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Speaking of God in Thomas Aquin - Anastasia Wendlinder
Speaking of God in Thomas Aquin - Anastasia Wendlinder
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Cassian’s Conferences
Scriptural Interpretation and the Monastic Ideal
Christopher J. Kelly
Anastasia Wendlinder
Gonzaga University, USA
© Anastasia Wendlinder 2014
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IV
Preface vii
Acknowledgments xi
Bibliography 205
Index 211
Preface
1
For a very informative and short read of the controversy over the use of Thomas
Aquinas at the Council, see the essay by Joseph Komonchak entitled “Thomism and the
Second Vatican Council,” in Continuity and Plurality in Catholic Theology: Essays in
Honor of Gerald A. McCool, S.J., ed. Anthony J. Cernera (Fairfield, CT: Sacred Heart
University Press, 1998), 53-73.
2
Anthony de Mello, Sadhana, A Way to God: Christian Exercises in Eastern Form
(New York: Doubleday Dell, 1984).
3
The full title is The Way to Love: The Last Meditations of Anthony de Mello
(New York: Doubleday, 1992).
4
Thomas Merton, Zen and the Birds of Appetite (New York: New Directions, 1968).
5
Ibid., 9. Merton is quoting from Eckhart’s Sermon, “Blessed are the Poor.” Note that
both “God” and “god” are used—“God” is used to express God as existing in God-self and
“god” used to express any conception of God, which of course is the point of the passage.
viii Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
To my great surprise and delight, I was assigned Meister Eckhart’s theology on the
Trinity and, even though my turn to facilitate was not until later in the semester,
I wasted no time plunging back into his enigmatic mind!
It seemed that in some providential way, I had come full circle; however,
between the two courses an interesting, unconscious and unintended convergence
began to happen, and at the end of the semester I stepped hesitatingly into
David Burrell’s office and asked him if he would be my director, to which he
emphatically said, “of course.” When asked what my interest was, I declared I
wanted to focus on Eckhart’s metaphysics of creation, to which he smiled and
replied—I’m paraphrasing now—“Ah yes, Aquinas and Eckhart, that sounds like a
splendid dissertation!” My mind immediately stated to itself, “wait, what? I didn’t
say anything about Aquinas.” But I acquiesced and pleasantly nodded my approval
of his modification. And so, the journey commenced, and the bond I feel for my
teacher and mentor lasts to this day. When, a few years later, it was time to focus on
actually writing, I was again blessed by an exceptional community of scholars as
my dissertation committee, co-directed by David Burrell and Joseph Wawrykow
and rounded out with Mary Catherine Hilkert, O.P., Lawrence Cunningham and
Christian Moevs.
This book, Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart: Beyond
Analogy, is what has been brought to birth from that conception. Originally
entitled, “Beyond Analogy: Articulating the Transcendence and Immanence
of God According to Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart,” I have made only
moderate revisions. Having set it aside for some time while focusing on my
vocation as teacher, first at the University of Notre Dame and then at Gonzaga, the
Jesuit university where I now reside, my initial intention was for more revision;
however, as I took it up again, I realized that it spoke to me as strongly as it did
while I was writing it, and still provides the freshness and relevance on its own
that it did when it was originally conceived and developed. Having said this, I
did give it a good cleaning up where needed, and in the final chapter, I added
some further reflections on how Aquinas and Eckhart together may be applied to
contemporary religious forms of life, based on other scholarship I have published
in the meantime and that I am currently working on, particularly in the area of
ecumenical and inter-faith dialog, and in the area of inculturated worship. I hope
this book is read in the spirit in which it is offered—written by a student of Aquinas
and Eckhart, imperfectly yet diligently struggling to put words to the inexpressible
experience of the Creator who is everywhere always present in all things, while
in no way being limited by this intimacy. I look forward to the well-meaning and
thoughtful responses of my readers—positive and critical—to help me move my
own reflections and scholarship to ever deepening levels.
I am modestly proud of the work that has been accomplished in this book,
and in fact, I am pleasantly astonished to realize my work on Aquinas and
Eckhart has thoroughly permeated my scholarship in other theological areas, my
personal spirituality, and my pedagogy, even though it now sounds very Ignatian
(of course—St. Ignatius must have been greatly influenced by Aquinas during
x Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
his own formation at Paris and elsewhere, a thought to be pursued in the future).
Having said this, I am profoundly grateful and humbled by the wealth of wisdom,
guidance, and care of so many without whom I could not have taken even the first
step forward let alone come to this place: my deepest thanks, first and foremost,
to Sean, who was my companion in this journey for twenty years, and who is still
my dear and beloved friend, and to David Burrell and Joseph Wawrykow, for
their directorship, mentorship—and friendship—as well as to my wise committee
members already mentioned. To all those un-named, my many excellent teachers,
colleagues, and, of course, my students from whom I learn an unfathomable
amount each year, my enormous appreciation. And finally, to Aquinas and Eckhart,
and to all of those scholars of theirs who have provided such a rich and fertile soil
for me to till, gratias vobis ago. I only hope that I have done justice to all of your
creative labor.
Acknowledgments
The author and publisher are grateful for permission to reprint the following
material:
Excerpts from Meister Eckhart: Teacher and Preacher, edited by Bernard McGinn,
Copyright © 1986 by Bernard McGinn. Paulist Press, Inc., New York/Mahway,
NJ. Reprinted by permission of Paulist Press, Inc. www.paulistpress.com.
Excerpts from Preller, Victor, Divine Science and the Science of God: A
Reformulation of Thomas Aquinas, Copyright © 1967 by Wipf & Stock Publishers.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. www.press.princeton.edu.
Grant me, Lord, to know and understand what I ought first to do, whether call upon
thee, or praise thee? And which ought to be first, to know thee, or to call upon thee?
But who can rightly call upon thee, that is yet ignorant of thee? … Or art thou rather
first called upon, that thou mayest so come to be known? But how then shall they
call on him, in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe without
a preacher? And again, they shall praise the Lord that seek after him: for, they that
seek shall find; and finding they shall praise him. Thee will I seek, O Lord, calling
upon thee; and I will call upon thee, believing in thee: for thou hast been declared
unto us. My faith, O Lord, calls upon thee, which thou hast given me, which thou
hast inspired into me; even by the humanity of thy Son, and by the ministry of
thy preacher.
St. Augustine, Confessions1
1
Augustine, Confessions, I.I., trans. William Watts (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 1912 reprint, 1995), 3.
2 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
and Eckhart together exemplify the profound breadth and depth of religious
language-use as it relates to the Christian faith journey.
In his opening reflection Augustine implies that speaking “about” God and
speaking “to” God are intimately connected. The Christian comes to have faith
in God, initially at least, through the humanity of Christ and the ministry of
preachers—means deriving their innermost inspiration from God. Hearing God
spoken of provokes me to call upon God; conversely, speaking to God compels me
to contemplate God and to articulate that reflection in spoken or in written word,
whether in the form of prayer, sermon, or even theological treatise. This insight
should not be undervalued: it is the ceaseless interplay between speaking “about”
God and speaking “to” God that propels the believer forward on her journey
of faith.
While the distinction between speaking to God and speaking about God might
seem more implicit in his opening passage, Augustine begins his Confessions by
explicitly pondering whether, and if so, how, speaking to (and by implication,
about) God leads to knowing God. He inquires, “which ought to be first, to know
thee, or to call upon thee? But who can rightly call upon thee, that is yet ignorant
of thee? … Or art thou rather first called upon, that thou mayest so come to be
known?”2 He answers his own question in the same paragraph, even though at first
glance it may appear circular: his search for God begins with faith in God, which
compels him to call out to God. “Thee will I seek, O Lord, calling upon thee; and
I will call upon thee, believing in thee.” And so it seems that faith seeks faith. But
it is God who has given him the faith in which to seek. Does this not imply that
someone first must have some knowledge about God before seeking God?
Augustine’s primary intent, though, is not to acquire knowledge about God,
but to know God. This qualification highlights the contrast—as well as the
relation—between speaking about God and speaking to God. Someone speaks to
another; it is a personal address. Someone can know many things about another,
but we can truly profess to know another only through personal encounter.
It follows that knowing something or someone personally is a type of knowledge
that cannot be completely or even adequately put into words, because such a
relationship is expressed non-verbally as well as vocally, and in fact, the deepest
facets of an intimate relationship are primarily unvoiceable. The insufficiency of
vocal expression is especially true with regard to our articulations of God, since in
our encounters with God, God does not converse with us as do other persons—a
reality that suggests an apparently unbridgeable chasm between this kind of
knowing and speaking about it.
On the other hand, whether someone speaks about God or to God is determined
not only by what kind of “knowledge” is being considered, but why. What is the
purpose of speaking about God? Is it to inform or to convince? And when we
speak to God, is it to implore or to praise? Augustine suggests these questions
are intrinsically interconnected in the faith process: the preacher’s vocation is to
Ibid.
2
Introduction 3
convert; the converted believer now continues her journey towards God in personal
conversation with God and with her own questioning and contemplation—a
journey that takes place together with other believers and in the deep silence of
her own heart.
Finally, Augustine’s reflection gives rise to the question of the relationship
between the speaker and the one upon whom the speaker calls or to whom she
gives praise. Again, the answer is proposed by Augustine himself: The Person
invoked is the Creator of the one who seeks. As Augustine expresses it, “this man,
this part of what thou hast created, is desirous to praise thee; thou so provokest
him, that he even delighteth to praise thee. For thou hast created us for thyself, and
our heart cannot be quieted till it may find repose in thee.”3
Augustine’s image of the restless heart speaks of a most profound union
between the Creator and the human creature. It says something not only about
who we are to God, but who God is to us. We are created for God; God is the one
in whom we have our end. Once recognized, this intimacy affects us so deeply,
we are unable to keep quiet, no matter how inadequate our speech. Speaking to
and about God is as necessary to our life as is our very breath. Indeed, the praise
issuing forth is not only directed towards the One addressed, but to anyone who
is within the range of hearing it. Even private prayer issues forth in theological
reflection, the process of rendering explicit our unconscious conceptions of God.
Speaking to God is, inevitably, speaking about God as well.
This recognition and proclamation of who God is compels the believer to
seek further knowledge of humanity’s Creator and End. The believer now must
ask, “What is therefore my God?,”4 an inquiry moving from immediate personal
“knowledge” of God5 to questions of knowledge about God. This type of knowledge
calls for a distinct type of expression. We soon learn from Augustine that it is not
enough to speak of God as “most excellent,” “most mighty,” “most merciful and
most just.”6 We must, in the same breath, also speak of God as “immutable, yet
changing all things,” and “never new, and never old.”7
Augustine seems to be pressing us into deeper contemplation, as this second
type of articulation requires us to push against the limits of our imagination.
While we might imagine something as the “most” of its kind, because there are
other things like it with which we can compare, we are unable to comprehend
something in which two seemingly contradictory qualities exist simultaneously:
immutable and changing; never new or old. In order to grasp such a thing, we
3
Ibid.
4
Ibid., 9 (emphasis mine).
5
When saying “knowing God” is awkward, “knowledge of God” is substituted;
however, the distinction between “knowing” and “knowledge about” is still implied, as is
the contention we cannot know anything about what God is, despite compulsory attempts
to do so.
6
Augustine, Confessions, 9.
7
Ibid.
4 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
should have some other similar thing with which to compare it; however,
Christians, and other monotheistic believers, proclaim there is no other God but
this One Creator. The Creator about whom we seek to know is at once intimately
present to us, yet completely distinct from us—in fact, distinct from anything in
our creaturely experience.
Augustine’s answer to this quandary is to articulate God in the only way he can:
autobiographically. He does not propose to speak about God in his Confessions
through logical propositions, but through narrative. For Augustine, speaking about
God means speaking about his own encounter with and journey towards God. The
two are inseparable.
Reflection on how to understand and articulate the relationship between
the Creator and creature in light of the Christian journey of faith continued to
occupy the minds of theologians after Augustine—and it still does today. But in
no period of history was this reflection more creative, and enduring, than in the
Middle Ages—in no small measure (at least in the West) due to Augustine. As the
following chapter explains, the Order of Preachers established in the Middle Ages
was specifically modeled on Augustine’s contemplative character; its friars were
well-versed in his meditations.
Among these Dominicans, Thomas Aquinas has come to epitomize the medieval
Dominicans, especially with his many well-known theological treatises. In his
Summa theologiae, Aquinas introduces the subject of God—treating specifically
in the first part of this work what we can know about God.8 He determines we
cannot know what God is, only what God is not. Over the span of the next eleven
questions, he proceeds from this assertion to the ways in which we describe God,
or, how we speak about God. The culmination of this development is Question 13,
which asserts the most proper way of describing God, if there is one, is by analogy,
a concept he takes great pains to qualify for the unique case of the relationship
between creatures and their Creator.
If we consider not only his academic training, but also the discipline of his
religious life as a Dominican friar, we discover within Aquinas an underlying
narrative echoing Augustine’s opening reflection on the problems inherent to
articulating God. From this perspective, Aquinas’ analysis in these questions
amounts to much more than a speculative treatise on the doctrine of God; it
is an exercise designed to increase his reader’s flexibility in extending limited
human speech about God, without compromising either God’s transcendence
or immanence, as students work their way through the text. More importantly,
this linguistic exercise is not supposed to be an end in itself, because the
ultimate purpose of theology is salvific: the goal of sacra doctrina is to attain
Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae, I.3 (hereafter STh). The Fathers of the English
8
Dominican Province (Texas: Thomas More, 1981) translation will be used throughout this
book, as well as consultation with the English translation and original Latin provided by
Blackfriars (New York and London: Blackfriars in conjunction with McGraw-Hill, Eyre &
Spottiswoode, 1964).
Introduction 5
9
STh, I.1.
Meister Eckhart, Meister Eckhart: Teacher and Preacher, trans. and ed. Bernard
10
McGinn, Frank Tobin, and Elvira Borgstadt (New York: Paulist Press, 1986), 399, “Middle
High German Glossary.” A profound example of detachment is Eckhart’s German Sermon
on the Beatitudes:
If it be the case that man is free of all created things and of God and of himself, and
if it also be that God may find place in him in which to work, then I say that … he
is not poor with the most intimate poverty. … When man clings to place, he clings
to distinction. Therefore I pray to God that he may make me free of “God,” for my
real being is above God if we take “God” to be the beginning of created things.
6 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
it [the power of the spirit] is far above them. It is free of all names, it is bare of
all forms, wholly empty and free, as God in himself is empty and free.”11 In his
Latin Sermon on the Feast of the Holy Trinity, Eckhart asserts: “In summary,
note that everything that is said or written about the Holy Trinity is in no way
really so or true. … Second, [it follows] that since God is inexpressible in and
of his nature, what we say he is, surely is not in him.” He employs a variety
of rhetorical devises in his discourse to facilitate his audience’s conceptual
detachment: paradox, negation, juxtaposition, dialectic, chiasmus, and other
“poetic effects.”12
In addition, he creatively incorporates Neoplatonic principles into his vernacular
in order to take his Christian audience out of their conventional modes of thinking
about God, for example, ûzbruch, or in the Latin, emanatio—the emanation or
flowing out of all things from the Divine Source13—which he uses to explicate
the Christian doctrine of the Triune God’s creative action, reflected in the human
soul. He employs emanation language to highlight the unique distinction between
creatures and their Creator: on the one hand, because all things emanate from the
Source they bear a likeness to it; on the other hand, this Source is distinct precisely
by virtue of its singular existence. By describing the relationship in these terms,
which he articulates with a strategic set of rhetorical twists and turns, Eckhart
effectively introduces a variety of linguistic frameworks whereby his readers and
listeners will become more and more detached from any particular concept of God
that may hinder their journey towards knowing God. Because—as Eckhart often
reminds us—if we could capture God with one conception, then truly “God would
not be God.”
The idea that God would not be God if God could be defined by any conception
is articulated in a variety of ways throughout Eckhart. For example, in his sermon
on Ephesians 4:23, he writes:
But if you want to be without sin and perfect, you should not chatter about
God. And do not try to understand God, for God is beyond all understanding.
One authority says: “If I had a God whom I could understand, I should never
11
German Sermon on Luke 10:38. Unless otherwise specified, quoted texts from
Eckhart are taken from translations in the Classics of Western Spirituality series by Paulist
Press: McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt (Meister Eckhart: Teacher and Preacher, 1986) and
Colledge and McGinn (Meister Eckhart: Essential Sermons, 1981). These volumes are
particularly helpful because they include High Medieval Latin and German glossaries as
well as extensive indices.
12
See, for example, Tobin’s discussion in Meister Eckhart: Thought and Language
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1986), 158-82. See also Cyprian Smith,
The Way of Paradox: Spiritual Life as Taught by Meister Eckhart (New York: Paulist
Press, 1987).
13
McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher, 403 (glossary).
Introduction 7
consider him God.” If you can understand anything about him, it in no way
belongs to him.
and
A man ought not to have a God who is just a product of his thought, nor should
he be satisfied with that, because if the thought vanished, God too would vanish.
But one ought to have a God who is present, a God who is far above the notions
of men and of all created things.
Eckhart also demonstrates his linguistic ingenuity in his Latin sermons and
scriptural exegeses, although his creativity is perhaps less obvious than in his
German works. To aid his students and more scholastic audiences in transcending
conventional conceptions of God, Eckhart, like Aquinas, adopts and modifies a
highly philosophical vocabulary that appears to be Aristotelian in character: esse,
essentia, potentia, actio, and so on. Rather than resting with descriptions of God in
terms of emanation to help his audience overcome their conceptual rigidity, Eckhart
also often describes God as Intelligere14 and the process of human transcendence as
“detached intellection.”15 He identifies God’s Existence with God’s Knowledge in
such a way that, the closer his audience comes to detached intellection about God,
the closer they may come to know God.16 The goal of this process is to become so
identified with God that there is no longer any separation between the existence of
the two “subjects,” the human knower and the Divine Knower (the human creature
and its Creator)—in fact there are no longer any subjects to know about.17
14
Ibid., 395 (Latin Glossary).
15
See Carl Franklin Kelley, Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1977) on “Divine Knowledge” as a central theme in Eckhart’s work.
16
Eckhart often combines “detached intellection” with emanation imagery. For
example, in his commentary on Exodus, Eckhart speaks of “bringing every intellect into
captivity in service of Christ” (essentially, detached intellection), but in the next verse, he
combines descriptions of God’s existence with emanation: “the repetition … ‘I am who
am’ … indicates a reflexive turning back of his existence into itself … a ‘boiling’ or giving
birth to itself” (McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher, 43-6).
17
However, Eckhart remains consistent in maintaining that, while there is no
separation between them, the distinction between Creator and creature nevertheless
remains. This process of identification is neither initiated nor moved by the human creature,
but by and through God, who created us for this determination.
8 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
While his approach may sometimes appear very different from that of his
vernacular works, his purpose is the same: transcending ordinary language-use
in order to speak about God, and so leading others to knowing God. Eckhart
proves himself adept in his dual vocation as Preacher and Teacher, for he has the
remarkable ability to transform his rhetoric to accommodate his diverse audiences.
In both roles, as teacher of future preachers and as himself preacher extraordinaire,
Eckhart offers a living reply to Augustine’s quandary: “But who can rightly call
upon thee, that is yet ignorant of thee? … and how shall they believe without
a preacher?”18
Unfortunately, Eckhart was condemned by the Church for his enigmatic use of
language, an injustice which has yet to be reversed.19 Ironically, while nothing
could have been further from his intent, Eckhart was accused of “leading simpler
minds astray in matters of faith and morals.”20 Eckhart died before he was able
to explain himself, and his writings have rested in virtual obscurity for several
centuries. However, renewed interest in the writings of medieval mystics has
prompted scholarly research into Eckhart’s work.
In fact, much has been written about the ingenious and complex manner in
which Meister Eckhart employs language in speaking about the relationship
between creatures and their Creator. In this regard, many scholars have attempted
to compare Eckhart to his well-known predecessor, Thomas Aquinas. This has
generated a fair amount of controversy about whether, and to what extent, Eckhart
follows or departs from Aquinas, but the general tendency is to highlight the
differences between them.
Disagreements over Eckhart’s adherence to Aquinas as well as the tendency
to contrast them often stem from the various points of departure scholars take
when considering the two medieval masters’ works. One approach compares their
so-called metaphysics, focusing on what each has to say about the nature and
existence of God. Taken from this perspective, contrasts between Eckhart and
Aquinas seem apparent. Another approach examines Eckhart and Aquinas at the
linguistic or rhetorical level—that is, how they each use language to achieve a
desired effect in their respective audiences. This examination requires us to consider
many factors in a given text before drawing any “metaphysical” conclusions,
such as: For whom is each writer writing, and for what purpose? What literary
and linguistic forms are employed in each composition? While inevitably, many
different interpretations arise between scholars, this perspective makes room for
the suggestion that differences between two texts or authors may exist mostly at
a surface level. In fact, on closer reading superficial differences give way to an
underlying complementarity between the texts or authors under consideration.
The following discussion provides a brief survey, by no means exhaustive, of
major trends in current scholarship on the relationship of Eckhart and Aquinas.
The purpose of this survey is twofold: first, to acknowledge the many contributions
of contemporary scholars in this area, and second, to reveal the need to explore
Eckhart and Aquinas from a slightly different angle, one of reading Eckhart in light
of Aquinas, with the intention of uncovering the profound creativity generated
by their inherent connection regarding religious language-use. This vantage point
has not been adequately exploited, because while there has been much scholarly
reflection on Aquinas’ understanding of analogy as well as on Eckhart’s creative
use of rhetoric, the underlying assumption that there exists a deeper intrinsic unity
between the two has for the most part been underappreciated. However, research
established by scholars of Eckhart and of Aquinas has indeed produced a fertile
(if confusing) ground for exploring how these two medieval Dominican masters
facilitate our own religious language-use.
There is little consensus among scholars about the extent to which Eckhart
actually departs from Aquinas in speaking about God or in describing the
Creator–creature relationship. Often, when one scholar asserts something of one
or the other masters, another scholar asserts just the opposite! However, the major
contrast appears to be in determining Eckhart as a Neoplatonist and Aquinas as
an Aristotelian. This contrast breaks down to include further differences, such
as respective notions on divine causality, priority and distinction/indistinction of
divine perfections, and the independence (or not) of the creature’s existence apart
from its Creator.
Frank Tobin, for example, citing Eckhart’s commentary on the book of
Genesis (“God naturally possesses all forms and the forms of all”), argues for
Eckhart’s Neoplatonism in stressing God as formal cause, in contrast to Aquinas’
Aristotelian tendency to speak of God as efficient cause.21 On the other hand,
Carl Franklin Kelley, who downplays Eckhart’s Neoplatonism, points out passages
in Eckhart where essence by itself can never be a formal cause. According to
Kelley, Eckhart does not place essence prior to existence as a Neoplatonist would.22
In terms of divine perfections, Alain de Libera and J.A. Aertsen contrast Eckhart,
who writes of the essential indistinctness of divine perfections (for example, in
his commentary on Gospel of John), with Aquinas, who discusses distinctions
between divine perfections apart from our imperfect way of knowing.23
21
Ibid., 57.
22
Kelley, Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge, 53.
23
See J.A. Aertsen, “Ontology and Henology in Medieval Philosophy,” in
On Proclus and his Influence in Medieval Philosophy, ed. E.P. Bos and P.A. Meijer (Leiden:
E.J. Brill, 1992), 135 and Alain de Libera, Le problème de l’être chez Maîter Eckhart:
10 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
inherited, insofar as the creature’s being is in the being of the Son.35 Zum Brunn’s
description, which in a sense explicates Mojsisch’s, fits into “dialectical analogy.”
In addition to interpreting Eckhart’s analogy as some kind of synthesis,
de Libera, along with McGinn, sees Eckhart moving through different and
increasingly deeper levels of language-use: predication, analogy, dialectic.36 They
stress that these modes of speaking are complementary and mutually dependent
on each other. De Libera’s insight into the inherent connection between analogy
and dialectic follows upon the work of Vladimir Lossky, who focuses on Eckhart’s
particular use of dialectic describing a dynamic relationship between creature and
Creator: in one “moment” of creation, when the creature is created from nothing,
the creature’s existence is purely equivocal to, or distinct from, the Creator; in
another “moment,” indistinct with regard to the Divine Cause’s knowledge and
production, the creature shares an univocal relationship with the Creator.37
According to Lossky, Eckhart departs from Aquinas’ understanding of analogy as
a “middle-way” between the equivocal and the univocal. Rather, Eckhart perceives
analogy as a dynamic movement, or rather, a dynamic unity, between the two modes
of speaking: “The univocal and equivocal relation must be rejected or taken together
when speaking of an analogical Cause, creator of all things.”38 By “[t]he univocal
and equivocal … taken together,” Lossky is referring to pairs of seemingly contrary
terms consistently showing up in Eckhart’s writings when he refers to the creature
in relation to its Cause: distinction and indistinction, dissimilarity and resemblance,
exteriority and interiority, separation and unification, and so on.39 This explanation
of analogy, like others,40 sees “analogical causality” as a kind of metaphysical
category that is, for Eckhart, best described dialectically. The unstated—but very
significant—implication of Lossky’s interpretation of Eckhart is that, since the
Émilie Zum Brunn and Alain de Libera, Maître Eckhart: metaphysique de Verbe
35
connection between the creature and its Creator is essentially dynamic, not static, it
cannot be articulated by a static concept of analogy. The recognition that dialectical
language-use is itself somewhat “analogical”41 moves the concept of analogy from
a static definition, such as we understand by “analogy of proportion” or “analogy of
attribution,” to a dynamic description much more difficult to grasp, something that
does not fit into any well-defined linguistic typology.
A more dynamic interpretation of Eckhart’s use of analogy in turn must affect
how Eckhart is viewed with respect to Aquinas. In fact, McGinn cautions us to
avoid overly simplified contrasts between the two.42 While he also tends to draw
out differences between Eckhart and Aquinas, McGinn concedes that if Burrell is
correct in asserting Aquinas’ understanding of analogy is more about developing
a sense of attentiveness to the subtle play of language than about defining, for
example, an intrinsic and/or proportional relation between Creator and creature—as
some scholars credit Aquinas—then Eckhart is a master of the art of analogy.43
Supposing there is an “art of analogy” requires distinguishing between
analogy as a simple rhetorical or linguistic device—that is, a comparison of two
things (for example, Creator and creature) by extension of one thing to another,44
whether it is by proportion, attribution, or even causality—and analogy as a type
of language-use that is context dependent, and that leads the reader from speaking
about God towards the type of knowing—encounter—which ultimately evades
proper articulation. Analogical language-use, therefore, is an integral part of the
journey of faith seeking understanding. But understanding resulting from this type
41
Although perhaps Lossky himself would not explicitly assert this. He appears to
vacillate between identifying Eckhart’s dialectical language-use with analogy and merely
associating the two.
42
McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher, 26-7. See also McGinn,
Mystical Thought of Meister Eckhart, 96, where he discusses Eckhart’s possible use of
Aquinas on analogy:
[F]rom time to time, Eckhart appeals to Aquinas’ language of analogy and thus
seems to want to preserve something of the Thomistic via eminentiae. This may
seem like mere confusion, but I would argue that Eckhart is drawing on both
Maimonides and Aquinas as resources for the creation of his own dialectical
God-language.
43
McGinn, Mystical Thought of Meister Eckhart, 96.
44
Janet Martin Soskice distinguishes analogy from other types of comparison,
specifically metaphor: “Analogy as a linguistic device deals with language that has been
stretched to fit new applications, yet fits the new situation without generating for the native
speaker any imaginative strain.” Metaphor and Religious Language (Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1985), 64. That is, analogy extends the meaning of a word beyond its ordinary
use, “a matter of teaching an old word new tricks” (borrowing from Newson Goodman).
Metaphor, on the other hand, is a form of language-use “whereby we speak about one thing
in terms which are seen to be suggestive of another.” Ibid., 15. I will have more to say on
this distinction later.
14 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
45
See Sokolwski’s, The God of Faith and Reason: Foundations of Christian Faith
(Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1995).
46
STh, I.13.2.
Introduction 15
Sokolowski uses the “pagan” gods as examples, who were seen as “natural
necessities,” having control over various aspects of worldly affairs: nature, politics,
and in essence, human fate.50 They were integral parts of the world, and, apart from
47
The term “non-contrastive” is borrowed from Kathryn Tanner, and will be
explained in the following section. See God and Creation in Christian Theology (Oxford:
Blackwell, 1988).
48
Sokolowski, God of Faith and Reason, xi.
49
Ibid., 23. However, the question arises whether the contrast between so-called
pagan gods and the Christian God is as clear cut as Sokolowski indicates, an issue beyond
the scope of this book and left for future reflection.
50
See, for example, descriptions from Frederick Turner, “Apollo,” in The Olympians:
Ancient Deities as Archetypes, ed. Joanne Stroud (New York: Continuum, 1996), 50
16 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
[I]n the Christian distinction God is understood as “being” God entirely apart
from any relation of otherness, not the world or to the whole. God could and
would be God even if there were no world. … No distinction made within the
horizon of the world is like this.51
and Donald Richardson, Great Zeus and all His Children: Greek Mythology for Adults
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1984), 1 and 77. See also Guilia Sissa and Marcel
Detienne, The Daily Life of the Greek Gods, trans. Janet Lloyd (Stanford: Stanford
University Press, 2000), 167.
51
Sokolowski, God of Faith and Reason, 32-3.
52
Ibid., 35-6.
53
The Greek gods, for example, are especially characterized by manipulation of the
world and human affairs, even to the extent of mating and reproducing with mortals. See,
for example, Sokolowski, God of Faith and Reason, 92. Mating between immortal and
mortal inevitably blurs the divine and non-divine, as well as the possibility of comparing
and contrasting the two.
54
According to Tanner in God and Creation in Christian Theology:
Finite beings within the world are specifically identified in virtue of the particular
qualities which characterize them and by which they differ from other beings. God,
Introduction 17
else, and God’s identity does not depend on (or can it be found in) comparison to
anything else in existence. Therefore, that which distinguishes God from everything
else is an absolutely unique distinction. Sokolowski provides a glimpse of the
implications this particular “distinction” has on understanding the relationship
of creatures to their Creator, and the problems that arise when we attempt to
articulate it. Whenever we say anything about God as Christians, we must consider
whether we are collapsing God into the created order. If we do not recognize that
our speech about God, of necessity drawn from creation, cannot adequately reflect
what God is, then we risk treating God as though God were another being in the
universe. We will then view our relationship to God as one over against ourselves,
with all the distortions such unconscious presumptions entail.
Furthermore, even the concept of “analogy” when used of the Creator–creature
relationship risks falling into this same error, unless analogy is employed to
maintain a sense of God’s unique distinction from the world rather than to define
“what God is.”55 The emphasis of analogy when used of Creator and creature
should be on moving the believer closer to its ultimate end rather than proving
God’s existence or defining God’s nature—and such a move depends on a Creator
God who is both transcendent and immanent to creation.
58
This is not to say, however, that Eckhart scholars are unaware of both elements
in Eckhart’s work, or that their explanations do not include both transcendence and
immanence; it is more a matter of emphasis than neglect.
59
Tanner, God and Creation in Christian Theology, 28.
60
The relation between God’s will and the human creature’s free will is a central
theological problem. Tanner observes: “freedom and contingency as attributes of the
creatures … might suggest a conflict with the theological formality of a creature’s complete
determination by God’s creative agency” (ibid., 90). She asserts this need not be the case, if
the rule for talking about created efficacy is directed by a non-contrastive use of language.
See Tanner’s ch. 3: “God and the Efficacy of Creatures.”
Introduction 19
Direct contrasts are appropriate for distinguishing beings within the world; if
God transcends the world, God must transcend that sort of characterization, too.61
61
Ibid., 42.
62
Ibid., 45-6.
63
For Aquinas, “God’s transcendence does not spell that he is an absentee from the
world, the remote and uncaring deity of some Aristotelians, for, as already indicated, the
first origin and last end is causally closer to secondary causes and effects than they are
among themselves: ‘in him we live and move and have our being.’ And a new presence is
added when God dwells in us by his grace and is the immediate object of our knowing and
loving.” Thomas Gilby, STh, Blackfriars translation, Appendix 12, 215.
20 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
See Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 16-17, for description of the
65
condemnation with regard to Eckhart’s teaching on the identity of Christ with the just man.
66
However, as will be asserted later, it is this very point that contributes to the
misunderstandings over the true nature of Jesus Christ over which the early Church struggled.
Introduction 21
time, and God’s nature is not the opposite of the creatures’, for this opposition
is what really blurs God’s true distinction—transcendence-in-immanence—and it
blurs, too, the real significance of God as Creator, who draws creation back to its
origin in a union beyond any that can be compared in the world. Non-contrastively
speaking, eternity is the “center,” origin, and ground of time, and God is the
“Center,” Creator, and ground of the creature.67 The doctrine of the Trinity plays
a similar role for Eckhart, that of protecting a non-contrastive understanding of
the Creator’s unique distinction from creatures. This point will be elaborated on
in Chapter 5.
Aquinas, too, must be read from a non-contrastive perspective, and, in fact,
Aquinas attempts to form within his reader the skills to be able to use language
non-contrastively. In this sense, he has also been much misunderstood. For
example, in the third question of his Summa he asserts we cannot know what
God is, only what God is not. But then, astoundingly, he goes on to explicate
the perfections and attributes of God: Simpleness, Goodness, Limitlessness,
and so on.68 Therefore, it is easy for scholars to conclude by this accounting that
either Aquinas is not altogether serious when he states we cannot know what God
is, or, that the attributes of God must be understood equivocally with regard to
creatures. However, both conclusions presume a contrastive understanding: those
who do not think Aquinas is serious when he declares we cannot know what
God is may understand the perfections of God to be comparable to our human
perfections (that is, we contain a proportion of God’s perfections); and those who
see a purely negative reading of God’s perfections may perceive only an extrinsic
relation between our perfections and God’s.
A similar problem arises when considering God as Primary Cause, that is, God
the Creator. Some scholars, such as George Klubertanz, call attention to this divine
characteristic and label Aquinas’ analogy a “causal analogy.”69 One problem with
using the category of causality to describe the Creator–creature relationship is that
the “causality” attributed to God must be carefully and extensively qualified in
order to preserve the Creator’s unique distinction from creation. God’s creative
activity is not exactly like the creature’s creative activity, because we do not create
ex nihilo. We can distinguish how creating something out of nothing is different
67
If eternity is an immeasurably long time (proportionally), we cannot naturally share
in God’s eternity due to our mortality. If eternity—having no beginning or end—is the
opposite of time, measured precisely by beginning and end (for example, birth and death),
we cannot for the same reason naturally share in God’s eternity. Both definitions, while
maintaining God’s transcendence, leave out God’s immanence—God’s continual presence
in and sustenance of time. We expect “grace” to fills this theological gap. But the contrastive
definitions above create the impression that grace comes externally, and can be measured,
instead of thoroughly permeating and transforming from within. The implications of a
non-contrastive understanding of grace will be explored later in this book.
68
STh, I.3-11 (Questions 3-11).
69
George Klubertanz, St. Thomas Aquinas on Analogy: A Textual Analysis and
Systematic Synthesis (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1960).
22 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
than our own way of creating. God creates immediately and directly—needing no
material with which to create, no instruments, and not limited by the constraints
of time. In addition to these qualifications, we still have to contend with the issue
of opposition. If God does not create in a manner comparable to creatures, then
God must create over and against creatures, inevitably limiting a creature’s own
power to create. Therefore, God’s creative power is relegated to the category of
the divine, and the creature’s to the non-divine. “Causal analogy” risks the same
misconception as “analogy of proportionality” and “analogy of attribution” unless
God is first and foremost understood to be outside of the world of comparison and
contrast, and second, that terms such as “cause,” “create,” and “make” inevitably
retain some metaphorical or “poetical” sense.70
A non-contrastive reading of Aquinas must presume a comparison of God’s
perfection or causality to our own is far from Aquinas’ intent. This non-contrastive
presumption is based upon God’s unique distinction, one where our perfections
are neither opposed to nor proportioned with God’s perfections, but where
God’s perfections both completely transcend and wholly permeate our own. The
question is, how can this be articulated? Aquinas’ discussions of God’s nature and
attributes must not intend to introduce us directly to God, but to serve as examples
of how to extend our language beyond what we can grasp, thereby respecting
God’s mysterious “otherness.” Each question following the third reinforces
and exercises this skill of extension, and when we reach his Question 13 where
Aquinas proposes we must talk about Creator and creatures neither univocally nor
equivocally but analogically, we discover that we have been doing so all along!
Only from this perspective will we understand that Aquinas does not adopt the
analogy of “proportion” or “attribution,” but goes beyond our ordinary definitions
of analogy altogether. A non-contrastive understanding of Aquinas allows us to see
how he moves us into analogical language-use, a dynamic notion of analogy set up
specifically for the unique case of speaking about God the Creator. In turning to
Eckhart, then, it becomes clear he not only absorbs Aquinas’ lesson, but creatively
exercises it in his own work.
This introduction has attempted, first, to bring to light the underlying issues—and
obstacles—inherent to undertaking a study of religious discourse, and second, to
70
See Preller, Divine Science and the Science of God, 19-21. According to Preller,
attempts to describe the relationship between God and the world in terms of causal analogy
(which he puts under the “so-called ‘analogy of proper proportionality’”) do not necessarily
protect God’s distinction from the world, and fall into the same misinterpretation as did
Cajetan. “Causal analogy” does not solve the problem those who employ it intend to
solve—it does not “capture” or adequately describe the Creator–creature relationship,
because it falls into a comparison or contrast of “creation” terms.
Introduction 23
71
And, for Aquinas, practicing Christians do it all the time, without being aware of
what they are doing.
72
As distinguished from the theology that is part of philosophy (metaphysics),
discussed by Aquinas in STh, I.1.1.
24 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
73
Tanner, God and Creation in Christian Theology, 12.
74
Ibid.
75
Ibid., 15-17.
Introduction 25
76
Ibid., 13.
26 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Thee will I seek, O Lord, calling upon thee; and I will call upon thee, believing
in thee …. My faith, O Lord, calls upon thee, which thou hast given me, which
thou hast inspired into me; even by the humanity of thy Son, and by the ministry
of thy preacher.77
work. However, each carried out this mission very differently: Eckhart expressed,
in perhaps a more “practical” way, through his commentaries and preaching,
what Aquinas expressed pedagogically in Part I of his Summa—the process of
learning how to speak about God. To be sure, this distinction between pedagogy
and practice is somewhat artificial. However, using this distinction to think about
Aquinas’ and Eckhart’s respective approaches will ultimately reveal the profound
connection between them that is otherwise obscured.
This chapter explores the necessary interconnection of study and contemplation
providing the foundation for speaking about God in the Christian journey of faith.
Beginning with the origin and mission of the Dominicans—carried out through
their innovative system of education combined with spiritual formation—we
then move to the role the university played in the order and in the lives of our
two masters. Against this backdrop it becomes clear that, despite his highly
scholastic and philosophical jargon, Aquinas attempts to capture the unique
Dominican pedagogy in his Summa, and Eckhart’s work is inevitably directed by
his predecessor.
1
M. Michèle Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study”: Dominican Education
Before 1350 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1998).
2
For more on the Albigensian heresy, or Catharism, see Michael Costen, The Cathars
and the Albigensian Crusade (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997), 52-114.
3
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 7.
4
Ibid., 8.
