparisons made between religion and science which make an unnecessarily sharp dichotomy
between the two. Some comparisons do not fully appreciate the role of
models within scientific theorizing and so make a misleading contrast between science and religion which rests on the contrast between 'no model/
model.' Others recognize the role of explanatory models and metaphors
based on them in science, but limit religion to the realm of affective, rather
than explanatory, models (as if we do not need to provide reasons for
orienting ourselves in one way rather than another-111-12).
Still others,
with less consistency, posit religious models as explanatory while denying
the possibility of assessing them in terms of truth and reference (105).

BOOK REVIEWS

All such comparisons result from an insufficient appreciation of the point
and limits of competing philosophies of scientific explanation, and she attempts to redress that neglect through an assessment of varieties of scientific realism and its alternatives. Here the tie is made between linguistic
and epistemological concerns; the earlier concern with reference in terms
of the single (rather than dual) subject of metaphor gives way to the
concern with referenc.e in terms of epistemological access which is preliminary to a discussion of theological realism.
The attempt to support a cognitivist account of religious belief and
language, to support an account in which models have explanatory, rather
than merely affective, force, depends on the possibility of a non-reductively empirical account of epistemic access. The argument underlying
the final chapters of the book is that language can successfully refer without ' defining,' and this account of reference is at the heart of the critical
realism she defends in Chapter VII. On a critical realist understanding
of scientific explanation not only does referring not require knowledge, it
need not involve "unrevisable or exhaustive description "-reference is
possible without infallibility or claimed access to ultimate essences. On
such a view theoretical posits need not simply be heuristic aids; they can
Theoretical terms generated by a
make claims, to "reality-depiction."
given scientific model are metaphorical, but they can guide our access to
something without defining it. In fact, she writes, " the vagueness of
metaphorical terms, rather than rendering metaphors unsuited to scientific
language, is just what makes them indispensable to it," for "it is just
that vagueness ... the lack of strict definitional stipulation, which allows
for the revisability necessary to any account that aims to adapt itself to
the world" (133). The metaphorical language generated by the model
can " designate theoretical entities " and " depict relations," without exhaustively defining or describing.
Although the task of reality-depiction in theology is "admittedly very
different" (137), Soskice concludes that there are analogies to be drawn.
What grounds the possibility of referring to the transcendent is that one
can designate theoretical entities in the absence of unrevisable or exhaustive description. Given the distinction between "referring to God
and defining Him," theological realism thus obviates the "criticism customarily levelled at the theological realist, that he claims to describe God"
(140). Drawing on what she argues is partially right about causal theories
of reference, she parallels reference to "that which caused this state of
affairs" with the religious reference-" We do not claim to describe
God, but to point through His effects, and beyond His effects, to Him."
To sum up,
this separation of referring and defining is at the very heart of
metaphorical speaking and is what makes it not only possible but

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723

necessary that in our stammering after a transcendent God we must
speak, for the most part, metaphorically or not at all ( 140).

Such theological realism denies the need to resort to non-cognitivism because it is founded on a theory of reference which allows designation
without description. It implies a commitment to the relevance to theology
of concepts of explanation, justification, and corrigibility. Soskice emphatically claims that in both science and religion.
"to be a realist about reference is to be a 'fallibilist' about knowledge of the referent. Speakers may refer and yet be mistaken, even
quite radically mistaken, as to the nature of that to which they
refer " ( 139) ,

I have only one real reservation about this book, and it concerns what
the author terms a second feature of critical realism. The first feature is
that it is not committed to arguing that any particular view of the world
is privileged; the second is "that it has a social and context-relative nature " (131). This second feature, its contextualism, is expressed, for example, in terms of the claim that " reference is linked to the context of
inquiry " because "it is not words but speakers using them who refer "
(150). This, she continues, has "commonly" (though incorrectly) "been
taken to imply a relativism like that of Nietzsche." Moreover, she writes
that the insight that, when people pick particular models or images, " they
do so as heirs to an established tradition of explanation and a common
descriptive vocabulary " is often " deprived of its value by being linked
to the relativist arguments which vitiate the ' religious language-games '
approach. . . ." (150-51). It should be noted that proponents of the
' religious language-games ' approach need have nothing even remotely
resembling a relativism "like that of Nietzsche." But more importantly,
the attempt to emphasize contextualism and to link reference to the context of inquiry while avoiding the insularity and uncriticizability commonly thought to follow from a 'language-games' approach is one I
wholeheartedly applaud, but one which Soskice's account does not sufficiently support. The claim that " terms can be coreferential across
theories" (150), which she offers in passing as an answer to Nietzschean
relativism, needs a good deal of support to show how it can function in
the needed way when it is claimed as well that "there are religious communities of interest (Christians, for example) which are bound by shared
assumptions, interests, and traditions of interpretation, and share a
descriptive vocabulary " and that it is " speakers using words who refer,
and that speakers use words according to established patterns of investigation and interest " ( 150). Not that I deny any of the latter-but what
makes coreference across theories possible on such an account is not obvious, and the defense of that possibility is crucial to any attempt to dis-

