Thomas Aquinas
Image via WikipediaWithin Protestant circles St. Thomas Aquinas has been the victim of a bad rap.
“Aquinas bashing” has become a popular pastime with some Protestant scholars.
Viewing Aquinas as a theological ogre may be linked to a form of “Cathlicophobia.” Since Rome claims Thomas as the “Doctor Angelicus,” his status as “the” theologian of the church makes him the target of much Protestant criticism.
Aquinas & Aristotle
St. Thomas made use of Aristotelian philosophy. His thought does indicate a kind of synthesis between Aristotelian philosophy and Christian theology.
Many of the categories of Aristotle’s philosophy appear in Aquinas’s reasoning. This is true not only with respect to Aquinas but more broadly throughout Roman Catholic theology.
In the doctrine of transubstantiation, the miracle of the mass is formulated in Aristotelian terms when the church declares that the substance of the bread and wine is changed into the substance of the body and blood of Christ, while the accidens (the external qualities) remain the same.
This formulation is unintelligible apart from Aristotle’s metaphysical or ontological distinction between substance and accidens. This involves a double miracle (something foreign to Aristotle) in that you end with the substance of one thing and the accidens of another and vice versa.
Image via WikipediaA parallel may be seen with St. Augustine.
Augustine is claimed both by Rome and by Protestantism as a theological “patron saint.” Augustine’s influence on Luther (an Augustinian monk) is well documented. His influence on Calvin is even more evident. Augustine is quoted more often in Calvin’s Institutes than any other extra-biblical writer. Indeed, Calvinism is often designated by the alternate name: Augustinianism.
Augustine fought a life-long battle against neo-Platonic philosophy, yet he adopted many of his opponents’ premises. It is often said of Augustine that as Aquinas achieved a synthesis between Christian theology and Aristotelian philosophy, so Augustine achieved a synthesis between Christian theology and Platonic (or neo-Platonic) philosophy.
The influence upon Western thought exercised by Plato and Aristotle is so enormous that it is hard to overestimate it. It has been said, perhaps a bit hyperbolically, that the history of western philosophy is but a footnote to Plato and Aristotle.
Every generation of Christians has found it necessary to address its culture in terms of the prevailing philosophies of the times. The danger of accommodation or seduction by alien philosophy is always there, and I suppose never entirely avoided.
Nature & Grace
The second rap against Aquinas is perhaps the most prevalent. The charge that Aquinas separated nature and grace is most common among Protestants.
This charge against Aquinas disturbs me because it simply is not true. It is a serious distortion of Aquinas, driven either by a misunderstanding of St. Thomas, or worse, a woeful ignorance of his writings. I fear that this “bad rap” is received uncritically by one generation of Protestants and then passed on to the next.
If there was anything St. Thomas did not do, or certainly did not desire to do, it was to separate nature and grace. He fought his most strenuous battle against those who did separate nature and grace.
Image via WikipediaAt a time when Christianity faced its most serious threat with the use of the Islamic religion as a world-conquering force, Aquinas rose as the champion of the Christian church to engage the Islamic philosophers in intellectual warfare.
The Arab philosophers, chiefly Averroës and Avicenna, created a synthesis between Aristotle’s philosophy and Islamic theology. It was called “Integral Aristotelianism” precisely because it sought an integration between Islam and Aristotle.
For Aquinas the most repugnant element of this Islamic synthesis was its “Double Truth theory.” The double truth theory maintained that something could be true in religion (grace) and at the same time be false in philosophy or science (nature). It would be similar to someone today saying that he believes man emerged from the slime as a cosmic accident and, at the same time, was created by the purposive act of God. This involves a radical separation of nature and grace.
To overcome the separation of nature and grace inherent in the double truth theory, Aquinas sought to maintain their unity. He saw both united under God’s rule and dominion. He also saw both as spheres of divine revelation.
What Aquinas did do was to make a distinction between nature and grace (following his exegesis of Romans 1).
We must learn to make a distinction between distinguishing between things and separating them. We distinguish the two natures of Christ, the divine and human. We do not separate them, unless we embrace the Nestorian heresy. We distinguish between a person’s body and soul. We do not separate them unless we kill them. It is one thing to distinguish between a husband and a wife. To separate them is to do violence to their marriage.
Aquinas distinguished between those things that are learned exclusively by special revelation (the Bible) and those things that are learned by a study of general revelation (nature). In addition he spoke of “mixed articles” (
Image via Wikipediaarticulus mixtus). The mixed articles refer to those truths that may be learned either by reading the Bible or by “reading” nature. Most prominent of the mixed articles is the existence of God, which is revealed both in Scripture and in nature. Far from divorcing nature and grace, Aquinas sought to show their unity. He was convinced that all truth is God’s truth and that all truth “meets at the top.” Aquinas refused to put asunder what God had joined together.
The whole Christian world owes an abiding debt to Thomas Aquinas. He is a giant of the faith upon whose shoulders we who are dwarfs are compelled to stand. We dare not simply bash him, or ignore him. He is a true gift of God to His church.
Sproul, R. C. (1994). Right Now Counts Forever: Thomas Aquinas: A True Gift of God. In R. C. Sproul, Jr. (Ed.), Tabletalk Magazine: May 1994 (R. C. Sproul, Jr., Ed.) (4–49). Lake Mary, FL: Ligonier Ministries, Inc.