Study as Contemplation 29
realized that already the historical perception was that the Dominican order
had been created only with a view to defending the faith against heresy in
the Albigenis; such, in fact, is presented as being the case in the Legenda of
St. Dominic. But while it is true enough, explains Humbert, that a desire to
defend the faith had first moved Dominic to consider forming a new order, when
that order was officially established by the Church’s authority, its intention was
enlarged to encompass preaching in general.5
Thus the Dominican order, writes Humbert, really has two ends, preaching
and the salvation of souls; and although the one end, namely, praedicatio, is
more properly speaking the particular purpose of the order, this end is clearly
subordinated to the order’s more general and universal end, the salus animarum.6
Furthermore, Dominic discerned this end could be achieved better through “learned
preaching” than simply through moral exhortation. Therefore, the study of theology
must play a central role in the formation of his friars. But study, like preaching
itself, was a means to the ultimate goal of salvation and not an end in itself.
According to Mulchahey, prior to Dominic’s new order, none of the
orders in existence were entirely suited to the special needs of a preaching
ministry—especially a “learned” preaching ministry as Dominic envisioned.7
Dominic naturally turned to the Rule he had lived under for nearly twenty
years: the Rule of St. Augustine. Because the Rule of St. Augustine is primarily
a life of contemplation, Dominic’s choice, “may not be an obvious one for a
group of men who were proposing to define themselves as a new community of
skilled preachers.”8 But Dominic perceived that the Rule was vague enough to
accommodate certain modifications and clarifications directed towards education
and preaching activity. Indeed, in his own life under the Rule Dominic found no
incompatibility between preaching and contemplation. Mulchahey refers again to
Humbert, explaining Dominic’s choice of Augustine as his model:
5
Ibid., 3‑4. Humbert’s treatise on the formation of preachers may be found in Part
III of Simon Tugwell, ed., Early Dominicans: Selected Writings, Classics of Western
Spirituality (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1982).
6
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 4-5.
7
Ibid., 12.
8
Ibid.
30 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
According to Mulchahey, Dominic interpreted the active life of the Rule as the life
of the preacher, and the contemplative life as study—while retaining the notion of
austerity and poverty characterizing the Augustinian Rule. Austerity and poverty
became the “preconditions for preaching by example.”10 These characteristics,
especially contemplation, certainly must have played a major role in the Dominican
formation of both Aquinas and Eckhart, and, as will be shown later, are manifest
throughout their works.
1. Dominican Education
When Dominic adopted “learned preaching” and “study” as means to his order’s
ultimate end, he turned towards the university as a model. Accordingly, the
destination he chose for his first preachers were centers of learning, university
towns, where they could study, preach, and find converts to their order who were
already literate.11 Since some of the most renowned masters of theology could be
found at the University of Paris, Dominic enrolled his disciples as well as himself
in the theology course in Toulouse offered by a Paris-trained master of theology.
The friars of the newly-formed Dominican order were sent to study with such
masters to enable them to excel as preachers and teachers of Christian doctrine.
However, since study was a means to an ultimate end rather than an end in
itself, the friars’ education at the university was an initial step in Dominic’s vision
of establishing their own conventual schools where the friars would be primarily
educated as preachers (and confessors) by the Dominicans themselves. The chapter
of 1220 stipulated that every convent must be set up with a teacher, making every
convent also a school. As the order became firmly established, only those friars
who possessed the intellect and talent for teaching and higher learning were sent
to the university for their education, with the practical goal of serving the order’s
need for adequate formation of their friars into learned preachers.
Besides theology being a means to an end rather than its own end, the Dominicans
departed from university education in another way: early friars were forbidden
to study the liberal arts. According to a redaction of the Dominican constitution
of 1220, this included: “the books of the pagans and of the philosophers, although
they may examine them briefly. They may not pursue the secular sciences, nor
even the arts which they call liberal, but both young friars and the others shall read
9
Ibid., 14.
10
Ibid., 19.
11
Ibid., 26.
Study as Contemplation 31
only theological books.”12 This proscription excluded the ars grammatica, because
new entrants were expected to know Latin grammar in order to learn the Divine
Office and study the classic literature of spiritual formation.
In the medieval university, education in the arts was a prerequisite to all higher
disciplines, including theology. Although many Dominicans argued that the study
of the arts, including natural philosophy, would be advantageous to studying
theology, it would not be until the 1260s that Dominican schools designed to
teach such subjects were created, and these schools were not mandatory for all
the provinces until after the turn of the century.13 Before this time, outside of
theology, only logic and grammar were officially taught in the conventual schools
or pursued at the university.14
Of course, many early converts to the order were from the university itself,
and they were already well schooled in the liberal arts as well as in the writings
of the pagans and philosophers—including Aristotle. This fact contributed, albeit
slowly, to a change in direction towards integrating liberal arts into the Dominican
curriculum. Almost from the beginning of the order, the question of the relationship
of theology to the other sciences arose out of the clash between the Dominican
ban, on the one hand, and the background of some of its most literate converts,
on the other. For instance, Roland of Cremona, already master of arts and regent
master in the medical faculty at Bologna when he joined the Dominicans, wrote on
the working relationship between theology and the other disciplines: “Theology
is perfect in itself, but with respect to us it is said to be imperfect or in need of
grammar, logic, and the other sciences, because it is taught to us and we teach it
and promulgate it through their mediation.”15 For Roland, the sciences each make
their own contribution to a better understanding of theology and of Scripture.
The reaction of Roland—as well as that of others similarly educated—to the
order’s repudiation of the other sciences is echoed in Question 1 of Aquinas’ Summa,
Articles 1-8 on the relation of sacred doctrine to the human sciences. And this makes
sense—Jean-Pierre Torrell places the writing of the Summa’s Prima pars in the
mid-to-late 1260s, around the time natural philosophy was just beginning to be
adopted into the Dominican curriculum.16 Later, this chapter considers Aquinas’
intention for writing the Summa—the Prima pars in particular—and its impact on
the Dominican order. Important to note here is that the question of the place of
the “human sciences” did not originate with Aquinas, but was a question already
12
Ibid., 56.
13
Ibid., 59.
14
For more on the medieval study of logic and grammar, see Jan Pinborg, Medieval
Semantics: Selected Studies on Medieval Logic and Grammar, ed. Sten Ebbesen (London:
Variorum Reprints, 1984).
15
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 61.
16
Jean-Pierre Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, vol. I: The Person and His Work,
trans. Robert Royal (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1996).
See Chronology, 327.
32 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
debated among his predecessors and his contemporaries. Aquinas treats this issue in
the context of the order’s mission, a point that relates to the purpose of his writing
the Summa.
17
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 138.
18
Ibid., 67.
19
Ibid., 90.
20
Ibid.
21
Ibid., 91.
Study as Contemplation 33
the common for the apostles. At the same time, novices also learned the order of
service for the Divine Office and the behavior demanded of them in choir.22
As already pointed out, the main purpose of the novices’ education was not for the
pursuit of an academic career, but for their vocation as a learned preacher. Many of the
requirements, such as the memorization of the Psalter, slowed the pace of academic
advancement and discouraged those who entered the order only as a means of obtaining
an education.23 Furthermore, most novices would never be given the opportunity for
the higher education leading to the university; this was reserved for those students
deemed especially intellectually gifted (such as Aquinas and Eckhart) and those
suitable to become teachers. Nevertheless, intellectual formation—or, as in the case
of those who had already been formed by university education, reformation—was an
integral and major portion of the Dominican novitiate, and in fact, this intellectual
endeavor was a lifelong undertaking for the Dominican friar.
Various works were recommended to assist the young brothers in their spiritual
and intellectual formation. Such readings formed the novice in approaching their
intellectual studies from the standpoint of faith. Mulchahey lists several works
we can assume both Aquinas and Eckhart would have been familiar with and
impressed by from the beginning of their own formation as Dominican friars, such
as Hugh of St-Victor’s Didascalicon, used as an introduction to “the enterprise
of study and the priorities of the Christian student”;24 Hugh of Fouilloy’s
De claustro animae, an allegorical treatment of the soul’s journey under religion;
St. Anselm’s Orationes and Meditationes;25 and most importantly, the Confessions
of St. Augustine, “that personal saga of the rational mind seeking faith and object
lesson for the Dominican,” together with the entire Augustinian corpus.26
Thus, the essence of the Dominican formation of friars was the life of faith
and contemplation which guided the life of study—with the active goal of learned
preaching necessary for the salvation of souls. Everything written by Aquinas and
Eckhart must be read in light of this ultimate objective.
When thinking about Aquinas and Eckhart as teachers, the image that comes
naturally to mind is their role as masters of theology in the great universities of
Paris and Cologne. This is especially true when considering Aquinas’ Summa
theologiae, which reads so philosophically, and less so when reading Eckhart’s
22
Ibid., 101-2.
23
Conventual schools were open to young men not joining the Dominican
order—however, their education was one of the order’s main ways to recruit novices.
See Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 85-6.
24
Ibid., 109-10.
25
For other works listed by Mulchahey, see “First the Bow is Bent in Study.”
26
Ibid.
34 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Ibid., 131.
27
Ibid.
28
Study as Contemplation 35
gifted students for further study.29 As discussed earlier, the Dominican order had
from early on, in accordance with the Church, banned the pursuit of liberal arts,
including “pagan” philosophy. While the establishment of the studium artium
appears to have been a relaxation of the Dominican ban, the Dominicans did
not teach “the arts” as it was understood in the universities. Natural philosophy,
including Aristotle, was not a part of the Dominican curriculum. Rather, the
Dominican studia artium were schools of logic.30
Of course, it must always be kept in mind that, unofficially at least, the
Dominicans could not keep their friars completely from the influence of the
university arts outside of logic, because many of the friars came into the order
with a background in the liberal arts. Later, the Dominican’s program of study
inevitably made the transition from schools of logic to include natural sciences.
However, the study of logic and grammar was inherent within the very foundation
of the order itself. For instance, Roland of Cremona, the first Dominican to
become master of theology at Paris, believed that in accord with St. Augustine, the
teaching of theology was mediated especially by grammar and logic which were
the tools of speech and thought. We can see how this argument may be particularly
relevant for the friar in the Order of Preachers, for if he is not schooled in logic and
grammar, “he can be deceived by fallacious arguments.”31 It was only later that
schools of philosophy which went beyond logic and grammar, studia naturarum,
were to take root in the Dominican education system.32
Finally, the Order developed a fourth tier of education, the studia generalia,
analogous to university education. In fact, as the Dominican order became well
established, the program of study in theology at the university was often chaired
by talented Dominicans. The studium generale provided friars with the best and
most advanced theological training available through the order. Theology was the
sole discipline of the school, setting it apart from the university, which extended to
the other disciplines. According to Mulchahey, “the [theology] curriculum offered
within a Dominican studium generale … was its true reason for being, and from
which all its other qualities flowed.”33 The friars selected to attend the studium
generale were considered the best qualified to be trained as conventual teachers
and, eventually, provincial teachers within the order. This was the main purpose of
the Dominican studium generale.34
29
Ibid., 221-2.
30
Ibid., 223-6.
31
Ibid., 228.
32
For more on the Dominican notion of the place of philosophy in the Dominican
curriculum, see Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 232-3.
33
Ibid., 378.
34
Ibid., 384.
36 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
35
Ibid., 134.
36
Ibid., 133.
37
Ibid., 139.
38
Ibid., 140.
Study as Contemplation 37
For a theologian or preacher to make the interpretive transition from the sensus
historicus to the sensus spirituales, whether allegorical, moral, or anagogical,
he needed, said Hugh of St-Victor, “right doctrine” in the second daily lecture
offered in the schola, the lecture on the Lombard’s Sentences. Here, with the
Lombard’s help, they made first contact with the theological science essential
to preaching and to its peculiar exegetical needs, and were given the tools with
which to delve into the sensus moralis and to begin making the connections
between Scripture, doctrine, and tropology.39
39
Ibid., 140-41.
40
See Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 40.
41
Ibid.
42
Ibid., 43.
43
See also Anthony Kenny and Jan Pinborg, “Medieval Philosophical Literature,” in
The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy I: From the Rediscovery of Aristotle
to the Disintegration of Scholasticism, 1100-1600, ed. Norman Kretzmann, Anthony
Kenny, and Jan Pinborg (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 16-29, where
Jan Pinborg discusses the link between lectures and disputations as well as the origins of
the disputation.
44
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 59.
38 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
that arose beyond the commentary at hand. The disputation probably first arose
in the form of the question, or quaestio, and began a process that would detach
itself more and more from the text.45 While perhaps not a direct descendent from
the early Greek philosophers like Plato, the quaestio was in essence an exercise
in the dialectical method.46 Torrell points out that in the disputation, while one
pedagogical element—the text—gradually disappears, another very important one
appears: discussion.
However, Torrell also discusses the quaestio as a literary genre—the most
“beautiful specimen,” according to Torrell is Aquinas’ Summa theologiae, “which
is entirely composed according to this scheme.”47 The Summa, although
If disputations were not enough exercise to firmly implant material from lectures
into the minds of the friars, the schola provided a third formal exercise: repetition
or review. Repetitiones were essentially tutorials in which an assistant to the
teaching master reviewed the material presented by the master in his lectures:
“reiterating, emphasizing the important points, answering further questions the
students might have.”49
Ibid., 60.
45
For the possible origin of the disputatio, see the discussion in Kenny and Pinborg,
46
the normal preparation for the second.”52 Torrell quotes from Peter Cantor: “It is
after the lectio of Scripture and after the examination of doubtful points thanks to
the disputatio, and not before, that we must preach.”53
The primary method of teaching friars how to preach, simply, was by imitation
and practice. The master of students decided who would preach private sermons,
but he could also choose a beginning preacher from his community to preach any
of the daily sermons he discerned the student could handle. The student preachers
would thus work up from lesser preaching assignments to more important ones.
The conventual prior in union with a board of advisers decided when a friar was
ready to preach outside the convent, based upon the progress and exhibition of the
friar’s abilities within the convent.
The conventual library contained not only model sermon collections, but
other texts beginning and experienced preachers alike could use in constructing
their own sermons. These collections included “lists of moral distinctiones and
interpretationes which condensed and cross-referenced the tropes of scriptural
exegesis [as well as] legends of the saints and other related narrative materials
such as collections of exempla which could be mined for illustrations.”54 With the
help of such aids, beginner preachers could build up a substantial knowledge of
popular sermon styles and begin to develop their own particular styles. We can
suppose that Meister Eckhart, for example, referred quite often to such collections
at the beginning of his vocation as preacher, and that, due to his success as a
preacher, he was also a great influence on young preachers in training.
Mulchahey sums up the process of training in which the Dominican novice
engaged for life as learned preacher:
What stood at the core of every friar’s formation as a Preacher, then, was the
oft-repeated cycle of study, hearing the Word of God propounded, and practice
in preaching to one’s community. Through a combination of exposure to the
spoken sermon, study of the written sermon and its elements, and actual practice
in preparing and delivering short sermons of his own, the Dominican brother
received the best practical education possible in the ars praedicandi before ever
preaching publicly.55
Along with the role as preacher, the Dominican friar was also to be a confessor,
an important step in fulfilling the Dominican goal of saving souls. Essentially, the
novice was also trained as a parish priest. To perform this function, friars must
have a firm grasp of the sacramental theology of penance along with an instinct for
the issues within moral theology arising in the course of any particular confession.
52
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 69.
53
Ibid.
54
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 191. For more on specific preaching
aids and manuals, consult chapter 6.
55
Ibid., 193.
40 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
56
For more discussion on this topic, see Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in
Study,” 193-4, 216-17.
57
However, the question of Aquinas’ Aristotelianism is complicated, as will be
shown later. See Mark Jordan, The Alleged Aristotelianism of Thomas Aquinas, The Etienne
Gilson series, 15 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1992).
58
See Bernard Dodd, “Aristoteles latinus,” in The Cambridge History of Later
Medieval Philosophy, ed. Kretzmann, Kenny, and Pinborg, 45-79.
59
Ibid., 49.
60
For more on the Latin translations of the Arab philosophers in the thirteenth century,
see Dodd, “Aristoteles latinus,” 52, 62-3. Jeanne Ancelet-Hustache points out that these
philosophers—or the translators themselves—tended to interpret Aristotelian thought
in the Neoplatonist sense, which also had the consequence of attribution of works like
Study as Contemplation 41
Aristotle from Greek-Latin were very literal, word order was preserved as much
as possible. “Hence the ideal was to present to the reader Aristotle’s actual words,
put together in just the way Aristotle had put them together, with minimum
‘interference’ from the translator.” However, since many features of Greek
grammar simply cannot be put into Latin, the ideal of perfect literalness could not
be achieved. Arabic-Latin translations were also made as literal as possible, but
even more imperfect than Greek-Latin translations, Arabic translations were often
made through intermediate Syriac versions—two steps removed from the original.61
One of the Dominican order’s greatest, and earliest, advocates for Aristotle
was Albert of Cologne. From before the middle part of the thirteenth century,
Albert was key in the debate over philosophy’s role, Aristotle in particular, in
the theologian’s work. He became an outspoken defender of the so-called
“Christianized philosophy” as master of theology at Paris between 1245 and 1248.
With his own “encyclopaedic recapitulation of Aristotelian natural philosophy”
Albert strove to integrate all of Aristotle’s philosophy, not simply his logical
works, into the Dominican curriculum.62
In 1248 the order decided to create schools in the provinces of Provence,
Lombardy, Germany, and England to parallel St-Jacques as studia generalia of
theology. Of particular importance was Germany’s studium, located at the convent
of Heilige Kreuz in Cologne, where Albert, the order’s first German master of
theology, was named its first teacher. Thomas Aquinas, incidentally, was among
his students there. Albert continued to expand Aristotle’s works in his teaching,
including a course on Aristotle’s Ethica, and later he disputed a cycle of questions
drawn from De animalibus.63 However, despite its geographical distance from the
university influence, the school at Cologne and the intellectual tradition associated
with Albert itself became a center of advanced theological studies. Consequently,
“the presence of the Dominican school greatly enhanced Cologne’s stature as a
centre of learning and led to the rise of a secular studium in Cologne.”64
Albert’s contribution to the spread of Aristotle throughout the order went far
beyond the conventional commentator:
Albert calls upon Avicenna and Averroës, Pythagoras and Plato, Socrates and the
“Stoics.” But Albert never actually lemmatizes or quotes Aristotle’s texts directly
after the manner of a commentator, and, to be sure, he does much more than
comment. Albert digresses, he explores difficult implications, and supplements
Proclus’ Liber de causis to Aristotle. All of these authors were cited with great frequency by
Eckhart and other masters of his time. See Jeanne Ancelet-Hustache, Master Eckhart and
the Rhineland Mystics, trans. Hilda Graef (New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1957), 30-31.
61
See Dodd, “Aristoteles latinus,” 64-7.
62
See discussion of Albert’s contribution to the rise of the Studia Naturarum in
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 252-67.
63
Ibid., 255-6.
64
Ibid., 368-9.
42 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
areas in Aristotle he felt had been left ambiguous. Occasionally, Albert fabricated
whole books his reading of Aristotle told him should have been there, possibly
having been lost in transmission or never completed by the author.65
Moreover, while attempting to give coherence to the Aristotelian world view, Albert
also made no qualms about correcting Aristotle when he thought he was wrong.
According to Mulchahey, Albert’s work on Aristotle “coincides convincingly
with the steps forward taken by his order’s studia naturarum,”66 which by 1271 had
become a permanent part of Dominican advanced education, and made mandatory
in all provinces in 1305.67 However, it must be kept in mind that this new philosophy
did not replace the course of study of the studia artium. A Dominican student was
only eligible to proceed to one of his province’s studia naturarum after studying
logic for three years in a studium artium. This prerequisite was expected for entrance
to the Dominican philosophy program throughout most of the fourteenth century.
Moreover, it can be assumed that the natural philosophy curriculum was yet only
another step for students destined for higher theological studies.68
Although Aristotle spread throughout the Dominican order, as it did in the
university, inevitably the difference in focus led to a clash between some members
of the arts faculty and the theology faculty, for those bound by the religious
life had by this time begun to gain more of the limited chairs in theology at the
university.69 In 1255, the arts faculty adopted a new syllabus consisting primarily
of the Aristotelian corpus, wherein, according to Lohr, “the arts faculty became
what we might call a philosophical faculty, with a new importance in its own eyes
and a tendency to develop a teaching independent of the theological faculty.”70
We must bear in mind that medieval universities in Europe were often initiated
by the Church, and we cannot lapse into thinking of the university in terms of a
state–church separation under which we operate today.71 The university was not
65
Ibid., 259. Mulchahey continues: “Albert’s instincts were proven correct in at least
one case, when he chanced upon Aristotle’s previously unknown De motibus animalium
while in Italy in 1256-57, having in the meantime written his own tract on the motion and
movement of animals.”
66
Ibid., 254-5.
67
Ibid., 263-5.
68
For more on the influence of the syllabus of the University of Paris on the Dominican’s
advanced curriculum of studies, see Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 271-4.
69
See Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 75-9. See also C.H. Lohr, “The Medieval
Interpretation of Aristotle,” in The Cambridge History of Later Medieval Philosophy,
ed. Kretzmann, Kenny, and Pinborg, 87-8: “What came to be known as the Averroistic
controversy in the 1260s and 70s led to some of the most intransigent formulations of the
masters’ own understanding of their role” (88).
70
Lohr, “Medieval Interpretation of Aristotle,” 87.
71
See, for example, A.B. Cobban, The Medieval Universities: Their Development
and Organization (London: Methuen, 1975), 25-6. Popes often established universities or
conferred privileges on them.
Study as Contemplation 43
“secular” in the contemporary sense. Nor should we therefore believe that university
faculty outside of the religious orders were not interested in the salvation of souls
or the possession of religious truths. However, differences between disciplines
inevitably arose, and the conflict between the secular faculty and the Dominicans
was deeper, of course, than the number of chairs held by the religious; it had to
do with the very premises upon which philosophy had been built, creating a split
between philosophy and theology:
Medieval exegesis had been concerned with the Bible. Its premiss was that the
exegete was already in possession of a truth revealed by God himself. His task
was accordingly not the discovery of new truths, but rather the unveiling of the
truth concealed in the words of the sacred text. In accomplishing this task he not
only turned to the councils and Church Fathers as authorities to lead him, but also
felt himself, as a living link in a corporate undertaking, endowed with the same
authority to teach. In the twelfth century, as discrepancies among his authorities
became increasingly obtrusive, his conviction that the tradition of which he was
custodian was at bottom coherent guided his efforts to penetrate more deeply
into the truth of God’s word as a sort of concordia discordantium. Even the great
Summae of the thirteenth century which arose out of this effort are in this sense
exegesis. Their point of departure was the articles of faith which God had revealed
in the Bible. The purpose of the summist was to try to make the res, the transient
things of this world, shine in the light of the voces, the divine words as the bearers
of immutable truth. That is why Thomas could say that theologians are like the
mountains, elevated above the earth and first illumined by the rays of the sun.72
In contrast, the master of art’s approach was quite different. While the theologian
was concerned with “unveil[ing] a truth concealed,” that is, a truth already
possessed in the infallible text, Scripture, the “philosopher”—that is, the master of
arts—sought the truth while recognizing the fallibility of his sources. “Since the
work of Aristotle, the primary source for a member of the arts faculty, was for him
neither a new dogma nor an infallible guide, he need make no clerical attempt at
harmonizing science and the Bible.”73
While Lohr’s description of the difference between the arts and theology
faculty may be overstated, he illuminates the Dominican’s characteristic approach
to theology through the contemplative life. Even in their adoption of Aristotle, the
Dominicans departed somewhat from the university. If we follow Aquinas’ thought
quoted by Lohr above, while philosophy can assist the theologian’s understanding,
the theologian must first be “elevated,” that is, informed and enlightened by the life
of faith. With that in mind, consideration must be made of how Aquinas inspired,
and was inspired by, this Dominican insight and how he attempted to capture this
insight in his great Summa.
72
Lohr, “Medieval Interpretation of Aristotle,” 88.
73
Ibid., 89-91.
44 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Although Aquinas’ physical life was relatively short, his impact on the Dominican
life was immeasurable. Although his desire to replace the long-used standard
text of theology, the Sentences, with his own Summa went unfulfilled, within a
few decades of his death his work—not only his writings, but also his work as
an administrator—thoroughly permeated every level of Dominican study, and
further, Aquinas’ influence extended beyond the classroom and into the order’s
preaching office. The thesis of this chapter is that, while the Summa, and the first
thirteen questions of the Prima pars in particular, did not become a standard text
of teaching, perhaps Aquinas did capture something of the unique Dominican
pedagogy—study through contemplation—and, thus, it must be an important
interpretive tool for Eckhart, who strove, as did many of his contemporaries, to
write in conformity with the thought of Aquinas.
Aquinas, born around 1225 and dying in 1274, joined the Dominicans as a
young man already well educated and absorbed in the religious life.74 The young
Aquinas was sent to the studium generale in Naples in 1239 to receive more
advanced education. According to Torrell, while there, he studied liberal arts and
philosophy as a prerequisite to his study of theology. There, Aristotelian science,
Arabic astronomy, and Greek medicine were flourishing.75 Very likely Aquinas
became familiar early in his studies with Aristotle’s natural philosophy and
metaphysics, even though these studies were still officially banned in Paris.76
And in Naples he encountered and decided to join the Dominicans. According
to Torrell,
Thomas surely perceived very quickly that his inclination toward study would
be better satisfied in the new order and that, according to the theory he developed
later, if it is good to contemplate divine things, it is even better to contemplate
and transmit them to others.77
Around 1246 Aquinas was sent to the studium generale in Cologne, where
he studied under the studium’s founder, master Albert, who was “reputed
to be accomplished in all realms of knowledge”78—especially, as we have
seen, in Aristotelian philosophy. Studying under Albert in Cologne, Aquinas
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 1. Aquinas received his early education and was
74
introduced to the Benedictine religious life when he was 5 or 6 years old. Ibid., 4-5.
75
Ibid., 6.
76
Ibid., 7. While Aristotle’s natural philosophy and metaphysics was officially
banned in Paris, “the repetition of the interdictions shows that they were scarcely respected.
And, like the study of Averroes, the study of Aristotle was already flourishing in Paris
around 1230.”
77
Ibid., 15.
78
Ibid., 18. Cologne’s studium generale was opened in 1248 by Albertus Magnus.
Study as Contemplation 45
This last collation is a highly structured meditation on the place of the Word of
God in theology and preaching. From the outset, it is a light for the intelligence.
But affectivity also finds a place there: to meditate on the Word is joy. … We see
in this development the practical goal that Thomas assigns to theology.
As to the “instructing others,” we can see here, without deceiving ourselves, the
signature of the young member of the Order of Preachers. The ruminatio on the
word does not find its end in itself.82
While Aquinas carefully gives priority to the literal sense of Scripture for
the purposes of argumentation, he recognizes the role of the spiritual sense as
an essential part of teaching: study as approached through the eyes of faith.83
This is an echo of Dominic’s vision, adapted from the Rule of Augustine, of the
contemplative life as study. This theme of contemplation plays such an important
and vital role for Aquinas. Study of God goes far beyond learning the material at
79
Ibid., 37-38.
80
Ibid., 28.
81
Ibid., 29.
82
Ibid., 31. See also Denise Bouthillier, “Splendor gloriae Patris: Deux collations
du Super Isaiam de S. Thomas d’Aquin,” in Christ among the Medieval Dominicans:
Representations of Christ in the Texts and Images of the Order of Preachers,
ed. Kent Emery, Jr. and Joseph P. Wawrykow (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1998), 139-56, where Bouthillier discusses the main themes of two of Aquinas’
Isaiah collations, and “Le Christ en son mystère dans les collationes du super Isaiam
de saint Thomas d’Aquin,” in Ordo Sapientiae et Amoris: Image et Message de Saint
Thomas d’Aquin, à travers les récentes études historiques, herméneutiques et doctrinales.
Hommage au Professeur Jean-Pierre Torrell OP `à l’occasion de son 65e anniversaire,
ed. Carlos-Josaphat Pinto de Oliveira (Fribourg: Universitaires Fribourg, 1993), 37-64.
83
See, for example, STh, Question 1, especially Article Ten.
46 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
at least sketched out, the great spiritual themes of all times: God, to be sure,
Christ, and the Holy Spirit; but also more precise subjects: the approach to God,
prayer, raising our gaze toward God, cooperation in the work of the Holy Spirit,
the evil effects of sin, the return to oneself, tears of compunction, the demands
of poverty.84
And we can surmise that Aquinas went through this same process in his formation
as a Dominican friar:
If we are seeking a reason for the great predominance of the Psalms over all
the other books, we might in the first place hear an echo of Thomas’s prayer.
He did not just work with a concordance; the material that came spontaneously
to his heart and mind is that on which he had meditated longest. … [This is] a
general rule observable in Thomas’s contemporaries as well. They give their
preference to the wisdom books, because these books lend themselves more
easily to “moralizing,” an integral part of exegesis at the time.85
Aquinas not only internalized the notion of contemplation as study, but then
expresses it as a pedagogical method. Torrell cites a passage where Aquinas
explains qualities doctors in Sacred Scripture must possess in order to perform their
tripartite duty of lecture, disputation, and preaching: “They must be ‘elevated’ …
by the eminence of their lives to be able to preach effectively; ‘enlightened’ in
order to teach in an appropriate way; and ‘fortified’ to refute errors in disputation.”86
Aquinas continued to refine the theme of contemplation in his more mature
work. Consider his Johannine commentary, dated to his second period of teaching
at Paris. This commentary is considered by many, such as James Weisheipl and
Jean-Pierre Torrell,87 as one of his most profound biblical commentaries. Torrell
states that it is “the theological work par excellence by Saint Thomas,” because, at
least for Aquinas, “John’s gospel contains the ultimate in revelation.”88 In Aquinas’
interpretation of John’s gospel we see the theme of contemplation at the center of
Aquinas’ inspiration. Torrell points to material
84
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 33.
85
Ibid., 34.
86
Ibid., 54.
87
James A. Weisheipl, “The Johannine Commentary of Friar Thomas,”
Church History 45 (1976): 190 and Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 200.
88
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 200.
Study as Contemplation 47
living water that gushes from his breast”; and the Paraclete in chapters fourteen to
sixteen, who completes Jesus’ work and leads us toward all truth. Thomas reveals
himself here as one of the contemplatives of whom Saint John is the model.89
Aquinas achieved notable repute within the Dominican educational system and
was commissioned to assist the orders in reforming their studies. Apparently,
after 1261 he continued to participate in the Roman provincial chapters, and may
have used this position to assist in his goal to found his own house of theological
studies in Rome, at Santa Sabina.91 According to Boyle, this would be more of a
studium personale than a studium generale like those found in Paris, Bologna, or
Cologne, an experiment where Aquinas could apply a study program according
to his own theory of teaching.92 Unlike the order’s studia artium, which focused
Ibid., 201.
89
See Leonard Boyle, The Setting of the Summa Theologiae of Saint Thomas,
90
The Etienne Gilson series, 5 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1982), 19,
and John Jenkins, Knowledge and Faith in Thomas Aquinas (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1997).
91
See Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 5 and Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 143-4.
92
Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 9-10.
48 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
on logic and grammar, and the studia naturarum, which expanded its study to the
rest of the Aristotelian corpus, Aquinas’ studium would center on theology. But
Aquinas intended to go well beyond the standard theology curriculum practiced
by the order at that time, which emphasized moral theology—an emphasis
reflecting the Dominican concern over salvation of souls. For Aquinas, however,
this accent on practical theology needed to be balanced by “dogmatic” theology.93
Consequently, in the Summa, which grew out of Aquinas’ teaching experience, the
section on practical theology, the Secunda pars, is framed by the dogmatic: the
doctrine of God and creation on one end, and the incarnation and sacraments on
the other. With the Summa, according to Boyle, Aquinas puts practical theology
within its full theological context.94 Paradoxically, although the intent of the
Order is geared toward the practical end of salvation, Aquinas’ attention to the
full implications of theology—directed by the speculative—shows Aquinas to be
most truly Dominican, for the Summa captures the Dominican spirit of learned
preaching at its most profound depths.
Lombard’s Sentences, beginning with the doctrine of God, served as the primary
source of dogmatic theology in the studia generalia. But obviously Aquinas
was not satisfied with the use of the Sentences as the textbook for theological
lectures. Earlier in his teaching career he wrote, as did others before him, his own
commentary on the Sentences.95 During the first academic year at Santa Sabina, he
used his commentary—as he did when he wrote it at Paris for his new students.
At the end of the academic year in 1266, however, he abandoned it and began
composing the Summa theologiae’s Prima pars. Torrell agrees with Boyle that,
although Aquinas did not actually begin composing the Summa until his stay in
Rome, his four years of teaching at Orvieto gave him the motivation to take on
the project of creating a new classroom textbook going well beyond Lombard,
specifically, “to fill in the most conspicuous gaps by giving moral theology the
dogmatic basis it had been lacking.”96
The underlying problem Aquinas grappled with in his attempt to capture
the Dominican ethos was the isolation, specifically in Dominican conventual
education, of moral and sacramental theology from an overarching doctrine of
God: creation, Trinity, and so on. While the Sentences was standard in university
and in Dominican studia generalia, it was rarely used by conventual Lectors—and
93
Boyle uses the terms “dogmatic” and “systematic” theology, and later “doctrinal”
to refer to the theology of God, Trinity, Creation, and incarnation. “Practical” theology
refers to moral theology and ethics. See Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 15-16.
94
Ibid.
95
For more information on Aquinas’ commentary on the Sentences, see Leonard
Boyle’s article, “‘Alia Lectura Fratris Thome,’” Mediaeval Studies 45 (1983): 418-29.
96
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 144-5. See also Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 15-19.
The Sentences never became a standard textbook at the conventual houses of study. If it was
used by conventual lectors, it was most likely confined to the fourth book which dealt with
the sacraments.
Study as Contemplation 49
then, only Book Four, which treated the sacraments. Beginning his Summa with
the question of the nature and attributes of God (and how to articulate this
incomprehensibility), “put practical theology, the study of Christian man, his
virtues and vices, in a full theological context”:
to study human action is therefore to study the image of God and to operate on
a theological plane. To study human action on a theological plane is to study it
in relation to its beginning and end, God, and to the bridge between, Christ and
his sacraments.97
Remember, one of the things setting the Dominicans apart from other preachers
was their attention to learned preaching as a method of leading souls to God.
Aquinas perceived that isolating moral theology from its fuller theological
context—especially the doctrine of God and creation—was likely to hinder this
task. Further, learning to speak about God (appropriately but improperly) is the
underlying method Aquinas uses to instill in his future preachers the means by which
to carry out their mission. This will be a point taken up in the following chapters.
As with the Sentences, the Summa begins with God and creation; however,
Aquinas departs radically from Lombard—not only in his use of authorities,
citing Aristotle almost twice as much as Augustine, but in his arrangement of
the material. Recall that Lombard’s material is divided into what he considered
“logical and historical” sections. Aquinas wanted to give the students a more
“organic synthesis that would permit them to grasp internal links and coherence.”98
The theological material is organized with “God as the center and everything else
around Him, according to the relationships that they maintain with Him, whether
they come from Him as their first cause or return to Him as to their final end.”99
Evidently, Aquinas found the Sentences too fraught with multiplications of useless
questions, articles, and arguments to provide the unity and coherence needed to
impart one with the skills for contemplative study or learned preaching.100
Regarding this thought, Mulchahey brings up the interesting question of what
texts Aquinas selected for his lectures while he was composing and teaching
material for the first part of his Summa. She speculates he may have used the
Pseudo-Dionysius’ De divinis nominibus:
97
Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 16.
98
Ibid.
99
Ibid.
100
See Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 321.
50 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
May of 1268. And it has been mooted that the work was presented as a series of
lectures during one of Thomas’ assignments as a teacher for the Roman Province,
either as a lector at Orvieto or, in fact, in the studium in Rome.101
It is not so much that lecturing upon the De divinis nominibus suggested such
a pattern to Thomas, as that he chose to comment upon the Pseudo-Dionysius
at Santa Sabina along-side his principal lectures because the pattern already
seemed to him significant. As a young man he had been exposed to Albert the
Great’s treatment of the Corpus Areopagitum as a starting place for theological
enquiry; when he came to write his first commentary on the Sentences at Paris,
Ibid., 291.
101
the Summa to the emanation/return schema. Patfoort cites lack of explicit mention of
emanation/return in the first part of the Summa as evidence that the Summa does not follow
this pattern. Thomas d’Aquin, Les clés d’une théologie (Bar le Duc: presses de l’Imprimerie
Saint-Paul, 1983), 51.
103
Mulchahey,“First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 297.
104
Ibid.
105
However, other Aquinas scholars are also beginning to recognize the profound
Neoplatonic influences in Aquinas, particularly in the organization of the Summa, as
opposed to a more strictly Aristotelian interpretation. See, for example, W. Norris Clarke,
Explorations in Metaphysics (Notre Dame. IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1994);
W.J. Hankey, God in Himself: Aquinas’ Doctrine of God as Expounded in the Summa
Theologiae (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987); and Robert Henle, Saint Thomas
and Platonism: A Study of the Plato and Platonici Texts in the Writings of Saint Thomas
(The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1956).
Study as Contemplation 51
Thomas worked to interpret the Lombard’s text as an essay in exitus and reditus.
The difficulties he encountered in making the Lombard’s text fit this pattern
is a central factor in Thomas’ decision to compose a work which allowed him
to arrange his material differently. Here is another reason to contemplate the
possibility that Thomas lectured upon the De divinis nominibus even as he began
to compose his Summa theologiae.106
According to Mulchahey, Albert set a precedent for using this text in his advanced
theology course at the order’s new studium generale during the time Aquinas
had accompanied Albert to Cologne some fifteen years earlier. Aquinas even
copied Albert’s lectures on the De divinis nominibus, and kept this copy with him
throughout the duration of his career. Perhaps Aquinas even used these lecture
notes, Mulchahey further speculates, as he organized his own lectures on theology.107
Torrell discusses the differing opinions over the specific influence Aquinas’
study of Pseudo-Dionysius had on Aquinas’ appropriation of Platonism.108 Some
see Pseudo-Dionysius as of primary importance in this area, while others believe
in fact Aristotle was responsible for transmitting Platonic elements to Aquinas.
According to this view, “[i]f Thomas is a Platonist, it is because Aristotle
himself is more of one than we usually think.”109 Torrell suggests a better answer
includes the influence of Proclus’ Liber de causis through which Aquinas was
linked to the Platonic heritage.110 However, as Mulchahey hints, Aquinas should
be seen to go beyond his adoption of an exitus/reditus schema in organizing his
commentary—and later, his Summa—to capture something deeply characteristic of
his Dominican context of study as contemplation. And, Torrell explains, Aquinas’
Torrell and Mulchahey indicate that, not only is the organization of the Summa a
product of Aquinas’ creative mind, but more importantly, Aquinas himself was a
product of his Dominican background, including, of course, his Dominican and
university education. The implications of this are far reaching, especially as we
In fact, this copy still survives, in MS. I.B. 54 of the Biblioteca Nazionale in
107
consider the relationship between Meister Eckhart and Thomas Aquinas. The
exitus/reditus pattern, perhaps obscured in Aquinas’ work, is indeed a favorite
theme of Eckhart in his work, most obviously in his German sermons. However,
the connection may be more profound and meaningful than immediately apparent.
This issue must be considered in more detail later.
Aquinas’ work as a teacher of theology in the Roman Province was not yet
finished, for, three years later, in 1272, he was assigned to conduct a “studium
generale theologie” at San Domenico. During this time, having finished the
Secunda secundae of the Summa while in Paris, he began the Tertia pars when
he arrived at San Domenico and composed the first ninety questions by the end
of 1273.112 However, Aquinas’ stay at San Domenico was short-lived, for in 1273,
after directing the program for barely a year, he quit teaching and died early the
following year.