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tinguish one's approach (as Soskice wants) from the 'language-games '
approach.
The very difficult and much-debated questions concerning
cross-contextual criteria and overlap between contexts need to be addressed-otherwise such an ' answer ' to relativism is merely distinguished
assertion. In sum, the relation between intra-theory reference and coreference across theories requires more than what seems to me to be the
short-shrift the author provides.
The issue can be pressed a little further, for it bears on the concessions
concerning fallibility or corrigibility which the author (correctly, I think)
makes. She writes boldly:
the theist may be mistaken in his beliefs about the source and cause
of all and assume it to be something of which one can appropriately
predicate personalistic terms when one cannot, or assume it to be
a unified source when it is not, and so on. This fallibilism should
not trouble the Christian realist if he acknowledges that he may
simply be wrong in his various beliefs and that some of them are so
central that, if he is wrong concerning them, his whole structure of
belief is gravely flawed. If that which the Christian refers to as the
source and cause of all bears no conceivable resemblance to God as
conceived by Christianity, then he must admit himself to be so
deluded as to the nature of the referent that his faith must be
lost. This possibility of being in error is the risk such a realist
takes ( 139).
The question remains, however, whether on such an account of reference
this can be a real " risk" at all. In the absence of more than mere assertion of coreference across theories it is difficult to see what bite such
concessions have. Where reference is interest-bound, and communities of
interest are specified as narrowly as " Christians, for example", what
could count as supporting the claim that the Christian conception bears
no resemblance to that to which the Christian
What epistemological considerations could ever force the Christian to admit he was deluded
as to the nature of the referent (except the internal constraint of consistency)
Whether or not such coreference across theories (as would
decisively distinguish this account from the 'language-games' approach)
is possible, Soskice's account neither explains nor supports the possibility.
One could, of course, reply that this is beyond the scope of the book, but
I suggest that the author's express desire to avoid particular kinds of
relativism generates some kind of responsibility to engage the problem
more seriously.
That reservation aside, the latter part of the book is a well-argued
(and, I should add, extremely well-written) defense of a cognitivist account of religious belief, with a remarkable sensitivity to the intricacies
of the bearing of metaphor in such an account. The aim-to advocate a
theological critical realism-is understood in terms of defending the "conceptual possibility" of a theological realism which parallels in important

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7Q5

respects a critical realist philosophy of science, rather than in terms of
arguing that any particular reference is correct, or even justified. The
project is an important one because, as the author correctly notes, "much
of the Christian tradition has been undeniably realist in sensibility,"
whereas much modern philosophical theology has an "anti-realist drift"
(137). In sum, the quality of the book as a whole makes it one which
deserves to be widely read.
M. JAMIE FERREIRA
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, Virginia

Moral Action: A Phenomemological Study. By ROBERT SOKOLOWSKI.
Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1985, Pp. ix + 225.
$24.95 (cloth).
In this carefully written study of the constituents of human decision
making, the author lays an elaborate groundwork to develop the importance of the distinction between choice and the voluntary in moral discourse. In order to differentiate between choice and the simple voluntary,
we must look at that which is chosen. Choice leaves its mark. There is a
difference between doing something willingly and choosing to do something. I give my child medicine. He takes it willingly, but he may not
have chosen it. Everything chosen is voluntary, but not everything that
is voluntary is chosen. The voluntary is a genus with two species: the
chosen and the willed but not chosen.
Choice emanates from a simple voluntary. It is done with a view to
an end, although not simply as a means to an end. Still, the distinction
between the chosen and the voluntary lies in the end results. In the
former a thing is done for something else, while in the latter voluntary
actions are done for themselves.
Choice can also be the preference of one voluntary over another. When
I am thirsty, for example, I can drink water or milk. By my choice I
am comparing one drink to another. This differs from the choice made
in view of something. Finally, routine choices can become simple voluntaries, which the author calls " sedimented " voluntaries. These, in turn,
may become the base or matrix for further articulated choices.
Choice and the chosen can be further analyzed as one option among
many: one choice may be substituted by another. If it can't be, it is not
a choice. Furthermore, as a possibility among alternatives, the chosen is
involved in a chain of consequences and implications: a concatenation. In
order to bring about a simple choice, many words and events are required.

BOOK REVIEWS

Thus, a chosen is always seen against a background of purpose, substitution, and concatenation. These the author calls the "categorialities"
of choice. A practical, responsible, clear-thinking agent articulates choice
in all three directions. This is triangulating the chosen, according to the
author.
Two factors enter in this triangulating process. Imagination allows the
possibilities of choice to arise. Ambiguity, on the other hand, can suffocate the process. Thus, if one is slothful, dim, or mindless, the triangulalation analysis will not work. If, however, the choice is thoughtfully made,
the analysis can be effective. We can readily distinguish between the two.
Choice in view of something can be triangulated; choice as preference
cannot be because it is done simply because we want to do it, or have it
over another. It is based on taste. Likewise, the simple voluntary is done
for itself. Simple observation usually enables us to distinguish whether
a thing was chosen in view of something else, over against something
else, or simply willed for itself.
The simple voluntary immediately .engages us. We are always involved
in it. It is the most elemental of our realities, and it becomes the matrix
for the chosen. The chosen is a voluntary but it is no longer simple
since it is done in view of something else. It pushes me away from my
immediate conscious experience, away from my consciousness of what I
am doing now, and what I will do. This is the mediated voluntary, and
it is philosophically different from the simple voluntary.
All moral acts are embodied in the human performance of them. They
are affected by the historical situation in which they are performed. What
we do in these situations are moves in human relationships, whieh measure
and manifest our humanity. A human action is never just its situation.
My act of kindness is unique, even though someone else could have done
it as easily.
Moral action is immersed in, but distinguishable from, material performances.
We can distort human action in two ways:
1. We can suggest that the moral action is essentially an internal achievement. This distorts human action by separating the external action from
the internal.
2. We can suggest that the moral act follows the material performance:
I gave you food; now you are my friend. I strike you; now we are
enemies. This involves two actions, yet the moral act is one.
The author argues that the moral act occurs publicly in the material
performance, not just in the mind or heart. It does not occur in anything other than the material performance.
Material performance becomes a moral act when it is recognized or
identified as mine, and when it is recognized as good or bad. Recognition

