Summa Theologiae I, Q.1: Prologue, Overview, and Art. 1–2 (Why Sacred Doctrine Is Necessary; Objections to It Being a Science)

Orientation #

He refers back several times to “the Constitution there, the first Vatican Council” as having made both points of the first article’s body, and to things “we saw in Vatican I” (that God can be known by natural reason) (prev. lecture). He also recalls “what I was putting out before” about the same things being known in different ways, and “we’ve talked about that many things before” on wisdom vs. knowledge. The previous class treated reason’s role toward the mysteries of faith by way of Vatican I’s Dei Filius; this class begins the study of the Summa itself.

The class, in order #

1. The prologue: writing for beginners (“suitable to the instruction of what beginners”) #

Point: the short prologue states Thomas’s aim, his audience, and the three faults of existing teaching he means to avoid.

• Compared with the long prologues to his commentaries on the Psalms or St Paul, this one is short; what those prologues contain (what the book is about, its order) is here found in question 1 itself.
• Audience: not only the proficient but beginners, per St Paul, “as little ones in Christ, I gave you milk to drink” (Corinthians). Reminds him of Porphyry, who also writes for beginners and abstains from certain questions.
• Three impediments beginners meet in what has been written (he calls this a mark of a good teacher, attending to students’ difficulties):
  1. multiplication of useless questions, articles and arguments: “a sin of too much”;
  2. necessary things not treated in the order of learning (“a very important point… often neglected”): at Assumption College the four required philosophy courses were once ordered by the Laval people in the order of learning; when that order is lost you cannot teach so well. Thomas notes St Paul’s lists of virtues and vices are not in the order of learning but pick what those people need. Two causes of the disorder: (a) following the exposition of books — Scripture says “God is good” countless times; to explain it each time is to repeat endlessly, so Dionysius wrote the Divine Names, gathering all he could say about God’s goodness, then His knowledge, etc.; (b) following the occasion for disputing — the quaestiones disputatae are less in the order of learning than the two Summas, and a fortiori the quodlibet (“what you will”), where one question may presuppose another;
  3. frequent repetition breeds boredom and confusion (aside: someone complained to Cicero about repeating; “I repeat it to understand myself”).
• The name sacra doctrina: sacred teaching. Augustine’s De Doctrina Christiana is “kind of the same thing”. Both titles emphasise the teacher; at the other extreme mathematics is named from the student (Greek mathētēs, as in the end of John’s Gospel, “make students of all men”). So this is the furthest from mathematics: it requires authority the most, geometry and arithmetic the least.
• Breviter et lucide: brief (“brevity is the soul of wit”) and clear (lucide from light), “according as the matter admits” — the matter does not admit of being completely elucidated for us.

2. The ten articles and their grouping (“what sort of knowledge it is”) #

Point: question 1 asks what sort of knowledge sacred doctrine is and to what it extends; he sorts the ten articles.

• a.1 necessity; a.2 whether a science (the word “science” will need examination); a.3 one or many; a.4 speculative or practical — the famous division of philosophy into “looking” (theoretical) and “doing” (practical): Lady Wisdom in Boethius’ Consolation wears a theta (Theoretica) above a pi (Practica); logic is sometimes a third part, “but that’s more the tool”; a.5 comparison to other sciences, above, below or amidst; a.6 whether a wisdom.
• Science vs. wisdom: in Ethics VI scientia and sapientia are divided against each other, yet sapientia is also called the highest scientia. As in English “knowledge” and “wisdom”: something can be knowledge without being wisdom, not wisdom without being knowledge; wisdom is divided against knowledge for its particular excellence.
• Grouping: aa.2–6 ask what kind of knowledge this is; a.7 is different — the subject, what the science is about; aa.8–10 how it proceeds. So four parts; or better, a.1 against the other nine, since a.1 asks whether such a thing exists, and “does it exist” comes before what it is, what it is about, how it proceeds.
• On the mode (aa.8–10): in the Sentences commentary Thomas has an article on how sacred doctrine proceeds “artfully, according to the matter”, with a fuller list: narrative (historical books), orativus et laudativus (Psalms), revelatory (Apocalypse), argumentative (Job, St Paul’s epistles with syllogisms whose premises are backed up). Here he singles out the argumentative mode, which the Summa itself uses (a.8). Striking that a.9 then asks about metaphors (metaphor and symbol used synonymously; Dionysius’ Symbolic Theology treats names said of God metaphorically — fire, water, rock — as the Divine Names treats proper names). Why include it: objections sometimes take a figurative text properly; it reminds us the matter is not perfectly accessible by argument; and the Bible is addressed to all men. a.10: the many senses, letter vs. spiritual senses.