Aquinas probably did not lecture upon Scripture at Santa Sabina, so far as can
be ascertained, but focused on theological science. But during his return to the
Roman Province, at San Domenico, Aquinas is reported to have changed back
to the conventional scriptural exegesis for one of the two lectures and chose to
comment upon the Hebrew Scriptures: Psalms 1-54 during the 1272-73 school
year and Romans and 1 Corinthians during the school year until December 1273.113
Not surprisingly, the Psalms played an important role in the themes Aquinas
presented as the core of his teaching at San Domenico, since, for him, the subject of
the Psalms—praise of all of God’s works—is the whole of theology: “His creation
of the world, His governance of the world, His saving of the world, and His final
glorification of the world.”114 Clearly, the years of training and spiritual formation as
a Dominican friar, as well as the unique Dominican character of approaching study
through contemplation, were well ingrained in Aquinas’ theological imagination.
Having discussed the context behind the Summa, that is, the time frame
within which it was written, during his tenures at Santa Sabina, Paris, and finally,
San Domenico, and the Pseudo-Dionysian pattern on which the Summa may have
Ibid., 310.
112
See, for example, Mulchahey’s table of lectures in “First the Bow is Bent in
113
Like much scholarly writing of the period, one of the distinctive literary features
of Super Psalmos is its highly structured, organizational method. Aquinas’
decisions about textual division, however, were driven by more than concern for
clarity and accessibility. … He seeks … to produce students who are not only
informed about the Psalms but also personally formed by them. (abstract)
Ryan’s dissertation has been published as Thomas Aquinas as Reader of the Psalms
(Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2000).
Study as Contemplation 53
115
See Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 23-4 and Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in
Study,” 321.
116
See Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 321.
117
Ibid., 322.
54 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
formal introduction of Aquinas’ writings into the classroom and into the conventual
curriculum in particular did not take place until 1313, several decades after
Aquinas’ death. The Summa was used in the classroom; however, not as a textbook
replacing Lombard. Rather, the conventual teachers were instructed to lecture on
Lombard “according to the mind of Thomas.”118 This consisted of treating three or
four articles of Aquinas each day in the lecture on Lombard’s Sentences. “Ideally,
friars everywhere were to become familiar enough with Thomas’ opinion that they
would be able to defend it in any situation in which they might be called upon to
do so.”119
We might suppose that by “treating three or four articles” of Aquinas in the
classroom, the Summa was meant, for the obvious reason that articles “form the
basic building-blocks of the Summa theologia.”120 However, this is not explicit;
references to using Aquinas in the classroom refer to his “doctrina,” his “opinio,”
or even his “opera” in the plural.121 Neither the Summa nor any other individual
work is consistently mentioned by name, and in any case “are certainly not
Ibid., 141.
118
Of course, the acceptance of Aquinas in the classroom was not without controversy.
119
See Robert Wielockx, “Autour du procès de Thomas d’Aquin,” in Thomas von Aquin. Werk und
Wirkung im Licht neuerer Forschungen, ed. A. Zimmermann (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1988), 413-38
and “A Separate Process Against Aquinas. A Response to John F. Wippel,” in Roma,
Magistra Mundi: Itineraria Culturae Medievalis, ed. Jacqueline Hamesse (Louvain-la-
Neuve: Internationale des Instituts d’Études Médiévales, 1998), 1009-31. However, whether
or not Aquinas was implicated in the 1277 condemnation and whether or not a separate
process directed against Aquinas was later initiated is still a matter of debate, particularly
among Wielockx, Roland Hissette, J.M.M. Hans Thijssen, and John Wippel, and beyond
the scope of this work. For more information on this issue, see also John Wippel, “Thomas
Aquinas and the Condemnation of 1277,” Modern Schoolman 72 (1995): 233-7, and
“Bishop Stephen Tempier and Thomas Aquinas: A Separate Process against Aquinas?,”
Freiburger Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Theologie 44 (1997): 117-36; Roland Hissette,
“L’implication de Thomas d’Aquin dans les censures parisiennes de 1277,” Recherches de
Théologie et Philosophie Médiévales 64 (1997): 3-31 and “Thomas d’Aquin directement
visé par la censure du 7 Mars 1277? Réponse à John F.Wippel,” in Roma, Magistra Mundi:
Itineraria Culturae Medievalis, ed. Jacqueline Hamesse (Louvain-la-Neuve: Internationale
des Instituts d’Études Médiévales, 1998), 425-37; Hans Thijssen, “1277 Revisited: A New
Interpretation of the Doctrinal Investigations of Thomas Aquinas and Giles of Rome,”
Vivarium 35 (1997): 72-101. Also see Palémon Glorieux, “Pro et contra Thomam un
suvol de cinquante annees,” in Sapientiae Procerum Amore, ed. Theodor Kohler, Studia
Anselmiana, 63 (Rome: Anselmiana, 1974), 255-88.
In any event, the Dominicans reacted to this attack by creating expositions on Aquinas’
teaching, and in 1286, Dominican officials exhorted the friars “‘omnes et singuli,’ to
familiarize themselves with Aquinas’ doctrine, to promote and defend it.” Mulchahey,
“First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 152-5.
120
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 161.
121
Ibid.
Study as Contemplation 55
122
Ibid.
123
Probably both the Summa and the Scriptum super libros Sententiarum were at
the lectors’ disposal. Mulchahey cites texts appearing at this time that juxtaposed Aquinas
conclusions in both the Summa and the Scriptum. Ibid., 163-4. Additionally commentaries
on Lombard’s Sentences were written in the fourteenth century explicitly drawing the
majority of their material from the Summa and other works of Aquinas. These commentaries
were known as lecturae thomasinae. Ibid., 163. See also Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 47.
124
Mulchahey, “First the Bow is Bent in Study,” 426-31.
125
Ibid., 432.
126
Ibid., 439.
127
Ibid.
56 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
use of Aquinas in sermons and sermon handbooks, however, was not always
done explicitly.
As this chapter illustrates, Aquinas’ work was marked through and through
with the Dominican approach to theology from the perspective of faith and its
interpretation of the contemplative life as study. And not only does he internalize
this theme in his commentaries, he also reflects explicitly on how contemplation
as study is played out pedagogically. In other words, Aquinas attempts to capture
the Dominican mission of preaching (learning to speak about God) in his Summa.
This point will be examined in detail later when the content of the Prima pars,
Questions 1-13 is explicitly considered.
D. Meister Eckhart
Having raised the theory that Aquinas integrated or captured the essential Dominican
theme of “study through contemplation” throughout his own work, including the
Summa—and spread it throughout the life of the order—it is appropriate to turn to
the issue of Eckhart’s relation to Aquinas’ work. As the above discussion of Aquinas’
influence on his order reveals, Eckhart could not have possibly been unaffected by
his predecessor, and even if he departed from Aquinas’ thought, he would not have
done so openly. Rather, he would have attempted to integrate Aquinas’ thought
throughout his own work. One of the goals of this book is to understand how Eckhart
did just that; in other words, how Eckhart put into practice the unique Dominican
approach—expressed by Aquinas—of knowing and speaking about God.
However, before taking up this issue, it is important to know something of
the diversity and popularity of Eckhart’s career as a Dominican, which included
teacher—and master—of theology, administrator, spiritual advisor, and preacher.
What emerges from this portrait is that Eckhart himself exemplified the dual
Dominican focus on the contemplative and active life.
1. Background
Unfortunately, although Eckhart was apparently one of the most popular Dominicans
of his time, information on his life is meager, “extracted” says Ancelet-Hustache,
“with great difficulty from various documents.”128 It is generally accepted that
Eckhart was born around the year 1260 in the village of Hochheim in Thuringia,
either near Gotha or near Erfurt.129
Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 4. Some scholars believe that Eckhart was of noble birth,
129
but this is in dispute. For example, James Clark, The Great German Mystics: Eckhart,
Tauler, and Suso (Oxford: Blackwell, 1949), 7, believes that Eckhart was of noble birth, but
Tobin does not (Meister Eckhart, 4).
Study as Contemplation 57
Eckhart entered the monastery at Erfurt as a very young man, and, like other
young friars, studied Latin, logic, and rhetoric as a prerequisite to his theological
studies in the Bible and Lombard’s Sentences. As one of a few select students
“who were conspicuous both for piety and for intelligence,”130 Eckhart was sent to
the province’s studium generale in Cologne for more advanced study of scripture
and theology, probably during the decade following Albert’s death.131 The exact
sequence of Eckhart’s education is not clear; however, Eckhart apparently
received his advanced education in Cologne and Paris, possibly receiving a
dispensation from the normal duration of coursework.132 During his academic year
in Paris, 1293-94, Eckhart began his teaching career.133
Eckhart apparently was not in Paris for long, however, and was commissioned
to two important posts between 1294 and 1298: prior of the Dominican house in
Erfurt and vicar of the Dominican houses in Thuringia. These positions included
administrative and financial duties as well as the more pastoral concerns of those
friars and students under his care. The fact that Eckhart was given two offices
simultaneously is strong evidence of the esteem his order held for him. However,
because holding two such offices imposed conflicting demands, in 1298, the
order’s general chapter banned anyone from continuing to be both prior and vicar.
It is estimated that Eckhart may have remained prior in Erfurt until 1300.134
In 1302, Eckhart is mentioned with the title of Master in Sacred Theology135 and
was appointed to the Dominican chair of theology in Paris, which was reserved for
a non-Frenchman. With this, Eckhart achieved the highest recognition possible in
the academic circles of his day. Eckhart was magister actu regens, that is, actively
teaching, during the 1302-1303 school year.136
According to Ancelet-Hustache,
This date is in dispute. Tobin conjectures Eckhart came to Cologne while Albert
131
was still there, in the year 1280 (Meister Eckhart, 4) However, Clark (Great German
Mystics, 7) and Ancelet-Hustache (Master Eckhart, 25) doubt this claim and believe
Eckhart arrived some time after Albert’s death.
132
Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 7. McGinn and Colledge take most of
their biographical material from Koch, “Kritische Studien zum Leben Meister Eckharts,”
Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 29 (1959): 1‑51; 30 (1960): 1‑52.
133
Clark points to the discovery of fragments of a commentary on the first four books
of the Sentences—Eckhart’s earliest known work, written between 1300 and 1302—as
evidence that Eckhart lectured on the Sentences in Paris for at least a year as Baccalaureaus.
See Clark, Great German Mystics, 7.
134
Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 6. See also Ancelet-Hustache, Master Eckhart, 26.
135
Ancelet-Hustache, Master Eckhart, 26.
136
Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 6.
58 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
[h]aving spent the first decades of his life in the atmosphere of German
mysticism,137 Master Eckhart, now aged about forty, found himself plunged
into the liveliest intellectual milieu of Christendom, the very meeting-place of
its main currents of ideas. He was cognizant of all these doctrines, which he
assimilated and forged more or less into his own individual thought.138
Thus, at Paris Eckhart attained the title by which he was to be known from that
time onward: Master Eckhart139—or, the German “Meister” Eckhart.
However, again, the new master did not remain at his academic post in Paris
for long. In 1303, the Erfurt chapter appointed Eckhart as Provincial Minister
of Saxony, which included forty-seven male Dominican houses and a number of
convents.140 After this, he was appointed Vicar General of Bohemia and entrusted
to the reform of the order’s Dominican convents there. By this time, Eckhart had
become one of the most eminent members of the order in Germany. According
to Clark, “his fame was not confined to his own native province of Saxony; he
was also honorably known in the much larger and more important province of
Alemannia, which included all the rest of Germany.”141
Although elected Provincial Minister of this region in 1310, the General
Chapter of Naples did not confirm the election. Instead, they relieved Eckhart
of his administrative duties in order to send him for a second tenure to Paris as
professor of theology.142 Apparently, “a second such appointment was an unusual
occurrence and has to be considered a great honor,” shared only by a select few,
such as his renowned predecessor Aquinas.143
In 1314 Eckhart was sent to Strasbourg, a great center of religious life in
the fourteenth century, to serve as the Vicar General of the Province of Saxony.144
In addition to his duties as Vicar, he was very involved with preaching and spiritual
direction in convents of Dominican nuns. Ancelet-Hustache surmises Eckhart
served as “prior, preacher, and professor of theology of the students of his Order.”145
137
The mystics with whom Eckhart was most involved were the Beguines, a movement
of lay persons not affiliated with any traditional order, emphasizing contemplation,
devotion to the Eucharist, and mystical visions; they were ultimately charged with “heresy,
pantheism, and antinomianism, the belief that one is independent of the moral law.” See
Robert Forman, Meister Eckhart: The Mystic as Theologian, An Experiment in Methodology
(Rockport, MA: Element Books, 1991), 35-9.
138
Ancelet-Hustache, Master Eckhart, 37-8.
139
Ibid., 41.
140
Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 6.
141
Clark, Great German Mystics, 9.
142
Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 7.
143
Ibid., 8.
144
Although it is not certain what position he held there, a document dated 1319 was
signed by Eckhart with the title of vicar. See Clark, Great German Mystics, 9.
145
Ancelet-Hustache, Master Eckhart, 42.
Study as Contemplation 59
Eckhart’s preaching gained such recognition and approval with the nuns and laity
that he became the most popular preacher in Germany.
Sometime around 1323 he was in Cologne, where he may have been master of
the more advanced students. But he continued being a very popular preacher; and,
according to Edmund Colledge, it was his preaching that was to make Cologne
the scene of his downfall.146 While there is no documentary evidence showing
that Eckhart was involved with heretics at Strasbourg, it is quite possible that
during this time he came under suspicion of treating “abstruse matters which the
common people could not understand” in his sermons.147 At the General Chapter
in Venice in 1325, although Eckhart was not specifically named, complaints had
been made of “certain German friars who preached about subtle and lofty matters
to the people to the peril of their souls.”148 And finally, in Strasbourg, this same
accusation was made directly against Eckhart.149
In 1326 the archepiscopal court of Cologne summoned Eckhart in order
to answer the charge of heresy, including not only certain propositions taken
from his written work, but material taken from what he allegedly preached in
his sermons. Eckhart declared he was not guilty of the charges, “because heresy
is a matter of the will, and it was his intention to remain and to die a faithful
son of the Church.”150 Eckhart ultimately took his defense to the highest court
in the Church—Pope John XXII himself. However, this effort to clear his name,
too, was in vain, since the same procedure was followed as was at Cologne, and
in the end Eckhart was condemned.151 The papal document “In agro dominico”
pronounced that
The first fifteen propositions, acknowledged as his by Eckhart, are heretical and
are condemned, as are the last two, which he denies having taught, but which
are nonetheless rehearsed. With regard to the remaining eleven, it is conceded
that although they have an offensive ring … are rash, and smack of heresy …
they could, “with many explanations and additions,” be given or already have a
catholic sense.152
146
Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 10.
147
Clark, Great German Mystics, 11.
148
Ibid.
149
Ibid.
150
Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 11.
151
Ibid. Papal commissioner, Cardinal James Fournier, later Pope Benedict XII,
expressed dissatisfaction with the method typically used in reviewing cases such as
Eckhart’s was. When pressed to pronounce on Durandus of Saint-Pourçain’s case—a case
Colledge remarks was “far more delicate that Eckhart’s,” Fournier protested he could not
make a just verdict until he had examined the contexts from which the propositions had
been taken.
152
Ibid., 12. The bull’s conclusion informs the archbishop, to whom it is addressed,
that Eckhart recanted on his death bed, a statement Colledge says was undoubtedly for the
benefit of the laity. The document does not report that Eckhart said he accepted the Church’s
60 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
The conclusion of the bull suggests that before it was finished, Eckhart had died.
The specific date and circumstances of his death are uncertain, but most scholars
place his death between 1327 and 1329.153
Colledge concludes that many modern historians of medieval spirituality
believe that “In agro dominico’s” verdict was “at least in part unsound.” One fact
is apparent: “if the commissioners had had a better knowledge of the fathers of the
Church, both Eastern and Western, they would have perceived that they too had
taught some of what Eckhart was now being condemned for teaching.”154
especially so that the better and more useful interpretations that the saints and
venerable teachers, particularly Brother Thomas, have written are not neglected.
On a few occasions I decided merely to note where their interpretations are to
be found.156
And Eckhart not only paid respect to Aquinas in his own work, but in Eckhart’s
defense against charges of heresy, he identifies his own situation with that
of Aquinas:
long ago, but in my own lifetime, the masters of theology at Paris received a
command from above to examine the books of those two most distinguished
men, Saint Thomas Aquinas and Brother Albert the Bishop, on the grounds that
they were suspect and erroneous. Many have often written, declared and even
publicly preached that Saint Thomas wrote and taught errors and heresies, but
with God’s aid his life and teaching alike have been given approval, both at Paris
and also by the Supreme Pontiff and the Roman curia.157
judgment that the propositions were heretical. Colledge disagrees with Koch, however, who
asserts that the bull claimed “an absolute revocation” by Eckhart. Ibid., 13.
153
Clark, Great German Mystics, 11.
154
Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 13.
155
See Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 313.
156
“Rabbi Moses treats it [intro of the Book of Genesis] especially in book two,
chapter thirty-one, of the Guide to the Perplexed, and Thomas in the Summa of Theology,
Ia, qq.44-47, and later qq. 65-74.” Colledge, introduction to Essential Sermons, 82.
See also 86, with regard to the notion of the indistinction and distinction of God.
157
Ibid., 72.
Study as Contemplation 61
The first mistake they make is that they think that everything they do not
understand is an error and that every error is a heresy, when only obstinate
adherence to error makes heresy and a heretic, as the laws and the doctors
hold. … Third, they object to things as heretical that Saint Thomas openly uses
for the solution of certain arguments and that they either have not seen or not
remembered. An example is the distinction and nature of univocal, equivocal
and analogous terms, and the like.158
On the one hand it was an active life, suited to an urban ministry, in which
preaching and teaching played the key roles. Yet it was simultaneously a
contemplative one: immersed in hours of silence, the friar or nun chanted the
Divine Office and practiced mental prayer daily.162
Forman links Eckhart’s dual focus on the contemplative and the active life
with Aquinas:
158
Ibid., 75.
159
McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher, 169.
160
Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 82-3.
161
McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher, 91.
162
Forman, Meister Eckhart, 44.
62 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
E. Summary
The first section of this chapter explored the impetus behind the Dominican
order—the primary context shared by Aquinas and Eckhart—which was the
preaching of doctrine. This had a twofold purpose: initially, to defend the faith
against heretics, and second, and more centrally, to impart knowledge necessary
for salvation. For the Dominicans, in order to preach doctrine, every friar first had
to be learned in the discipline of theology. Initially, Dominic and his disciples
turned to the university to educate themselves and provide a model for their
own system of educating their friars. However, they had to depart in significant
ways from the university model in order to accommodate their uniquely religious
character which they had inherited from the Rule of Augustine. First, the focus of
their studies had to be seen in terms of a means, not an end in itself. Because of
this, knowledge not relevant to or contrary to theology could not be pursued. But,
it soon became apparent to many Dominicans, especially those who joined the
order with a higher education, that the other disciplines and the knowledge they
imparted—especially the philosophy of Aristotle—were useful to the knowledge
of theology. Second, theology had to be approached through faith. What this
meant for the Dominicans was that their religious formation provided the context
for their studies: liturgy, prayer, and meditation on the Word of God. Thus, study
was to be seen as contemplation. Third, in addition to the threefold scholastic
method of instruction—lecture, repetition, and disputation—the Dominicans
added another, preaching, which was not only the culmination of their education,
but their reason for it. Preaching was, in fact, incorporated into their curriculum,
for students learned to preach just as they learned to dispute.
Ibid.
163
Study as Contemplation 63
As subject, God is a person whom we know and love (because He has given
Himself to be known and to be loved), a person whom we invoke and whom we
meet in prayer. When Thomas says that theology is principally speculative, he
means that it is in the first instance contemplative; the two words are practically
synonymous in Thomas. This is why—we shall not be slow to see this operative
in Thomas’s life—research, study, reflection on God can find their source and
their completion only in prayer.
64 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
164
Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, 157.
165
Ibid., 158.
166
Ibid.
Chapter 3
Thomas Aquinas:
A Pedagogy for Speaking About God
Chapter 1 laid out the obstacles to speaking intelligibly about God, and presented
the non-contrastive direction we must take to mitigate such impediments,
using Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart as our guides for this endeavor.
Chapter 2 provided us with the proper context in which to interpret these two
medieval masters, who lived in a world directed by their academic obligations
and wholly permeated by their religious life. This chapter considers Aquinas’
Summa, specifically his first thirteen questions, as a pedagogical instrument for
developing a non-contrastive appreciation of religious language-use. Following
upon this exercise, Chapter 4 explores how Eckhart masters Aquinas’ lessons on
speaking about God in a way that protects both the Creator’s transcendence from
and immediacy to creatures, a conviction central to both Christianity’s doctrines
and its religious forms of life.
1
Mt 22:37, 39 (NAB).
66 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
O my dove … let me see your face, let me hear your voice; for your voice is
sweet and your face is lovely.”3
The kind of knowledge expressed in these few Scriptural words is something far
beyond discursive language. It speaks of a presence so intimate, yet strangely
invisible, compelling ardent yearning in the one to whom that presence has
been revealed to “see” (not incidentally, a verb often used synonymously with
“understand”) that which lies out of reach. The author’s words communicate
an awareness of something unseen but at the same time familiar, something of
unfathomable beauty and worth, and the hope of someday being reunited with
it; this is Augustine’s journey of the “restless heart.” Speaking to and about
the beloved goes further than articulating this awareness, however; in some
imperceptible way it brings the lover closer to the object of desire. The author
of the Song proclaims to the one he seeks, “Your name is perfume poured out,”
and implores her, “[d]raw me after you.”4 As Scripture witnesses, speaking the
“name of God”5—that is, speaking to and about God—draws us ever nearer to our
ultimate end: communion with our Source.
2
Sg 3:2. The identification of knowing and loving God will be discussed later in
this book.
3
Sg 2:14.
4
Sg 1:2-4.
5
In his exegesis on Exodus, Eckhart explores the “names of God” (“I am who Am”),
the difficulties of speaking about God. This text will be considered in Chapter 5.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 67
As the second chapter reveals, the Order of Preachers took the Scriptural commands
to “love God with all your might” and “love your neighbor as yourself” to heart,
dedicating their friars to drawing closer to God through contemplation and to
drawing others closer to God though religious language, specifically through their
preaching. For the Dominicans this practice of speech about God must go beyond
the moral exhortations of earlier preachers; they must be grounded in Church
doctrine, which expresses Christianity’s articles of faith revealed in Scripture.
While Scripture, especially the accounts of Jesus Christ and the early Christian
communities, provides practical examples of the Christian life, the articles of faith
derived from Scripture provide precepts upon which those Christian forms of life
are based; in other words, the doctrinal aspects of Christianity shape and inform
the practical aspects, and vice versa. Therefore, the soteriological aim of preaching
is ultimately directed by Scripture. And, since Scripture contains the Revelation of
God and is the primary source for theology (speech about God), study of doctrine
must be grounded in contemplation.
Study as contemplation is an endeavor (if it can be called that) graced through
and through, from beginning to end. Scripture was the core of every aspect of
the medieval Dominican friar’s life, including their academic life, and this
was no less true for Aquinas and Eckhart than for any of their brothers. Since
Scripture contains the Revelation of God—God’s self-communication—then it
is considered (by those who hold it as authoritative) to be thoroughly graced,
God’s gift to humankind. Therefore, we must not presume we can “think” our
way to God, a belief that renders God to our bidding, rather than the other way
around. If we can become “closer” to God through rumination or speech, it is only
because we have first been invited and beckoned to do so by God, not because
we have the natural intellectual powers to do so ourselves.6 “Contemplation,” as
it is used in the context of faith, is not equated with discursive reasoning. Yet as
the notion of “study” itself implies, contemplation is in no way separated from
the intellectual process. The Dominican approach of study through contemplation
grows out of the friar’s religious practice, thoroughly based on and guided by
Scripture: silent prayer, divine liturgy, sacraments, acts of charity, preaching. This
practice exercises the whole range of the Dominican’s intellectual pursuits, from
the novice’s memorization of the Psalter to the conventual teacher’s scriptural
exegesis and to the parish priest’s discerning of appropriate penance for confession.
Thus the Dominican method of study as contemplation not only holds together the
delicate balance and interrelatedness of “faith” and “reason,” but, as it will soon be
shown, Aquinas re-articulates this relationship in a way that reveals Scripture to be
the most appropriate and important source for doing theology.
6
Terms like “closer” or “towards” are not literal when applied to the faith journey:
we cannot know how we become united to God, nor can we ever be “away” from God.
68 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Scriptural study was also integral to the medieval university curriculum, upon
which the Dominicans built their own educational system, and the brightest students
such as Aquinas and Eckhart were sent to the university with the expectation
that they would master its curriculum as well as contribute to the order’s own.
But, as Chapter 2 infers, the religious life and soteriological mission that bound
the Dominican student was not necessarily presumed in the university study
of theology (and it certainly is not today);7 therefore, reading Aquinas’ Summa
from a purely “academic” approach to theology inevitably misses Aquinas’ true
intention in writing it. Fully appreciating the Summa’s design requires considering
the specifically religious/spiritual life in which Aquinas was engaged; the divine
liturgy and hours spent in prayer and service to his order creates an underlying
narrative in Aquinas’ work not necessarily obvious from a surface reading of it.
Like other university masters, Aquinas wrote and lectured on Scripture, but he
was also bound to his order’s goal of teaching novices, preaching doctrine, and
even hearing confessions. We can infer from this that in his Summa Aquinas did
not mean simply to provide information about the nature and attributes of God, or
arguments to prove the existence of God, because these pursuits would hold little
meaning in light of the Dominican mission to lead others to salvation, understood
ultimately as communion with God, or “beatific vision.” Even if it were possible to
know “what God is” (which Aquinas explicitly asserts we cannot),8 then we would
still need to answer the deeper existential questions of “who” God is to us, and
“how” we are united to this Divine Existence—issues that make up the very
story-line of Scripture itself: creation, sanctification, and redemption. Regardless
of whom Aquinas wrote the Summa for—advanced university students, colleagues,
or the true “beginners” in theology (the Dominican novice9)—we must be attentive
to the implicit Scriptural narrative that underlies the Summa.
As introduced in Chapter 2, the Neoplatonic cycle of emanation and return is
recognized today by many scholars to be the framework within which the Summa is
written; in more specifically Christian terms, we could also say the Summa closely
follows the Scriptural narrative of creation–sanctification–redemption. As Boyle
discerns, Aquinas wished to place the issues treated by “practical” theology
(for example, moral theology and sacraments) within their fuller theological
context by framing them within the doctrine of God: creation on the one end and
7
Although medieval universities and the Church were often closely linked; therefore
many scholars wrote with religious intent, explicitly stated or not. We must not read any
medieval author—especially Aquinas—from the perspective of the contemporary secular
university. This will be reiterated regarding Aquinas’ notion of scientia, which has a much
different connotation than the one we have today.
8
See, for example, STh, I.3: “Sed quia de Deo scire non possumus quid sit sed quid
non sit, non possumus considerare de Deo quomodo sit sed potius quomodo non sit.”
9
Victor White captures Aquinas’ intention to address the broadest audience possible
as a teacher of Catholic faith. See Holy Teaching: The Idea of Theology According to
St. Thomas Aquinas (London: Blackfriars, 1958), 5-6.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 69
redemption on the other.10 In this way, the form of the Summa remains closely
attached to the journey of the believer from her emanation out of God (being
created) to her return back to God through the redemptive power of Jesus Christ.
The “narrative” Aquinas employs in the Summa leads student-readers through
their own journey by exercising them in appropriately extending human language
to the Divine, thus developing in future preachers and teachers skills in using
language flexibly in order to draw others away from misconstruing the articles
and doctrines of the Christian faith and towards knowing God. To avoid distorting
the Christian message revealed in Scripture, the believer must appropriate a
non-contrastive grasp of religious language, where our Creator God is neither
compared to nor contrasted from the world, but is realized as its unique Source and
Ground. The ultimate goal of this narrative is moving the believer from focusing
on knowledge about God towards knowing God—an awareness that “speaking
about God” goes beyond describing God to building a relationship with God.
In Eckhart’s terminology, the preacher assists believers in “detachment” from
false conceptions that hinder their spiritual journey.
10
See Boyle, Setting of the Summa, 15-16.
70 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
However, the Summa is not itself a work of sacred doctrine, because it employs
many sources other than Scripture: the Church fathers, “pagan” philosophers, even
non-Christian theologians (for example, Maimonides and Avicenna). In fact, on
the face of it the Summa reads more like a philosophical treatise than a scriptural
exegesis, especially because of Aquinas’ heavy use of Aristotle and metaphysical
terms such as esse, essentia, action. But the Summa cannot be read strictly as
a work of metaphysics either, because, as it will become clear, Aquinas tells us
rather bluntly that metaphysics will not get us where we want to go; it cannot bring
us closer to God, and, it cannot even do what it apparently claims to do: give us
knowledge of what God is.
Given the Dominican emphasis on education laid out in Chapter 2 as well as
Aquinas’ own preface, the Summa is rather best regarded as a pedagogical work,
a tool for teaching skills needed for “doing” sacred doctrine. As Victor White
observes, “St. Thomas’s own treatment and arrangement will be governed, not by
the interests of the professional investigator … but … by the ordo disciplinae—the
order of learning, pedagogical method.”13 However, ingeniously, metaphysics
does play an important role for Aquinas in this aspiration. The “metaphysics” of
the Summa is the content by which Aquinas brings about his pedagogical goal of
developing the reader’s skill in religious language-use. Employing philosophy and
all other sources at his disposal, and guided by an implicit Scriptural narrative,
Aquinas assists the reader in making the essential connection between speaking
about God and knowing God lying at the root of the believer’s journey of faith
seeking understanding.
13
See White, Holy Teaching, 7. For more on sacred doctrine in medieval education,
see T.C. O’Brien, “Sacra Doctrina Revisited: The Context of Medieval Education,”
The Thomist XLI, No. 4 (1977): 475-509.
14
See Chapter 2, section B.1.b) “The Rise of Aristotle in the Dominican Order.”
72 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Articles 1-8 deal with the scope, nature, and content of theology. The scope of
theology depends upon what we want to get out of it: definitive knowledge about
what God is or deepening of faith leading to salvation.16 Thus Aquinas qualifies
two different “types” of theology, metaphysics and sacred doctrine. The nature
of theology as sacred doctrine is leading others to salvation, and its content is
15
See Eugene Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth: Sacred Doctrine and the
Natural Knowledge of God (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1995), 32-4.
16
The contrast between “definitive knowledge about God” and “salvation” is drawn
because Aquinas intends to dispel the misconception that knowledge about God can lead
to salvation. On the contrary he contends that salvation is not gained through knowledge
about God; this type of discursive, definitive, or positive knowledge cannot be possessed
in this life.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 73
everything relating to God, both doctrinally and practically.17 The scope of sacred
doctrine, therefore, is much broader than that of metaphysics, and since sacred
doctrine encompasses not only topics of the existence and attributes of God, but all
things related to God, Aquinas chooses it as the theology with which the Summa is
concerned; and so too it is theology as sacred doctrine more so than metaphysics
that concerns this book. Articles 9 and 10 take up scriptural language and its
relationship to sacred doctrine. The connection between theology and Scripture
is not initially obvious from the list of articles Aquinas presents—there seems to
be a break between Article 8 on the function of argument in sacred doctrine and
Article 9, which switches from sacred doctrine to the use of metaphors in Scripture.
In fact, some scholars contend that Aquinas uses “sacred doctrine” and “sacred
scripture” interchangeably.18 However, the connection between theology and
Scripture is established very early on in the question, because the scope, nature,
and content of theology as sacred doctrine are determined by its primary authority
and source: Scripture. This determination is grounded by the soteriological goal of
sacred doctrine, as revealed through Scripture: the beatific vision, “knowing” God.19
Since this theology’s goal is ultimately soteriological, there must be an essential
link between theology (speaking about God) as sacred doctrine and coming to
know God. Aquinas ingeniously makes this connection by investigating theology
as “science”—“science” understood not merely as a body of knowledge, but as a
way or mode of knowing. However, the inclusion of sacred doctrine as a science
raises several difficulties that Aquinas must overcome: first, other sciences employ
discursive reasoning20 as their primary mode of knowing; yet, because of the
element of Revelation (the reality of God disclosed through grace) inherent in sacred
doctrine’s primary source, discursive reasoning always falls short of its theological
goal. Second, language employed by Scripture includes metaphor and other poetical
language, making clear and direct statements about God problematic at best. In effect,
it seems that trying to put sacred doctrine into the category with other sciences is
doomed to failure on the side of both faith and reason; since the object of a science is
to lead inquirers to making true statements through the human intellectual process,
“science” seems to be a poor apparatus for faith seeking understanding.
Victor Preller asserts, “Normally, Aquinas uses the expression sacra doctrina
18
inter-changeably with sacra scriptura—and that is clearly its primary use; he also
applies it, however, to the Apostles’ Creed, the ordinary teachings of the Church, and the
speculations of the theologian. ... The prime and radical locus of sacra doctrina is the Word
of God” (Divine Science, 232).
19
The beatific vision is reserved for the “afterlife” and for those “blessed departed.”
This knowing is ultimately communion with God, a state of distinction without separation.
See Preller, Divine Science, 259-60.
20
Discursive reasoning is the movement of the mind from one conclusion to another
until the end of the reflexive process. See Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 24-5.
Discursive reasoning is understood as a linear way of thinking and is often contrasted to
other types of intellection or ways of knowing, such as “intuition.”
74 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
1. Theology as Scientia
It was necessary for man’s salvation that there should be a knowledge revealed
by God, besides philosophical science built up by human reason. Firstly, indeed,
because man is directed to God, as to an end that surpasses the grasp of his
reason: The eye hath not seen, O God, besides Thee, what things Thou has
prepared for them that wait for Thee (Isa. Lxvi.4). But the end must first be
known by men who are to direct their thoughts and actions to the end. Hence it
was necessary for the salvation of man that certain truths which exceed human
reason should be made known to him by divine revelation.23
however, it can be applied since knowing God is the objective of sacred doctrine.
22
Marie-Dominique Chenu, Is Theology a Science?, trans. A.H.N. Green-Armytage
(New York: Hawthorn, 1959), 49.
23
STh, I.1.1, reply.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 75
not provide that knowledge. Yet there is still needed a teaching dealing with saving
knowledge revealed in Scripture, and this is called “sacred doctrine.”
In drawing this distinction between philosophy (metaphysics) and Scripture
(sacred doctrine), Aquinas implicitly raises the critical problem of reason versus
faith—since we cannot reach the knowledge we need for salvation through reason
(and even if we can get “part way” it would take much too long),24 then we must
hold it by faith. But, given the apparent dichotomy between faith and reason,
is it not futile to develop or pursue any doctrine of God?—should not reading
Scripture itself be enough? It seems even from Aquinas’ own explanation above
that the need for the type of knowledge (salvation) and the method of obtaining it
(Revelation) creates a vicious circle leaving out the process of rational intellection
and learning altogether.
The first article has raised a difficult problem for the teacher of theology: given
that knowledge “above” reason is necessary, does sacred doctrine stand on the same
footing with philosophy and other disciplines that a student is expected to master?
Following upon the necessity of revealed knowledge, Aquinas’ second article
considers whether sacred doctrine is, in fact, a science. From the first objection
it seems evident it is not, because other sciences, like philosophy, “proceed
from self-evident principles” whereas “sacred doctrine proceeds from articles of
faith which are not self evident.”25 In other words, since sacred doctrine cannot
proceed logically in the same manner as other disciplines—that is, from principles
ascertained through the reasoning process (for example, deduction, where “from
certain known things, other, unknown things are recognized”26)—then it cannot be
a science. But Aquinas will declare in Article 5 that not only is sacred doctrine a
science, but it is one more noble than other human sciences.27 In Article 2 he hints
at sacred doctrine’s exalted position among the other disciplines by referring to
Augustine: sacred doctrine is the only science whereby “saving faith is begotten,
[and] nourished.”28
The question Aquinas does not ask, but assumes, in Article 2 is more interesting
and relevant than whether sacred doctrine is a science: that is, why should we want
it to be? For sacred doctrine does not have the same goal (obtaining knowledge
about something) as the other disciplines. This question is not innocent, because it
hints there are presumptions about what a science is that may prevent us (as well as
it apparently did many of Aquinas’ own colleagues) from a faithful reading of the
Summa. If this insinuation is true, Aquinas has his work cut out for him. For, whether
sacred doctrine is a science strikes at the very heart of the process of faith seeking
understanding. We want to understand the God that we seek. And as Preller reminds
us: “[t]hat of which we cannot speak is that of which we cannot know. … In order
24
Ibid.
25
STh, I.1.2, reply obj. 1.
26
Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 26.
27
STh, I.1.5, reply.
28
STh, I.1.2, sed contra.
76 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
29
Preller, Divine Science, 4.
30
STh, I.1.5.
31
Evidenced, for example, by the predominance of the “lecture” format of most
undergraduate courses.
32
Thomas Gilby, STh, Blackfriars translation, Appendix 5, “Sacra Doctrina,” 61.
See also White, Holy Teaching, 7-10.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 77
33
Gilby, STh, ed. Blackfriars, Appendix 5, “Sacra Doctrina,” 59-60.
34
Ibid., 61.
35
Ibid.
36
White, Holy Teaching, 12.
37
See Preller, Divine Science, 4 and 233; White, Holy Teaching, 12-13; Rogers,
Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 34.
38
STh, I.1.2.
78 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
39
According to Preller, “for us to know what God is … would be for God to be a
kind of thing, a being essentially conditioned by his relationship to contingent beings, and,
indeed, a contingent being in his own right” (Divine Science, 90-91).
40
Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 24-5.
41
Ibid., 22.
42
Ibid.
43
Ibid., 26.
44
In other words, there is a distinction between the reality that is the object of the
science and the logic that best describes it. See ibid., 24-5.
45
Ibid., 20.
46
Aquinas postulates a new mode of knowing, the “lumen gloriae, which enables the
beati to internalize that which man in via can in no way conceptualize—the ‘whatness’ or
form of God.” Preller, Divine Science, 233. Since we cannot know “what God is” in this
life, we must be concerned with the journey which draws us to God’s self-knowledge.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 79
“concrete object” giving rise to the principles of sacred doctrine is God and God’s
own self-knowledge (although we do not normally think of God as concrete
since God is incorporeal, and as already established we should not think of God
as an object), therefore there is an intimate connection between the student of
sacred doctrine and the objective after which the student seeks: union with God.
In Chenu’s words, “[t]o know is in some sort to become the object. … In truth,
theology is a participation in God’s own knowledge of himself.”47 Despite the fact
that God’s self-knowledge radically transcends human reason, the first principles
of sacred doctrine allow for the process of knowing to take place—that is, for the
journey of faith seeking understanding to proceed—by virtue of God’s initiative
(not ours) and God’s unique distinction: transcendence-in-immanence.
Since first principles are not limited to the confines of human intellection, the
possibility for Revelation to function within a mode of knowing not only exists, but
is absolutely required for theology in its most profound sense. The first principles
of sacred doctrine are the articles of faith derived from Scripture and revealed by
God. Thus, sacred doctrine “borrows” its first principles from the highest science,
the “science of God and the blessed”; this is God’s knowledge of God’s-self and
the knowledge disclosed to the departed blessed who are now reunited with God.48
“A real science enjoys its scientific character ‘not just on account of the play of
categories, judgments, and syllogisms in it;’ it enjoys scientific character just
‘because an object shows itself, because a real source of light presents itself.’”49
Revelation found in Scripture is just that: God’s presenting God’s-self through the
events and persons of human history. The articles of faith derived from Scripture
sacred doctrine borrows as its first principles are truly Revealed principles.