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727

is what is added to the performance. It has a presentational quality-a
kind of epiphany of meaning.
The moral character of the act cannot lie in the intention or in the
consequences.
The author rejects the distinctions of act, intention, and circumstance
as separable components of the phenomenon of moral acts. He opts for
an interrelationship in such a way that intention is only intention when
actualized.
Intention cannot really be separated from actions. Performance actualizes intentions and actions characterize the performer. These make
their marks on the world.
The author believes that his approach establishes what he calls the
moral category which is concerned with presentation since it establishes
a relationship between agents and target. A moral theory based on the
category of choice is utilitarian or consequential; one based on judgment
is deontological. Because neither concentrates on the moral action itself,
they are both incomplete.
With his theory, the author believes he provides the answer to the
ambiguities of moral actions, thus eliminating the need for theories that
permit evil effects in order to achieve the good, such as the principle of
double effect and the theory of on tic evil of Fuchs, J ansens, and Keane.
He applies his analysis of choice and theory of moral categoriality to an
analysis of the virtues, and the being of human agents.
This work is challenging and novel. It breaks new ground in phenomenological studies and overcomes polarities and dichotomies which characterized older and more venerable moral theories. These theories have
tried with difficulty to reconcile anomalies of freedom and necessity, good
and evil, and means and ends in problematic instances. Robert Sokolowski
offers a new way of looking at moral actions which will have a profound
effect in academia and pastoral practice.
WALTER BILDSTEIN
St. Jerome's College
Waterloo, Ontario
Canada

Essays in Phenomenological Theology. Edited by STEVEN W. LAYCOCK and
JAMES G. HART. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986.
Pp. 219. $12.95, paper; $39.50, cloth.
Readers of this volume will find a collection of essays that represent a
spectrum of approaches to phenomenology and to phenomenological
theology and that draw inspiration from thinkers as varied as Confucius,

BOOK REVIEWS

Plotinus, Aquinas, Dumery, Hegel, Ricoeur, and Derrida, as well as from
Edmund Husserl. Those readers who are unfamiliar with phenomenological theology will most likely expect the collection to answer the question,
What is phenomenological theology, and what is the relationship between
phenomenology and phenomenological
Some of the contributors
do attempt to address this question, but their answers vary, from the
modest claim that phenomenology can provide descriptive guidelines to
the theological task to the more ambitious claim that phenomenology can
provide an ontological/phenomenological
proof for the existence of God
and synthetic a priori statements concerning his nature.
Iso Kern, in "Trinity: Theological Reflections of a Phenomenologist ",
makes fairly mod.est claims for phenomenology as far as its ability to
make theological statements is concerned. He states that phenomenology is
not theology, because it describes and does not postulate. Nevertheless,
he believes that "metaphysical postulates can be raised" on the basis of
its description (p. 36). Phenomenological description for Kern takes the
form of a delineation of three dimensions of human experience-nature,
sociality and self. He correlates these dimensions of human experience
with the Chinese awareness of their cultural tradition as determined
through "The Three Doctrines", Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism.
He also correlates these dimensions with the Christian concept of the
Trinity. According to Kern, metaphysical philosophies and religions, in
their attempts to articulate a non-transitory, unconditioned metaphysical
cause for human existence, must be cognizant of these three irreducible
dimensions of human reality and reflect this triad or else risk being distorted and one-sided. Thus phenomenology can prepare the way for true
theology by clearing away the false gods which are created through absolutizing relativities, such as would be the case if any one of the three
dimensions of human existence were to be absolutized.
Charles Courtney's discussion of "Henry Dumery's Phenomenology of
Transcending " makes similar claims for phenomenology and phenomenollogical theology. According to Dumery and Courtney, phenomenology
cannot make judgments concerning reality or value, or concerning religious truth or falsity. "Philosophy can, however, specify the conditions
according to which a religion or religious act is not unreasonable" (p.
55). Phenomenology can study sacralization, the action of "projecting
onto a thing the intention of, or aspiration for, the Absolute" (p. 56),
and also provide a critique of idolatry and superstition, instances in
which religious intention is being "fixed on an object rather than ...
using the object as a springboard for attaining the Absolute" (p. 59).
J. N. Findlay also sees phenomenology as providing descriptive guidelines, but in his essay, "Some Thoughts Regarding The Holy Spirit",
Findlay makes it clear that the function of phenomenology extends to

