INTRODUCTION (cont)
About the same time Roger Bacon, a prodigy of erudition, though not free from rash opinions, here and there in his writings speaks with contempt of Aristotle's philosophy, and of St. Albert and St. Thomas, whom he calls children.
Thomas Sutton, O.P., said to be English by birth (+1310), was
one among others who in his commentaries on the four books of the Sentences wrote in defense of St. Thomas against Scotus. But Peter Aureolus, O.M., Anthony Andrea, O.M., Richard of Middletown, O.M., took up the defense of Scotus' doctrine, and Gerard of Bonn, O.D.C., strove to reconcile the opinions of each school.
Throughout the fourteenth century and in the early fifteenth century, scholastic theology gradually resolved itself into a war of words, railleries, and useless subtleties. The chief reason for this decline was the revival of nominalism, which maintains that universals are mere concepts of the mind or common names. Hence not even an imperfect knowledge of the nature of things can be acquired, whether of corporeal things or of the soul and its faculties, or the foundation of the natural law, or the essence of grace and the essential distinction between it and our nature.
Thus the advocates of nominalism deny the principle that the faculties, habits, and acts are specified by the formal object. Wherefore nominalists, especially William Ockham, despising the sound and lofty doctrine of their predecessors, prepared the downfall of solid scholastic theology, and prepared for the errors of Luther, whose teachers in the schools of Wittenberg were nominalists.
In the fifteenth century a revival in scholastic theology began with John Capreolus, O.P. (+1444), who is called the prince of Thomists, with Juan de Torquemada, O.P. (+1468), who wrote the Summa de Ecclesia, with Cajetan, O.P. (+1534), the distinguished defender of Thomistic doctrine, who was practically the first in the schools to explain the Theological Summa of St. Thomas instead of the Sentences. In this same period we have Conrad Kollin, O.P. (+1536), who wrote a series of commentaries on the Summa contra Gentes. These last mentioned theologians prepared the way for the theology of modern times, which began with the sixteenth century. Its first task was to refute the errors of this time, namely, Protestantism, Baianism, and Jansenism. These attenuated forms of Lutheranism deny the essential distinction between the order of nature and that of grace, and give a distorted notion of predestination and the divine motion.
Most prominent among the controversialists who labored to refute these errors are St. Robert Bcllarmine, S.J. (+1621), Cano (+1560), and Bossuet (+1704). Among scholastic theologians, in the Dominican order we have Victoria (+1546), Soto (+1560), Bannez (+1604), John of St. Thomas (+1644), and Gonet +1681); among the Carmelites we have the theologians of Salamanca, who wrote the best commentaries on the works of St. Thomas. In the Society of Jesus we have Toletus +1596), Suarez (+1617), Molina (+1600), and Lugo (+1660), who proposed a different interpretation of the Angelic Doctor's teaching. Suarez, the eclectic, sought to steer a middle course between St. Thomas and Scotus, and receded less than Molina did from the Thomistic doctrine on predestination and grace.
Eminent in positive theology during this time are Batavius, Thomassin, Combefis, and others.
In the eighteenth century there was a gradual decline in theology
from its former splendor. Yet we still have such Thomists as Charles
Rene Billuart and Cardinal Louis Gotti, who defended the teach
ing of the Angelic Doctor with clarity and soundness of argument;
St. Alphonsus Liguori, who wrote particularly on moral subjects, has received the title of Doctor of the Church.
Finally, after the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, when peace was again restored, the study of both positive and speculative theology gradually began to flourish, and later on a special incentive was offered for the advancement of theology by the Vatican Council in its condemnation of Positivism and agnosticism. The fruits of this were seen in Modernism, condemned by Pius X. This Sovereign Pontiff, like Leo XIII, again highly recommended the study of St. Thomas' works and wrote: "But we warn teachers to bear in mind that a slight departure from the teaching of Aquinas, especially in metaphysics, is very detrimental. As Aquinas himself says, 'a slight error in the beginning is a great error in the end.'" (9)
Finally, the Code of Canon Law, promulgated by the authority of Benedict XV in 1918, says: "Mental philosophy and theology must be taught according to the method, teaching and principles of the Angelic Doctor, to which the professors should religiously adhere." (10) This is stated again in the new law for the doctorate promulgated by Pius XI(11).
All these testimonies, whether of the Sovereign Pontiffs or of the theologians who always have recourse to the Theological Summa of St. Thomas, most clearly proclaim its value and significance. All know of the works that have been written in recent times concern
ing the Theological Summa.(12).
Footnotes
9. Encycl. Pascendi and Sacrorum antistitum.
10 Can. 1366, no. 2.
11. Encycl. Deus scientiarum Dominus.
12. Consult the commentaries of FatherBuonpensiere, O.P., Father del Prado, O.P., Father Billet, S.J., Father Mattiussi, S.J., and others. Many articles have appeared in periodicals, especially in the Revue Thomiste, Bulletin Thomiste,
Revue des sciences philosophiques et theologiques, Angelicum, Gregorianum.
There are also many monographs on some particular part of the Sunama, and
several articles in the Dictionnaire de theologie catholique and in other contemporary encyclopedias. |