Rogers clarifies the relationship between “borrowed first principles” and
Revelation. In some way, “borrowing” principles from a higher science is itself
a kind of revelation, no matter what science we consider, because principles are
presumed, not demonstrated, within the confines of the discipline itself (even if
they can be demonstrated).50 For example, the melody a musician plays is based
upon mathematics (arrangement of patterns, meter, scale, and so on), although
the musician may know nothing about mathematics at all: the musician is
unconcerned about mathematics; he cares about music.51 However, the principles
of music are implicitly revealed through the practice of his art; a mathematician
listening to the music may be very aware of the specific mathematical character
of the melody—and may even take more pleasure in the music because of this
recognition. The mathematician is able to render explicit the mathematics revealed
through the operation of the music, even though the average listener and the
47
Chenu, Is Theology a Science?, 23-4.
48
Ibid., 90-91.
49
Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 24 (emphasis mine).
50
See STh, I.1.8, reply.
51
See Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 26, for more on the relationship
between mathematics and music.
80 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
musician are not required to know math in order to enjoy or play the music. As this
example illustrates, any given science is dependent to some extent on revelation,
because the discipline relies on principles to which it is has no immediate access
in order to function; demonstration or explanation of first principles is not a part of
the discipline itself. The most important point of this example is that there exists
a “deep connectedness” between the higher science lending its principles and the
science receiving them, and, since those principles are what makes the lower science
“work”—indeed, according to Aristotle they operate at every level from beginning
to end of it52—they are revealed practically within the science that borrows them.
It may certainly be beneficial in mastering an art to study the principles which
inhere within it. Following the example above, if a musician desires (and is
intellectually inclined) to understand the first principles of this discipline, it is
possible to do so; the musician can study math and it may be demonstrated how
mathematics and music are connected. But this is not the case for sacred doctrine.
The first principles of sacred doctrine, revealed by the highest science, the
scientia Dei, cannot be demonstrated, because God is ineffable, and we therefore
have no direct access to God’s knowledge. The difference between the revelations
to which other human sciences are privy and the Revelation upon which sacred
doctrine relies is not simply a matter of degree, but of kind, for the Revelation of
Scripture is imparted by a reality “outside” of the created world,53 a Creator who is
not a being within the created order—indeed not a type of being at all. Therefore,
the knowledge obtained through sacred doctrine also differs in kind from that of
other human sciences, and the identification or participation that is the end or goal
of this science is one of a unique union, a transformation on the part of the student
far outreaching other human disciplines. As Rogers remarks,
Thomas pursues a science that proceeds from principles that lie outside the
world…. Under those circumstances, to proceed from first principles must
therefore mean to proceed from … revealed first principles—no longer in the
straightforward sense in which all science proceeds from the revelations of
existing things, but now in the radically theological sense in which a revelation
sheds a light that goes beyond the created tendency to associate being with the
deliverances of our natural conceptual scheme and requires an intentionality
empowered by God’s elevating agency.54
This “radically theological sense” to which Rogers refers is the very orientation
Aquinas is driving at in Question 1. Unlike a specifically philosophical sense that
52
As Rogers explains Aristotle: “the beginning is a first principle (archê), the end is
a final principle (telos), and the way in between is an inner principle, or form (morphê).”
Ibid., 22.
53
“Outside” of the created world must be understood non-contrastively and
metaphorically, of course, since nothing is outside of God.
54
Rogers, Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 41.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 81
55
Augustine, Confessions, I.
82 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
it is not because we are rational creatures that we are united with our Creator.
It is because the Creator freely willed such a personal and intimate union with
the human creature that it was created with a rational nature and graced with an
incipient awareness and direction towards its Source.56
Once again, Aquinas must examine certain presumptions germane to our
conception of faith. The first presumption is to see faith as another type of reason
or further knowledge sharply contrasted to our natural mode of intellection
(that is, discursive thinking). The second presumption is understanding faith as
replacing reason. In both cases, faith is opposed to reason rather than compatible
with it. Furthermore, both presumptions prevent the reader from perceiving
how Aquinas adapts Aristotle to his own end throughout the Summa, and from
following the non-contrastive directive of the Summa. His adaptation is so subtle
it can lead to a reading of the Summa as a work of metaphysics.
Three articles in the first question contribute to re-visioning a relationship
between faith and reason that, in compliance with Aquinas’ intent, is essentially
non-contrastive. Article 5 re-affirms the superiority of sacred doctrine over
other human sciences, first by virtue of its certitude, transcending the certainty
human reason can attain, and second because of the worth of its higher subject
matter, God—even extending to the discipline’s practical goal, the beatific vision.
Article 6 identifies sacred doctrine with “wisdom above all human wisdom”
because it derives its principles from divine knowledge, which orders and
prioritizes (in other words, judges) knowledge gained through human reason.
Finally, Article 8 asserts that sacred doctrine employs human reason, not to prove
faith, but to clarify faith assertions upon which Church doctrine is formed. In this
article Aquinas explicitly treats the vital relationship between faith and reason.
Reason does not function to prove the tenets of faith; rather the reverse: faith
re-forms and re-orients reason, ultimately imbuing all human knowledge with
existential meaning. As will become clear, all three of these articles imply that,
rather than being opposed to reason, faith provides our rational intellection with
its foundation and direction; non-contrastively speaking, faith becomes the ground
and source of rational intellection about God.
In Article 5 Aquinas responds to the objection that, since the principles of
sacred doctrine are articles of faith, which can be doubted, sacred doctrine is
less noble than other sciences, whose principles can be shown to be certain. The
stated premise of this objection is that the nobility of a science depends upon the
To preserve the distinction between grace and nature, we must qualify that the
56
end to which our natures are directed is freely bestowed by God: human beings may have
been created rational creatures with no awareness of God—human intellection need not
necessarily have been involved in the process of salvation or being drawn back to the
Creator. Furthermore, Christianity holds that even human creatures with extremely limited
intellectual abilities are directed towards God. The task remains for theology to revise its
notions about what “rational” means, and what essential role persons with such disabilities
play in salvation.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 83
certitude it establishes. But the unstated presumption is that faith can never lead
to certitude, because it cannot be reached through demonstration or discursive
reasoning. Aquinas accepts the precept connecting “nobility” to “certitude” but
attacks the underlying presumption that faith cannot lead to certitude because it is
opposed to reason.
To the premise that the nobility of a science depends on its certitude, Aquinas
adds, with regard to “speculative” sciences, that nobility can also depend on the
worth of the subject matter, and with regard to the “practical” sciences, to the ultimate
goal or “further purpose” to which the science aspires. It is clear where Aquinas’
additional qualification is leading: obviously sacred doctrine is more noble than
other sciences because its “subject matter” is the highest possible subject matter,
God, and its goal the ultimate end, “eternal bliss” (in which all things relating
to God participate).57 Thus, because sacred doctrine covers both speculative and
practical aspects of theology, it is even more noble than metaphysics, which is
primarily a speculative discipline. Furthermore, Aquinas’ additional qualification
that sacred doctrine is both speculative and practical justifies the entire contents
of the Summa, both the doctrinal (speculative) and the moral (practical) sections.
But Aquinas does not abandon the issue of certitude; rather, in Article 5 he
uses the notion of “certitude” to begin laying the foundation for aligning faith
with reason that he further develops in Article 6 and makes explicit in Article 8.
In Article 5 Aquinas asserts that what we take to be less certain in this life may
indeed be more certain in reality, but because of the weakness of our intelligence,
we simply are not able to ascertain it.58 The rationale for this statement has already
been given in previous articles: there is an ultimate reality beyond ourselves
which we seek and the issue is whether or not and if so how we can access
that reality. This reality is the highest reality, God. Since this divine reality is
beyond ordinary rational intellection, knowledge of it cannot be realized through
discursive reasoning; only God and the blessed are privy to it. This fact, however,
does not diminish the objective certainty of that knowledge. In other words, God’s
knowledge is certain and irrefutable knowledge and is no less certain because we
cannot demonstrate it. Therefore, holding something by faith does not necessarily
mean it is less certain than what has been demonstrated. To follow our example of
music and mathematics, just because a musician does not know math—or perhaps
has no aptitude for math—does not mean the principles of mathematics operate
any less through the music, or the music is less mathematical in nature.
Likewise, holding articles derived from Scripture by faith does not mean the
knowledge revealed by God in Scripture is simply opinion without any objective
reality until it is proved through demonstration. In fact, Christianity asserts that
belief in God is not holding an opinion about whether or not God exists—faith
in God has existential implications for one’s entire life. Proving that a god exists
However, Aquinas gives much credit to the human intellect, which is actively
58
does not prove one must or ought to relate to it; take, for example, Avicenna’s
unmoved mover, who operates through intermediaries, and is therefore too far
removed to touch the daily concerns of one’s ordinary life. This is why, to preview
the dilemma raised by the next question of the Summa, proofs of the existence of
God typically fail to move an unbeliever to faith, and are therefore not the main
objective of theology (especially of sacred doctrine), a point Aquinas foreshadows
in Question 1, Article 8.59 Faith in God has implications that opinion and even
belief do not. According to Berard Marthaler:
In the New Testament, pistis [faith] is made to incorporate the meaning of several
Hebrew words that suggest the trust and confidence one puts in a person or a
person’s word because that person is judged trustworthy and dependable. Old
Testament faith meant that the Israelites committed themselves to Yahweh and
accepted with full confidence that the word spoken by God would be fulfilled. …
In the Gospels, faith connotes the trust and confidence that arise from accepting
the person of Jesus and his claims.60
Marthaler contrasts this dynamic Scriptural understanding of faith with the notion
of “belief” we tend to hold today:
Whereas to believe originally meant to hold dear and clearly implied a strong
personal commitment based on trust, it now connotes an element of uncertainty,
and even when addressed to a person—“I believe you”—it signals a minimum of
trust and does not imply commitment. … “Faith” and “belief,” as defined in our
modern dictionaries, are not synonymous. Faith is more than believing. It rests on
the kind of certitude that is implied in the phrase “believing in.” Faith establishes
a personal relationship. But strictly speaking one has faith—believes—only in
a person.61
The proposition “I believe that God exists,” for example, is open to revision if
it could be demonstrated through physical evidence that such a being could not
exist. However, if one assumes that God does exist and asks the further question
of the implications of believing in—having a personal relationship with—God, the
An act of faith that does not take the world and the human condition seriously
does not, in effect, accept God as the ground of all being. It implies that God is
finite and an entity apart from the created universe. The locus of faith, like the
proper place for prayer, is not a niche in a corner of one’s life, a space, however
small or large, where “religious” activity and perhaps ethical decisions take
place. Faith is more like the atmosphere, fresh air that permeates and enlivens
every hour of individual and communal life, waking and sleeping, work and
leisure, production and consumption. Where faith is concerned, there are no
gaps. … In making an act of faith a person exercises a fundamental choice that
defines one’s views about reality, about what is important and what is not, about
what is moral and immoral. Faith is not an optional accessory one adds like a
fireplace in a house or air-conditioning in an automobile.62
Marthaler’s distinction between “faith” and “belief” implies not only that faith
plays an essential role in shaping Christian forms of life, but further, that faith
provides a function unique with regard to proofs and demonstrations; in other
words, it is not merely a replacement for proof. This function becomes clear in
Article 8 as the misperception that faith versus reason evaporates.
But Article 6 first makes a critical and rather bold move which further erodes
the presumption that faith is opposed to reason by identifying sacred doctrine
with wisdom, a step above and beyond Aquinas’ assertion in Article 5 that sacred
doctrine is privy to certain and irrefutable knowledge. Not only is the knowledge
of sacred doctrine certain, it is “wisdom above all human wisdom.”63 By moving
from certainty to wisdom Aquinas has a very specific intent in mind; he not
only further disintegrates the notion that demonstration or proof is essential to
knowledge, but he replaces it with the method of study rooted in contemplation.
By demoting the importance of demonstration as a mode of knowing, Aquinas is
ready to reposition faith with regard to reason, and by implicitly raising the notion
of contemplation, he moves us a step closer to the language of Scripture as the
foundation for theology’s speech about God.
The objection raised in Article 6 is that sacred doctrine cannot be the same as
wisdom because “part of wisdom is to prove the principles of other sciences,” a
task that we know sacred doctrine cannot do, for its principles are revealed in the
most profound sense of the word. Aquinas fells the postulate that proving is a task
of wisdom with one swift blow: wisdom does not prove, but arranges and judges.
“The wise … arrange and judge … [using] the light of some higher principle” to
judge lesser matters.64 Since sacred doctrine uses the highest principles, borrowed
62
Marthaler, The Creed, 27-8.
63
STh, I.1.6, reply.
64
Ibid.
86 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
(that is, revealed) from the scientia Dei, then sacred doctrine is more wise than any
other human science.
The act of judging serves a very different end than that of proving something.
To prove or disprove something is simply to say whether it is or is not true; to
judge something is to evaluate its worth and prioritize its importance among other
things. For example, in the well-known story, King Solomon discerns that the life
of a newborn infant is more important to the babe’s true mother than her claim to
it.65 He does not seek proof of motherhood through physical or biological evidence
(even if he could have access to DNA testing, we assume he would not), because
for him wisdom dictates that life has priority over possession, and that motherhood
is more about nurturing children than being biologically related to them. In order
to wisely judge the case before him he must evaluate and interpret the details
presented to him.
Wisdom, acting as judge, interprets and arranges knowledge. Recall in Article 5
that Aquinas discerns that sacred doctrine is above other sciences by virtue of its
subject matter and objective. So, because of its elevated status, which rises to
the level of wisdom, sacred doctrine has the task of judging other disciplines,
interpreting and ordering them to its own end. This is why Aquinas, quoting
Proverbs 9:3, “Wisdom sent her maids to invite to the tower,” asserts that “[o]ther
sciences are called the handmaidens of this one [sacred doctrine].”66
Sacred doctrine derives its principles from divine knowledge, “through which,
as through the highest wisdom, all our knowledge is set in order.”67 Remember, the
Revelation upon which sacred doctrine is built differs in kind from other sciences
in that it is concerned with a different type of knowledge—not knowledge about
God, but knowing God, a pursuit that transcends the realm of ordinary experience
to personal identification with our Divine Source—and therefore demonstration
does not render the type of knowledge sought by sacred doctrine; demonstration
yields knowledge about something in the world (that is, whether or not something
exists, how it is structured, and so forth). We typically say, then, that the principles
of sacred doctrine must be held by faith. But the fact that we are dealing with a
different type of knowledge should in turn indicate that “faith” functions differently
than demonstration.
Aquinas’ discussion of wisdom implies this very point: since the principles
of sacred doctrine are held by faith and not by demonstration, and since we are
seeking something different than ordinary knowledge, then faith does not simply
replace demonstration, but functions in a way proper to its own discipline. If sacred
doctrine is wisdom, whose task it is to judge, then faith assists in the interpretation
and arrangement of the knowledge obtained through sacred doctrine, and, by
virtue of its higher subject matter, all knowledge obtained by the other human
disciplines as well. Faith, then, is not opposed to demonstration, because it has a
65
1 Kg 3:16-27.
66
STh, I.1.5, sed contra.
67
STh, I.1.6, obj. 1.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 87
different function: demonstration provides proof; faith requires (and provides the
means for) interpretation. Thus, if demonstrations reveal the truth or existence of
something, then faith judges the importance and meaning of that something. With
regard to sacred doctrine, believers assume God exists, and seek why and how
God’s existence is relevant to their lives.
But before moving on to articulate how faith manages this task, Aquinas wants
to open up a specific avenue of learning for his reader, one proper to its task.
The objection raised in Article 6 is that sacred doctrine cannot be the same as
wisdom because it is “acquired by study, whereas wisdom is acquired by God’s
inspiration.” The same presumption of which Aquinas desires to rid us inheres
within this objection: that faith (given through grace, God’s inspiration) is opposed
to the reasoning process (study). In order to achieve his end, Aquinas qualifies the
term “judging”: There are two kinds of judging, one gained by virtue of the judge,
who is the measure of the act, and the second due to knowledge gained through
study, which does not originate within the one judging. The first type of judging
stems from grace. The judging that belongs to sacred doctrine is “acquired by
study, though its principles are obtained by revelation.”68
The second type of judging is likened to the abilities that a human judge must
acquire through the active process of learning, say, law school and practice on
the bench. However, the measure or standard used by sacred doctrine in the act
of judging comes from elsewhere (outside of the theologian’s own power of
reasoning), and this measure is revealed—that is, given by grace—in Scripture by
God who is in reality the measure itself.
If we recall the Dominican method of learning, there is no contradiction
between the active life and the “graced” life—in other words, between study
and contemplation. For we must now understand contemplation to involve every
dimension of the religious life—and these dimensions are all ground in Scripture.
Both types of judging are involved in sacred doctrine; the ultimate judge, God,
lends the measure that the human judge, sacred doctrine (and by extension, the
theologian and believer), “studies.” Sacred doctrine holds the place of wisdom
both by grace and by study. We must therefore continually return to Scripture to
discern how and why God gives meaning to our lives, for Scripture contains the
original example for this expression. Far from hindering that Wisdom held by
faith, study actively engages it through contemplation.
This method of study is non-contrastive. It does not seek data or information,
but attempts to arrange and prioritize the contents of faith (articles, doctrine) in
such a way that the believer is led back towards God who is both transcendent
and immanent. As Aquinas has indicated, since the scope of sacred doctrine
comprises anything relating to God, all human sciences are servants to this end.
Thus, sacred doctrine employs its method of study through contemplation in
order to interpret and direct knowledge gained by human disciplines, whether
specifically theological (as is metaphysics) or not (as are mathematics and music),
68
STh, I.1.6, obj. 3.
88 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
since therefore grace does not destroy nature, but perfects it, natural reason
should minister to faith as the natural bent of the will ministers to charity.
Hence the Apostle says, “Bringing into captivity every understanding unto the
obedience of Christ.”69
The presumption that faith and reason are opposed is uncovered and consequently
deconstructed in three ways in this text. First, reason and faith have different
functions. Reason is supposed to clarify the articles of faith, not prove them.
Their truth and certainty are already assumed by virtue of the subject matter’s
existential importance to the believer. In other words, it has already been judged
that the subject matter of sacred doctrine has priority over obtaining other kinds of
knowledge. Second, reason should therefore minister to faith, for faith possesses
the superior function. In Aquinas’ analogy of the relationship between charity and
the will, it is charity that holds the superior position, giving direction to the will.
The will is not in competition with charity, but is a vehicle for it—after all, an act
cannot be considered charitable if it is forced. However, if it is to comply with
charity then an act must be performed for no other motivation than that dictated by
charity: disinterested piety.
Likewise, faith directs reason to its own end, not the other way around. For
example, so-called proofs of God’s existence rarely lead to faith in God. Even
belief in the existence of God does not necessarily lead to faith. Rather, God’s
existence is assumed, and believers’ faith in God directs their reasons—as well as
their actions—to the end of communion with God. Faith must direct reason, for
any rumination or action that is directed by any other motivation than disinterested
piety will not achieve faith’s intended goal.
Finally, faith suffuses rational intellection about God with existential meaning,
consequently transforming—that is, perfecting—reason and, by extension, the
rational creature. Human reasoning about God is thus formed and informed by
faith. To put it in Marthaler’s terms, faith provides the “atmosphere that permeates”
our reflections about and actions with regard to God. This is very different than
saying that human reasoning yields propositions or definitive knowledge about
God. Such knowledge (if it could exist) would be neutral, it would not answer
the questions of why God is meaningful and relevant to our lives and how we
are united to God; but faith actually brings us towards the answer, by identifying
with the Source itself. The end result of faith’s guidance is not information or
data, but communion with the object of that knowledge. So not only are the two
compatible with each other, but reason in fact depends upon faith; faith makes
all things under God reasonable and the intellectual quest to know God possible.
We cannot therefore say that faith replaces reason. In fact, we must say that faith
calls for reason; it compels the process of intellection to move beyond itself and
bring the believer with it.
As Article 8 clarifies, the tenet, “faith perfects reason,” though a familiar
phrase, is empty if we operate under the presumption that faith and reason are
opposed. The misperception that faith replaces reason or is additional knowledge
must be dispelled in order for a non-contrastive train of thought to develop.
As Preller remarks:
The popular notion that natural reason can take us part of the way toward God
and thus supply us with a logical platform from which we can take a “leap of
faith” fails to discern the locus of the problem. … The propositions of natural
theology … postulate the “reality” of a meta-empirical being to which no
significant and intelligible reference can be made.70
70
Preller, Divine Science, 182.
90 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
and reason. In other words, a “leap of faith” tries to bypass rational intellection
altogether; it supposes that we want to know “what God is” and because of our
intellectual limitations, cannot do so naturally. “Faith” operating in “leap of faith”
is understood as a kind of supernatural knowledge above natural knowledge. This
faith-knowledge does not engage (let alone perfect) our intellect in a meaningful way.
A non-contrastive understanding of the Creator–human relationship supposes
that what we desire is “knowledge” that is existentially significant. A leap of faith
cannot produce this end because it is not reasonable—it cannot supply our intellect
with reasons why or how speech about God is relevant to our lives. Rather, faith
must supply our rational intellection precisely with such “reasons” yet it can do so
only if faith directs intellection about God towards its goal.
Thus, faith judges (re-prioritizes, arranges) knowledge in such a way that “what”
is interpreted as “why” and “how”; and “why” and “how” are the atmosphere that
shapes and guides our knowledge, which terminates in our actions. This is the
process whereby faith perfects reason.
Non-contrastively speaking, faith judges knowing God above knowledge
about God in level of importance. Knowledge about God (if indeed we can have
any at all)72 as well as knowledge about human acts and the created world assists
in the faith journey. As Preller puts it, “just as no object in the world can be judged
intelligible without the natural light of reason, so also no particular object can
be judged salvific without the supernatural light of faith.”73 Far from replacing
reason, faith directs and transforms rational intellection to the human creature’s
soteriological end. “The application of the light of faith to certain empirical
events … makes present to the intellect nonempirical aspects of those same events,
their soteriological efficacy.”74 The illumination of an event’s soteriological
significance (for example, the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ) allows
us to direct our thoughts and actions to that particular end.
Furthermore, theological reflection directed by faith moves believers’ thoughts
and actions in a properly non-contrastive direction, so that Christian forms of life
may be better aligned with the Church’s faith claims. It is one task of theologians
to ensure faith statements not be taken improperly, because the result is practices
Ibid., 181.
71
See STh, I.1.9, obj. 3 (“Magis enim manifestatur nobis de ipso quid non est quam
72
quid est”) and I.3 (“Sed quia de Deo scire non possumus quid set sed quid non sit”).
73
Preller, Divine Science, 246.
74
Ibid., 252.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 91
which do not appropriately reflect the faith of the Church. A closer examination
of the following two articles reveals that when we encounter speech about God
that is, on the one hand, articulated using ordinary language (as it must be) but,
on the other hand, fails to capture the depth of our religious experience (as it
inevitably does) we should conclude such statements must be referring to a reality
uniquely distinct from anything in our created experience—for our salvation lies
“outside” of the world, that is, outside of our ordinary concerns of daily survival.
Therefore, we can (and do) say more about God than we can know about God.
Through Question 1’s articles, Aquinas lays the groundwork for the connection
between speaking about God and knowing God.
75
STh, I.1.7, reply.
76
Rogers emphasizes the Christo-centric character of the Summa, easily
overlooked unless one pays attention to the structure and implicit references in
Question 1 (Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth, 58-70). Christian theology cannot be solely
based on metaphysics, because metaphysics is not compelled to consider the Word incarnate.
92 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
In Article 7, sacred doctrine is one science that treats not only the divine, but all matters
relating to the divine, including human “things and signs; or the works of salvation; or the
whole Christ, as the head and members.”
77
See, for example, Preller, Divine Science, 232.
78
See, for example, Chenu, Is Theology a Science?, 74-5.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 93
the created world—is also intimately present within it. Through speaking about
God in such a way that this awareness develops, one is imperceptibly drawn closer
to knowing God, a knowledge that respects, even intensifies, a sense of God’s
incomprehensible Mystery.
The objections to Article 9 highlight the misperception that the purpose of
sacred doctrine is translating Scripture into propositions describing the Divine.
The first two objections allege metaphorical language is not fitting for a primary
source of theology, first because metaphor is the mode of expression proper to
poetry, and second because this type of language obscures truth, contrary to the
intent of sacred doctrine which is to make truth clear. A further objection is offered
that, assuming we could accept metaphorical language for doing theology, we
should at least use representations taken from higher creatures, “yet in Scripture
representations are often taken from the lower creatures.”
Aquinas answers all of these objections by referring to sacred doctrine’s true
task: Divine Revelation does not allow those “within whom revelation is made”
to rest in metaphors, “but raises them to the knowledge of truths; and through
those to whom the revelation has been made others also may receive instruction
in these matters.”79 Again, as in previous articles, the role of the intellect does not
contradict but serves faith, for “[t]he very hiding of truth in figures is useful for
the exercise of thoughtful minds.”80 Therefore, the use of metaphorical language is
valuable to theology, both in “exercising” believers on their journey of faith and in
“elevating” theologians and believers to Divine truth. We must infer, however, that
when Aquinas refers to the “knowledge of truths,” he does not mean discursive
knowledge about God, but the kind of knowledge that cleaves the believer to
God—a type of knowledge that cannot be realized directly in this life.81
Furthermore, as Eckhart will better express for us than does Aquinas, the
type of knowledge attained through sacred doctrine is never intended, even in the
“after-life,” for any kind of discursive expression. When the blessed creature is
reunited with its ultimate Source and End, there is no need at all for propositions;
for, detached from all creaturely limitations, the very function of speech—to bring
the hearer closer to that subject which is being addressed—is now altogether
vanquished. The creature and Creator now enjoy an identity of distinction without
separation. Therefore, there is no subject about which to speak. For instance, in
one of his German works, Eckhart queries:
But now I ask: “What is the prayer of a heart that has detachment?” And to
answer it I say that purity in detachment does not know how to pray … [A] heart
79
STh, I.1.9, obj. 2.
80
Ibid.
81
According to Preller, Aquinas ordinarily uses “scire” for “know,” and never in
connection with cognitions of God through natural reason. Cognito and cognoscere are
the broadest possible generic terms, referring to any state of mind connected with the
apprehension of reality (Divine Science, 32).
94 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
in detachment asks for nothing, nor has it anything of which it would gladly be
free. … And as the soul attains this, it loses its name and it draws God into itself,
so that in itself it becomes nothing.82
For Eckhart, when the transcendent-yet-immanent Creator and the creature are
reunited, even the medium of language disappears, for it no longer has a purpose.
Not only the assertions, claims, and statements which are expressed by propositions,
but even prayer—even naming—disappears, so intimate and personal a knowing
is that to which the restless soul aspires. In order to express such an immediate
sense of the Creator–creature relationship, Eckhart stretches language as far as he
possibly can: to the extent of paradox.
However, before Eckhart’s bold language of “detachment” can be appreciated
and grasped in the deeply orthodox way intended, we must come to realize by
its very nature (and by necessity, in this life) theology calls for a distinct mode
of speaking which inevitably remains “metaphorical” in a very broad sense of
the word. The problem then becomes: how are we able to navigate around the
difficulties inherent to such imprecise language? The answer to which Aquinas
directs us lies in Question 13: through analogical language-use. But in Question 1,
Article 9 he foreshadows and prepares his readers for his understanding of analogy
by indicating the use of ordinary language in preserving God’s unique distinction.
Responding to the objections that similitudes (such as metaphor) proper to
poetry, the lowest science, obscure truth and are unfitting for the highest human
science, Aquinas replies that due to the capacity of the human intellect which relies
on sensible objects, spiritual truths must be expressed verbally through figures of
corporeal things; therefore metaphor is “both necessary and useful.” To cut to the
chase, that is all that we have. We do not have a special language reserved for
divinity (not that it would help if we did). But Aquinas then goes a step further
and takes this answer as a springboard for his true target, the objection that, given
we have no choice but to use metaphorical language, representations of the Divine
ought to be taken from higher rather than lower creatures. Aquinas’ reply is key:
As Dionysus says, it is more fitting that divine truths should be expounded under
the figure of less noble than of nobler bodies …. Firstly, because thereby men’s
minds are the better preserved from error. For then it is clear that these things
are not literal descriptions of divine truths, which might have been open to doubt
had they been expressed under the figure of nobler bodies, especially for those
who could think of nothing nobler than bodies. Secondly, because this is more
befitting the knowledge of God that we have in this life. For what He is not is
clearer to us than what He is. Therefore similitudes drawn from things farthest
away from God form within us a truer estimate that God is above whatsoever we
may say or think of Him.83
The most obvious conclusion drawn from this text is that Aquinas wishes to maintain
a primarily negative theology, especially evident in the statement that “what God is
not” is clearer to us in this life than “what God is,” a claim Aquinas will reiterate in
Question 3. However, Aquinas in fact exposes in this text an insidious underlying
predisposition—of which he may have thought Dionysus to be instinctually
aware—that is, the possibility for believers to understand references made to God
in their ordinary sense, which would inevitably render God another being in the
universe. To follow Aquinas’ example, if we use the most noble figure we can think
of to refer to God, we are by admission saying that God is or is like the greatest
thing in the universe. This implies some proportion between God and created
beings, which transgresses God’s radical transcendence from the world. The use of
less noble figures (and the less noble the better), on the other hand, preserves God’s
unique distinction: using references that are almost ridiculously contrary to any
proportional notion between the Creator and creatures draws attention to the fact
that we are employing ordinary language in an extraordinary way, thus exercising
our skills in extending human language to the Divine.
Article 10 establishes Scripture as the exemplar of flexible language-use. That
a text in Scripture may have several different but related senses, some of which are
distinct to Scripture, functions first to set Scripture apart as uniquely appropriate for
theology, and implicitly points to the flexibility of human language—and human
language-users—in transcending language’s limitations to make meaningful and
existentially significant references to God. Ultimately, Aquinas’ discussion of the
various senses of Scripture assists in developing a non-contrastive understanding
of religious language, because we learn that even a so-called “literal” sense has the
capacity to refer to and open the believer to a profound reality inaccessible through
a “propositional” understanding of language-use. In a propositional understanding
of language, we perceive there to exist (mistakenly) virtually a one-to-one
correspondence between the words used and the reality to which they refer; in a
non-contrastive understanding of language, we know first of all there is always
some discrepancy between a reality and the verbal expression of it, and second,
when that reality is God, the words we use refer to a reality distinct from any other
thing and therefore the correspondence between the two is incomprehensible.84 The
hearer must rely on the verbal and non-verbal context surrounding speech about
God in order to discern its meaning—that is, to make the connection between the
words and the reality to which they refer.
Article 10 opens with the objection that a word in Scripture cannot have
several senses: first, because confusion and deception will result, and second,
because all force of argument will be destroyed. From this, the precept is advanced
that “Scripture ought to be able to state truth without fallacy.” By this time it
should come as no surprise that Aquinas attacks not the precept but its underlying
84
God’s “incomprehensibility” does not negate God’s intelligibility. God’s
incomprehensibility provides the basis for intelligibility. This will be discussed later in
the book.
96 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
presumption, which in this objection is that in order for truth to be stated without
fallacy, it must be stated in a direct and straightforward manner—in other words,
propositionally. The issue of Scripture as an authoritative source for argument has
already been resolved: Scripture is only effective for argument if the opponent
holds to at least some of the articles of faith. Argument is mainly used to bring
the opponent into agreement with other tenets of faith; belief in the existence of
God and the authority of Scripture is presupposed.85 So, in this case, the mode of
argument is in question, and as Aquinas has established through earlier articles,
due to the subject matter of sacred doctrine and our limited intellectual access to
it, we have no direct recourse and must rely on the flexibility inherent in poetical
language in order to perceive the truth towards which we strive.
Scripture is the unique source for Christian theology, and due to its inclusion
of “metaphorical” or poetical language, Christian tradition has assigned several
“senses” or ways of interpreting it, generally: historical or literal, allegorical,
tropological, or moral, and anagogical. Aquinas further points out that there
are additions to this categorization, which include etiological and parabolical.
The objections addressed in Article 10 warrant sifting through all these senses
to ascertain which one sense is proper for sacred doctrine’s purpose. From the
conditions of the objection it seems that this task is fairly straightforward: the
prevailing sense must be the one that does not produce confusion or deception, and
must be able to articulate the truth.
Aquinas’ response to the objection that the truth cannot be articulated through
more than one sense is based upon a distinction between the “literal” sense and
the “spiritual” sense. The “literal” sense, sometimes referred to as the “historical”
sense, is the meaning that is signified by the word, and the “spiritual” sense is
a further signification indicated by the thing itself; according to Aquinas, the
spiritual sense is “that signification whereby things signified by words have
themselves also a signification.”86 The spiritual sense has a threefold division: the
allegorical, wherein things of the “Old Law” or the Hebrew Scriptures prefigure
the “New Law” or Christian Scripture; the moral, wherein things done in Christ or
which signify Christ are types of what we ought to do; and the anagogical, wherein
things signify “what relates to eternal glory.”87
Although written by human hands, ultimately God is the author of Scripture
in its entirety. But, while a human author may intend the literal sense of a word
or text, the Holy Spirit alone is responsible for the spiritual sense(s).88 Therefore,
85
STh, I.1.8, reply.
86
STh, I.1.10, reply.
87
Ibid.
88
There is considerable debate over Aquinas’ definition of the literal sense.
See Robert Kennedy, “Thomas Aquinas and the Literal Sense of Scripture” (PhD Diss.,
University of Notre Dame, 1985); Mark Johnson, “Another Look at the Plurality of
the Literal Sense,” Medieval Philosophy and Theology 2 (1992): 117-41; John Boyle,
“Saint Thomas and Sacred Scripture,” Pro Ecclesia 4 (1995): 92-104; Beryl Smalley,
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 97
The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages (Oxford: Blackwell, 1983); and Wilhelus
Gerhard Bonifatus Maria Valkenberg, Did Not our Hearts Burn? Place and Function of
Holy Scripture in the Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (Utrecht: Thomas Instituut, 1990).
89
STh, I.1.10, obj. 1.
90
Aquinas does not give an example of what he means by “the truth of one text … not
[contradicting] the truth of another.” However, inferring from the non-contrastive exercise
following Questions 1-13, he may include in the “analogical” sense texts that appear
paradoxical, such as those that refer to Christ’s dying as a means to everlasting life. When
such texts are explicated, they are found not to be contradictory but complimentary and
essential to expressing a more profound truth than one text alone could articulate.
91
STh, I.1.10, obj. 3.
98 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
The mutability of literal senses does pose a problem for some accounts of
metaphor, for if one assumes that literal senses and literal truth conditions can
readily be assigned to words and sentences independent of contexts of use, then
inability to specify precise literal senses of terms will block any exhaustive
description of a natural language.95
92
Soskice, Metaphor and Religious Language, 57-8.
93
Ibid., 62.
94
Ibid., 21.
95
Ibid., 84.
Thomas Aquinas: A Pedagogy for Speaking About God 99
The context of the literal sense is not only essential to derive its intended
meaning, but also to grasp that the Divine reality to which the term refers is
not being contrasted or compared to anything in the world. For example, to
know that God’s “arm” literally refers to God’s operative power and not to some
bodily appendage, one must know that God is incorporeal, as is revealed in other
Scriptural texts. In this context, the use of “arm” to express an incorporeal reality
tips the audience off that the writer is using ordinary language in an extraordinary
way. As Aquinas attests, similes drawn from things farthest away from God
prevent us from perceiving God to be like anything noble in the universe, thereby
forming an awareness “that God is above whatsoever we may say or think
of Him.”
Furthermore, Soskice’s assertion that metaphorical language has the potential
to increase understanding in the language-user reveals the link between speaking
about God and knowing God; this is the end to which Aquinas directs his readers
in Question 1 of the Summa. For Soskice, metaphorical language-use allows novel
visions and referential access to emerge. For Aquinas, this is the task of faith in
perfecting reason. As Marthaler expresses it, faith is the “opening up of a new
vision of reality,” a grace “whereby human potentialities are caught up and given
a new dimension by God acting on the person.”96 Through the lens of faith, all
things, acts, and knowledge are imbued with new existential significance. Faith
and metaphor are inextricably bound to one another in the process: Faith is the
mode of knowing on the part of the believer; metaphor (as Aquinas uses it, in
the broadest sense of the term) is the proper mode of expression allowing for the
possibility of knowing to progress.
Aquinas broaches the relation between “metaphorical” and “literal” references
to God again in Question 13, for asserting metaphorical language to be appropriate
for sacred doctrine (as Aquinas does in Question 1) does not in itself exhaust—in
fact, does not satisfy—the requirements for a non-contrastive grasp of religious
language. A non-contrastive grasp of religious language demands the Creator’s
unique distinction, transcendence-in-immanence, be preserved in order for
Christian forms of life to conform to Christian tradition and its faith assertions.
Strictly employed, metaphor tends towards a univocal understanding of the
Creator–creature relationship, because these metaphors refer properly to creatures
and appear to highlight a likeness between the Creator and creature. Thus, in order
to allow for the range of flexibility required for a non-contrastive interpretation,
metaphor must be taken to encompass all types of poetical language-use, a practice
duly carried out by our Master Eckhart.
Eckhart is indebted to Aquinas for attending to this non-contrastive dimension
manifested throughout Eckhart’s work, for in his Summa Aquinas provides his
successors with a rigorous exercise in religious language-use. As Question 13
illustrates, all linguistic applications (even analogy) fail to capture the Divine;
therefore, we must effectively qualify our speech about God by finding ways to
96
Marthaler, The Creed, 22.
100 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
call attention to the fact that we are not applying our language in an ordinary way
when referring to the Divine. But in order to really absorb this lesson, we must
first work our way through the preceding questions, which offer instructions on
how to use language non-contrastively. Characteristic of Aquinas, he makes use
of every source at his disposal to lead his students onward in their vocation of
faith seeking understanding; and in this case—given the emerging importance of
Aristotelian philosophy in his order as well as in the university—Aquinas employs
the language of metaphysics, modifying it to achieve his pedagogical end.
Chapter 4
Thomas Aquinas:
From “Proof” to Analogy
1
See STh, I.1.9.
2
Ibid., reply obj. 3.
3
Tanner, God and Creation, 45-6.
102 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Having already carefully reoriented the relationship of faith to reason from one
where faith opposes or replaces natural reason to one where faith guides and
provides the existential (and eschatalogical) horizon for reason, it seems puzzling
that Aquinas immediately turns in Question 2 to proving the existence of God;
because Question 1 seems to call into question both the necessity and the value—as
well as the effectiveness—of such argumentation.
Recall the objections of Question 1, Article 8 drawing upon the association of
natural reason and argumentation: since sacred doctrine borrows its first principles
from the scientia Dei, whose principles cannot be demonstrated, they must be taken
on authority; and authority, the objection asserts, “is the weakest form of proof.”4
Aquinas’ response re-affirms sacred doctrine’s superiority despite its own inability
to prove its principles (not part of its task). Rather, argumentation based on the
highest authority—divine revelation—is stronger than argumentation based on
reason, provided that “the opponent admits some at least of the truths obtained
through divine revelation.”5 Indeed, sacred doctrine employs argumentation based
on natural reason, not to prove matters of faith, but to clarify the content of faith,
which in Christianity is Jesus Christ’s saving significance: living transformed lives
in light of the life, death, and resurrection of God-become-human. This implies,
does it not, that God’s existence is assumed as a matter of faith, so how can it be
sacred doctrine’s task to prove it so? After all, how and why God’s existence pertains
to salvation is the concern of sacred doctrine; whether God exists is a question more
relevant to metaphysics, whose subject matter is being.6 However, before Aquinas
4
STh, I.8, obj. 2.
5
Ibid., answer, and reply obj. 1 and 2.
6
For example, while Jesus’ miracles are often read as proof of divinity, their real
significance lies in associating God’s power to salvation: power to heal is the power to save.