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729

the founding of the existence and the nature of the divine. The object of
phenomenological theology is a "consummating point ", a " central
unity", which Findlay correlates with the Christian ideas of the Word
and the Holy Spirit, both of which he sees as having the function of
connecting "the Center of all being with its periphery ", or of connecting
"one aspect of the absolute Center with another" (p. 39). But Findlay
goes further than making suggestions as to how theology should conceptualize the object of worship. The living presence of the Divine Center, as
connecting and unifying everything that is, is an undeniable aspect of
human experience. Findlay claims that reflection on our impersonal values
"necessarily leads to the constitution ... of an object in which all suprapersonal Values will be present together, and in an absolutely transcendent, all-surpassing form" (p. 42), that "everyone in fact falls back in
thought on an irremovable Absolute of some sort " ( p. 43), and that
" everyone thinks in terms of a something or other that he cannot think
away" (p. 44). Thus Findlay's conception of phenomenological theology
equates the foundational efficacy of phenomenology for theology with
the validity of a version of the ontological argument.
In the introductory essay, "Introduction : Toward an Overview of
Phenomenological Theology", Steven W. Laycock concurs with the view
that phenomenological theology constitutes an ontological argument for
the existence of God. Laycock contrasts the method of phenomenological
theology both with the method of 'positive' theology, which assumes a
" textual or traditional authoritarianism", and also with the method of
speculative-natural theology, which attempts to deduce or induce "the
existence, essence, and modes of relatedness of God " from principles
which are more fundamental than the conclusions (p. 5). According to
Laycock, both of the latter are somewhat circular; phenomenological
theology, by means of the phenomenological method, avoids pulling " the
same rabbit out of the hat that was previously surreptitiously concealed
within it" (p. 7). It is descriptive of the structure of human consciousness, and its descriptions provide a guide to theologizing. But phenomenological theology is more than theology that takes account of phenomenological descriptions of human experience. Phenomenological theology
attempts to discover the divine in human experience by means of " the
of phenomereductive-eidetic-reconstructive
technique characteristic
nology " and thereby claims to make synthetic a priori statements about
the divine.
In his other essay in this volume, " The Intersubjective Dimension of
Husserl's Theology", Laycock argues that the natural attitude towards
the world includes a commitment to the reality of the world. This includes "a commitment to the relative approximability of the Gotteswelt ",
or a commitment to the existence of a universal "view of all views" (p.

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BOOK REVIEWS

184). This " view of all views" refers to the divine consciousness ( p.
173). "Intersubjectivity is the divine envisionment" (p. 173). Com·
munalization, which establishes a vantage point that all parties may
share, but which does not thereby demolish individual viewpoints but
rather acknowledges them, leads towards the "God-world", "the telos
of communalization, the ideal of maximal, apperceptive interpenetration
of finite minds" (pp. 178-179). In Laycock's words, "we thus have an
' ontological ' (or more precisely, phenomenological) argument for th!J
existence of a universal view of all views" (p. 184).
If, according to the words of Edmund Husserl, phenomenology attempts
"to arrive at God without God", the question arises whether the God of
phenomenological inquiry is dependent upon human consciousness in such
a way that it represents an atheistic option, at least from the point of
view of the Judaeo-Christian tradition. Robert R. Williams article,
" Phenomenology and Theology: Hegel's Alternative to Dogmatism and
Idealism" begins with a discussion of Ricoeur's belief that Husserl's phenomenological idealism does in fact lead to an atheistic interpretation of
religion and theology. l£ this is true, the whole phenomenological tradition, from Hegel through Henry Dumery in their " use of the transcendental turn, and accompanying derivation of objectivity from subjectivity, deprives God of any existence apart from transcendental consciousness" ( p. 68). Williams argues, against Ricoeur, that there is a difference
between Hegel and Feuerbach. For Hegel, Geist is not only an
anthropological reality but also a theological concept. The reality that " is
produced by consciousness is not dependent on consciousness, but rather
exists 'in and for itself "' ( p. 81). In Williams's interpretation, both
classical theism and critical philosophy tend to be one-sided, the former
in its reduction of all being to God and the latter in the reduction of
God's existence to a phenomenon of human subjectivity. According to
Williams, " Hegel contends that the ontological proof establishes a reciprocal relationship of the divine and the human" (p. 82). Thus consciousness and its object are equiprimordial.
Given that phenomenology does not reduce God to a projection of human
consciousness, the question still remains whether the God of phenomenology is adequate to the Judaeo-Christian conception of a transcendent
Creator-God. Thomas Prufer's " Creation, Solitude, and Publicity" is in
part about the impossibility of a phenomenology of religion which takes
account of the classical Christian doctrine of creation. Creation, in classi·
cal Christian tradition, is gratuitous, and the revelation of its gratuitousness is itself gratuitous. Both of these claims seem to be at odds with the
assumptions on which phenomenological theology is founded. If human
consciousness necessarily reveals the necessary interconnection between
human nature and divine nature, then it seems that neither the creature-