Seeing miracles as proof of divinity misses the point. In his own time, anyone intent on
debunking Jesus could explain his miracles as trickery. Witness of his miracles held the real
message: how he transformed the person healed and those to whom the healed proclaimed.
104 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
proceeds with his treatise on how humanity specifically obtains its pre-ordained
goal, Aquinas takes up the thesis of God’s being—that is, God’s existence and
nature—virtually inviting a philosophical approach to his whole work.
This difficulty may be why many scholars tend to analyze the Summa as a
work of metaphysics rather than as a work of sacred doctrine.7 Because Question 2
takes up the fact of God’s existence, and those questions immediately following
it examine the nature of that existence, it might seem Aquinas intends his Summa
to be a presentation of his metaphysics. It is therefore easy to separate this first
part of the Summa from its introductory first question as well as its more pastoral
second part and doctrinal third part. However, this puts Aquinas into a precarious
position regarding his philosophical competency, especially in modern thought,
which incorporates a radically different cosmology and world view than that to
which Aquinas was privy.
Many scholars unfortunately take their starting point from Aquinas’ second
question, after perhaps giving a passing nod to his first question on sacred doctrine
as a matter of politeness. Undeniably, at first glance there seems to be a discontinuity
between Questions 1 and 2, compelling the reader to choose one approach over
the other (sacred doctrine or metaphysics). But some scholars force the association
of metaphysics with the Summa even further by extracting Question 2, not only
from Question 1, but from the Summa itself, as if the Summa was a catalog of
metaphysical topics such as “existence” and “attributes.”8 Furthermore, much of the
scholarship on Question 2 considers only the answer to Article 3, the “Five Ways”
of proving God’s existence, apart even from its preceding articles and surrounding
text. Having sequestered the Five Ways from any distracting contextual elements,
the proofs are considered on their own merits. Thus Question 2 has become a topic
of controversy among scholars with regard to its place and function in the Summa
as well as the soundness of Aquinas’ proofs.
Leo Elders, for example, asks: “Do we have the right to isolate the Five Ways
in I 2, 3 from their theological context and consider this passus merely from a
philosophical point of view?”9 His answer is emphatically, “yes,” based upon the
article immediately preceding the proofs which concludes that God’s existence
is a preamble of faith rather than an article of faith, and therefore falls within
7
Anthony Kenny, The Five Ways: St. Thomas Aquinas’ Proofs of God’s Existence
(Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1969); John F.X. Knasas, The Preface
to Thomistic Metaphysics: A Contribution to the Neo-Thomist Debate on the Start of
Metaphysics (New York: Peter Lang, 1990).
8
Kenny and Knasas analyze the Five Ways without considering Question 1. Knasas
ties the Five Ways to other works of Aquinas, asserting they can only be understood
as intended by Aquinas—metaphysically—in the context of previous works such as
Commentary on the Sentences, De Ente et Essentia, De Princiipiis Naturae, and so on. See
Knasas, The Preface to Thomistic Metaphysics, 127.
9
Leo Elders, The Philosophical Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (Leiden:
E.J. Brill, 1990), 83.
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 105
the allowance of natural reason (meaning it may be taken on faith but can be
demonstrated by reason)—although later he checks himself by acknowledging
scriptural authority provides the pretext for the demonstrations.10 But this
concession carries more weight than Elders cares to give it. Not surprisingly, his
interest in Question 2, and the Five Ways particularly, concerns its contribution to
Aquinas’ metaphysics.
Separating the Five Ways from its context consequently reveals the proofs’
weaknesses, especially the glaring defect, philosophically speaking, common to
them all: each ultimately assumes the God as Creator at the outset in order to
establish the existence of the being concluded at the end of the demonstration.
Anthony Kenny, maintaining Aquinas intended his Five Ways to be taken
“as seriously as he meant any other philosophical proof,”11 argues that they fail
principally because they cannot be separated from the medieval cosmology
providing the background for each proof. This cosmology rests on the underlying
presumption that the order of the universe reflects the design and intelligence
of God, seen in the inherent tendency for created things to act for an end;
cosmological arguments are, for this reason, often referred to as arguments from
design or teleological arguments. Kenny is adamant that Aquinas’ “proofs” are
unacceptable, not only because the cosmology upon which he bases his proofs has
been radically revised, but more importantly because arguments from design or
teleology are logically invalid: they are tautological.
Victor Preller, taking the proofs as tangential, “even dangerous” to Aquinas’
doctrine, questions the assumption of scholars that Aquinas presented the Five Ways
as expressions of his own philosophical understanding of God’s existence. Indeed,
labeling Aquinas’ arguments as “cosmological” would tie God too closely to
creation to “satisfy Christian demands for his ‘otherness’ or transcendence.”12
Preller accepts the unsoundness of the cosmological argument, insisting Aquinas’
Five Ways must be radically re-read in light of the questions which immediately
follow it. He reproaches,
10
Ibid., 131.
11
Kenny, Five Ways, 1.
12
Preller, Divine Science, 108. Preller claims causal regress arguments lose a necessary
sense of God’s transcendence precisely because they entail ordinary understandings
of “causality.”
13
Ibid., 168.
106 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
What then can we make of Aquinas’ presentation of the Five Ways supposedly
proving God’s existence, or his inclusion at all of such a question in his Summa—a
work Aquinas claims in his preface as well as in Question 1 to be directed towards
sacred doctrine? Certainly the content of the arguments and also much of the content
of the following questions makes use of metaphysical principles; furthermore, the
arguments’ form is definitely recognizable as “cosmological.” How is it possible to
understand these arguments in light of the supposedly negative theology Aquinas
posits for speaking about God’s essence?
W.J. Hankey ascertains that the Five Ways “do more than indicate that
he is, they involve insight into the divine essence.”15 Hankey, like Preller, sees
Question 2 closely tied to the following questions about God’s nature; in fact,
Question 2 provides a plan for how Aquinas is going to proceed in Questions 3-11.
If this is the case, we must pay attention to how Aquinas introduces and lays out
the metaphysics he uses to teach us how to speak about God. Furthermore, if the
Five Ways intend to do more than supply proofs, it is important to ask how the
demonstrations work together—how their arrangement prepares for the proceeding
questions. Given this possibility, it is likely that, since each demonstration is
obviously fraught with weakness on its own, there may be something in their
organic unity into which Aquinas wants to draw his readers.
Finally, granting an essential link between Question 2 and those which follow,
it is certainly valid to expect that the question of God’s existence is inextricable
from the context of faith elaborated in the Summa’s opening question. As we
are introduced to Question 2, it is clear Aquinas intends his treatment of God’s
existence to flow directly from his explication on the method and aim of sacred
Ibid., 135.
14
doctrine, because he opens not only with explicit reference to Question 1, but also
to the plan of his Summa as a whole:
Because the chief aim of sacred doctrine is to teach the knowledge of God, not
only as He is in Himself, but also as He is the beginning of things and their last
end … we shall treat (1) of God; (2) of the rational creature’s advance towards
God; (3) of Christ, Who as man, is our way to God.
He continues by dividing his treatment of God into three parts, the first of which,
“Whatever concerns the Divine Essence,” contains the question of God’s existence:
Considering the Divine Essence, we must consider: 1) Whether God exists? (2)
The manner of His Existence, or, rather what is not the manner of His existence
(3) Whatever concerns His operations.
16
STh, I.1.5, reply obj. 1.
108 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
STh, I.1.9.
17
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 109
with existentially important moments in his or her life), but to keep believers
from falling into heresy of a “pagan” god, that is, a God who could be compared/
contrasted with the world. Far from slighting sacred doctrine’s ultimate purpose,
demonstrations of the Creator-God’s existence may facilitate the journey towards
faith’s fulfillment.
1. From motion
2. From the nature of the efficient cause
3. From possibility and necessity
4. From the gradation found in things
5. From the governance of the world
In the first two articles of Question 2, Aquinas justifies the need to demonstrate
God’s existence while subtly preparing his readers to approach such “proofs”
guided by faith’s requirements: it is not enough to prove the existence of a god;
it is the Creator God of Scripture that is sought. Yet, it is of course Aquinas’
perspective that the God of Scripture and the god of philosophy need not be at
odds: with regard to God’s nature, certain “formal features” must be attributed
in order for God to be God—for example, simplicity, immutability, infinity—and
as Maimonides observes, these features must indeed be attributed to the God of
Scripture, though they must also be interpreted negatively, in order to preserve a
sense of God’s incomprehensibility.18
Accordingly, while Aquinas is determined not to depart from the goals of
sacred doctrine, he also takes the opportunity to begin preparing his readers for
the metaphysics which will be unfolded throughout his following treatment of
God’s nature. Before his presentation of the Five Ways, Aquinas introduces the
concepts of causality and participation essential to developing a metaphysics that
will serve to orient his students—and, with any luck those to whom the future
teachers and preachers minister—towards sacred doctrine’s salvific goal. In the
second article, Aquinas refers to God as cause and, implicitly, creatures as God’s
effects. This articulation allows Aquinas to relate the god of philosophy to the
Creator God of Scripture, and at the same time maintain an intimate relationship
between Creator and creature. Philosophically speaking, the relationship between
the cause, or first principle, and its effects (creation) is commonly referred to as
the metaphysics of participation. Yet in order to compensate for the problems
raised by the philosophical approach—namely, how God as cause remains
incomprehensible—Aquinas must develop a corrective: as Article 2 clearly
indicates, knowledge of this unique relationship between cause and effect is not
proportionate. Furthermore, as Aquinas has maintained from the beginning of the
18
Moses Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed, trans. Chaim Rabin (Cambridge:
Hackett, 1995), Book I, 65-87.
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 111
Summa, the only way to avoid such misunderstanding is to pay careful attention to
how creaturely words are attributed to this ultimate Cause.
In Article 3, which presents the Five Ways, Aquinas introduces his metaphysics
by attending to the way God’s incomprehensibility may still be maintained
while permitting the creature to participate in God’s existence. Rather than
being concerned with whether each demonstration is philosophically sound and
self-contained, Aquinas is concerned to move our articulations about God out of
the realm of ordinary speech in a way that demonstrates God’s existence to be
uniquely distinct from the world. By laying a foundation where the Creator may
be articulated as the ground and source of the creature—the one who causes and
sustains the existence of all things—the “formal features” of God presented in the
following questions may be understood non-contrastively as relating to the world
transcendently, yet intimately, though incomprehensibly, present.
Article 3 opens with the objection that there would be no evil if God existed,
because God is understood to be the contrary of evil: infinite goodness. Second,
there is no need to suppose God’s existence because the world may be explained by
natural principles. The sed contra pits philosophy against Scripture by asserting,
from Exodus, that God is named “I am Who am”: Not only does God exist, but
God is the One Who Exists, indeed Existence itself. Aquinas answers that the
existence of God can be proved (probare), or better, tested, in five ways, thus
suggesting that philosophy may be used to support the scriptural affirmation of
God’s existence.
The First Way begins with motion. “Nothing can be in motion except it is in
potentiality to that towards which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch
as it is in act.” Motion is the reduction from potentiality to actuality, and only
something in the state of actuality can move something from potentiality to actuality.
The problem is that this movement cannot go on into infinity; therefore, there must
be something, being fully actual, that does not, cannot and never contained any
potentiality; this is Aristotle’s “Unmoved Mover,” and “this everyone understands
to be God.”19
Kenny observes, from Aquinas’ text, that the Latin “motus” should more
properly be translated as “change” than motion, pointing to Aquinas’ adherence
to Aristotle, who distinguishes between change of quality, change of quantity, and
change of place.20 Kenny also shows that the so-called “infinite regress argument”
does not, in fact, prove God’s existence because it does not demonstrate there is
“an unmoved mover at all resembling God.” For Kenny, to reach the God Aquinas
intends, “unmoved” must mean “changing in no respect.”21 Contrary to Kenny’s
own thesis, however—that Aquinas meant for his arguments to be taken as proper
proofs for God’s existence, but that each proof is fraught with weaknesses and
19
This last phrase is included in the Fathers of the English Dominican Province
translation, but not in the Blackfriar’s Latin edition.
20
See Kenny, Five Ways, 7.
21
Ibid, 23.
112 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Ibid.
22
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 113
This proof, although similar to the proof of the unmoved mover, draws one step
closer to the God of Scripture because, as Kenny himself notes, “[t]wo of the
best known Aristotelean theses about causation were that effects were like their
causes and that causes were prior to their effects.”23 While the unmoved mover
has neither an immediate nor an intimate relation to the world, the first efficient
cause has at least one essential feature similar to the Creator God of Scripture: the
resemblance of its effects to itself, calling to mind Genesis, where God says, “Let
us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness.”24 Affirming that
the human creature enjoys a close—even familiar—relationship to its Creator
by virtue of the Creator’s causality is so important that it is repeated in the next
Scriptural passage:
Like the relationship of first efficient cause to its effects, the Creator God is both
prior to creatures, having created them, and “familiar” to creatures in the sense that
they somehow—though incomprehensibly—reflect their maker.
The first efficient cause moves yet another step forward in presenting the
Creator God: it must be distinct from any worldly cause. Aquinas implies this
at the beginning of the proof in observing there is no case in the world of sense
where a thing is its own efficient cause. Establishing there must be an efficient
cause transcending any worldly cause appeals to the existence of effects; if there
be no ultimate cause, then ultimately there would be no effects. Now, for obvious
reasons, this proof appears to be unsound from a philosophical standpoint: in
order to see God as cause, the world must be interpreted as an effect (or series
of effects) and for that to be so, the cause must be assumed from the outset, since
by definition an effect includes the notion of its cause—therefore the argument is
circular. But the argument does make sense from a theological standpoint: it hints
at the doctrine of creation that lies at the heart of all faith statements and which
provides the foundation for how human beings are to live—as creatures whose
beginning and end (and everything in between) is inextricable from their Creator,
an end that lies beyond the world that is finite and corruptible. Only a Creator that
transcends this worldly finitude can preserve a beloved creature from its own fall
back into non-existence;26 only a Creator that is itself exempt from the possibility
of falling back into non-existence can achieve this act. Such a Creator must be
23
Ibid., 40.
24
Gen 1:6 (NRSV).
25
Gen 1:27.
26
Aristotle’s “efficient cause” is reinterpreted as “cause of being,” for a creator ex
nihilo could not be an Aristotelian “efficient case,” which presupposes material to work on.
114 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Preller senses here that Aquinas is wrestling with the problem inherent to the
philosophical proofs that there is no direct way to articulate the Creator God of
Scripture. Unless the argument is modified in such a way that removes God from
ordinary experiences of the world, God is either too attached to the world or too
removed from it. Yet, scholars such as Elders28 point out that Aquinas begins
each of his Five Ways from the world of the senses: the first on the basis of our
perception of motion in the world; the second on the basis of our observations that
certain causes yield corresponding effects. Aquinas has already established in the
previous articles of this question that, by necessity, all demonstrations begin with
the senses, because this is the mode of human knowing. On the other hand, unless
guided by faith, this knowledge does not lead to the God of Scripture, but at best
to the pagan god of the philosopher. And faith assumes a God whose existence is
as immanent as it is transcendent. This is the theological interpretation of God’s
distinction from the world.
Thus far, the first two demonstrations have created the space for God’s
transcendence by beginning with our understanding of motion and causality in the
world of sense and appealing to a being that must be the origin of these worldly
phenomena, without being subject to them. However, both demonstrations lack
the sense of God’s necessity with regard to the Creator’s own continued existence
as well as that of creation. In other words, God must transcend the world in yet
another way: it must be impossible for God not to be at any given time. In the
first demonstration, there is nothing to prevent God from being the first mover
and then going out of existence; likewise, in the second demonstration, there is
nothing to prevent God from causing the first worldly efficient cause and then
ceasing, leaving nature to continue its own causality. But this is far from the God
of faith, who is so immediate and so intimate that creation relies on its Creator
to continually sustain its existence, and who keeps it from falling back into the
nothingness from whence it came.
Aquinas takes up this issue in his Third Way. Once again beginning with the
world of the senses, he observes that in nature there are things that “are possible
to be and not to be,” given the contingency and corruptibility of created things.
At some point, the logic goes, we must come to something whose existence is
absolutely necessary—that is, not only incorruptible, but whose necessity is itself
uncaused—otherwise there would be nothing in existence. This is so because, if it
were possible that everything could not-be at some time, there would be nothing
to begin being at all. In other words, non-being would regress back infinitely, and
at some point there would be nothing from which to begin creation, for everything
that could possibly not be, at some time did not exist. And the unstated implication
is that should there be a being who, having created, ceases to be, then at some
point in time, there will again be nothing, since all contingent things inevitably
pass away: “it is impossible for these always to exist, for that which is possible
not to be at some time is not.” There must be a being who is excluded from this
possibility. This absolutely necessary being, Aquinas asserts, “all men speak of
[dicunt] as God.”
This proof may be the most difficult of all of the arguments that Aquinas
presents; but so much rides on it that it must be carefully examined. The language
Aquinas uses in this demonstration is tricky, because it is tempting to speak of
God’s “eternity” to explain how God is distinct from creatures with regard to their
contingency and corruptibility. One problem with speaking of God’s distinction
as “eternal” is that we also have cases of creatures being eternal; for instance
the beatified, who, having passed through earthly life, “rest eternally with God”
despite having been created as contingent and corruptible beings, who could have
been or not been, and whose earthly life was sure to pass away at some time. And
angels, though perhaps spoken of as eternal, are still created, and thus contain
some contingency.
Aquinas will take up God’s eternity later in Question 10, after considering
God’s infinity, and there he will be in a position to develop this essential feature
non-contrastively in order to allow us to speak more intelligibly about the
Creator–creature relationship—especially that with which sacred doctrine is
ultimately concerned, between the beatified and the One with whom they have
been reunited. However, at this stage in the lesson, as he is introducing the major
components of his metaphysics, Aquinas must be careful to avoid a misleading
interpretation of God’s existence. Although he refers here in the third proof to
a “time” in which things “may not be,” he refrains from attributing the term
“eternal” to a being for whom there is no possibility of non-existence, because
that would directly oppose God’s “eternity” with time or could ever lead us to the
conclusion that eternity is an “infinitely” long time. Ultimately, this interpretation
compromises God’s distinction from the world as well as prevents Aquinas from
further moving towards developing the metaphysics of participation that he will
introduce in following demonstrations.
116 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Aquinas emphasizes that God’s existence goes beyond duration in time (past,
present, or future); more is at stake than the capacity (or not) to count “infinitely”
backwards to a time where God came into existence. God’s infinity is about the
nature of creation’s dependency upon its Creator. Before Aquinas takes up God’s
eternity, he considers God’s infinity—and in so doing he will move it away from
its association with quantity (for example, duration of time or number of causes).
But for now, Aquinas allows us to assume our conventional understanding of
“infinity” so he can appeal to the philosophical concept of “infinite regress” to
move God out of the ordinary world of sense experience. In Question 10, which
follows God’s infinity, Aquinas considers God’s eternity, and there he will shift the
discussion away from temporal language, so eternity and time may be spoken of
non-contrastively, by re-articulating eternity in terms of immutability.
Instead of speaking of God’s eternity here in his Third Way, which would
present a more immediate problem than the conventional notion of infinity he has
employed in the previous two demonstrations, Aquinas refers to God’s necessity to
communicate creation’s reliance on God for existence—not simply in the sense of
being created or caused by God, but in the sense that without God, creation would
neither come to be nor remain in existence; there would simply be nothing. Although
Aquinas does use temporal language, his demonstration is not about how long God
must have been in existence (that is, always), but why God’s existence is necessary
rather than contingent: to create and sustain all things. The notion of God’s absolute
necessity includes everything that has been affirmed in the first two Ways: first, God
is fully actual, containing no potentiality whatsoever, and second, God is uncaused.
But God’s necessity goes beyond the unmoved mover and first efficient cause in that
God’s existence is interminably required for anything to have ever existed and, we
must assume, for anything to continue to exist, because if a created thing’s cause
could not-be, then so could its effect.29 And by God’s “interminable” existence—as it
is being used improperly here—more than unending time is indicated. The Christian
doctrine of creation is undeniably intended, for nothing could exist “prior” to God’s
existence, and this implies not only that God is the author of time itself, but more
importantly that God creates ex nihilo. Furthermore, at any time the existence of all
things will fall back into nothingness without God’s continual causality. Thus, God
is both the Creator and Sustainer of creation.
Given the immediacy of the Creator’s existence to creation suggested by the
previous (third) argument, Aquinas is now in the position to formally introduce the
basic structure of his metaphysics of participation central to the Creator–creature
relationship. In his Fourth Way, Aquinas shifts his attention back to God’s effects,
as he takes up the gradation found in created things. Recall that in the Second Way
Aquinas appeals to God’s effects, creatures, as evidence of their ultimate efficient
cause, a move correlating well with Scripture, where God creates all things directly
and human creatures in the divine image and likeness. From the Third Way we
discover God not only creates but remains present to creation, because there is
Ibid., 105.
29
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 117
never a moment wherein divine causality can be absent; furthermore, this causality
of necessity must exclude any contingency whatsoever, or creation is doomed to
fall back into nothingness. Whereas in the first and second demonstrations Aquinas
establishes God’s existence as necessarily transcendent, within the second and
third demonstrations, Aquinas begins to establish God’s existence as necessarily
immanent. Unlike the unmoved mover, who sets the first thing in motion, the first
efficient cause in the Second Way creates each thing directly; and furthermore,
although the first efficient cause is “outside” of the world because it is exempt
from causality, the worldly effects resemble it in some manner. In the Third Way,
this first cause, containing no contingency whatsoever, must remain active in
creation to preserve it from nothingness.
However, the previous demonstrations, while progressively moving towards
the God of Scripture—whose existence is both transcendent from and immanent
to creation—still lack the dimension of the Creator’s intimacy affirmed in
Scripture as well as in the lives of the faithful. With regard to the Second Way,
while creaturely effects must resemble their divine cause, there is no sense of the
manner in which that likeness exists. With regard to the Third Way, while God’s
existence is necessary to preserve creation, there is no sense that this presence
exists personally or with any intentional intimacy towards creatures. The Fourth
Way now steps implicitly in this direction. In this demonstration, God’s existence
is derived, not merely by virtue of the existence of effects, but by the specific
resemblance of the effects to their Cause as well as by the relationships of the
effects to each other.
Beginning, of course, with the world of sense, Aquinas observes that
[a]mong beings there are some more and some less good, true, noble, and the
like. But “more” and “less” are predicated of different things, according as they
resemble in their different ways something which is the maximum.
Aquinas employs the principle that the maximum in any genus is the cause of
every member of the genus,30 and he concludes there must be something which is
the cause of all perfections as well as of all being, “and this we call God.”
Aquinas reaches this conclusion by assuming that if there is a maximum for
every perfection (goodness, truth, and so forth), then there is also a maximum for
being. In fact, being is associated with perfection, following Aristotle’s Metaphysics
(ii): “those things that are greatest in truth are greatest in being.” However,
Aquinas does not explicitly include—but rather assumes—the fact that being,
while considered a perfection, cannot be a genus in the proper sense of the word,
because being is common to all genera, and consequently inclusive of every created
thing. In order for something to belong to a genus, it must first exist. In this sense,
30
Aquinas’ metaphysics of participation includes elements of Aristotle. See Elders,
Philosophical Theology, 115-17. See also Kenny regarding the Platonism of the Fourth
Way (Five Ways, 79).
118 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
being holds priority over any given perfection. On the other hand, since being is
a perfection common to all genera, it may be used as the criterion with which to
compare and contrast them; in other words, among beings there is more or less
being with regard to their respective genus or species. Thus, Aquinas implicates
two different measures in the created world: that among creatures of the same kind
and that between creatures of different kinds. These two measures’ relation to the
maximum of being, the cause of all, is important in imaging the Creator.
Aquinas’ modification lies between the maximum of being (which implies
God) and the maximum of each particular genus. Since the maximum of being
is the cause of all being—and hence all genera—then the maximum must, in this
case alone, be the cause of its own existence. Since no created thing can be the
cause of its own existence (or its essence would be its own existence) then the
maximum of being cannot be compared to or contrasted with anything that it
causes. By organizing his metaphysics of participation around the principle that
the maximum of a genus is the cause of all in that genus and by further including
being among perfections—in fact giving it priority of perfections—Aquinas lays
the groundwork for speaking about a Creator who is distinct, yet whose effects
exist profoundly in relation to it.
The entity who causes all being is not only excluded from every genus but is
outside of all genera, and therefore is uniquely “outside” of the world (Question 3
will make explicit), for we define things in the world by categorizing them into
their genus, species, and finally, their individual qualities. The implications of
this conclusion are critical to the negative theology of both Aquinas and Eckhart,
because this prohibits God from being spoken of as any type of being at all: the
one who causes all being is not being itself nor any particular being, and cannot be
placed within any of the categories by which everything in our world is described.
Therefore, God is ineffable.
On the other hand, precisely because this God—and no other—causes all
being, all things have an immediate relation to its Creator, as well as to each
other; each thing is related to all other things by what they share: being. Being,
or existence, is the most immediate and intimate thing that can be said about
something—something has first to be (even if only in the imagination) before
it can be any particular thing. Yet, to be a creature at all, its existence must be
inseparable from its particularity: in creating, God causes something to be this and
not that. In this sense, God’s very incomprehensibility, that which distinguishes
God from the world and allows God to be the cause of all, is the very source of the
intelligibility of creatures, and it is the particularity of the creature which relates it
not only to other created things but to its Creator as well. Therefore, the creature is
a reflection of its Creator, not only in itself, but in its relationship to others.
What the Fourth Way adds to previous demonstrations is how creatures
resemble God in their particular relationships to each other. This allows Aquinas
to move forward in demonstrating the existence of the God of Scripture. Presently,
in Question 3, Aquinas will further develop the implications of God’s exclusion
from every genus. Specifically, he will explore the issue of the difference between
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 119
the Creator’s essence and that of the creature (God’s essence and existence
are identical while the creature’s essence and existence are not),31 effectively
eliminating any possibility of God’s belonging to any genus or species. However,
central to his explication, Aquinas must show God not only as the immediate and
immanent Creator—causing and continually sustaining creation—but also as the
intimate and personal Creator, whose creatures reflect and return to their ultimate
Source. The Fifth Way will complete the plan by showing that God intentionally
creates the world such that their end is that same source.
As noted above, all creatures resemble other creatures in their genus in relation
to the maximum of that genus; Aquinas uses the example of particular perfections
such as “good” and “noble,” which are said to be more or less in relation to a most
good or most noble. Thus we can describe something by comparing and contrasting
it with other things of the same genus. Furthermore, while all creatures can be
compared and contrasted to others of their own kind, one kind can also be compared
with and contrasted from another by virtue of their order of being: for example, with
regard to existence a fern is more noble than a rock, a horse more noble than a fern, a
human more noble than a horse, and an angel more noble than a human. This reflects
the standard Neoplatonic hierarchy of being. The Neoplatonic hierarchy, however,
lacks the resources to separate creation from its Creator. In this schema, then, it
could be said that creatures possess their existence and all the perfections it entails in
proportion to their Creator. But we know that Aquinas rejects this position: creatures
have no proportion to the Creator. Even less should it be said that any creature, no
matter how noble its existence, is like the Creator, because that could very well lead
to the misapprehension that there is a proportion between the two.
The Fourth Way distinguishes the Creator from all else by incorporating efficient
causality (that is, the Creator is the maximum of being, the cause of all perfection
and of all genus), effectively removing God from the world of comparisons and
contrasts and eliminating the possibility that any creature—or any genus—enjoys
a relationship of proportion to the Creator. But, with the same move, since all
things are related to each other by their common feature of existence, not only the
very multiplicity, but the hierarchy of creation reflects the Creator. According to
Rudi Te Velde,
31
Aquinas introduces this distinction in that opening of the second question. STh,
I.2.1, answer.
32
Rudi Te Velde, Participation and Substantiality in Thomas Aquinas (Leiden:
E.J. Brill, 1995), 212.
120 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
If God is the cause of existence, then God is the cause of all perfection; if God is
the maximum of being and of perfection, then in God’s existence alone is found
the perfection of perfection. No single creature and no single type of creature, no
matter how noble, adequately reflects God’s perfection. Yet through the continuity
of being—where there are no gaps and no distance between creatures—the
simplicity and unity of the Creator shines forth, the inexhaustible intelligibility
of God is implicated. As Elder notes, for Aquinas, “[b]eing shows itself in the
perfection it exhibits.” The more being—and the more beings—therefore, the
more God’s perfection is manifest. God’s incomprehensibility is found in God’s
inexhaustible intelligibility, displayed in the continuous profusion of creation.
The order of creation, not merely creation’s existence as effects, demonstrates
God’s existence. But even this demonstration does not yet fulfill the requirements
of Scripture’s Creator which includes God’s intentionality towards creation. For the
faithful, not only is God the fullness of Goodness, Truth, and all such perfection, but
above all, God is “Love”; and love is a personal gift given in absolute freedom. A God
whose creation is only a natural “by-product” of its existence is not meaningful to the
believer. For God to be the God of Scripture, the act of creating must be intentional
and purposeful—and personal. For human creatures, this purpose is finding their
end in their Creator, ultimately for reunion and for communion. Thus, when the God
of Genesis professes the creation of the world “good,” this affirmation expresses
more than an emanation or effusion of the Creator’s own goodness into creation;
it expresses an intentional and personal act of the Creator’s self-communication
and self-sharing with the creature, which can only be described as an act of divine
Love. Not only does the order of creation reflect the perfection and existence of
the Creator, but it also reflects the love of the Creator for creation: God’s free and
personal self-communication manifest in all of creation.33
The Fifth Way accomplishes this last step, though quite implicitly at this point
in the treatise, demonstrating a God whose creative operation is intentional rather
than natural, and whose effects reflect their cause by virtue of the end to which they
are purposefully designed. Aquinas argues that even things lacking intelligence act
for their proper end, which in effect means reaching their full potential with regard
to their particular place in the order of being. “Now whatever lacks intelligence
cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed by some being endowed with
knowledge and intelligence. … Therefore some intelligent being exists by whom
all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God.”
This argument “from the governance of the world,” is often called the
teleological argument, referring to the inbuilt purpose something reaches after its
existence fully unfolds, for example an acorn becoming a tree.34 While Aquinas
reaches to the lowest common element—those things lacking intelligence—his
aim is obviously drawn much higher on the scale of being, specifically humanity,
whose teleology is communion with God. This is clear not only from the beginning
of the question of God’s existence, where Aquinas replies that knowledge of God’s
existence is implanted in us (if only in a “general and confused way”) because
“God is man’s beatitude,” but also from his introduction to the questions on God’s
existence and nature: the mission of sacred doctrine is to teach the knowledge
of God, “as He is the beginning of things and their last end, and especially of
rational creatures.” The Fifth Way comes full circle by demonstrating God whose
existence we are considering is none other than the Creator who draws all things
towards their intended end and, as Aquinas will further indicate, who ceaselessly
coaxes the human creature into communion with its Ground and Source.
Thus, while the Five Ways may perhaps fall somewhat short of proving the
existence of God from a purely philosophical perspective, careful examination
from the “radically theological” perspective Aquinas intends does demonstrate
that, in order for God to be “God,” God must exist as uniquely distinct:
transcendent (distinguished from the world) yet immanent (related to the world
as cause); and further, in order for God to be the Creator God of Scripture, God
also exists intimately related and personally present to creatures (as their ultimate
source and end).
Preller points out that even philosophically speaking the Five Ways succeed,
at least in establishing the parameters around which we may inquire about God:
Preller perceives that the theological motivation for creating this unique kind
of logical space removing “God” from the range of our conceptual powers is
emphasizing our natural inability to “conform our minds to God” without God’s
grace.36 In other words, the Scriptural imperative demands that not only God’s
distinction from the world, but God’s incomprehensibility be preserved. This is
at the heart of what it means to be a human creature in relation to the Creator,
whose gratuitous self-communication is the only means by which the human
may accomplish its intended end. Furthermore, if the Five Ways do create such a
“logical space” for speaking about God, then (contrary to Preller’s initial claim)37
Aquinas’ proofs for the existence of God are neither dangerous nor irrelevant to
his doctrine; indeed, they are essential to understanding Aquinas’ metaphysics as
35
Preller, Divine Science, 151-2. Words such as “cause” are not employed in the
ordinary sense when applied to the Divine.
36
Ibid., 156.
37
Ibid., 108.
122 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
38
The first way (from motion) closes with “This everyone understands to be God”;
the second way (from efficient cause) with “which everyone gives the name of God”; the
third way (from necessary being) with “this all men speak of as God”; the fourth way (from
perfection) with “and this we call God”; and the fifth way (from the one in whom the end
of all things is directed) with “and this being we call God.”
39
Hankey, God in Himself, 73.
40
Ibid., 42.
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 123
because we cannot know what God is, but rather what He is not, we have no
means for considering how God is, but rather how He is not. Therefore we must
consider 1) How He is not; 2) How He is known by us; 3) How He is named.
Now it can be shown how God is not, by denying of Him whatever is opposed
to the idea of Him—viz., composition, motion, and the like.
Aquinas’ aim here is to draw an intimate connection between knowing God and
speaking about God, but not before the correct order of the relationship between
Creator (the One spoken about) and the creature (the speaker) is firmly embedded
in the minds of his readers. To appropriately grasp this relationship, Aquinas
examines certain features said to be unique to the Divine, thereby setting God
apart from all else. Such “formal features”41 are attributed to the Creator alone:
simplicity, oneness or unity, perfection,42 limitlessness (infinity), and immutability
(eternity). Not only do these features establish the Creator’s distinction from
creation, they give the believer a specific vocabulary with which to speak to and
about God, especially as Creator and in relation to creatures. These formal features
certainly deny any and all creaturely attributes; however, what Aquinas does not
yet reveal is that this negative interpretation must at the same time encompass
every creaturely attribute so God is articulated as the Creator of all—in other
words, this negation must be understood non-contrastively.
We have already seen that Aquinas follows Dionysius: it is better to compare
God to the lowest existing thing than to risk understanding God as the most noble
of creatures, for “what God is not is clearer to us than what [God] is.”43 However,
Aquinas is also indebted to the medieval Jewish theologian Moses Maimonides
for his negative theology. Like Aquinas, Maimonides is primarily concerned with
41
See David Burrell’s use of “formal features” in his Excercises in Religious
Understanding, ch. 3, “Aquinas: Articulating Transcendence,” and Analogy and Philosophical
Language (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973), 129-31. See also Burrell’s Knowing
the Unknowable God (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1986), 46.
42
Perfection, however, deviates from the other formal features, but is crucial to
Aquinas’ development of non-contrastive language-use.
43
STh, I.1.9, reply 3.
124 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
How is it that such positive assertions about God can be understood completely
equivocally and simultaneously affirm the Creator God of faith? Maimonides’
answer goes further than simple negation of Divine attributes, but includes
the proper ordering of that negation. As Harry Austryn Wolfson observes,
Maimonides’ ordering of divine attributes shows how—when taken as the
negation of their opposites—such propositions constitute a complete description
of the dissimilarity between Creator and creatures, safeguarding God’s absolute
unity and unique distinction:48
48
Wolfson, “Maimonides on Negative Attributes,” 190-91.
49
Wolfson’s translation is “God is not missed.” However, his description better
fits “not potential or contingent” because the proposition intends to point to God’s
necessary existence.
50
Aquinas specifically criticizes Maimonides’ negative interpretation of “God is
Living = God is not dead,” asserting this is not what ordinary Christians (or Scripture)
mean by attributing Life to God. STh, I.13.2, answer.
51
Common usage is God is “incorporeal.” Wolfson uses the philosophical terminology
of “form.”
126 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Notice the first proposition presents the thesis of the negation: The Creator’s
existence is unlike the existence of anything else. The next three propositions
show the distinction of this existence by moving God out of the created order of
being: inanimate and animate corporeal things as well as incorporeal things. The
second set of three propositions shows how God’s perfect action is unlike human
action: without God’s creative act there would be no other; this primordial creating
is neither necessary nor accidental, but fully gratuitous and intentional. The last
proposition reaffirms the singular uniqueness of God’s existence. Excluded from
all creaturely categories, the Creator in no way essentially participates in the
order of creation. But Maimonides’ negation—in keeping with a purely equivocal
interpretation—goes beyond excluding God from all creaturely categories;
Maimonides also qualifies that propositions of Divine attributes must be negated,
and further, the terms themselves must be negated in their ordinary sense.52 For
instance, not only does “God is powerful” mean “God is not weak” but also that
Divine power is totally equivocal to creaturely power: God is not weak and God’s
power is unlike creaturely power.
Not incidentally, for Aquinas, both the order of essential attributes and the
negation of these attributes in their ordinary sense play a critical role in his
negative theology developed throughout Questions 3-11. In the end, Question 11
on God’s unity actually reaffirms God’s simplicity, treated in Question 3, as well as
summarizes God’s perfection and other formal features examined in Questions 7-10.
Furthermore, within these questions Aquinas strives to show precisely how these
essential attributes are not to be understood in their ordinary creaturely sense.
Therefore, in light of Maimonides’ qualifications regarding affirmative forms of
Divine attribution, Aquinas’ treatment of the manner of the Creator’s existence
may be interpreted as thoroughly negative.
On the other hand, Aquinas proposes a “middle way” in Question 13 between
an equivocal and an univocal understanding of the Creator–creature relationship,
which would seem to compromise a truly negative theology. Maimonides rejects
any such position between equivocal and univocal uses referring to Divine essence
because this would inevitably imply a third likeness between the Creator and
creature, endangering the Creator’s distinction from creation.53 Although both
Maimonides and Aquinas are primarily concerned with preserving this distinction,
Aquinas—by virtue of his religious vocation dedicated to orienting the faithful
Medieval Philosophy and Culture. Essays in Honor of Arthur Hyman, ed. Ruth Link-Salinger
(Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of American Press, 1988).
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 127
The first article appeals to both scriptural and philosophical arguments. All five
objections raised refer to passages in Scripture referring to God in corporeal terms.
Recalling Question 1’s conclusions about scriptural language, Aquinas responds
that these texts are meant to be taken metaphorically, and such bodily terms refer
literally to God’s power and incomprehensibility.55 Therefore, corporeal terms
are not taken in their ordinary sense when used of God. Aquinas also takes this
opportunity to restate the distinction he made in the First Way between potency
and act, creating a basis for removing the Creator from all creaturely categories
and establishing the Creator as primary cause. Anything corporeal contains some
potency and must be moved to actuality by something already in act, but since
God is pure act, not only is God incorporeal but He is the cause of bringing all
potential things into actuality. Article 2 further qualifies God’s incorporeality by
distinguishing it from any type of form which participates in matter. Article 3
concludes that God’s essence is, therefore, God’s individual and full definition:
“Since God then is not composed of matter and form, He must be … His own Life,
and whatever else is thus predicated of Him.”56 Articles 4 and 5 make this explicit:
“God is not only His own essence, as shown in the preceding article, but also
His own existence.”57 The identification of God’s essence and existence removes
the Creator from creatures by the very way we define ourselves, that is, by the
categories of genus and species in which we participate, necessitating a separation
between our essence and our existence. We must say the Creator is outside of
creation, and further, the Creator is outside of all creaturely definitions—essentially
preserving God’s ultimate incomprehensibility.
54
STh, I.3.7, answer.
55
See, for example, STh, I.1.10, reply obj. 3.
56
STh, I.3.3, answer.
57
STh, I.3.4, answer.
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 129
Article 5 seals the Creator’s complete transcendence from creatures. The Creator
is outside of all genus and species, and simultaneously the measure of all genus and
species. This measure is in no way proportionate, because a proportionate measure
must be homogeneous with what is measured. So, “measure” is not used in its
ordinary sense when referring to the Creator. Rather, Aquinas says, “He is called
the measure of all things, in the sense that everything has being only according as
it resembles Him.”58 This calls attention back to Aquinas’ development of divine
causality in the Five Ways: it is by virtue of God’s causing and sustaining all things
in being—moving them from potency (nothingness) to act—that any likeness
or measure is possible at all. Moreover, this likeness or measure is much more
profound than resemblance; it manifests the Creator’s presence and immediacy to
creatures. Therefore, the Creator’s complete transcendence from the created order
also allows for the Creator’s immanence.
Articles 6 and 8 implicitly raise the question of how the Creator is present
to creation. Objection 1 foreshadows Aquinas’ treatment of God’s perfection
as well as the notion of analogy by asserting there must be accidents in God
because “wisdom, virtue, and the like, which are accidents in us, are attributes of
God.” Aquinas replies that these are not predicated of God and of us univocally.
Therefore, we may conclude, these perfections are not used in their ordinary sense
when referring to God. Since we do not share in God’s perfection in an univocal
way, can we then say that God is present to us by entering into the composition
of things? Question 8 refutes this understanding as well, following Dionysius,
that union with God does not imply co-mingling.59 The Creator’s immediate
presence to creation, as well as a creature’s ultimate communion with God, does
not compromise the Creator’s distinction, because the Creator is the first efficient
cause, which does not participate in the form or matter of the thing caused. The
Creator’s presence to creation, therefore, must be an altogether unique kind of
presence. In Question 3 Aquinas accomplishes what Maimonides did by providing
a complete description of how the Creator transcends creation, but goes well
beyond Maimonides by pointing towards the issue of the Creator’s immanence
to creation.
Questions 4-6, on God’s perfection and goodness, re-orient the question
of the Creator’s presence so that all divine formal features may be understood
non-contrastively. These three questions together form a unit, for goodness is
considered the primary perfection: “because everything in so far as it is perfect
is called good.”60 However, viewed together with the other questions concerning
the manner of God’s existence, those on God’s perfection and goodness do not
seem to fit with the notion of formal feature; since we attribute limitlessness,
immutability, and the like only to God and not to created things, we do attribute
various perfections to creation—indeed, we especially speak of the creature’s
58
STh, I.3.5, answer.
59
STh, I.3.8, sed contra.
60
STh, Question 4, introduction.
130 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
“[God’s] existence is the most perfect of all things, for it is compared to all
things as that by which they are made actual; for nothing has actuality except so
far as it exists. Hence existence is that which actuates all things.”61
From the perspective of creation, existence has the lowest status, requiring nothing
else to reach its perfection, but from the divine perspective, existence has the
62
Ibid.
63
An effect can also be a cause if it brings about another effect (for example, a mother
who has a daughter who has her own daughter), but the prior effect becomes a cause, and
so on—the two are still in contrast.
64
See STh, I.4.2, answer.
132 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
relationship, all perfections existing in the creature it receives from the Creator, its
primary and ultimate cause. Thus, the most proper meaning of “perfection” would
be applied to the divine; however, when we get to Aquinas’ treatment of analogy,
it will become clear that, since the understanding we have of such terms is derived
from our creaturely experience, our notion of perfection can only be attributed
improperly to the divine.
At this point in the exercise, the Creator is clearly distinct from the creature.
At the beginning of Question 4, univocal predication of divine perfection was
shown to be unacceptable because every criterion by which we attribute perfections
to ourselves is nullified in God. Therefore, any such predication extending a
creaturely perfection to God must be in some sense equivocal. However, this
equivocally-based extension creates two problems: first—as we have discussed
at length in this book—whenever the divine is opposed or contrasted with the
world (just as when compared), God becomes a type of creature and cannot be
incomprehensible; second, if the terms we use for us and for God have little in
common save a defective or far-removed reflection of our cause, then a personal
and loving Creator God is incoherent.
Aquinas now corrects these problems by moving his language-extension a
step beyond itself, essentially rejecting the equivocal language-use he just took
such great pains to establish. He is able to do this based on the type of unique
distinction setting God apart from the world, introduced in the Five Ways and later
developed in Question 3. The identification of essence and existence excludes
God from worldly categories, so the Creator in no way shares any form with
creation. Therefore, God cannot be opposed or contrasted to the world. According
to Aquinas,
66
These formal features include, scripturally speaking, God’s infinity and eternity,
or, philosophically speaking, God’s limitlessness and immutability.
134 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
rather than passive and invalidating, the implications of which will be explored in
the last chapter of this book.
From the introductions to Question 7 and Question 8 it should be obvious
that Aquinas intends to teach the use of formal features to emphasize the singular
presence of the Creator to creatures. Question 7 asserts, “we must consider the divine
infinity, and God’s existence in things; for God is everywhere, and in all things,
inasmuch as He is boundless and infinite.” Question 8 restates this proposition,
by concluding, “it evidently belongs to the infinite to be present everywhere, and
in all things.” In order to make the leap from God’s infinity to God’s existence in
things, however, Aquinas must reform our understanding of infinity, which, after
all is said and done, depends upon our creaturely notion of finitude, rendering it
not only improperly, but inappropriately attributed to the Creator.
As he did on God’s perfection, Aquinas’ first move in Question 7 is to reverse
the criteria as it is conventionally used. The objections in Article 1 remind us that
with created things the infinite is imperfect because it lacks form, by which a thing
achieves its perfected end and makes it what it is. Having previously established
God as perfect, we must conclude God cannot be infinite. Furthermore, “finite
and infinite belong to quantity. But there is no quantity in God, for He is not
a body.” In his answer, Aquinas reverses these requisites and anticipates his
lesson on extension: first, the perfection achieved through form can only apply
to matter—which contains potentiality—and as we have seen, God’s perfection
is due to the lack of potentiality; therefore, this criterion does not apply. Second,
infinity, when applied to God, is not a measure of some quantity (such as the space
a body takes up) and therefore does not belong in the same category as the finite.
This is an important qualification, because if infinity were to be categorized with
the finite, then the finite might be understood to be some proportion of the infinite,
allowing for comparison or contrast of the finite creature with the infinite Creator.
In fact, the infinite is excluded from every creaturely category, because being
categorized into genus or species requires receiving form, limiting it to being this
thing or that thing.
The implications of Aquinas’ reversal are more apparent if infinity is seen in
terms of limitlessness. The Creator must be limitless, contrary to creatures, who
require—by the act of being created—some kind of received limit, whether it be
form, matter, or, as with angels, received being. Only that which is essentially
limitless (that is, self-subsisting) can create all else, including the matter out
of which they are created. Consequently, “the fact that the being of God is
self-subsisting, not received in any other … shows Him to be distinguished from
all other beings, and all others to be apart from Him.”67 When infinity is seen
as limitlessness, it cannot apply to creatures, since before receiving a limit the
creature does not yet exist, except in pure potentiality. Contrary to where the
question began—identifying the infinite with imperfection—infinity is related to
perfection, which in turn is properly attributed to the Creator: to be perfect in
67
STh, I.7.1, reply 3.
136 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
the proper sense of the word means to be self-subsisting, which requires being
limitless, which belongs to God alone.
Limitlessness not only preserves the distinction between Creator and creature
but makes room for extending a creaturely understanding of the infinite beyond
itself. In Article 1 Aquinas expands infinity’s definition to include form, something
outside of the category of “quantity” on the basis of lacking a body, creating
the opportunity to move the discussion towards the relationship of potency to
act—which, as in previous questions, allows for non-contrastive language-use.
Prior to being contracted by matter, form may, in an abstract way, be considered
infinite since it is undetermined. But depending on the perspective, infinite form may
be considered either imperfect or perfect. From the creatures’ perspective, infinite
form is imperfect because, being undetermined, it is “formless matter”—strictly
speaking nothing (no-thing). But from the perspective of limitlessness, infinite
form is perfect because it is unrestricted being; it is not confined by time or space.
In the following article, Aquinas extends this second notion of infinity by using
an example of something lacking quantity but considered infinite: angels, who as
forms without matter to limit them enjoy relative infinity; they are limited only by
virtue of having received being.
Aquinas is now ready to apply an extended use to the singular case of God,
which in Question 8 and those following better reveals the Creator’s unique presence
to creature. Having maintained God’s distinction from created beings in the last
question by virtue of God’s unlimiting self-subsistence, Question 8 asserts that,
being infinite, God exists in all things and everywhere. By reminding us that God’s
existence is excluded from every possible creaturely category, Aquinas moves even
beyond his last extension of the infinite to unlimited form, because God is excluded
even from the category of angels who, while unlimited by matter, are nonetheless
contracted to a determinate nature—unlike God, angels have being but are not their
own being. Extending infinity to angels, however, shows there could be an infinite
entity not limited to space or time. But extending this kind of infinity to God still
fails to communicate divine incomprehensibility, because it does not necessarily
say anything about the relationship between the creature and the infinite being.
What we want to express, according to Aquinas, is what causes us to be and to act,
as confessed by Isaiah: “Lord … thou have wrought all our works in us.”68
Articulating the existence of something present in the manner of the Creator
God requires another type of extension, and here Aquinas draws upon the example
of an agent and its presence in its effects. While this is different from his extension
of infinity to unlimited form, Aquinas has taught his reader with the last example
that certain terms may be applied in an extraordinary manner when detached from
conventional assumptions. Aquinas began this exercise in his Five Ways, where
he drew our attention to how the god of philosophy (the unmoved mover) does not
meet the criteria of the God of faith, and he began maneuvering towards the God
of Scripture by introducing the relationship of potency to act—which develops
the basis for his extension of perfections/formal features to the Divine, allowing
creatures to participate in the Creator’s existence. In Question 8 the implications
of those earlier demonstrations become clear:
God is in all things; not, indeed, as part of their essence, nor as an accident; but
as an agent is present to that upon which it works. For an agent must be joined
to that wherein it acts immediately, and touch it by its power … Now since God
is very being by His own essence, created being must be his proper effect. …
Now God causes this effect in things not only when they first begin to be, but as
long as they are preserved in being. … Therefore as long as a thing has being,
God must be present to it, according to its mode of being. But being is innermost
in each thing and most fundamentally inherent in all things since it is formal
in respect to everything found in a thing. … Hence it must be that God is in all
things, and innermostly.69
Aquinas explicitly restates from the first two Ways that, unlike the unmoved mover,
the God of faith creates without mediation, and unlike the first efficient cause, the
Creator God must remain with the effect throughout its existence. Now Aquinas
makes it clear, God is very different than conceived by philosophers or heretics;
for the God of faith is in all things “by His power,” contrary to the Manichees who
believe God is only responsible for creating the incorporeal, “by His presence,”
contrary to those who believe God’s providential care does not extend to inferior
bodies, and “by His essence,” contrary to those who believe God’s presence is not
necessary for the creation and maintenance of all creatures.70
But where Aquinas held off in the Five Ways, he now renders explicit the
intimate and personal consequences of God’s unique presence: the Creator is
innermost present to the creature; “hence nothing is distant from Him, as if it could
be without God in itself.”71 Not only is the Creator in all things, but such that there
is absolutely nothing closer to the creature than the Creator’s presence, no object
or being, not even the creature’s own breath. Recalling Question 2 where Aquinas
asserts the human creature is inherently driven to know God,72 Question 12 will
take up the Creator’s special intimacy with the human creature, who through
participation enjoys the possibility of knowing its divine author in a way no other
creature can, thereby fulfilling its particular telos. The third article of Question 8
anticipates Question 12 as well as future questions on the human creature’s love for
the Creator and on the beatified’s communion with God.73 In his answer, Aquinas
claims God’s presence as operator is proper “according as the thing known is in the
69
STh, I.8.1, answer.
70
Ibid.
71
STh, I.8.1, reply 3.
72
STh, I.2.1, reply obj. 1.
73
See, for example, Questions 1a2æ.27-8 and 1a2æ.2.8 and 3.8. See also Appendix 5
in the Blackfriars edition, “The Vision of God,” 153-5.
138 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
one who knows, and the thing desired in the one desiring,” which is “especially in
the rational creature, [who] knows and loves Him actually or habitually”; further,
he mentions “another special mode of God’s existence in [the human] by union”
which he treats later in the Summa.74
This union, referring to the faithful departed, is articulated in Christianity
as “eternal life.” A contrastive reading leads us to interpret this as God’s
granting the beatified unending existence, opposed to the relatively short span
of time between the beginning of the human being’s existence and its inevitable
creaturely end. But we want to say more about our ultimate destiny than how long
(that is, interminably) we will be granted existence; we want to say something about
the quality of that existence. Eternity for the beatified is the state, metaphorically
speaking, of “seeing God face to face,” radically communicating the impression
of equality between creature and Creator. The nature of this “equality” is the
communion between the creature and its Creator, or, the identification of creature
with its source.
To avoid the superficial understanding of eternity as an interminably long time,
Aquinas moves his reader from this contrastive interpretation to a non-contrastive
use where eternity is not the measure of time but, rather, of immutability. As with
infinity, Aquinas must render immutability, and then eternity, free from any
association with quantity, again by appealing to the relationship of potency to act.
In his answer to Question 9, Article 1 he establishes God’s immutability on the
basis of previous questions:
First … there is some first being, whom we call God; and … this first being
must be pure act, without the admixture of any potentiality, for the reason that,
absolutely, potentiality is posterior to act. Now everything which is in any way
changed, is in some way in potentiality. Hence it is evident that it is impossible
for God to be in any way changeable. … Secondly … in everything which is
moved, there is some kind of composition to be found, but it has been shown
that in God there is no composition, for He is altogether simple. … But since
God is infinite, comprehending in Himself all the plentitude of perfection of all
being, He cannot acquire anything new, nor extend Himself to anything whereto
He was not extended previously. Hence movement in no way belongs to him.
Ibid.
74
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 139
75
See, for example, STh, I.9.1, reply 1.
76
STh, I.10.4, answer.
77
Ibid.
140 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
This notion of eternity adds to that of immutability a space for expressing the
participation of creatures in the existence of the Creator without compromising the
Creator’s distinction from creation. The Creator’s existence is singularly unique
because nothing else is its own duration and its own being,78 and therefore nothing
brings or moves the Creator to being nor sustains it there. But, at the same time,
the Creator’s existence is not opposed to that of creatures since the Creator is
the author and agent of all beings and as such is absolutely necessary to them in
every respect of their existence. To be opposed to creatures would mean a totally
separate and disconnected existence, such as the gnostic god, dwelling in and only
concerned with the transcendent incorporeal realm. As effects, creatures participate
in the Creator’s existence by being actualized—by being moved (metaphorically
speaking) from nothingness into being and sustained there—but the Creator does
not likewise participate in the creature’s existence. So the participation of creatures
in their Creator’s existence refers not to how long they exist in proportion to or
measured against the Creator’s interminably long life, but to the quality of their
participation in it, according to their being in the order of creation.
Questions 7-10, in addition to providing several exercises in extraordinary
language extension, have also established an identification between God’s infinity,
immutability, and eternity, because when severed from creaturely assumptions,
each feature points to the Creator’s unique distinction from the world. Yet, with
each example, the reader is pushed closer towards recognizing God of Scripture’s
intimate presence and to anticipating the special place of the human creature in the
existence of its source as its final end. Question 11 now completes the cycle by
summarizing this identification and returning to the formal feature from whence
the reader began this journey, God’s simplicity. Aquinas adds to his features that of
unity or oneness. In reality, God’s oneness sums up all of God’s features:
God is one: First from His simplicity. … Now this belongs to God alone; for God
Himself is His own nature. … Secondly from the infinity of His perfection. …
God comprehends in Himself the whole perfection of being. … Thirdly … from
the unity of the world. … For many are reduced into one order by one better
than by many; because one is the per se cause of one. … [I]t must be that the
first which reduces all into one order should be only one. And this one is God.79
The idea of God’s oneness exceeds, but includes, the quantity—or number—of
God; it extends to the quality of this one God’s existence. Furthermore, God’s
oneness illuminates the relationship of the many creatures to their one divine
source: “For multitude itself would not be contained under being, unless it were
in some way contained under one.”80 The unity of the world, therefore, obtains
from the fullness of God’s being, and from the distinction of the Creator, who calls
78
Ibid.
79
STh, I.11.3, answer.
80
STh, I.11.1, answer.
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 141
all things forth from nothing: “and so in being, by reason of its universality, the
privation of being has its foundation in being.”81 By moving God’s oneness away
from numerical or quantifiable association, Aquinas has reached the Creator God
of Scripture and Tradition: “I Am Who Am,” who, far from a deity dwelling in a
detached transcendent realm and wrapped up in its own self-contemplation, is the
God of Moses, the One God who not only through pure existence brings us into
being, but out of intimate concern leads us out of slavery into freedom—ultimately
into communion and our own deification. Thus, the features that we properly
attribute to the divine do not really attempt to define the manner of God’s existence,
but communicate the personal and unique relationship between Creator and creature.
81
STh, I.11.2, reply 1.
82
Sokolowski, God of Faith and Reason, 32-3; Tanner, God and Creation, 28.
83
Tanner, God and Creation, 12.
142 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
end in the divine life, brought about by Jesus Christ who through his incarnation
makes this reditus journey possible. In the doctrine of Jesus Christ, asserting his
full humanity and full divinity, we find the perfect expression of this balance, and
further, the articulation of human and divine consummation: eternal life in its
fullest sense of actualized being.
Indeed, Aquinas’ insight into how formal features reveal the uniquely intimate
relationship between Creator and creature as well as its intended fulfillment goes
beyond non-contrastive language. For Aquinas, speaking about God and knowing
God are intrinsically connected, and knowing God is the result of the believer’s
journey of faith seeking understanding. Since the knowing that results from the
faith journey is not data about God but personal union—transcends all human
relations—more than balancing divine transcendence and immanence is entailed;
the believer must reach for the incomprehensible, an endeavor that would be futile
without the capacity to recognize and respond to that which is always beyond
grasp. Due to the human creature’s limited intellectual faculty, this inchoate
awareness—the “restless heart”—must be developed and directed to its end by
some power greater than itself. This extraordinary endowment, generally referred
to as “grace,” requires its own language, and with the notion of grace we must
move from balancing language to transforming it.
Recall in Question 1, Aquinas re-visions faith so that instead of being a
type of revealed knowledge far exceeding the faculty of human intellection
and, thus, unquestionably accepted in a leap of imagination, faith becomes the
instrument—given through revelation and nurtured by tradition—wherein all
human knowledge and experience is imbued with saving significance.84 In this
re-visioning, grace is not merely an occasional gift given to bolster faith when it
languishes, but the immediate and continual communication of God’s presence,
not only in relation to a particular event or moment in time, but in everything
within and outside of the life of the believer; and so faith ever-expands as the
believer becomes more aware of God’s presence and providence in all things.
Aquinas demonstrates this intimate relationship in Questions 3-11, and in so doing,
also begins to open a linguistic space in which to discuss grace. In Question 12
on how we know God, grace becomes the determining factor in moving beyond
a superficial sense of knowing God based upon visual or formal data (“knowing
about”) to knowing God as union and identification with the incomprehensible.
Finally, Question 13 makes explicit the role religious language-use plays in this
journey: with the rising awareness of our inbuilt telos to seek after God as our
own end and with the attempt to verbalize the deepening appreciation of God’s
incomprehensible presence accompanying this realization, we begin to discern that
the most basic principle of speaking about God is understanding that our words do
not adequately capture the reality they seek to articulate. We must strive instead
to speak in a way that draws attention to the uniqueness and significance of God’s
presence. As believers, our ceaseless quest to express the incomprehensible leads
85
STh, I.12.1, obj. 1.
86
STh, I.12.1, answer.
87
STh, I.12.1, reply 4.
144 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
In the first article of Question 12, the human creature’s proportion to its Creator
is explained as a “relation,” but one where the idea of quantity (that is, whatever
is to be measured) is excluded. As in preceding questions, once the criteria of
quantity is removed, a term may be extended to include something which
transcends the constraints of the physical world, and then further extended to the
singular case of God who transcends all creaturely categories whatsoever. In this
question, however, Aquinas now factors the creature into this extension. Thus, the
proportion between human creature and its Creator may be described as a potency
to receive, respond to, and be transformed by the Creator’s self-communication.
It does not refer to humanity’s existence as more or less in proportion to the
Creator’s when compared to other creatures in the order of being (although we
do speak metaphorically of the human being as closer to God than “non-rational”
creatures), nor does it refer to a formal likeness between the two that could be
measured; this latter qualification was already made in Question 4, where Aquinas
submits that creatures’ likeness to Creator is not one of form but of participation.
Obviously the initiative for the human creature’s participation remains entirely
with the Creator, who produces and sustains it throughout its faith journey, and
according to Christian tradition, this is equally true with regard to its fulfillment,
the granting of eternal life. However, as the Fourth and Fifth Ways of Question 2
indicate, each creature has its own particular telos according to its place in the
created order as well as a correlating means of achieving its end. For the human
creature, defined by its rational nature, not only the way but the goal—eternal
life—involves the intellect. Aquinas reminds us of this correspondence in
Question 12:
the ultimate beatitude of man consists in the use of his highest function, which
is the operation of the intellect. … [Accordingly] there resides in every man a
natural desire to know the cause of any effect which he sees; and thence arises
wonder in men. But if the intellect of the rational creature could not reach so far
as to the first cause of things, the natural desire would remain void.88
He concludes that those who reach their intended goal must know their
divine source.
The following twelve articles explore the manner by which the human
creature comes to know the Creator, given that the object of this intellectual
pursuit transcends any comparable creaturely relation. The first and more
apparent determination of this inquiry is that natural reason can grasp that the
Creator, as the primordial cause of all things, is uniquely distinct from creation
and consequently enjoys a relationship of transcendence-in-immanence with
it; however, the nature of this existence still remains unknown.89 In order to come
to a higher knowledge of God, we must have the benefit of divine revelation,
allowing us to formulate this distinction in a way that not only directs us towards
God as the incomprehensible Creator, but as Sanctifier and Redeemer as well.
Since formulations like the doctrine of the holy Trinity and of the hypostatic union
are derived from revelation proclaimed in Scripture, they have their origin in
God’s grace rather than in human reason. These graced formulations are essential
to religious faith because they are designed to lead believers away from the
misapprehension of God as a being while further revealing the human being’s
appointment in the divine life; and doctrines accomplish this by drawing attention
to the singularity of the Creator God’s existence and also to the singularity of the
Creator–creature relationship—particularly the Creator–human relationship. Free
from misdirection, the believer’s faith ever increases as, according to Aquinas,
“we know Him more fully according as many and more excellent of His effects
are demonstrated to us.”90 In Christian terms, believers led by faith become open
to seeing the saving significance of Christ in everything around them. Although
God’s essence is still unknown, the nature of humanity’s end may be revealed.
However, having established that knowledge given through revelation assists
the rational faculty by directing it towards ascertaining God as Creator, Sanctifier,
and Redeemer, throughout Question 12 Aquinas continually reminds us that a
set of propositions about God—natural or revealed—cannot reunite the human
creature with its Creator, because it does not yield knowledge of God’s essence,
wherein the knower finds ultimate fulfillment in the beatific vision. “[W]hen any
created intellect sees the essence of God,” says Aquinas, “the essence of God
itself becomes the intelligible form of the intellect.”91 This divine illumination,
which raises the intellect “to such a great and sublime height” radically transforms
the departed blessed, who are made “deiform—that is, like to God.”92 Rational
cognition is inadequate for such an identification of creature to its Creator,
because the knowledge produced, information about, stands between the knower
and the object known. Neither can simply adhering to a doctrine—revealed or
otherwise—produce communion; in fact, later Eckhart, following Aquinas, will go
to great lengths to detach us from any formulation about God. For, in the beatific
vision, knowledge between creature and Creator is unmediated and active, likened
to but far exceeding the personal knowing between lover and beloved.
In order to show how cognition is nevertheless involved in the journey whose
end lies beyond physical death, Aquinas must first dissociate the necessary use
of bodily organs from the operation of intellect, allowing the beatific vision to
transcend the physical limitations of the human creature—in fact, Aquinas
implicitly prepares his readers to understand terms such as “vision” and “sight”
as metaphors, used improperly when attributed to knowing God. Article 2 rejects
the idea that God’s essence is seen through an image by reminding us, as he
did in Question 4, that there is no formal likeness—but a much more profound
90
STh, I.12.13, reply obj. 1.
91
STh, I.12.5, answer.
92
Ibid.
146 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
one—between Creator and creatures. The following two articles eliminate the
use of the bodily eye in the beatific vision, and it therefore must be concluded
that knowing God’s essence does not terminate in data about God. For Aquinas,
the intellect is a cognitive power that is not an act of any corporeal organ but a
capacity to receive God’s self-communication and a potency to respond to that
recognition.93 It is in this sense we may say that human creatures are proportioned
to their Creator.
At this point, Aquinas begins to distinguish between knowledge derived
through the senses and unmediated knowledge. Rational cognition produces
knowledge by similitude, which mediates things outside of the knower to mental
images inside of the knower through the bodily senses. But there is another type
of knowledge where the object is immediately present and directly united to
the knower, which Aquinas later explains in his consideration of the causes and
effects of beatitude.94 This knowing moves beyond verbal articulation, towards
transformation, wherein it goes by another name: love. For, as Question 28 of the
Prima secundae affirms, in a relationship of deep intimacy knowing and loving
become inseparable, causing a dynamic communion between the participants:
Mutual indwelling is both a cognitive and an orectic effect of love. … the lover
is cognitively present in the person loved in the sense that he is not satisfied
with a surface knowledge of him, but strives for personal insight into everything
about him, and penetrates into his very soul.95
93
STh, I.12.4, answer.
94
STh, Ia.2ae.2-3.
95
STh, Ia.2ae.28, 2.
Thomas Aquinas: From “Proof” to Analogy 147
realized their full actuality, they are deified, not infinitely, but with respect to their
intended end. For Aquinas, and Eckhart as well, this special relationship is one of
distinction without separation.
Having demonstrated knowing God is not only possible, but is required for human
creatures in order to fulfill our destiny, Aquinas now turns to how we might
articulate this ineffable reality. The heart of Question 13, how we speak about
God, is analogy, standing as one of Aquinas’ more controversial presentations in
the Prima pars, because—as with Eckhart’s explanation of analogy—it finds little
consensus among scholars as to its interpretation or as to its consistency with his
use of analogy in other works. In reality, however, Aquinas starts preparing his
students for his presentation of analogy from his first question, and in Question 3
he begins a rigorous and progressive exercise in analogous language-use. By the
time we have reached Question 13 the hard work on appropriating analogy has
already been accomplished, and so Aquinas’ main task is to make explicit what
we have been doing all along. Consequently, without the benefit of having worked
through Questions 3 to 11, and without the benefit of the first two questions’
guidance, it may be difficult to grasp the subtle nuances in the explanation of
analogy that Aquinas gives in Question 13.
Analogy is the extension of a term from its ordinary usage to a new context,
thus revealing a similarity or relationship that may otherwise remain obscure.96
In Questions 3-11, we find a repetitive pattern of extensions, with subtle yet
sophisticated twists; for the divine context that we want to ascertain is absolutely
novel, and consequently there are no terms that can properly be stretched to such an
extent; in fact, it is not simply a matter of how far a term can be extended, but what
kind of extension is possible. As Article 1 of Question 13 expresses this dilemma:
“Can we use any words to refer to God?”97 This query is echoed again at the end of
the question, where he asks, “Can affirmative statements correctly be made about
God?” If Aquinas is consistent with his proscription at the beginning of Question 3
that we can only know what God is not, the answer must be: terms ordinarily used
to refer to creatures must be negated when extended to the divine—which seems to
be counter-productive to the whole exercise, considering all we can know comes
from creaturely experience, and further, we name things as we know them.98 The
question becomes “Can we make such negative extensions, and if so of what use
are they to us?”
In Questions 4-6 Aquinas considers the validity of extending perfection terms
to God. Later, in the third article of Question 13 he reaffirms these terms are indeed
more appropriately extended to the divine than are any other creaturely terms, and
96
See Soskice, Metaphor and Religious Language, 64.
97
Emphasis mine.
98
STh, Question 13, introduction.
148 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
so may be considered literal names of God.99 Here he makes explicit that they
are understood properly only when referring to the Creator and improperly when
referring to creatures, thus, as Gavin Ardley reminds us, “restor[ing] theology to
its right order, instead of the upside-down condition to which anthropomorphists
reduce it.”100 In analogical terminology, this makes God the prime analogate in the
relationship, thus preserving the priority of Creator over creature.
This qualification has already been indicated in Question 4, where Aquinas
reverses the criteria of perfection when it applies to the divine, not only restoring
the correct order of the relationship, but securing the distinction of Creator from
creature. God’s perfection comes from being uncreated and fully actual rather than
having reached a designated end, which would necessitate having a measure of
potentiality. Consequently, God is the Creator from whom all things have their
origin and, hence, all perfections flow from Creator to creatures. Remember in this
question Aquinas maintains a non-univocal understanding of divine perfection,
for the likeness of a creature to its Creator is not one of formal resemblance, and
therefore we cannot compare the Creator’s perfection to creaturely perfections,
confined in our rational cognition to forms. Since we can only understand these
perfections from our creaturely experience of them, these terms are therefore used
improperly when applied to God, although we intend them to signify a reality
that exists primarily and properly in God. With this kind of extension—as long
as we are aware that we are using a term improperly—we can say more than
we can understand about God, thus maintaining God’s distinction and, further,
“allow[ing] the genuine negative way to emerge.”101
Aquinas then moves from terms conventionally attributed to both creatures
and Creator to terms attributed primarily to the Creator and only metaphorically
to creatures—that is, the divine features: infinity, eternity, immutability. While the
features explored in Questions 7-10 are included in the category of perfections,
they present a special case because they are specifically meant to distinguish the
divine from the non-divine—the uncreated from the created—and are therefore
equivocal in nature. Aquinas’ task in these questions is to show divine features
are not truly equivocal, but rather reveal the true intimacy of Creator to creatures.
Aquinas employs the same strategy to accomplish this as he did in the prior
questions: reverse the criteria we would conventionally assign them; however,
in Questions 7-10 this maneuver uncovers the misguided presumption that these
features are free from creaturely conceptions to begin with, and so in addition
to being reversed such criteria must also be qualified. In actuality, conventional
usage of these divine features is based upon an opposition to creaturely experience:
infinity to the finite; eternity to time; immutability to change. These features are, in
a sense, negative extensions of creaturely terms. But such extensions are not all that
99
STh, I.13.3, reply obj. 1.
See Gavin Ardley, “From Greek Philosophy to Apophatic Theology,” Prudentia
100
[N]ames are thus used … according as one thing is proportionate to another, thus
healthy is said of medicine and animal, since medicine is the cause of health
in the animal body. And in this way some things are said of God and creatures
analogically. … Thus, whatever is said of God and creatures is said according to
the relation of a creature to God as its principle and cause, wherein all perfections
of things pre-exist excellently. Now this mode of community of idea is a mean
between pure equivocation and simple univocation. For in analogies … a term
which is thus used in a multiple sense signifies various proportions to some
one thing; thus healthy applied to urine signifies the sign of animal health, and
applied to medicine signifies the cause of the same health.
150 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
102
Denys Turner, “The Art of Unknowing: Negative Theology in Late Medieval
Mysticism,” Modern Theology 14, No. 4 (Oct. 1998): 479.
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Chapter 5
Meister Eckhart:
From Analogy to Silence
inheres in the Trinitarian formula, further drawn out in the Creed’s second and
third articles. As Son, the second Person is articulated as “one in being with the
Father” sharing without separation or distinction of any kind in the Father’s divine
nature. Together with the Holy Spirit, the Father and Son share in the divine act of
creation, each in their own immediate, and intimate manner, thus establishing their
identities as three unique Persons.
Unfortunately, the many reiterations in the opening of the Creed’s second
article regarding Jesus’ oneness with the Father—“eternally begotten,” “God from
God,” “light from light,” “true God from true God,” “begotten, not made,” “one in
being with the Father”—leads to the equally heretical tendency to overshadow
the narrative of Jesus’ humanity, a problem taken up by the Council of Chalcedon
in 451. The Chalcedon formula, or “hypostatic union,” although not incorporated
into the Creed, intends to counter this contrastive tendency, while at the same
time preserving the transcendence-in-immanence of this unique person: Jesus is
“one in being with the Father regarding his Godhead,” and “one in being with
us regarding his humanity,” “unconfusedly, immutably, indivisibly, inseparably
[united].”1 However, the formula more often than not is understood contrastively
such that divine and human natures exist in opposition within Jesus, rather than in
interrelation to each other.
Religious formulas such as the Trinity and the hypostatic union were never
meant to become the end-all and be-all of theological reflection, but rather the
beginning of reflection on how God’s revelation relates to the life of the believer.
Since more is required of faith than formulas, those in charge of helping believers
forward in their journey towards God must learn how to inspire them beyond the
structure of a doctrine—that is, from formula to encounter, ultimately pushing
them out of their comfort zones towards conversion.
For his diverse audiences—many of whom were someday to engage in
vocations where they would be responsible for expounding intelligently on the
Church’s doctrines—Eckhart created novel “universes of discourse,” to use
Tanner’s phrase,2 drawing students, readers, and listeners beyond familiar formulas
towards deeper awareness of God’s radical presence, an awareness that can only
develop with the realization of the Creator’s unique distinction from creation.
Further, Christian audiences would be familiar with the stories of Scripture, which
move from the divine act of creation to the saving event of Jesus Christ. Eckhart
took his cue from Aquinas, who, observing the congruence between the Christian
journey and the Neoplatonic cycle of exitus/reditus, implicitly arranged his Summa
according to this cycle and adopted the vocabulary of the Neoplatonist philosophers
(especially pseudo-Dionysius and Aristotle). This vocabulary, carefully modified,
allowed Aquinas to highlight divine features found in Scripture—Eternal, Infinite,
Perfect, One—easily misused by those who might be tempted to conceive God in
opposition to creatures.
Neoplatonism also had much to offer Eckhart in his attempt to direct students
and congregations away from conventional understandings and towards a deeper
appropriation of their faith. First, because emanation correlates with the divine
act of creation depicted in Scripture, but especially because the second part of the
cycle, return to the Source, can be re-visioned in scriptural terms to emphasize
salvation as deification, the believer’s radical and dynamic self-identification
with God. In the scriptural narrative there is a necessary middle act connecting
emanation with return to God: redemption from the circumstance named “sin” that
provokes the human creature’s alienation from its Creator.
Salvation in its more profound sense goes beyond achieving an interminable
status of perfection to realizing a relationship of identification with God, or
deification. In Neoplatonic terms, reditus is a total and complete return to the One
from whence creation came. There is no longer any separation between Creator
and creature, but as in the beginning, before creation, one existence in the Creator,
now a dynamic unity of love—a unity so profound, Eckhart asserts, that it cannot
even be conceived or uttered in conventional terms;3 as in the case of other such
terms, “love” must be understood non-contrastively if it is to be used at all to refer
to the Divine.
For Christians, through his incarnation, death, and resurrection Jesus provides
the link between emanation and return by freeing humanity from the alienation of
sin and rejoining the human and the divine, allowing believers to be reunited with
God. As part of the exitus/reditus cycle, sanctification must be more than God’s
continual pardoning of the incapacitated believer from sinful act to sinful act; it
must include transformation, a movement of identification with and manifestation
of the Divine. In traditional Christian terms this is achieved through the “imitation
of Christ.” This language is used to articulate that the movement from the
condition of sin to embodying Christ is “adoption”: what Jesus was by nature
(the divine Son), those who die having lived as he lived become, through adoption,
sons and daughters of God. This “adoption” language presents a formula designed
to show the intimacy existing between God and the beatified, while maintaining
the strict distinction of the Creator from creature.
Eckhart employs the adoption formula many times throughout his works, but
finds that, in and of itself, it fails to express the dynamic identification of creature
with Creator, so he uses the exitus/reditus cycle as well as his own linguistic devices
to force the audience beyond a conventional understanding of adoption (even to
the point of abandoning this term altogether in some instances), giving us novel
approaches to the “imitation of Christ,” reaching towards the Eastern Christian
notion of deification. Eckhart uses similar strategies with formulations of the
3
See, for example, German Sermon 83: “You should love God … as he is a non-
God, a nonspirit, a nonperson, a nonimage” (Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons)
and On Detachment, “And when this detachment ascends to the highest place, it knows
nothing of knowing, it loves nothing of loving, and from light it becomes dark” (Colledge
and McGinn, Essential Sermons).
156 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
STh, I.13.2.
4
See, for example, German Sermon 1, on Mt 21:12 (McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt,
5
Teacher and Preacher) and Counsel 6, “Of Detachment and of the Possession of God,” in
Counsels on Discernment (Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons).
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 157
A. Analogy in Action
“They that eat me, shall yet hunger.” With this unusual scriptural passage from
the book of Sirach,6 Eckhart begins his exegesis on the analogical relationship
between Creator and creature. In true scholastic fashion, however, Eckhart moves
6
Sir 24:20.
158 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
that these three are to be distinguished: “the univocal, the equivocal and the
analogous. Equivocals are divided according to different things that are signified,
univocals according to various differences of the [same] thing.” Analogous
things are not distinguished according to things, nor through the differences,
but “according to the modes [of being]” of one and the same simple thing. For
example, the one and the same health that is in an animal is that (and no other)
which is in the diet and the urine [of the animal] in such a way that there is no
more of health as health in the diet and urine than there is in a stone. … Being
or existence and every perfection, especially general ones such as existence,
oneness, truth, goodness, light, justice, and so forth, are used to describe God
and creatures in an analogical way.7
It follows from this that goodness and justice and the like [in creatures] have
their goodness totally from something outside to which they are analogically
ordered [Latin: analogantur], namely, God. … Analogates have nothing of
the form according to which they are analogically ordered rooted in positive
fashion in themselves. But every created being is analogically ordered to God
in existence, truth, and goodness. Therefore every created being radically and
positively possesses existence, life, and wisdom from and in God, not in itself
as a created being.8
7
Commentary on Ecclesiasticus (hereafter Comm. Ecc.), n. 52 (McGinn, Tobin, and
Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher). Quoted text from Aquinas appears to be from In I Sent.
D. 22, q. 1, a.3, ad. 2.
8
Comm. Ecc., n. 52.
9
De Libera, Le problème de l’être chez Maîter Eckhart, 6; Colledge and McGinn,
Essential Sermons, 32-3.
10
See, for example, Commentary on John (hereafter Comm. Jn.), nn. 24, 107
(Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons).
11
For example, Commentary on Wisdom (hereafter Comm. Wis.) (1:14), n. 34
(McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher); German Sermon 71 (McGinn,
Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher).