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731

liness of human consciousness nor the gratuitousness of God's revelation
is accounted for. The contingency of human nature and of human consciousness of God both seem to contradict the possibility of a theology
that is phenomenological in the more ambitious sense of phenomenological
theology.
James G. Hart, in his essay, "A Precis of an Husserlian Philosophical
Theology", contends that there is a contingency to Husserl's concept of
the stream of primal presencing, but that this contingency is not a characteristic of the ongoingness of the stream but of its rationality and teleology. Thus "the Husserlian version of the question, Why is there something rather than nothing?, is not a reference to creatio ex nihilo, not to
the 'existential' . . . fact that there is a mind presencing, but to the
rational-teleological way in which the primal presencing occurs" (p. 126).
In Hart's interpretation of Husserl, the divine is dependent upon the
world as well as the world being in some sense dependent upon the divine.
It is true that "the divine is the entelechy for the monadic prate hyle''
but it is also the case that " the entelechy (or formal and final cause) of
the monadic universe is the essence of the divine" (p. 145) and that
" divinity is actual only through the mediation of the monadic universe
as the eternal product of divinity's informing its Other, the prate hyle"
(p. 146). Thus Hart notes that, in contrast to Prufer's essay, within the
context of his own understanding of transcendental phnomenology, "it is
not true that God and the world are not greater than God alone" (p.
145).
As Laycock notes in his introduction, James Buchanan, in " The
Rhetorics of Appropriation/Transgression:
Postmodernity and Religious
Discourse", presents an even more comprehensive challenge to the phenomenological project as conceived by Husserl than does Prufer. Buchanan discusses the departure of post-modern continental philosophy from
Husserlian phenomenology. According to Buchanan, Derrida and Ricoeur
are indebted to Husserl in that both take their point of departure from
Husserl. But in contrast to Husserl, who speaks from the transcendental
standpoint, they are " dwellers in the gap " and speak from the gap. Both
of them are postmodern and deal in rhetoric rather than in classical
"ontotheology ". The difference between Derrida and Ricoeur is that for
Derrida, glimpses of the WORD only serve to remind us of our blindness, not to gnide us, whereas for Ricoeur there is hope in community
and in practical action. Thus for Buchanan, Husserlian transcendental
phenomenology contrasts with post-modern theology and philosophy in
that it is based on "faith in a region of consciousness in which being is
presence" (p. 188). Husserl holds on to faith in the WORD, despite the
fact that "the density of human subjectivity" and "the contingencies of

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the historical subj.ect" threaten to destroy the transcendental project (p.
190).
The variety of approaches to phenomenological theology that are represented in this collection, with the inclusion even of essays that present
challenges to the phenomenological project, is a strength in that it provides something to stimulate every reader's interest and prevents the
book from being doctrinaire. Steven Laycock's introductory essay goes
a long way towards making explicit some of the implications of the various essays and towards sorting out the interrelationships among the views
of the contributors. Nevertheless, this reviewer was left with the wish that
there had been more of an attempt on the part of the editors to have the
individual contributors directly address one another's differing views. This
may be an unfair criticism, however, since it is in effect a request for
another, more narrowly focused kind of book about phenomenological
theology.
TIINA ALLIK

Loyola Marymount University
Los Angeles, California

The Mental Philosophy of John Henry Newman. By JAY NEWMAN.
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada: The Wilfrid Laurier University Press,
1986. Pp. xii + 209. $22.95. Cloth.

" It is obvious," wrote the literary critic George Levine in his study
of John Henry Newman in The Boundaries of Fiction (Princeton, 1968,
p. 195), "that everything [Newman] wrote was aimed at producing an
effect, or, to use Mill's terms, at working 'upon the feeling, or upon the
belief, or the will of another.' " Whatever else he may or may not have
been, Newman was .ever the skilled, even consummate rhetorician-a fact
which has been for many tantamount to an admission of his having been,
at best an equivocator, at worst a calculating liar. "Like the sophists of
old," Kingsley charged Newman in 1864, " he has used reason to destroy
reason" (Apologia, Oxford, 1967, p. 370). Of course, Aristotle had a
high regard for rhetoric, not as sophistry but as an art of informed argument on contingent matters, so the mere fact that Newman sought to
persuade may be itself no argument as to the quality of the rhetoric he
produced. Admirers of Newman hear in his writings notes of moral and
religious truth, and have claimed to have found there intellectual riches
to last more than a season. Indeed, nearly a hundred years after his
death Newman speaks cor ad cor to increasing numbers. Among commentators, however, it is still something of an issue whether or to what