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 159
employs the term “nothing”; for example, at times he dialectically asserts that
from the creaturely perspective, God is nothing (no-thing), a linguistic strategy
leading some scholars to call Eckhart’s analogy dialectical or reverse analogy.12
As Chapter 1 of this book observed, scholars tend to contrast Eckhart’s
so-called extrinsic analogy with Aquinas’ so-called analogy of proportion,
especially as formulated in Question 13, precisely because Aquinas seems to give
more autonomy to the creature than Eckhart. This is probably partially due to the
(mistaken) impression of Aquinas’ analogy of positive attribution as opposed to
Eckhart, who is seen primarily as a negative theologian.”.13 But closer examination
of Aquinas’ development of analogy reveals it not to be positive theology but
apophatic, rejecting both positive and negative attribution; moreover it transforms
attribution altogether. By reading further on in Eckhart’s exegesis of Sirach, we
discover he too reverses this negation, by showing that only by being totally
“outside” of the creature can the Creator be completely immanent to it and draw it
towards its final end. Eckhart continues:
“They that eat me, shall yet hunger” is perfectly fitted to signify the truth of the
analogy of all things to God himself. They eat because they are; they hunger
because they are from another. … God is inside all things in that he is existence,
and thus every being feeds on him. He is also on the outside because he is above
all and thus outside all. Therefore, all things feed on him, because he is totally
within; they hunger for him, because he is totally without.14
As often in other works,15 here Eckhart moves in one direction, then suddenly
works in reverse, indicating he is using language in a transformed manner. In the
opening of his exegesis on Sirach 24:20, Eckhart advances God’s transcendence
by declaring the Creator totally outside of the creature. However, in the next
passage he reverses himself by beginning with God’s immanence—the Creator’s
being “within” the creature—but then again reverts to God’s transcendence, the
Creator’s being totally “without” the creature. This dialectical movement between
the Creator’s being within all things and the Creator’s being without all things
reverses the negation set up earlier in his exposition and signals that Eckhart means
for his Creator–creature analogy to be read non-contrastively. The relationship
12
For example, German Sermon 71 (“When he saw nothing, he saw God”) and 83
(“you with him perceive forever his uncreated is-ness, and his nothingness, for which there
is no name”). See Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 33 (dialectical analogy) and
Kelley, Meister Eckhart on Divine Knowledge, 31 (reverse analogy).
13
See Commentary on Exodus (hereafter Comm. Ex.), nn. 143-74; the introduction to
Colledge and McGinn, Essential Sermons, 15-30.
14
Comm. Ex., nn. 143-74.
15
See, for example, Latin Sermon IV on the Feast of the Holy Trinity (McGinn,
Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher).
160 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
between the Creator and creature can be neither contrasted (that is, opposed) nor
compared; therefore, the analogy is neither negative nor positive.
Eckhart first secures God’s unique distinction here by demonstrating
that the Creator must be wholly transcendent in order to be, simultaneously,
wholly immanent to the creature. Recall that, according to Tanner, this is a first
requirement for the God of Scripture and tradition, who creates ex nihilo and
who is the supremely personal God of faith.16 The Creator’s transcendence and
immanence are inseparable as Eckhart’s dialectical rhetoric, proposing a negation
of negation, clearly establishes. Therefore, to call Eckhart’s analogy “extrinsic”
or one of “formal opposition” only captures one half of his articulation of the
Creator–creature relationship: God’s transcendence. For Eckhart, articulating
God’s immanence is equally—if not more—critical to expressing the Creator.
Eckhart does not stop with securing God’s distinction and providing a lesson
in non-contrastive language use. For this Dominican, the God of Scripture is not
only the Creator, but the personal Creator who draws the creature back towards
itself, a reunion that for the human creature in particular constitutes a process
of deification:
This is what is said, “They that eat me, shall yet hunger.” … In spiritual and
divine things it is different on both ends. First, because every act first causes
a separation from its bitter opposite. Here there is nothing prior and posterior;
each and every act is first for this reason. Forward progress then is not to leave
the First [that is, God], but to draw near to it, so that the Last is the First. The
reason is progress brings one nearer the end, and the End in the Godhead is the
Beginning. … Therefore, an approach toward the end is always joined with its
beginning if it is God and the pure divine that is eaten and drunk.17
creature and by incorporating Neoplatonic elements into his narrative, Eckhart goes
beyond dialectical or reverse analogy and creates a linguistic space for expressing
the creature’s return to its Source, wherein its own completion is achieved. It is
not merely the creature’s autonomy (or lack thereof) vis-à-vis the Creator that is at
stake, but more pointedly, the creature’s actualization, the mode of which depends
on the creature’s particular telos as determined by its place in the order of creation.
For the human creature, its telos is deification—identification with the divine—and
its mode of actualization is its intellect, achieved through wisdom or “detached
intellection”; this is the way in which the human creature images its Creator.
Scholars who contrast Eckhart and Aquinas often miss the deeper significance
they place on the analogical relationship between creature and its Creator,
doubtless born out of their shared background as Dominicans concerned with
saving souls, as explained in Chapter 2 of this book. For both Aquinas and Eckhart,
it is the saving God of Scripture and faith, not the god of philosophy that must be
professed. Aquinas should be recognized for laying the foundation for Eckhart’s
remarkable ability to negotiate around the limitations of religious language, since
it is precisely Aquinas’ exercises in non-contrastive language-use that allow for
analogy to go beyond itself in referring to the divine without violating either
God’s transcendence or immanence, while—more importantly—giving voice to
the creature’s imaging of its Creator and return to its one and the same Source.
It is important to see how Aquinas lays out this foundation before moving on
to Eckhart. Recall that Aquinas’ analogy of proportion holds the most promise
for divine attribution, as well as for articulating the Creator–creature relationship.
However, since there can be no proportion between any creature and the Creator,
Aquinas has to make some essential qualifications, the full implications of
which can hardly be perceived unless the reader has carefully worked through
the preceding questions on the manner of God’s existence as One, Infinite and
Eternal. These perfections secure God’s unique distinction of transcendence-in-
immanence. Although on the surface they appear to highlight God’s transcendence
from the world, attentive reading of the first thirteen questions as a unit reveals
Aquinas’ intention to underscore God’s immanence.
In accordance with the requirements of Christian orthodoxy, Aquinas insists
there can be no proportion between creature and Creator because, obviously, there
is nothing bodily by which the Creator can be measured;18 if there were, God would
be another type of creature. In fact, Aquinas goes on to assert that the Creator does
not even share any type of form with the creature,19 a point which becomes crucial
to understanding how Eckhart puts Aquinas’ lessons on analogical language-use
into practice. Undeterred by the problems presented by employing “proportion,”
Aquinas introduces another, most extraordinary, strategy whereby the biblical
assertion that the human creature is made in the image of God is united with the
Neoplatonic notion of participation.
18
STh, I.3.5, especially reply obj. 2.
19
STh, I.4, reply obj. 3.
162 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
because they see Him, and in seeing him, possess Him as present, having the
power to see Him always; and possessing Him, they enjoy Him as the ultimate
fulfilment of desire.22
For Aquinas the blessed’s knowing God and possessing God are essentially
the same. Both are signified by the metaphor of “seeing”: in the first sense,
comprehending something, and in the second, beholding an object of great import.
But even knowing and possessing must be interpreted metaphorically, for in God
there is strictly no-thing to know or to possess. God is not a thing of any kind.
Aquinas takes his readers through several levels of language-transformation, in
which Eckhart was no doubt very well trained as a Dominican student. First, seeing
is a metaphor for both knowing and possessing, which shows the flexibility with
which Aquinas expects his students to become familiar. Knowing and possessing
become, then, further metaphors for presence: possessing God is the believer’s
total presence to God and God’s total presence to the believer. Finally, the most
subtle move: the “power to see always” is transformed into fulfilled existence.
20
STh, I.4, reply obj. 3.
21
STh, I.12.4.
22
STh, I.12.7.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 163
In his earlier lessons on God’s infinity and God’s eternity, “always” has a
non-contrastive meaning when used in reference to the divine. Aquinas divorces
divine Infinity and Eternity from their quantitative presumptions and connects
them instead to immutability, which in God is not a static or unending existence
but rather one of pure act. Eternity must be understood differently than being
“a really, really long time”; this would contrast or measure created time against
divine time. Eternity is, non-contrastively speaking, the source, the center, and
the fulfillment of time. Therefore, living the eternal life implies more than never
dying; it means living a fully actualized existence, to be alive all-ways, that is, in
every way: the divine way.
Since the human belongs in the created order of intellect, fully actualizing
existence means attaining to the divine intellect—Wisdom—which in God is
the same as Existence; this is so because God’s essence and God’s existence
are one, and Wisdom belongs to the perfection of God’s essence. Therefore, to
take Aquinas’ process of transforming metaphors to its logical conclusion, the
beatified know God in God’s-self and in so doing themselves become deified;
their knowledge is now divine knowledge. In God there is no separation between
knowing and possessing or possessing and presence, and thus the beholder
(beatified) and beheld (the Divine) are one. Far from any formal sense—there is
no form to share, but only pure presence. This brings Aquinas much closer to the
notion of deification than might be easily recognized.23
Aquinas’ above lessons are in no way lost on Eckhart. All of the vital elements
Aquinas develops in his exercises are dramatically present throughout Eckhart’s
works, notably in his commentary on the Book of Sirach with his own explication
on analogy. For Eckhart, as with Aquinas, creatures do not share a formal likeness
to the Creator, but—in Eckhart’s own words—a much more “radical … and
positive” possession, especially in “existence, life and wisdom,” the three levels
distinguishing creatures in the created order.24 Far from articulating an extrinsic
relationship and unbridgeable gap between them, Creator and creature have the
capacity and desire to be fully open to each other; in fact, the creature’s potential
existence—its “nothingness”—is not a disadvantage to its fulfillment, but a
potency, its greatest strength and way to God.
Eckhart returns time and again to the human creature’s potency as intellect,
laboring to detach his readers from narrow and misguided notions about the
intellect as well as how it relates to divine Wisdom and, ultimately, to knowing God.
In fact, the human intellect plays a determining role in Eckhart’s examination of the
doctrine of the economic Trinity, and, Christologically formulated, of the adoption
of believers as heirs (sons) of God, derived from the scriptural writings of Paul.
23
For more on deification in the Summa, see A.N. Williams, The Ground of Union:
Deification in Aquinas and Palamas (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), especially
ch. 2.
24
Comm. Ecc. on Sir 24:20. This use of “formal” is distinguished from God as formal
cause, which belongs to God’s oneness in Formal, Efficient, Material, and Final cause.
164 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Thirst and hunger, desire and appetite are taken in a double way. “In one way as
meaning the appetite for something not possessed; in another way as meaning
the exclusion of disgust.”26 Beware of thinking that the latter sense, that is, the
exclusion of disgust is the principal or first meaning. Many do this and thus crudely
explain our text, “They that eat me, shall yet hunger,” as though they eat without
saiety. This seems to give too little to divine Wisdom, that is, to God, especially
speaking of himself, teaching about himself, and recommending his excellence.27
25
STh, I.1.6.
26
Eckhart is citing from Aquinas, STh, Ia.IIae.33.2.
27
Comm. Ecc., n. 60. The accompanying footnotes in McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt,
Teacher and Preacher suggest Eckhart includes Aquinas in his attack here.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 165
Now I, like a rivulet from her stream, channeling the waters into a garden, said to
myself, “I will water my plants, my flower bed I will drench”; and suddenly this
rivulet of mine became a river, then this stream of mine, a sea. Thus do I send my
teachings forth shining like the dawn, to become known afar off.
Verse 26 makes it is clear that the human creature cannot comprehend its Creator.
From the perspective of negative theology, the human’s inability to fathom its
Creator expresses the supremely unknown God who remains hidden even while
close at hand. Further, it suggests the human creature’s natural incapacity to know
its Creator and the necessity of supernatural knowledge or Revelation to raise it
above its intellectual limitations.
However, this interpretation does not conform to the Scriptural narrative, as any
good Dominican in line with Aquinas should quickly perceive, for it neglects the
pivotal detail that the human being is made in the image of God in a way more
profound than any form can capture. Indeed, Sirach is replete with symbolisms
derived from the Creation story. Recounting Genesis, the Creator God is the nourisher,
166 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Here Eckhart ties the creature’s telos, its inbuilt appetite for its Creator, with God’s
divine existence: to be. Negation is rejected because the end to the creature’s search
is not a hidden, God, but the self-present God. Speaking of the creature’s appetite
in terms of a capacity to possess—to be one with—God, Eckhart re-emphasizes
that this telos is fulfilled by an imaging beyond any creaturely form:
Again, when hunger is taken as “the appetite for something not possessed,”
formally speaking, hunger or appetite is not defined on the basis of the thing that
is not possessed. This is only a negation or privation and is something material.29
Ibid.
29
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 167
the essence of hunger is formally an affirmative appetite, the root and cause for
the exclusion of saiety which accompanies it. As such it belongs to something
possessed and is a thing in some way positive. …
STh, I.1.9-10.
30
Each and every one of these explanations is based on some of the supreme
attributes of the godhead, such as infinity, simplicity, purity, priority, and so
forth. They teach … the nothingness … of creatures in themselves in relation
to God.32
The hunger to know the Creator and to become one with the Source belongs
first and foremost (and essentially) to God’s existence, and this appetite creates
and arranges the very way in which the human fulfills this divine directive and
participates in the divine Existence. In this sense, we possess God by allowing
ourselves to be defined by the Divine. The supreme attributes, being distinct from
any creaturely category and thus divorced from created forms, allow us to know
God more intimately and immediately than anything in our ordinary experience,
because they are not limited to knowledge attained through the process of rational
intellection. That is why Eckhart says these divine features “teach” us about our
own nothingness: in becoming detached from all creaturely forms by which the
believer defined itself—even religious terms such as “Christian”—the believer
enters into its own nothingness and becomes conformed to the divine life.
B. Doctrine as Analogy
33
See McGinn, Mystical Thought of Meister Eckhart, 37-9 and 210 (fn. 12).
34
The “nothingness” of God is Haas’s use; Grunt is McGinn’s. See ibid.
35
Ibid., 38.
36
See STh, I.1.9, reply obj. 3.
170 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Soskice distinguishes analogy from metaphor by placing analogy into literal speech
37
Since they do not adhere to any creaturely form, master metaphors are able
to express God’s unique distinction from the world. Furthermore, they refer to
the Divine in a literal—meaning “proper”—way by securing God as the prime
analogate from which all else flows, without, however, falling prey to the illusion
of a one-to-one correspondence, or to the misconception inherent to ordinary
metaphors and perfection terms which convey creaturely forms along with the
idea of imaging the Divine. Master metaphors work to reverse ordinary metaphors.
While ordinary metaphors are taken from creaturely experiences that can be
explained through their forms, master metaphors are taken from those experiences
that, while common to every creature, lack defining features.
Applied primarily to the Creator, and then extended reflexively to creatures,
the master metaphor confers divine significance to even the most ordinary object
or mundane experience, because existential meaning is derived from being created
and informed by the ground of being, which in itself is no-thing. When the most
mundane experience is interpreted as an encounter with the Divine, the order
of the universe is completely turned around. Thus the comfortable God, safely
tucked away from the rational intellect in a shroud of “mystery”— who doles out
just enough information about the divine Self to set the believer on the righteous
path—becomes the demanding and disquieting God, whose disclosure through
routine and traumatic experiences alike forces the believer to re-evaluate every
experience and creature—even the seemingly unholy or unorthodox—as possible
bearers of the Divine. The believer must reach into the no-thingness of the creature,
into the source of its incomprehensible intelligibility, and encounter God there.
For the religious master, this radical method of reversal has its roots in Scripture,
beginning where the Creator imparts the divine image to the creature, thus
merging two apparent opposites and, consequently, breaking through conventional
ideas of what it means to be divine, for example wholly transcendent, supremely
unknowable, and untouchable. This theme of reversal is continually carried out
through the scriptural narrative: a nation arises out of slavery, a king arises from
among the poor, and in the final movement, victory over alienation from God
comes by the shameful death of an innocent person. In each instance, God is
revealed, not in the lofty as would befit a powerful being, but in the most unlikely
of places and with the most surprising results. The divine king does not lord over
his subjects, but serves them by completely identifying with them. The lesson:
God is not what is expected, nor is the believer’s road to salvation. Redemption
comes not by adhering to moral and religious codes, but by imaging God in
extraordinary and unconventional ways. Accordingly, theological and religious
articulations must draw attention to the strangeness of God and, at the same time,
maintain the relevance of that strangeness to the faith journey. To accomplish this,
language must explode through our presumptions and agendas.
The following section draws out Eckhart’s analogical exploration of doctrine:
first, on the Trinity as it pertains to the Creator–creature relationship in general; and
second, on the human creature’s adoption to divine Sonship through the imitation
of Christ—or, in Eckhart’s more evocative language, through the “birth of the
172 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Word in the soul.” For Eckhart, religious doctrines provide entry into the Christian
faith journey, involving a process of detached intellection. In his explications
of doctrine, Eckhart employs the Neoplatonic structure of exit and return, but
modifies it through the use of “master metaphors,” to keep his audiences from
becoming attached to this philosophy as well as to emphasize how profoundly
creatures image the Creator. In effect, his dynamic speech leads reflectively to
Christian forms of life, whether it be living as the “Just Man,” or seeing all things
in themselves as they are in God; the result of which, in any case, is being aware of
the “inner meaning” of everyday life—“direct encounter with the Divine.”39
1. Trinity as Analogy
The divine act of creation, in Christian theology, is Trinitarian: each divine Person
has a proper and distinct role in bringing all things into being and sustaining them,
transforming them, and bringing them back to their divine Source. Indeed, creation
is imprinted with this Trinitarian structure according to its own designated end,40
and for human creatures, the intellect is especially conformed to the second Person,
who is the Word of God. Through conformity to the divine Word, the believer is
actualized and reunited with God. While Eckhart discusses the immanent Trinity
(the interrelations among the divine Persons), he invariably moves his rhetoric to
the economic Trinity, the divine Persons’ intimate involvement with creation and
especially with the human creature’s existence in and return to God. Eckhart is
concerned with the analogical relationship between Creator and creature, not the
divine essence.
Of course, for Eckhart, Trinitarian language remains metaphorical regardless
of its reference to some incomprehensible reality. Among his most controversial
assertions is “everything said or written about the Holy Trinity is in no way really
so or true.”41 All things originate from the Ground, beyond differentiation and
beyond conception. But, since all things derive their intelligibility from God,
all concepts must have a basis in divine reality, however inadequately it can be
verbalized, and Eckhart is careful to maintain that “[i]t is true, of course, that
there is something in God corresponding to the Trinity we speak of and other
similar things.”42
In his German works, when Eckhart speaks of the Trinity or of creation, he
speaks of their source in the divine grunt. The grunt acts as a master metaphor
because, as source for both Trinity and creation, it creates a linguistic space for
discussing the distinction between the origination of persons in the Trinity from
that of creatures, while simultaneously—and more fundamentally—emphasizing
the immediate connection between Trinity and creation and the potential identity
39
McGinn, Mystical Thought, 39.
40
See, for example, Eckhart’s Comm. Jn., 1.122.
41
Latin Sermon IV, n. 30.
42
Ibid.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 173
“All things” are “from” the maker, “through” the form, and “in” the end.
Therefore, God is the “from whom” of all, that is, the maker of all; the “through
whom” of all, that is, the form of all or what forms all; and the “in whom” of all,
because [he is] the end of all things.44
The creature’s exit and return is implied within the Trinitarian structure; however,
Eckhart weaves his master metaphor of indistinction within this conventional
explanation, thus stretching the boundaries of the exitus/reditus paradigm in order
to emphasize the depth of the Creator’s immediacy and presence to the creature as
well as the creature’s identification with its Creator.
God is totally indistinct in himself according to his nature in that he is truly and
most properly one and completely distinct from other things; so too man in God
is indistinct from everything which is in God, and at the same time completely
distinct from everything else.45
43
See McGinn, Mystical Thought, 38-44.
44
Latin Sermon IV, n. 29.
45
Ibid., n. 28.
46
Ibid., n. 23.
47
Ibid., n. 22.
174 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
being, nor a maker, nor a form, nor an end.”48 Like his Latin commentaries on
Wisdom and Exodus,49 the creature’s nothingness draws attention to the Creator’s
distinction, and specifically to the Creator’s unique power to bring all things into
being without pre-existing matter, as well as the Creator’s necessary sustenance in
keeping creatures from falling back into non-existence.
Because it is employed to support the Creator’s distinction, the term
“nothing” does not operate as a master metaphor, as it does in some of Eckhart’s
German works, where it is closely connected to the grunt. However, led by
the master metaphor of indistinction, the nothingness of creatures conveys yet
another—although implicit—significance. To understand how the term “nothing”
can function in a dual way, we must return to the scriptural story of creation.
In Genesis 1, God does not, in fact, bring the world to being out of “thin air” so
to speak, like a magician, but rather creates all things out of a formless wasteland.
God does create out of “nothing,” but in a more artistic sense: where there was
no particular thing—no-thing, a formless wasteland that served no particular
purpose—now there are specific things (formed) that have specific purposes
(informed). The story of creation is, therefore, not really about God’s power over
creation, but about God’s wisdom in forming and arranging creation, and, as the
story continues, arranging so that the divine is imaged by and manifest within
creation, especially by the human creature, the culmination of God’s creative
activity. By this divine ordering the creature participates in the divine existence.
Derived from Scripture, tradition holds two senses of creation from nothing: one
securing God’s distinction from and power over the world; the other, emphasizing
the creature’s manifestation of and designated end in its Creator.
The first sense is clearly present in John’s Gospel. In response to Jn. 1:3, Eckhart
declares (note the implicit Trinitarian structure), “How might there be or might
something be that is beyond existence, or without existence, or not in existence?”50
God alone is the author of existence, and God alone is existence. This seems to indicate
the Creator’s transcendent power over and distinction from creation. However,
Eckhart is not content to present the doctrine of creation without plumbing its depths;
nor is he afraid of the controversy this dangerous exploration will inevitably cause
for his audiences—in fact he counts on it. Eckhart prefaces his above reply to John,
first asserting that “‘[a]ll things are in him’ in such a way that if there is anything not
in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is not God;” and then, continuing:
If there were anything outside him or not in him, he would not be existence and
consequently not God. … “All things are in him” in such a way that nothing is
in the Father, nothing in the Son, except because the Father and the Son are what
the Holy Spirit is.51
48
Ibid., n. 29.
49
See, for example, Comm. Wis. (1:14), n. 34, and Comm. Ex., nn. 102-6.
50
Latin Sermon IV, n. 23.
51
Ibid., n. 24.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 175
when we say that all things are in God [that means that] just as he is indistinct in
his nature and nevertheless most distinct from all things, so in him all things in
a most distinct way are also at the same time indistinct. … Further, just as God
is ineffable and incomprehensible, so all things are in him in an ineffable way.52
Like the German grunt, indistinction is free from creaturely form while conveying
the idea of identity: two things that are identical are indistinct, because there is
nothing, no single feature, by which to distinguish one from the other. Eckhart’s
dialectical attribution of distinct and indistinct existence seems to be an example
of what Zum Brunn calls the dual status of the creature: in the world (borrowed
existence) and in God (liberated existence).53 In the world, the creature is separated
from other creatures and from the Creator by virtue of its form; but in God, the
creature is one with other creatures and with the Creator by virtue of its indistinction
with the divine existence.54
This dual mode of existence creates a linguistic space for articulating God’s
transcendence as well as the creature’s total dependence on the Creator, while
at the same time expressing God’s immanence and the creature’s freedom from
the constrictions of its created form—language-use Zum Brum calls “dialectical
analogy.” However, led by indistinction as master metaphor, the dual ontology
of the creature (distinct and indistinct) passes beyond dialectically balancing
God’s transcendence and immanence, or the creature’s borrowed and liberated
existence vis-à-vis the Creator: indistinction expresses a non-contrastive
relationship where the creature shares a radical identity with the Creator more
profound than any likeness between creatures, and furthermore, creatures share
a radical identity with each other not perceived through ordinary awareness, but
52
Ibid., n. 28.
53
See Zum Brunn and de Libera, Maître Eckhart, 90.
54
See Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 92-3.
176 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Surprisingly, Eckhart does not exploit the language of the hypostatic union. The
doctrine of the hypostatic union protects God’s distinction by positioning Jesus
as the absolutely unique human example of divine transcendence-in-immanence.
Often, the hypostatic formula is understood contrastively, where as divine,
Jesus wholly transcends creation and as human is wholly immanent to creation,
especially to other human beings. However, this assumes that to be divine is the
opposite of being human, and this would not do justice to the profound intimacy
God has to humanity through the incarnation.
In his German works, Eckhart employs exitus/reditus language in his
explication of the birth of the Word in the soul, a development earning him official
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 177
condemnation for seeming to blur the distinction between Creator and creature.
In his Latin works, however—notably his commentary on John’s Gospel—Eckhart
appeals to the Pauline notion that, through Jesus Christ believers become adopted
heirs of God. For Eckhart, the hypostatic formula does not provide as much
linguistic space for articulating the return of the believer to God as the language of
“adoption.” Subtly directed by the master metaphor of indistinction, the doctrine
that through Christ believers become adopted heirs of God passes from traditional
formula to dynamic analogy.
In his Latin Commentary on John’s Gospel, Eckhart quotes: “‘The Word was
made flesh and dwelt among us,’” continuing: “the first fruit of the Incarnation
of the Word, who is the natural Son of God, is that we should be God’s sons
through adoption.” Eckhart borrows Paul’s adoption language from Galatians and
Romans, where Paul writes, “‘you have received the spirit of adoption of the sons
of God.’ … ‘If we are sons, we are heirs also: Heirs indeed of God and joint heirs
with Christ.’”55 Eckhart explains, “it would be of little value for me that ‘the Word
was made flesh’ for man in Christ as a person distinct from me unless he was also
made flesh in me personally so that I too might be God’s son.”56
Eckhart maintains Christ’s unique distinction from creatures, because he alone
naturally exists both as human and divine (divine here understood as “immanent-
yet-transcendent”). Additionally, adoption language shows that the believer,
returned to the Creator, exists divinely through adoption; therefore, adoption
language yields more than does that of hypostatic union. However, Eckhart’s use of
“adoption” goes beyond conventional understanding, which distinguishes natural
sonship from adoption in a way that opposes human and divine. Conventionally
understood, the idea that believers become by adoption—or through grace—what
Jesus was by nature, God’s son, preserves Jesus’ unique status as both fully
human and divine and preserves Jesus’ unique status as uncreated, unlike any
other human person. Although we can become heirs of God, we can never be both
human and divine in the same sense Jesus was; we can become sons of God, but
not THE Son of God. Eckhart, however, is not satisfied with this discrimination
because it presumes an unbridgeable separation between human and divine, and
does not convey the intimacy between Creator and human creature made in the
divine image.
Rather, for Eckhart, adoption must be extended beyond its ordinary meaning,
becoming a dynamic analogy. To become adopted means Jesus is made flesh in the
believer personally, indicating a profound transformation—or con-formation—within
the human creature. He goes on to draw this out more explicitly:
“The Word was made flesh” in Christ who is outside us. He does not make
us perfect by being outside us; but afterwards, through the fact that “he dwelt
among us,” he gives us his name and perfects us “so that we are called and truly
55
Gal 4:7 and Rom 8:15-17.
56
Comm. Jn., n. 117.
178 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
are God’s son.” (1 Jn.3:1)57 For then the Son of God, “The Word made flesh,”
dwells in us, that is, in our very selves—behold God’s dwelling with man …
[Isaiah] says, “He dwelt among use,” that is, he made man his dwelling.58 Again,
“He dwelt among us” because we have him in us. … “We are being transformed
into the same image from glory to glory, as through the Spirit of the Lord.”
We should not falsely suppose that it is by one son or image that Christ is the
Son of God and by some other that the just and godlike man is a son of God, for
he says, “We are being transformed into the same image.”59
Statements like this mark one of the most controversial aspects of Eckhart’s work,
because it appears that, in identifying the believer with Jesus Christ, Eckhart erases
the line between divine and human—and between nature and grace—effectively
the only thing setting Jesus apart from other humans.60 His German works articulate
this even more boldly, for example his sermon on the Book of Wisdom 5:16,
where Eckhart asserts, “The Father gives birth to the Son without ceasing, and I
say more: he gives me birth, me, his son and the same son.”61
In his Johannine commentary, as in some Latin sermons,62 the believer’s
adoption as God’s son through conformity to Jesus Christ relies on Eckhart’s
understanding of “image.” Driven by the master metaphor of indistinction,
conformity to Christ dynamically analogizes Christ’s imaging of the Father as
the Word of God. In his Commentary on John, “The Word was with God, and the
Word was God,” Eckhart explains how Jesus Christ is the image of the Father:
the image and that of which it is an image, insofar as they are such, are one.
“The Father and I are one” (Jn 10:30). He says “we are” insofar as there is
an exemplar that is expressive and begets and an image that is expressed or
begotten; he says “one” insofar as the whole existence of the one is in the
other and there is nothing alien to it there. … The image and the exemplar
are coeval, and this is what is said here, that “the Word,” that is, the image,
“was in the beginning with God” in such a way that the exemplar cannot be
understood without the image and vice versa. “He who sees me also sees my
Father” (Jn 14:9).63
Emphasis mine.
57
The imaging between Son and Father is so profound that it goes beyond any
shared form to their existence; in God, image is an expression of identity rather
than likeness, and therefore the Son’s imaging of the Father indicates indistinction
with regard to divine existence. Furthermore, since “[t]he principles of knowing
and of existence are the same,”64 knowing and existence in God are also indistinct,
for “nothing is known through what is alien to it.” Borrowing from Matthew’s
Gospel, Eckhart concludes, “[n]o one knows the Son except the Father, nor does
anyone know the Father except the Son.”65
So far, image understood as indistinction is limited to the Divine Persons;
however, true to form, Eckhart quickly turns from immanent Trinity to economic
Trinity. The relationship between indistinction and image has profound
soteriological implications for human creatures. Indistinction does not appear
often in Eckhart’s commentary on John, but operates tacitly throughout the text
as he continues to develop the notion of adoption, moving from how the Word
images the Father to how, as believers become conformed to the Word incarnate,
they too image God and consequently become deified heirs.
“[I]ndistinct existence is proper to God, and he is distinguished by his
indistinction alone, while distinct existence is proper to a creature,”66 asserts
Eckhart, maintaining the orthodox position of the Creator’s unique distinction
from creature. More importantly, though, he sets the stage for the formula of
adoption to become a dynamic analogy expressing the human creature’s reunion
and identification with its Source. Even early in the commentary Eckhart begins
to extend God’s indistinction to human beings, following Augustine that “we are
made to the image of the whole Trinity.”67 Humanity’s creation in the image of the
Trinity is significant to Eckhart because, according to Christian tradition, the God
of Scripture is the triune God proclaimed by the Church. Therefore it is the Trinity’s
role in creation that concerns Eckhart—particularly, in his Johannine commentary,
of the second Person’s role in the creation of humanity. The human creature has
a special relatedness to the second Divine Person because it is endowed with
intellect, which directs it back to its Source through the Word’s incarnation.
Explaining John’s opening declaration, “in the beginning was the Word,”
Eckhart borrows from Augustine on the various meanings of the Greek Logos.
The Greek Logos means the same as the Latin “idea” and “word.” In this passage
we translate it more correctly as “Word” to signify not only the relation to the
Father, but also the relation to the things that are made through the Word by
means of operative power. “Idea” is a term rightly used even if nothing is made
through it.68
64
Comm. Jn., n. 26.
65
Mt 11:27.
66
Comm. Jn., n. 99.
67
Ibid., n. 123, following Augustine, Trin. 7.6.12.
68
Ibid., n. 28, quoting Augustine’s Book of Eighty-Three Questions.
180 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Eckhart discerns that even from the beginning of the gospel, John’s focus is
soteriological rather than speculative, and concrete rather than abstract. He takes
John’s highly symbolic language as an opportunity to extend divine existence to
redeemed humanity: through God’s revelation in Jesus Christ, believers are able
to realize their indistinct existence through imitation.
Becoming “heirs” or “adopted sons” means revealing God just as Jesus Christ
reveals the Father. He was able to reveal the Father by virtue of his divine nature,
which is indistinct from the Father. Human creatures are capable of revealing
God insofar as they image Jesus, who, as exemplar (Word or Logos) has a proper
role bringing creatures into existence from nothing. Although distinct among
themselves, creatures are indistinct in God because all they possess comes from
God and from nothing else, and continued existence depends on God. “The image
is in its exemplar, for there it receives its whole existence. On the other hand,
the exemplar insofar as it is an exemplar is in its image because the image has
the whole existence of the exemplar in itself.”69 Indistinction extends to creatures
because, as Eckhart continues, “the Word itself, the exemplar of created things,
is not something outside God towards which he looks … but the Word is in the
Father himself.” Since the Word is in the Father, and the Word is the exemplar of
creatures, creatures are in God and are indistinct.
Indistinction operates here as master metaphor, albeit tacitly. The term “image”
indicates indistinction, because it goes beyond formal definition. The Son does not
image the Father through any particular form or feature, divine or otherwise, but
through existence. Jesus Christ manifested his divine (fully actualized) existence
by living in such a way that he did not cling to created forms, but treated everything
as it was in itself and in God. As Eckhart puts it, he lived “without a why,”70
foregoing self-interest for the sake of others, especially those who—by all outward
appearances, or in other words, through their created forms—did not seem to merit
such attention. Likewise, insofar as we become detached from created forms and
live “without a why,” we manifest the divine existence by becoming conformed to
the formless image of Jesus Christ, and are transformed into one and the same Son.
The capacity to be transformed into the Son is inbuilt into the human creature’s
telos by virtue of its intellect. Eckhart begins establishing the association between
human intellect and divine Intellect—just as he does everything else—with the
Creator as prime analogate. The human intellect is not discussed until divine
Intellect is considered, thereby preserving proper linguistic order of Creator to
creature. Eckhart toggles back and forth between divine Knowledge and human
knowledge of God throughout the Johannine commentary. Speaking first of John’s
text, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was
God,” Eckhart explains, whatever is produced from something is “universally its
word.” By “word,” Eckhart means that it “speaks, announces and discloses whence
Ibid., n. 20.
69
Essential Sermons).
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 181
it comes.”71 The Word reveals the divine Source. Creation manifests the divine
because it reflects its Creator, and especially the Word, through whom creatures
are brought into being. The purpose of the incarnation is to make God known to
creatures through the highest worldly creation, humanity, who images its Creator’s
existence through being, through life, and most specifically, through intellect.
The question of why the Word’s incarnation was necessary and appropriate is
answered in terms of redemption: drawing the believer back to its source—for the
end of all creatures is in their divine Source—especially the human creature, made
in God’s image but manifesting its Source like a reflection in a dark glass, because
it tends to attach itself to created forms. “[T]he intellect, which begins in the senses,
is clouded by the [created] images through which and in which it knows.”72 Because
of this weakness, we need an exemplar to which we can cling and which we can
imitate who images God purely. Jesus Christ as Word incarnate is divine exemplar
and pure image of God. Because he existed corporeally, he communicated the
divine physically, and related himself to others through the senses.
However, in becoming conformed, believers must also become detached from
the human image of Jesus Christ, for even clinging to the Word incarnate will
keep the believer from wholly identifying with and knowing God. “[T]ake good
heed of Christ’s words, when he spoke about his human nature and said to his
disciples ‘It is expedient for you that I go from you, for if I do not go, the Holy
Spirit cannot come to you,’” Eckhart quotes from John’s Gospel in his German
work On Detachment: “This is just as if he were to say, ‘you have taken too much
delight in my present image, so that the perfect delight of the Holy Spirit cannot
be yours.’”73 The faithful must come to know everything, including Jesus Christ,
as indistinct from God—and not through the forms that define them. Eckhart
often calls this transformed way of knowing, which images the divine Intellect,
“unknowing” or “detached intellection,” because to know something by seeing
through its created form to its indistinct existence—knowing personally—is
different than our ordinary way of obtaining knowledge; it is, therefore, preferable
not to use the same designation as for ordinary knowledge in speaking about divine
knowledge, lest it is taken in the ordinary sense obtained through created forms.
In order to guide audiences non-contrastively in detaching from “formal”
knowledge towards appreciating the depth, immediacy, and intimacy of things as
they are in themselves and in God, Eckhart develops the analogical implications
of the Creator–creature relationship, which he does here first by securing the
Word’s equality and identity with the Principle of creation, as well as the Word’s
distinction from creatures:
In things that are analogical what is produced is always … less perfect and unequal
to its source. In things that are univocal what is produced is always equal to the
71
Comm. Jn., n. 4.
72
Ibid., n. 83.
73
Jn 16:7.
182 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
source. It does not just participate in the same nature, but it receives the total nature
from its source in a simple, whole and equal manner. … [W]hat proceeds is the son
of its source. A son is one who is other in person but not other in nature.74
The Son as Word of God is equal to the Principle (the Father) and distinct from
creatures. Whatever is produced in terms of being created derives from the source
and as such is “beneath” it (metaphorically speaking). However, without delay
Eckhart moves in reverse, extending the Son’s indistinct existence with the Father
to creatures:
note that it is proper to the intellect to receive its object, that is, the intelligible,
not in itself, insofar as it is complete, perfect and good, but to receive it in its
principles. This is what is meant here: “In the principle was the Word.” And
again, “This Word was in the principle with God. … [T]he word, that is, the
mind’s concept … is that through which the maker makes all that he does and
without which he does nothing as a maker. Hence there follows: “All things
were made through him, and without him nothing was made.”76
Created things are indistinct by virtue of their pure potency to become a particular
thing solely from the artistry of the triune Creator. Thus, Creator and creature are
distinctly indistinct: creatures are indistinct because of their no-thingness, while
the Word is indistinct because of its existence as pure act, by which it derives its
divine creative power to inform all things.
The creature’s indistinction, neither univocal nor equivocal with the Word’s
indistinction, lends the creature the capacity to manifest the Word, insofar as its
“idea” is conveyed by the creature—the idea constituting its particular place in the
order of creation: being, living, or intellect. “[I]n the case of created things, only
their ideas shine,” Eckhart deduces from Aristotle, for “[t]he idea of a thing which
the name signifies is its definition,” and, at least from the creaturely perspective,
in defining something knowledge about it is revealed.
74
Comm. Jn., n. 5.
75
Ibid.
76
Ibid., n. 9.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 183
Explicating John’s text, “the light shines in the darkness,” however, Eckhart
reverses Aristotle’s tenet, that knowledge of something is revealed through the
ideas—that is, through the forms—by which is it defined, concluding, nothing
shines in creatures except their idea, which, although distinct with regard to the
order of creation, is indistinct in God since its origin is the divine Word. “Shining”
is a metaphor for the disclosure of divine knowledge. To distinguish the creature’s
divinely originated idea, one must paradoxically move beyond the apparent or
created forms of the creature—that which defines it outwardly, but which tends
to obscure its inward reality—to the formless image within, its divine idea,
which “remains immobile and intact, even if the creature is changed, moved, or
destroyed.” Insofar as the “idea” of a creature shines forth through its created
forms, it reveals and manifests the Creator. To know a creature truly, what-it-is
in itself, is to perceive it indistinctly in God, consequently to know the Creator:
personally, immediately, and intimately. There is no distance between Creator and
creature in personal knowing, and no distinction between the human creature’s
knowing and its existence in God. Instead of being defined by their created forms,
creatures as they are in themselves are therefore defined by how they reflect and
reveal the Creator.
Humanity has the special capacity to know and disclose God personally
through its intellect, suggesting the potency for transformation and identification
with the divine Intellect. Of course, by intellect, Eckhart means more than rational
faculty. Certainly, though, reason is not disregarded. “Corporeal nature as such
does not distinguish between the thing and the idea, because it does not know
the idea, which only a rational and intellectual nature grasps and knows.”77 The
power of reason allows us to organize thoughts, prioritize experiences, and
most significantly, to derive the idea of something apart from its existence as a
particular “what it is.” But intellect goes beyond reason in its capacity to transform
the human being, which it does by perceiving things in themselves as well as their
indistinction in the divine Source. Consequently, the human creature is able to
pass beyond its own assumed identity to recognize its indistinction in God and
its potency for manifesting its divine image through detachment—or, scripturally
speaking, through disinterested piety.
According to John, the Word incarnate was life, and “the life was the light of
men.” For Eckhart, John’s use of “light,” synonymous with “idea,” is symbolic
of divine self-knowledge revealed to the human intellect, ordered to God as a
capacity to receive and to respond to divine communication. God’s revelation
through the incarnation of the Word is an appropriate expression of divine
self-communication because of the correlation between divine knowledge
and existence:
The intellect’s effect in itself is … word and idea … The Idea in the proper
sense is certainly in the First intellect. It is also “with God” in every neighboring
77
Ibid., n. 1:31.