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788

extent critics like Kingsley were correct: even i£ Newman was sincere
enough in practice (which is not always conceded), the question remains
whether his theory of reason skeptically undermines the enterprise of
philosophy.
This question, and others connected with it, provide the leitmotif for
Professor Newman's book. Like others before him (e.g., Pailin, Price,
Boekraad, Cronin, D'Arcy, Zeno, Juergens), Jay Newman seeks to understand and assess Newman's theory of belief as set forth in the Essay in
Aid of a Grammar of Assent (1870), but unlike them he undertakes
" to provide an analytical philosophical criticism " ( p. 202), that is, a
chapter-by-chapter examination of the Grammar alone, "using only the
logical tools of the analytical philosopher" (p. 7). Despite its title, then,
this work is not designed to have the sweep that a V argish or Sill em offers
of Newman's "mental philosophy," nor in any way to serve as an introductory survey of Newman's work. And though there are disadvantages
to reading the Grammar apart from Newman's work as a whole, students
of Newman's thought will find here a clearly-written, careful, and above
all provocative discussion which will occasion new reflections on Newman's treatment of enduring philosophical problems. What I perceive to
be serious problems with this study-of method, argument, and interpretation-considerably
tempers my enthusiasm (these problems I will
mention after a description of the book's contents). But it is to be hoped
that the serious student of Newman's work will weigh these difficulties
against the real gains that Professor Newman offers.
Chapter One, "Newman's Philosophical Proj.ect," is a polemical introduction to Newman the man and to the Grammar. Its general effect is to
cast Newman as a thinker whose sentimentalism (p. 3), self-obsession (p.
23), association with irrationalism (p. 4), self-serving and apologetical
motives (pp. 18, 21), "distrust and resentment" of philosophers (p. 5),
"workaholic" personality (p. 13), and treason to the Protestant cause (p.
19), combine to render him an unattractive and not-altogether trustworthy guide or subject for philosophical inquiry. This is the effect of
the chapter, not its explicit purpose or content, which is to explain the
object and structure of the Grammar, to allege a tension between its
phenomenological and epistemological dimensions, to uncover its personal
and political ideology, and to suggest that, as a philosophical treatise of
sorts, the Grammar merits more philosophical attention than it has
received.
Chatper Two, "Modes of Apprehension and Belief," corresponds with
chapters one through four in the Grammar. Professor Newman begins by
questioning Newman's three-fold classification of propositions (pp. 37-38)
as question-begging and apologetically motivated. Raising (only to waive)
the issue of Newman's nominalism, the author concentrates most of the

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chapter on exposing confusions of thought (and craftiness of motive) in
Newman's treatment of the modes of apprehending propositions as " real "
or "notional." According to the author Newman fails to identify apprehension clearly (p. 45), to specify how much apprehension is sufficient
for assent (p. 43), to present a plausible typology of notions (p. 57),
or-most importantly-to distinguish adequately or consistently between
real and notional apprehension ( p. 63). All of these claims naturally involve close reading and arguing which it is impossible to do justice to
here. It may be useful to observe that Professor Newman is convinced
that the project of the Grammar is held aloft on apologetical struts which,
when philosophically undermined, send the whole thing crashing down
(which, however, is not equivalent to saying that it is useless: " The
Grammar •.. gives us a great deal to reflect upon, and that alone would
justify its fame; p.196).
Chapter Three, "Religious Belief as ' Real'," correlates with chapter
five of the Grammar, and Chapter Four, "Degrees of Belief," with
chapters six and seven. Again, both entail close reasoning which it is not
possible to reproduce here. Chapter Four in any event is the more important of the two, and in my view the best chapter of the book. Here
Professor Newman painstakingly dissects Newman's four major lines of
argument supporting the view that an "assent" to a proposition is always unconditional, and thus absolutely distinct from an " inference,"
which is always conditional. Potentially, at least, much is at stake here,
for on this distinction turns part of Newman's legitimation of the absoluteness or unconditionality of religion belief. In the Grammar, it may
be recalled, Newman had objected to Locke's view that one must adjust
his degree of assent to a belief to the evidence he possesses for it. Since
the evidence in contingent matters is always materially probable at best,
our assents (except in a handful of cases, according to Locke) should also
be only probable. Though Locke himself believed that the existence of
God could be demonstrated (hence was unconditional), followers, like
Newman's own friend, William Froude, resolutely held to the uncertain
nature of beliefs in science, history, politics, and a fortiori in matters of
religion and theology. Religious belief was thus at best only "morally
certain," that is, sufficient for action, insufficient for intellectual certainty.
For Newman, of course, this would not do. Religious belief was unconditionally certain belief, and the challenge was to show how and why.
As the author observes, "Newman must ultimately show either that evidence and the ethics of belief are not nearly as intimately related as the
Lockeans claim or that the peasant has important evidence [for his
religious belief] of a kind that Lockeans tend to ignore" (p. 122). In
this chapter Professor Newman's ordinary language analysis goes far in
dismantling the first part of this alternative, and-after exposing further

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735

difficulties in Newman's doctrine on certitude-the author proceeds in the
next chapter to direct it against the second, more important part.
Chapter Fiv:e, "Formal and Informal Inference," corresponds with
chapter eight in the Grammar, and Chapter Six, "The Illative Sense,"
with chapters nine and ten. Once more the reasoning is tight; it is not,
however, nearly as disclosive or compelling, although it is quite impossible to rebut it effectively here. What is ultimately at stake is the rationality of real assents, including of course religious beliefs. According
to the author, however, it is just this rationality that Newman subverts.
For example, by associating formal inference with logic, and by thus
implying that the world of concrete "things " is something other than
logical ( p 141), Newman implies our inability to reason about it at all
(we are thus brought full circle to Kingsley's charge of sophistic rhetoric).
This conclusion is confirmed for the author when it is seen how all reasoning seems to rest for Newman on "first principles," which, since they
involve unanalyzable "sentiments of age, religion, ... social habit" (p.
143) and the like, do not provide the objective validity required for rational argument. The author concludes the first section of Chapter Five
in this way: He [Newman] throws the baby out with the bath water,
reduces apologetic to rhetoric, and makes the resolution of ideological conflict a matter of force majeure" (p. 144). This line of reasoning is continued in the next section on informal inference, which is " so central to
[Newman's] project" (p. 145) that confusion or collapse here could spell
the total incompetency of Newman's "mental philosophy." And in fact,
by making informal inference (and the illative sense) "mysteriously incomprehensible," and by placing its operations and results "beyond criticism" (p. 157), Newman, it is argued, effectively removes it from the
realm of rationality altogether. In his final Chapter Seven ("Mens ad
Cor Loquitur ") the author concludes: "If my analysis in the foregoing
chapters has been a reasonably accurate one, then most of the major
theses in the Grammar are false, and most of its major arguments are
unsound" (p. 196).
It is difficult to give an adequate impression of the problems of this
otherwise well-written (sometimes even breezily-written) book because
some of them at least are cumulative and matters of subtle overall effect
(as Newman said complex "things " in the world often are). Least
damaging of these problems, perhaps, is the author's highly selective use
of the secondary literature on Newman. A fairly consistent side-stepping
of rival interpretations-for example, on the question of Newman's character, or his supposed nominalism, or his "irrationalism," or his understanding of formal and informal inference-gives the impression that
matters are simpler than they are, or solved when they are not, or that
they fall one way when general consensus would suggest the opposite.

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This practice may well derive from a much larger and more serious flaw
in the book as a whole, namely the author's considerable lack of sympathy for Newman as man or thinker. It goes without saying that, if
Newman is in fact as bigoted (p. 31), elitist (p. 32), and designing (pp.
35, 37, passim) as the author thinks, we need to be apprised of this fact.
The problem is that this claim is never argued. Indeed, for all his understandable disdain for what he takes to be sophistic rhetoric, the author
has readily availed himself of generally fallacious strategies: insinuation,
name-calling, ad hominem arguments, false pretense to knowledge of Newman's motives, a sometimes mocking irony, and aggressive attacks quietly
qualified or withdrawn later. All of this is distracting in the extreme,
and does nothing to further the author's claim.
But the most serious problem of this work is the author's choice to
read the Grammar in isolation from Newman's work as a whole-meaning not only his other statements on faith and reason (most notably in
the Oxford sermons and the Theological Papers on Faith and Certainty),
but also his practice of " informal" reasoning throughout all of his
works. It is one of Newman's most important epistemological insights
that " facts " or " things " in the world (under which rubrics he included
even highly complex "ideas," such as Christianity or Platonism), if they
are to be "really " apprehended as irreducible and unique complex particulars and not be attenuated into abstractions, cannot themselves be
abstracted from the cumulative " circumstances" and converging facts
and probabilities which go to make them up. Now, Newman's thought on
assent is just such a complex "fact," and constituted by the full body
of theory and practice distributed throughout the Newman corpus. To
gain an adequate apprehension of it, and not merely a " theoretical and
abstract" account which attacks one set of particulars only because it
does not have other sets to qualify and balance it, requires a sensitive and
sympathetic reading which strictly logical tools cannot provide. This is
not a retreat into obscurantism. Chapter-by-chapter and line-by-line
analysis with the most rigorous tools is necessary and, as the author
points out, too infrequently performed on Newman's work. But such analysis is doomed to frustration (and even resentment p. 140) if we read
Newman solely with the expectations we bring to the professional philosopher. Newman says as much in the beginning of the Grammar (Oxford,
1985, p. 21) : " ... in a philosopher it is a merit even to be not utterly
vague;" hearers must "throw their minds into the matters in discussion,
must accompany his treatment of them with an active, personal concurrence, and interpret for themselves, as he proceeds, the dim suggestions
and adumbrations of objects, which he has a right to presuppose, while
he uses them, as images existing in their apprehension as well as in his
own." Newman was a " philosopher" in much the way a rhetorician like

BOOK REVIEWS

737

Cicero was: non-technical, unsystematic, and geared to the pragmatic,
popular, and persuasive (which is not simply equivalent to saying that
he is not principled and disclosive). While we may have just grounds to
complain of the obscurity and contradictoriness we sometimes find, we do
not get any closer to understanding Newman's thought by wrenching a
part from the whole and complaining that it is inadequate.
Finally, there are in my judgment innumerable mistakes in interpretation, both small and large, occasioned for the most part by this unsympathetic and decontextualized reading: to cite but one example, Professor
Newman's admitted confusion about informal inference, and his mistaken
conclusion that such inference is non-verbal, illogical, and beyond the
reach of rational criticism. Closer correlation of the Grammar with Newman's theory and practice elsewhere, and attention to (for example)
Brian Wicker's well-known essay on Newman and logic in NewmanStudien V, might have prevented these errors. And yet, flawed as it may
be, we might do well to say of this book what the author said of the
Grammar, that it "gives us a great deal to reflect upon, and that alone
would justify its fame."
WALTER JOST