184 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
intellectual being that is its image, or made according to its image as “God’s
offspring.” Furthermore, reality and intellect are the same in [God].78
From the divine perspective, the Word, or Logos, is the divine Idea, deriving its
power to inform creation by virtue of its indistinct existence as pure act; from
the creaturely perspective, intellect—which allows the human creature to discern
the existence of something apart from its form, and thus respond to it as it is
actually—is the highest form of creaturely existence. Humanity, endowed not only
with reason but with its whole intellect as its telos guiding it to full existence
(full actualization) in its Source, is thus ordered to the divine Intellect. It is
therefore fitting for the Word of God to assume human nature, so that humanity
could assume divine nature. Eckhart begins with the formula of adoption and draws
his readers to its redemptive implications, of which the ultimate end is deification.
“The Father gives birth to his Son in eternity, equal to himself,” Eckhart
reminds his readers in his German Sermon on Wisdom 5:16, where he refers again
to John’s opening passage, “The Word was with God, and God was the Word.”
He reasons, “it was the same in the same nature.” But here in this German work,
Eckhart abandons adoption language, and moves his identification between the
Word and the human creature further than in his Latin works:
Yet I say more: He has given birth to him in my soul. Not only is the soul with
him, and he equal with it, but he is in it, and the Father gives his Son birth in the
soul in the same way as he gives him birth in eternity, and not otherwise. … The
Father gives birth to his Son without ceasing; and I say more: He gives me birth,
me, his Son and the same Son.79
Eckhart breaks his audiences out of their comfort zone to extend the birth in the
soul to the divine nature itself:
I say more: He gives birth not only to me, his Son, but he gives birth to me as
himself and himself as me and to me as his being and nature. In the innermost
source, there I spring out in the Holy Spirit, where there is one life and one being
and one work. Everything God performs is one; therefore he gives me, his Son,
birth without any distinction [underscheit].80
Not only does Eckhart seemingly blur the Son and human creature’s distinction,
but he clarifies that, in giving birth to the Son unceasingly, the Son’s divine nature
and the human creature’s nature are one and the same. Arguing from Second
Corinthians, Eckhart declares: “We shall be completely transformed and changed
into God.”
78
Ibid., n. 37.
79
German Sermon 6.
80
Ibid.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 185
While Eckhart seems to drift dangerously close to—if not actually into
the terrain of—the heretical, we must investigate the analogical, and therefore
metaphorical, dimensions of this language. In speaking of the identity between
human creature and Creator, Eckhart employs the “soul” throughout his German
works, without, however, giving it a single consistent definition or description.
This should come as no surprise, for to give a fixed interpretation might allow
audiences to cling to the concept of the soul without exploring its metaphorical
depths. The metaphor of “soul” is driven by the master metaphor of grunt, the
“place” (metaphorically speaking, of course) where indistinction, and therefore
identity, between Creator and creature may be found.
The birth of the Word in the soul, understood through the master metaphor
of ground, develops a non-contrastive interpretation falling well within the
confines of Christian orthodoxy, because it protects the Creator’s uniqueness
while expressing the total dependence and potency of the human creature. Indeed,
Eckhart’s “birth” motif should be considered radically orthodox, because it is
more likely to succeed where conventional Christian formulas, such as hypostatic
union, are less likely to: first, in detaching believers from superficial identification
as individual creatures privileged by virtue of their God-given superior rational
nature—set apart and above other creatures—and second, in revealing to believers
their potential identities as divine creatures accountable to God and to other
creatures by virtue of their union and indistinction with them.
In Christian terms, Jesus exemplified this in sacrificing his life, thereby
identifying completely with the human condition. Jesus was able to identify
completely with humanity because he lived a life of disinterested piety, allowing
him to see others as they were in themselves indistinct from God. His self-sacrifice
on the cross is considered an act of God’s love for humanity. In actuality, detached
intellection and love are one and the same, because to know something in itself
is to identify completely with it, and to identify completely with something is to
give yourself completely to it. In giving birth to the Son in the soul, God identifies
so completely with the human creature that any distinction is extinguished.
Eckhart does, therefore, dissolve the distinction between Creator and creature;
however it is well justified by the Christian imperative of love and is in this sense
radically orthodox.
While Eckhart is daring enough in his German works to risk conflation between
the human soul and the divine nature in order to pull his congregations out of their
doctrinal complacency, it is important to note he was no less intent on detaching
his Dominican students from reliance on formulaic interpretations of doctrine,
since they were someday to preach to their own congregations and to teach their
own students. In his Latin works, Eckhart’s use of insofar, deemed the “inquantum
principle” by scholars like Tobin,81 allows Eckhart to remain within the confines
of orthodoxy while carrying audiences beyond conventional (mis)understandings
of the Creator–creature relationship, which might blur the divine and the created.
81
See Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 49-61, 90-94.
186 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
Where the Father gives birth to his Son in the innermost ground, there this nature
is suspended [or hovers – German: însweben]. This nature is one and simple. …
Here God’s ground is my ground, and my ground is God’s ground. Here I live
from what is my own, as God lives from what is his own. … Whoever seeks for
God without ways will find him as he is in himself, and that man will live with
the Son, and he is life itself.82
Eckhart’s identification of the “most inward part of the soul” and God’s ground
has elicited much controversy because it seems to give something “uncreated”
to the human creature, obscuring the essential distinction between Creator
and creature.83 But Eckhart is intent on preserving the correct analogical order
between the two: the soul receives the uncreated because it is ordered to it, not
because it is of itself uncreated; the human creature must have the capacity to
receive, respond to, and identify with the divine if it is to manifest it rather
German Sermon 5b. See Peter Reiter, Der Seele Grund: Meister Eckhart und die
82
Tradition der Seelenlehre (Würzburg: Verlag Königshausen and Neumann, 1993) for more
on Eckhart’s relationship between the soul and the divine ground.
83
See, for example, McGinn and Colledge, Essential Sermons, pertaining to Eckhart’s
condemnation, 12-15, and Tobin, Meister Eckhart, 132.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 187
than just reflect it like an image in a mirror. “Uncreated” and “created” are
not in opposition, but are non-contrastive. The identification of the soul with
the divine ground bespeaks of its pure potency, and in this sense it should be
called uncreated: “All things are created from nothing; therefore their true
origin is nothing,” Eckhart exhorts, in a cunning word-play suggesting several
simultaneous levels of interpretation: the creature’s being brought forth out of
nothing, or the not-yet-something specific, or the not-yet-created; the creature’s
being created by and from the one who is no-thing and uncreated, the Creator
who is distinct from creation by virtue of its indistinction, divine no-thingness.
Even nothingness is not outside of God. Therefore the creature’s true origin and
end is as no-thing, or, as in God, uncreated.
When Eckhart declares there is no distinction whatever between the soul giving
birth to the Word and the divine nature, he means no distinction exists between
God and the soul which can be compared to any kind of distinction found among
creatures. This dynamic moment, uncreated and indistinct, conveys a relation
between Creator and human creature that is singularly unique or, more personally,
a love so strong that Lover and beloved are one and the same in a complete mutual
self-presence drawing all things into itself:
The man who has God essentially present to him grasps God divinely, and to
him God shines in all things, for everything tastes to him of God, and God forms
himself for the man out of all things. God always shines out in him, in him
there is a detachment and a turning away, and a forming of his God whom he
loves and who is present to him. … Truly, wherever he is, whomever he is with,
whatever he may undertake, whatever he does, what he so loves never passes
from his mind, and he finds the image of what he loves in everything and it is the
more present to him the more his love grows and grows.84
This person, detached from the distinction of created forms, just as the Jesus Christ
was detached from such distractions, “does not seek rest,” Eckhart affirms,
“because no unrest hinders him.” He has passed beyond affirmations, beyond
negations, and beyond comparisons and contrasts—to silence.
C. Analogy as Silence
“‘[The light] shines in the darkness,’ that is, in a silence and stillness apart from
the commotion of creatures,” Eckhart concludes his exegesis of John’s fifth verse.
Drawing from Augustine’s Confessions, he queries, “‘What is similar to your
Word … if the commotion of the flesh is silent to a person, images are silent …
84
Counsels on Discernment. Counsel 6, “Of Detachment and of the Possession
of God.”
188 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
and the soul is silent to itself and passes beyond itself by not thinking on itself?”85
And, meditating on Wisdom (18:14), he pauses, as if his thoughts drift off and
evaporate: “When a deep silence held all things.”
Eckhart reflects more extensively on the meaning of silence in his earlier
commentary on Wisdom, considering this same verse, and from his meditations
there the interconnection between speaking of and knowing God may be derived.
As he does in his later work, Eckhart turns to Augustine for inspiration: “‘Be not
foolish, my soul, and make not the ear of your heart deaf with the turmoil of your
folly. Hear the Word itself; there is the place of imperturbable rest.’”86 He concludes
by quoting from Book 9: ‘“if the soul be silent to itself and by not thinking of itself
transcend itself … he may speak alone through himself in order that we may hear
his Word.”87
God speaks to the silent soul immediately, without a medium, suggesting
both knowing and identification. But this is not supernatural revelation bypassing
human thought. Rather, it is an immediate “opening up” of thought, or a bursting
through thought—Eckhart sometimes uses the language of a “spark” in the
soul—causing a transformed awareness of God manifest in all things. “[T]he very
idea of a medium [must] be removed, given up, be silent and at rest so that the
soul can rest in God. … [J]ust as many things and all things are one in the One
and in God … ‘[w]e have all things in you, the One,’ and … ‘God will be one in
all.’”88 The metaphor of “silence” in these passages does not refer to the cessation
of thought or speech—as it does for the beatified in their union with God after
death—but to an awareness of the silence permeating and lying at the center of
each word, each thought, and each creature.
This silence, unrecognized, lies hidden beneath the veil of the created image,
whether a fellow creature, a work of art, a rock, or a word; and because hidden,
it causes the soul to be restless after its purpose and meaning. Once perceived,
however, the Source—the Word of God—speaks so loudly through the creature
or work of art, or rock, or word, you can barely distinguish where the word ends
and your ear begins. This is the apophatic way: to perceive things as they are in
themselves indistinct from God is to be dramatically transformed: the Word and
the hearer are one.89 This indicates that the value of apophasis, or the “negation
of negation” in Eckhart’s terms, does not lie in the cessation of speech, but in the
fulfillment of its soteriological purpose. The hearer who is transformed becomes
the Word who bears divine silence through itself, just as Jesus the incarnate
Word did during his human life—in every facet of his human life, word, and
85
Comm. Jn., n. 80.
86
Augustine, Confessions, 4.9.
87
Ibid., Book 9.
88
Comm. Wis. (18:1), 285, quoting from Tb 10:5 and 1 Cor 15:28, respectively.
89
See J.P. Williams, Denying Divinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000),
4-5; Louis Dupré, “Eckhart: From Silence to Speech,” International Catholic Review:
Communio 11 (1984): 28-34.
Meister Eckhart: From Analogy to Silence 189
deed. Human discourse about and to God bearing the divine Silence within
transforms other hearers—“who have ears to hear,” Scripture qualifies—and
unites the speaker, the listener, and the Word as one in God. Those who are
transformed and bear the Silence within themselves are not rendered mute, but
on the contrary, are compelled to speak of God all the more, so that others may
be gathered into God. This is the Preacher’s soteriological calling, to gather
believers into Christ. Eckhart, through practical exercise of Aquinas’ analogy,
lends a new and dynamic meaning to Augustine’s repose of the restless heart.
The heart at rest in God is a silent heart, but not a speechless one, until it has
completed its last earthly beat.
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Chapter 6
Conclusion: Living Without a Why
and the Christian Forms of Life
In today’s religious climate, far removed from medieval Europe where Church and
state were aligned, and—though already divided from the Eastern tradition—there
seemed but one dominant Christian voice, the Roman Church, theologians must
be sensitive to diversity and to the demands of pluralism, both undeniable and
irrevocable facts of life. However, Aquinas and Eckhart still have much to teach
contemporary students of faith in using language analogically to reflect upon
and to further deepen their experience of God, and additionally, to broaden the
experience of God across denominational and religious borders. If anything, their
lessons are more relevant and pressing than in their own time, for communicating
about the divine seems even more problematic in an atmosphere where any given
religious perspective is just one among many, and where the goal is union with
God, not through uniformity, but through unity-in-diversity, the effect of which
is mutual transformation. For Christians, spirituality and the forms of life it takes
must be consistent with this ultimate end.
the preceding words have been interpreted in many ways so that the reader can
freely take now one and now the other as seems useful to him. I use the same
method of multiple exposition in my many commentaries.1
We must never forget that Aquinas and Eckhart assume their linguistic exercises
are inseparable from the context of faith—or rather, from the practice of faith.
They expect their audiences to be actively engaged in Christian forms of life:
liturgy, personal prayer, silent contemplation, and especially the moral life, living
for others. It is the Christian life that lends significance to their works and is the
1
Comm. Jn., n. 39.
2
Tanner, God and Creation, 13-14.
3
Ibid.
194 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
very purpose for their efforts. Divorced from the practice of faith, Aquinas’ Summa
and Eckhart’s vernacular and Latin works lack their full force, and in many cases
make for weak philosophical arguments or contrastive interpretations.
For example, as Chapter 4 explained, Aquinas’ Five Ways appears to depend
on teleological arguments, weak from the philosophical perspective because they
are tautological: in order to see creation as a reflection of divine ordering, one
must first assume the existence of God. Only when examined in light of his first
question, which asserts that the proper subject of theology is sacra doctrina rather
than metaphysics, does Aquinas’ Five Ways make sense: it is not the existence of
God that is demonstrated, but the necessity and relevance of the Creator God of
Scripture and tradition, who not only creates all things from nothing, but more
importantly draws all things back to their preordained End. From the Christian
perspective, this is particularly significant because, as revealed later in the
narrative of the Summa, the human creature, who being created in the divine image
is to be united with the triune God in an especially intimate and personal way, must
first become conformed to the incarnate Word, Jesus Christ. Viewed in this light,
the Five Ways go beyond philosophical argumentation to render soteriological
meaning. Because they draw attention to the immediacy and intimacy of God
as Creator and to the human creature’s telos of union with God, the Five Ways
provide an initial non-contrastive directive for the Christian life.
Eckhart sums up this Christian mandate in the phrase “living without a why,”
found abundantly throughout his Latin and German works. In German Sermon 29,
Eckhart remarks: “the person who … seeks nothing for himself in things and
performs all his works without a why and out of love, such a person … lives in
God and God in him.”4 Living without a why requires detached intellection, the
ability to look beyond created distinctions and discern God in all created things.
This is explained beautifully in his sermon on Sirach 14:22, “Happy the man who
dwells in wisdom,” which he correlates with Christ’s command to his disciples in
John 15:4, “stay in me”:
Now listen to what a person should have who is to dwell in him, that is, in
God. … The first is that he has renounced himself and all things and is not
dependent on things which hold on to the senses from within, nor should he
dwell in any creatures that exist in time or in eternity. The second is that he not
love this good or that good; he should love, rather, the good from which all good
flows. For a thing is only enjoyable or desirable insofar as God is in it. Hence
one should love something good only to the extent that one is loving God in
it; and one should, therefore, not love God because of heaven or because of
any other thing. … [I]f you want to stay in him, love him for nothing other than
himself. … And so, if a person were to take all things in this power, he would
4
German Sermon 29 on Acts 1:4 (McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and
Preacher, 288).
Conclusion 195
take them not as they are things, but as they are in God. … Thus a person would
dwell in all things alike and take them as they are all alike in God.5
Living without a why is self-transcending because it unites the believer not only
with other creatures encountered, but with the divine ground disclosed through
creation. The profound awareness of God’s radical intimacy and immediacy to
creation brings about self-identification with the divine. Eckhart equates living
without a why to love, and love to divine identification:
This is how the words of Augustine are to be understood when he says, ‘whatever
a person loves a person is. If he loves a stone, he is a stone, if he loves a human
being, he is a human being. If he loves God—I dare speak no further. If I were
to say that he was then God, you might stone me. But I refer you to Scripture.’
Therefore, in joining himself nakedly to God in loving, a person becomes
unformed, informed, and transformed in the divine uniformity in which he is
one with God.6
5
German Sermon 40 (McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher).
6
Ibid. Quoting Augustine’s On the Letter of John to the Parthians, 2:14, and in
Comm. Wis., 1:14, and “You are what you love,” from his Commentary on the Epistle of
John 2:14 (McGinn, Tobin, and Borgstadt, Teacher and Preacher, 303).
196 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
was by no means uniform in the Middle Ages, and so anything said about the
spirituality of Aquinas’ and Eckhart’s day must be considered generalization. But
if Aquinas’ and Eckhart’s theological lessons on analogical language are to be
used to inform as well as to reflect contemporary Christian forms of life, some
discriminations must be made about them in their historical context.
For Roman Catholics, the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) marked a great
reversal in the Church’s self-understanding and practice. From at least the
twelfth century, the Church’s spirituality could be characterized as increasingly
contrastive: as the centuries passed, the divine was understood ever more over and
against the fallen world. A great chasm developed between clergy and laity, and
correspondingly, a great distance was perceived between the believer and God,
who was mainly accessible through the clergy. The clergy were understood as
mediators between divine and human, as well as representatives of Christ charged
with administering sacraments to the faithful. This contrastive perspective of the
divine–human relationship was evidenced especially in the liturgy of the mass,
wherein the Eucharist became an object of adoration and awe, elevated high
in the air by the presiding priest or bishop (with his back to the assembly) at
the words of institution. Upon visual contact of the elevated host, many of the
faithful responded with “acclamations, bowing, kneeling or prostration.”7 Christ’s
“divinity,” understood in terms of his supernatural power—and thus God’s
transcendence—became emphasized well over his humanity and immanence.
In fact, Christ’s humanity was so far perfected above our own potential that Christ
has little to do with us, other than mysteriously saving us by “substituting” his
own humanity for our own. Substitution, or atonement theology, is inherently
contrastive because it opposes humanity with divinity such that there is no
intrinsic unity between Christ and the rest of humanity, except the word “human”
describing one of Christ’s two perfect natures.
The doctrine of “transubstantiation” was formulated, too, in the twelfth century.8
According to this formula, at the consecration the substance of the bread and
wine are transformed into the body and blood of Christ, while the accidents—the
outward appearance—remain unchanged. Transubstantiation was adopted as the
official explanation of Christ’s “real presence” in the Eucharist, a point leading to
7
John K. Leonard and Nathan D. Mitchell, Postures of the Assembly during the
Eucharistic Prayer (Chicago: Liturgy Training Publications, 1994), 69. See also Theodor
Klauser, A Short History of the Western Liturgy: An Account and Some Reflections, trans.
John Halliburton, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979). Klauser traces many
other changes in the liturgy as well.
8
See, for example, Joseph Martos, Doors to the Sacred: A Historical Introduction to
Sacraments in the Catholic Church (New York: Doubleday, 1982).
Conclusion 197
serious controversy centuries later, when Martin Luther countered the formula to
correct certain abusive practices arising out of Eucharistic devotions.
Transubstantiation is not, in itself, contrastive, but lends itself to contrastive
interpretations that overplay divine transcendence when extracted from the context
of the liturgy. Indeed, to profess Christ’s substantial presence in the bread and
wine is to look beyond their created forms to their existence in and manifestation
of God, which discloses the Creator’s profound immanence to human creatures
through creation. However, the somewhat supernatural, or “magical,” view of
the consecration that many of the faithful began to hold—as in fact, many still
do—led to the opposite effect, of imposing divinity (that is, a concept of divinity)
onto the bread and wine, such that the “accidents” become merely an illusion.
The implications are akin to understanding Jesus’ humanity as an illusion, merely
accidental to his divinity, a view declared heretical by the early councils of
the Church.9
The magical view of the consecration was largely a consequence of the changes
in the Eucharistic liturgy throughout the Middle Ages, which emphasized Christ’s
supernatural divinity and separated the laity from the clergy. Some of the most
dramatic changes included: the movement of the altar so that the priest prayed
over the elements with his back to the assembly; the elevation of the altar area
several steps above the pews; the elevation of the host high above the presider’s
head at the consecration; kneeling of the assembly during the Eucharistic prayer;
and the exclusive use of Latin as the official liturgical language—giving the
impression that there can be a special language reserved for the divine exempt
from the limitations of ordinary human language. These changes effectively
divorced the act of consecration from the Scriptural context of the Passover meal
that instituted the Christian Eucharist, from Jesus’ ministry and life recounted in
the gospels, and from the communal nature of the liturgy. The focus of worship
became the moment of consecration and the adoration of the consecrated host
rather than the act of participating together in communion. Christ’s presence was
construed to be his concentrated divinity contained in the blessed wafer: this was
what most ordinary believers came to understand “transubstantiation” to articulate,
a misunderstanding still serious and widespread today.
The isolation of the doctrine of transubstantiation from the context of the
liturgy, and the limited understanding of real presence to the consecrated host, led
to devotional practices reinforcing contrastive understandings of the divine–human
relationship, a situation in no way lost on the great reformer Martin Luther.
Because, according to the doctrine of transubstantiation, the substance of the
bread and wine are transformed into the substance of Christ, as long as the bread
exists in the form of bread, it exists as Christ and therefore may be used as an
object of adoration. The practice of reserving the consecrated host began in order
9
See, for example, Marthaler, The Creed, 111-20 and Leo Davis, The First Seven
Ecumenical Councils (325-787): Their History and Theology (Wilmington, DE: Michael
Glazier, 1987), 170-76, 180-91.
198 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
to make the Eucharist available to those unable to come to mass due to illness
or some other disability. However, with the understanding that Christ’s presence
remains with the bread long after the consecration, the faithful could extend their
devotion to the blessed sacrament outside of mass.10 Luther sensed this divorce
of the consecrated bread from the liturgy was misguided, and so put forth his
own understanding, called “sacramental union,” wherein Christ is understood to
be substantially present in the consecrated Eucharist as long as it is used for its
intended purpose, that is, within the context of mass and in the act of communion,
or to take to the ill who could not be present during mass. The substance of the
bread and wine are not replaced by Christ’s substance, but are united to it.11
Luther’s understanding of Eucharistic real presence fit into his overall view
that the liturgy should be more accessible to the laity and that it should be more
scripturally-centered. While, of course, other theological issues were at stake which
keep the identity of Lutherans and Roman Catholics distinct, Luther’s insight into
the necessary unity between the Word of God and the Eucharistic celebration
proved him to be centuries ahead of his time, for when the Second Vatican Council
in 1962 considered liturgical reform, many changes envisioned by Luther were
enacted in the Roman Catholic Church. This signaled a great reversal from the
contrastive direction the Church had been travelling in for too many centuries, and
opened the way for a non-contrastive spirituality to develop from which Christian
forms of life may better reflect Eckhart’s “living without a why.”
a) Liturgy
Vatican II and post-conciliar liturgical reforms retrieved the organic unity
between the liturgy of the Word and the liturgy of the Eucharist, at both verbal
and non-verbal levels, allowing for a more non-contrastive experience of God
in one of the most obvious Christian forms of life: communal worship. This was
accomplished by moving the altar from the wall and turning the presider towards
the assembly as it was in the earliest centuries of the Church, and by returning to
the vernacular, allowing the laity—having heard the Word of God proclaimed—to
connect their own lives to the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures and especially
the life of Jesus directly. Now the words and actions of the Eucharistic prayer,
not only recalling the last supper narratives in the gospels, but also, as does the
Jewish sedar prayer, the divine creative and liberating actions of God narrated in
the books of Genesis and Exodus, became more clear. Furthermore, the dialogical
nature of the mass was recovered by giving active voice and active posture to
to Luther. Luther resisted putting the Eucharist into any formula. See, for example,
Martin Luther, Luther’s Works, ed. Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut Lehmann, 55 vols
(St. Louis: CPH and Fortress Press, 1955-86), 37:187.
Conclusion 199
the assembly.12 Rather than passively kneeling spectators of the great Eucharistic
drama unfolding on the altar, or silently involved in private meditation, each
member of the assembly—taking voice and standing with the presider—is drawn
into the divine–human conversation that takes place throughout the mass.
Finally, the re-admission of the Epiclesis in the three alternative Eucharistic
prayers recognizes the transformative power of the Holy Spirit in sanctifying the
bread and wine, as well as in the sanctification and communion of the gathered
assembly. Since the earliest centuries of the Church, the Holy Spirit has been
understood to be the divine Person responsible for sanctifying, unifying, and
bringing all things back to the divine Ground;13 therefore acknowledging the
transforming power of the Holy Spirit moves our Eucharistic expression from
remembering to analogy, articulating not only the immediacy of the Creator God
to creatures, but the movement of the human creature back to its divine Source
through communion with others and with God, as they become the body of Christ.
This dynamic analogy expresses itself not only through the Eucharistic prayer,
culminating in the consecratory words of institution, but through the participation
of the assembly in receiving communion, thereby uniting the Word and the act, the
verbal and the non-verbal.14
The formula of transubstantiation, put in the full context of the mass, regains
its non-contrastive meaning by articulating the unique presence of Christ as
transcendent yet profoundly immanent, because in dynamically experiencing
communion, we are able to penetrate through the forms of bread and wine—now
a part of our own bodies—to experience the consecrated elements, and ourselves,
as we exist together as one in God and God in us. The last movement of the liturgy
ushers us forth into the world to live and love as Jesus; for now we are Jesus, the
very body of Christ, who spreads the Word of God to others the same way that
Jesus did, by acting towards others “without a why,” without personal agendas but
12
Nicea (325) condemned kneeling during the Eucharistic prayer. P. Norman,
ed., Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 1 (Washington, D.C.: Sheed & Ward;
Georgetown University Press, 1990). However, as the Christology climbed ever higher
during the Middle Ages, laity began taking to their knees, a posture expressing the growing
popular Eucharistic devotionalism and reinforcing the distinction between clergy and laity.
In the 1975 revised Roman rite, the active posture of standing replaces kneeling during the
Eucharistic prayer, with the exception of brief genuflection during the words of institution,
in effect returning to the posture of the ancient Church. For more information on the
history of kneeling during the Eucharistic prayer, see Leonard and Mitchell, Postures of the
Assembly during the Eucharistic Prayer.
13
Meister Eckhart, drawing from centuries of tradition, writes often of the unifying
power of the Holy Spirit, in terms of both the immanent Trinity (uniting the Father and the
Son) and the economic Trinity (uniting creation to its divine end in God). See, for example,
German Sermon 15, On Detachment, Comm. Jn., n. 120, Latin Sermon IV, among many
other works.
14
See, for example, John H. McKenna, “Eucharistic Epiclesis: Myopia or
Microcosm?” Theological Studies 36 (1975): 265-84.
200 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
for love of God alone, who we see manifest in every creature, especially those most
vulnerable and in need.
As an extension of this, one of the most promising—and difficult—
developments arising from Vatican II is liturgical inculturation, that is, celebrating
the liturgy in such a way that recognizes the presence and experience of Christ
from within the cultural expressions of the particular community celebrating, as
opposed to receiving Christ through the cultural expressions conveyed and limited
to the Roman Rite. Section 37 of Sacrosanctum concilium took a first step by
calling for acculturation, the inclusion of some cultural expressions insofar as they
are not inconsistent with the essential form of the Roman Rite. The most obvious
examples of this are the celebration of the Eucharist in the vernacular—that is, in
the language of the people—and hymns sung in the native tongue in the musical
style of the native culture.
Including different cultural expressions in the liturgy moves non-contrastively
by presenting diverse narratives very much in line with Eckhart’s method of
presenting multiple interpretations and expositions within his work. However,
acculturation in itself poses potential problems. For example, if the translation of
the liturgy into the language of the people does not correspond to the actual lived
language, then it will not have the transformative power called forth by a truly
non-contrastive grasp of Christ’s presence. There will always be something “off”
or inauthentic to it. This is compounded by the current practice of the Vatican’s
“more literal” translations of the liturgy from Latin, which are only into the general
major languages of the people, not taking into account regional differences. For
example, people in the UK, the US and Canada speak English very differently
from each other; even people in different parts of the same country speak the
same language very differently, and no one speaks in the same manner as people
of the Middle Ages. Additionally problematic is the addition of certain cultural
elements into the main body of the liturgy which are of an imposed or alien culture
(that is, Rome), inevitably communicating a superiority of the received culture,
and its translation and control over the native one. These issues keep the liturgy
from realizing its true non-contrastive potential.
Liturgical inculturation (in its Christian context) is, rather, “[t]he incarnation of
Christian life and of the Christian message in a particular cultural context, in such
a way that this experience not only finds expression through elements proper to the
culture … but becomes a principle that animates, directs and unifies the culture,
transforming it and remaking it so as to bring about a ‘new creation.’”15 This
involves more than including certain native cultural elements into the Roman Rite;
it is re-interpreting the Roman Rite through the lens—in fact through all of the
senses, not just the eyes—of the people. In this way, Christ arises from within the
particularity of the community rather than being received by the community from
without, constituting the community into a concretely realized body of Christ.
15
Alyward Shorter, Toward a Theology of Inculturation (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
Books, 1988), 11. Here he is quoting Fr. Pedro Arrup.
Conclusion 201
Since the liturgy itself is an expression of Tradition, and more essentially, of the
Scripture upon which the liturgy is grounded, especially the narratives of Jesus’
life, death, and resurrection (already culturally determined), multiple narratives
emerge, but the “superior” or primary one is Scripture, the central theological
source for the whole religious faith. Thus, in identifying with Christ from within
the culture where the depth of life’s experience happens, in its joys but especially
in its brokenness, the worshiping community may penetrate to the Christ beyond
cultural forms who exists at the heart of all of them.16
since the Church, in Christ, is in the nature of sacrament—a sign and instrument,
that is, of communion with God and of unity among all men [sic]—she here
proposes, for the benefit of the faithful and of the whole world, to set forth,
as clearly as possible … her own nature and universal mission. … For by
communicating his Spirit, Christ mystically constitutes as his body those
brothers of his who are called together from every nation. … the one Christ is
mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the
16
Liturgical inculturation is still new and relatively undeveloped in practice
and in theology. The non-contrastive implications of inculturation warrant much more
consideration than this book can afford.
17
Avery Dulles, Models of the Church (New York: Doubleday, 1st ed., 1978;
expanded ed., 1987), 17.
18
Dulles includes a variety of other images, many of which fall into these main five
categories. Marthaler also discusses these main ecclesiologies in Ch. 19 of The Creed,
“From Community to Ecclesiology,” 277-91.
202 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
church. … The holy People of God shares also in Christ’s prophetic office. …
All … are called to belong to the new People of God.19
When drawn out, each of these ecclesiologies becomes its own narrative, telling
of the Christian believers’ journey towards their end in God within the context of
the worshiping faith community. For example, the Church as Servant explores
the implications of living out the life of Jesus concretely in the world, seeing
God in the lowly, poor, and marginalized, and ministering to them by working
against unjust institutions and inhumane conditions contrary to human dignity.
The resulting transformation, social action, is mutual and ever expanding. Not
only does the Servant Church empower the powerless, but in its self-sacrifice and
identification with the other, it transcends itself along the way, for to paraphrase
the prayer of St. Francis: “it is in giving that we receive, and in dying to ourselves
that we receive eternal [fully actualized] life.”20
The narrative of People of God reminds the Christian community of its
Hebrew roots in becoming the liberating God’s chosen people, re-visioned
now in light of the liberating event of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. This
community of believers is characterized by its radical equality among members,
who all share in the prophetic office of Jesus Christ—in stark contrast to the
ecclesiology of the Institution, characterized by a rigid hierarchy separating the
clergy and laity, which, while by all means still quite operative, had dominated the
Church’s self-identification for centuries. Though in some instances seemingly
in contradiction with each other, all of these ecclesiological narratives are
interrelated, and mutually interdependent, because no single image or model can
adequately capture the divine existence, which the Christian Church is supposed
to manifest.
Following Eckhart’s method of presenting several intertwining narratives
at once, these ecclesiologies can be mutually transforming. This approach may
be especially valuable to ecumenism, an emerging Christian form of life which
may be extended to interfaith relations: in order to progress in dialogue and
communion with other faith perspectives, every partner in the conversation must
recognize the necessity of diversity and be willing to detach from their own
self-understandings and continually overturn the presuppositions embedded in
their own denominational and religious faith statements in order to enter into
each other’s ecclesiological narratives “without a why,” personally encountering
the other as existing in God. This understanding of ecumenism is by its nature
analogical, in the sense that Aquinas and Eckhart conceived analogy to be, because
See Austin Flannery, ed., Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar
19
Documents (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 1992), 350-58. Emphasis mine.
20
St. Francis was an exception to the contrastive spirituality of the Middle Ages,
seeing the presence of God so radically manifested in creation that it is reported he even
preached to birds.
Conclusion 203
21
I have expanded further on this idea in my article, “Christian Dialog as Symphonic
Unity: Lessons on Non-Contrastive Language Use from Thomas Aquinas and Meister
Eckhart,” One in Christ 44, No. 2 (Winter 2010): 168-85.
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Bibliography 209
living, without a why, Eckhart 194-5, 198, pagan religions, Christianity, difference 16
203 Paris University, St Jacques school 32, 34,
Logos see Word 36
Lohr, C.H. 42, 43 theological pre-eminence 30
Lombard, Peter philosophy
Sentences 32, 36, 44 sacred doctrine, distinction 75
Aquinas theology, split 43
commentary on 37, 48, preaching
50-51 Aquinas’ contribution to 55
dissatisfaction with 53 in Dominican education 36, 38-40, 62
organization 37 Dominicans as preaching ministry 29,
as textbook 37 30, 62
Lossky, Vladimir 12 and faith 1
Luther, Martin 197, 197-8 new way of 55-6
salvation through 27-8, 29, 33, 49, 64, 67
McGinn, Bernard 12, 13, 169 and speaking about God 64
Maimonides 110 training for 39
God’s attributes 125-6 Preller, Victor 75-6, 89, 105, 106, 114, 121
negative theology 123-6 Proclus
Marthaler, Berard 84-5, 89 Elementatio theologica 49
on faith 99 Liber de causis 51
Merton, Thomas, Zen and the Birds of Pseudo-Dionysius
Appetite vii Aquinas’ borrowings from 101
metaphor De divinis nominibus 49-50, 50-51
Creator-creature relationship 169-71 Albert of Cologne’s lectures on 51
Eckhart’s use 170, 172-3
and faith 99 reason, and faith 81-91, 101
and God, speaking about, and knowing dichotomy 75-6, 81
99 Rogers, Eugene 78, 79, 80
potential 98, 99 Roland of Cremona 31, 35
purpose 98, 168-9
and Scripture 92, 93, 94 sacred doctrine
Summa theologiae 92, 93, 94 aim 107
metaphysics first principles 79
sacred doctrine, distinction 101 revealed 81
Summa theologiae as 71, 82, 104 undemonstrability of 80
Moevs, Christian viii, ix and knowing about God 107
Mojsisch, Burkhard 11 and knowledge 93
Mulchahey, M. Michèle 35, 50, 53 metaphysics, distinction 101
“First the Bow is Bent in Study” 28 philosophy, distinction 75
on preacher training 39 purpose 93
and Revelation 86
Naples, studium generale 44 and salvation 103
Neoplatonism 153 as science 72, 73, 75, 77, 78, 81
Aquinas’ appropriation of 51 scope of 73
and Christianity 154 Summa theologiae 75
Eckhart’s use 9, 155 theology as 73, 194
participation notion 161 and wisdom 85, 85-6, 88
216 Speaking of God in Thomas Aquinas and Meister Eckhart
salvation faith
and sacred doctrine 103 and certitude 83
through preaching 27-8, 29, 33, 49, 64 and demonstration 86-7
and Scripture 67 and the intellect 93
Sansedoni, Ambrogio 55 and reason 81-91
science (scientia) the “Five Ways” 104, 106, 110-22, 194
Aquinas’ understanding of 71-2, 77 act and potency 112
Aristotelian, and Revelation 72 cause and effect 112-14
meaning 69 design 105
sacred doctrine as 72, 73, 75, 77, 78, governance of the world 120-21
81 gradation 116-20
theology as 73, 74-81 and inquiry about God 121
as way of knowing 77 motion 111-12
Scripture possibility and necessity 115-16
and contemplation as study 67 God’s existence 70, 71-100, 103-22,
God as author of 96-7 104-5, 108
literal sense 97, 98-9 as Creator 109
mediating role 5 and essence 106, 107, 108, 132,
and metaphor 92, 93, 94, 167 163
narrative 67-9 goodness 129, 130
and nature of God 68 immutability 123, 138-9, 140
and speaking about God 91-100 limitlessness 123, 134-6, 139
theology, source of 67, 70, 71-100, 73, manner of 123-41
91-2, 96, 107 measure of all things 129
Second Vatican Council (1962-65) vii, 196, oneness 140-41
198 perfection 123, 129, 130-31, 132,
Dogmatic constitution on the Church 147
201-2 simplicity 123, 126
ecclesiologies 201-2 unity 123, 126
silence language-use 99-100, 102
analogy as 187-9 as metaphysics 71, 82, 104
Eckhart on 187-9 narrative, use of 192
Sokolowski, Robert 14, 15-16, 17, 18, non-contrastiveness 69-71, 74, 82, 87,
141 156, 161, 192
Soskice, Janet Martin 97-8, 98, 99 as pedagogical work 71
Staensby, Alexander 36 as philosophical treatise 71
study, contemplation as 45-6, 51, 56, 62, prima pars 31, 44, 48, 50, 69, 70
63, 67, 87 prima secundae 146
and Scripture 67 purpose 53
Summa theologiae (Aquinas) viii, 4, 5, 21, sacred doctrine
28, 33, 37, 43, 47 metaphysics, distinction 101
analogy, use of 102, 147-51 and Revelation 86
audience, intended 47, 68 and salvation 103
disputation 38, 63 as science 75, 77, 81, 103
in Dominican curriculum 53-6 and wisdom 85-6, 88
eternity, concept 139-40 Scripture
exitus/reditus schema 50, 51, 53, 68, language-use 95-6
69, 70, 107, 122, 154 and metaphor 92, 93, 94
Index 217
Tanner, Kathryn 18, 18-19, 20, 25, 101, Vatican II see Second Vatican Council
141, 160, 193 (1962-65)
Te Velde, Rudi 119
teaching, medieval method 76 Weisheipl, James 46
theology White, Victor 71, 77
atonement, contrastiveness 196 the will, and charity 88-9
etymology 91 William of Moerbeke, translation
nature of 72-3 Aristotelian corpus 40-41
negative 167 Elementatio theologica (Proclus) 49
of Maimonides 123-6 William of Tournai, De instructione
philosophy, split 43 puerorum 32
purpose of 4-5, 23-4, 63-4, 73, 92, 101, wisdom
141 dwelling in 194
as sacred doctrine 73, 194 meditating on 188
as science 73, 74-81 and sacred doctrine 85, 88
Scriptural source 67, 70, 73, 91-2, 96 Wolfson, Harry Austryn 125
time, and eternity 20-21, 116, 139, 139-40, The Word (Logos)
163 creation, role in 182
Tobin, Frank 9 Eckhart on 177-8, 182
Torrell, Jean-Pierre 38, 39, 44, 45, 46, 51 eternity of 20
on Aquinas 63-4 incarnate
Toscanella, Aldobrandino da 55 and God’s Idea 184
transubstantiation and God’s revelation 183
contrastive interpretations 197 and redemption 181
and The Eucharist 196-7 meaning 179, 180-81
non-contrastiveness 199-200
origins 196 Zum Brunn, Emilie 11, 12, 175