University of Virginia
Charlottesville, Virginia

THE GENERAL INDEX TO THE THOMIST
VOLUME 51 (1987)
INDEX OF ARTICLES
PAGE

Ashley, Benedict M., O.P. Constructing and Reconstructing the Human Body
Bobik, Joseph. Aquinas's Fourth Way and the Approximating Relation
Casey, Gerard. An Explication of the De Hebdomadibus of Boethius
Cataldo, Peter J. Husserl on Galileo's Intentionality
.
Cessario, Romanus, O.P. Theology at Fribourg
Connery, John R., S.J. The Non-Infallible Moral Teaching of the
Church
Duncan, Roger. Lublin Thomism
Echeverria, Edward J. The Fate of Theism Revisited
Hilkert, Mary Catherine, 0 .P. Hermeneutics of History: The Theological Method of Edward Schillebeeckx
Hill, William J., O.P. The Doctrine of God after Vatican II
Hill, William J., O.P. On "Knowing the Unknowable God": A
Review Discussion .
Jackson, Timothy P. The Theory and Practice of Discomfort:
Richard Rorty and Pragmatism
Kelley, Francis E. Robert Orford's Attack on Giles of Rome .
Kendall, George. Space-Time and the Community of Beings .
Knasas, J. F. X. Esse as the Target of Judgment in Rabner and
Aquinas
Krasevac, Edward, O.P. Christology from Above and Christology
from Below .
Meynell, Hugo. From Epistemology to Metaphysics .
Michalson, Gordon E. The Inscrutability of Moral Evil in Kant .
Mitcham, Carl. Towards a Religious Ethics of Technology: A Review
Discussion
Molnar, Paul D. Is God Essentially Different From His Creatures¥
Nelson, Daniel M. Karl Rahner's Existential Ethics
Schepers, Maurice, 0.P. Conversion and Convergence: Personal
Transformation and the Growing Accord of Theology and Religious Studies
Seidl, Horst. The Concept of Person in St. Thomas Aquinas .

501
17
680
325

1
307
632
97
395
699
270
70
480

222
299
205
246

146
575
461

658
435

INDEX OF AUTHORS Continued
PAGE

Simpson, Peter. Saint Thomas and the Naturalistic Fallacy
Tavuzzi, Michael, O.P. Aquinas on the Preliminary Grasp of Being
Theron, Stephen. The Divine Attributes in Aquinas

51
555
37

INDEX OF REVIEWS
PAGE

Austin, S. Parmenides: Being, Bounds and Logic. (Benitez, E. E.)
Balthasar, Hans Urs von. The Glory of the Lord, II. (Keefe, Donald
J., S.J.) .
Balthasar, Hans Urs von. The Glory of the Lord, III. (Keefe, Donald
J., S.J.) .
Bracken, Joseph. The Triune God. (Hill, William J., 0.P.) .
Cessario, Romanus, O.P. Christian Satisfaction in Aquinas. (Buckley,
James)
Childress, James, and Macquarrie, John, eds. The Westminster Dictionary of Christian Ethics. 2nd, rev. ed. (Johnstone, Brian,
C.SS.R.) .
Childs, Brevard S. Old Testament Theology in a Canonical Context.
(Boadt, Lawrence, C.S.P.)
Grant, Robert M. Gods and the One God. (Placher, William)
Hallett, Garth. Reason and Right. (Schultz, Janice)
Laycock, Steven W., and Hart., James G., eds. Essays in Phenomenological Theology. (Allik, Tiina.)
Josol, Abdon. Property and Natural Law. (Habiger, Matthew,
0.S.B.)
Kirpatrick, Frank G. Community: .A Trinity of Models. (Nelson,
Paul) .
Kress, Robert. The Church: Communion, Sacrament, Communication.
(McConville, William, 0.F.M.)
Morris, Thomas V. The Logic of God Incarnate. (Weinandy, Thomas,
0.F.M.Cap.)
Nagle, Thomas. The View from Nowhere. (Lauder, Robert E.)
Newman, Jay. The Mental Philosophy of J. H. Newman. (Jost,
Walter)
Nielsen, Kai. Philosophy and .Atheism: In Defense of .Atheism.
(Churchill, John}
Ogden, Schubert. On Theology. (Jenson, Robert) .
Peacocke, Arthur. Intimations o.f Reality. (Austin, William H.)
Proudfoot, Wayne. Religious Experience. (Meynell, Hugo)
Rudavsky, Tamar, ed. Divine Omniscience and Omnipotence in Medieval Philosophy. (Redpath, Peter A.) .

377

178

710
172
524

375
714
542
530

727
539

372
176
367
189
732

384
521
194
193
716

INDEX OF BOOKS REVIEWED
PAGE

Shafto, Michael, ed. Row We Know. (Lauder, Robert
Sokolowski, Robert. Moral Action. (Bildstein, Walter)
Soskice, Janet M. Metaphor and Religious Language. (Ferreira,
Jamie M.)
Spangler, Mary Michael, 0.P. Logie: .An .Aristotelian .Approach.
(Smith, Raymond, O.P.)
Steidl-Meier, Paul. Social Justice Ministry. (Bildstein, Walter) .
Sugg, Joyce, ed. A Packet of Letters: A Selection from the Correspondence of J. H. Newman. (Ferreira, M. Jamie)
Thiemann, Ronald. Re1,elation and Theology. (Dulles, Avery, S.J.) .
Tracy, Gerard, ed. The Letters and Diaries of J. R. Newman, VI.
(Ferreira, M. Jamie)
Veatch, Henry. Ruman Rights: Fact or Fancy? (Crossin, John,
O.S.F.S.)
Walsh, Katherine, and Wood, Diana, eds. The Bible in the Medieval
World. (Matter, E. Ann) .
Weisheipl, James A. Nature and Motion in the Middle Ages. (Kelley,
Francis E.) .
Westphal, Merold. God, Guilt and Death. (Crowell, Steven G.)
Wiebe, Paul. The .Architecture of Religion. (Whittaker, John)

526
725
719
188
392
199
169
199
535
186
381
545
388