3. Four senses of “necessary” (“the word necessary is a word that’s equivocal”) #

Point: “necessary” is equivocal by reason, and Aristotle’s four senses (Metaphysics V) fix which sense a.1 uses.

• Where Aristotle treats it: at the end of the first part of book V, on names of causes (beginning, cause, element, nature), because necessary is tied to cause. Three senses go with extrinsic causes, one with intrinsic.
  1. From intrinsic causes: two is necessarily half of four (what two is); a triangle necessarily has angles equal to two right angles; man is necessarily corruptible because he has matter that can be a lion, worms, dust.
  2. From the mover: winds you cannot resist move you “God knows where”; terrorists pinion your arms and you must go along, being too weak. 3–4. From the end, “some end cannot be without this”: necessary for being vs. for well-being. Food and breathing: not necessary because I am a man (some starve), but if I am to live I must eat. Well-being: Thomas’ example of a horse for a journey; a car to get to this class (“depends upon your strength” — a student; reply: you’d take an awfully long time walking, and in winter not make it); at Laval everything was within walking distance, in California you cannot get anywhere without a car.
• Applied to philosophy: is logic necessary for philosophy? Yes, but for doing it well, not for doing it at all: logic was the last part of philosophy discovered, Aristotle the father of logic at the end of the golden age; natural philosophy, geometry, ethics were done before, only with more mistakes. And if reason could not work at all without logic, logic would never have been found.
• The other sense: De Koninck (Physics I or II for first-years, later books such as place and time in book IV for advanced) and Msgr Dionne (logic) did not teach metaphysics, because of the order of learning — hence meta ta physica, after the books on nature. What he does at Assumption is a “foretaste” of wisdom, necessary in the first sense for two reasons: (1) a philosopher is a lover of wisdom and cannot love what he does not somehow know; (2) all studies (geometry, logic, natural philosophy, ethics) must be ordered to wisdom, and you cannot order them to an end you do not somehow know.
• Which sense in a.1? Student: both. He: both, but not with respect to the same things — absolutely necessary for the end above reason (as with the foretaste of wisdom); necessary for well-being as to what reason can find about God. Both points are in Vatican I: “you’re plagiarizing the Constitution… you should acknowledge where you got this from.”

4. The shape of an article (“divided into three parts”) #

Point: objections (a contraction of the back-and-forth of the disputed questions, cut to the essentials), a sed contra (often an authority rather than an argument), the body, replies — usually only to the opposite side, though in the disputed questions one sometimes answers both when truth lies between. a.1 comes first because, as learned in logic, “does it exist” precedes “what it is”, just as “whether this is that” precedes “why”; before knowing it exists you may ask what the word means, not what the thing is.

5. Article 1, objections and sed contra (“Do not seek those things that are above you”) #

• Obj. 1: man should not seek what is above reason (Ecclesiasticus 3); what is subject to reason the philosophical disciplines treat sufficiently; so another teaching is superfluous. “Good objection.” (Disciplina, from being schooled.)
• Obj. 2: teaching is only about being, since only the true is known and true is convertible with being (“we learned that in the ninth book of wisdom”); philosophy treats all beings, even God — a part of it is called theology, per the Philosopher (Aristotle “by antonomasia”) in Metaphysics VI, where wisdom is distinguished from practical and productive knowledge, and the theoretical divided into natural philosophy, mathematics and wisdom, which he calls theology — “natural theology”. Anticipation of a.7: this teaching has more right to the name, since first philosophy has being as subject and God only as end, whereas here God is subject as well as end.
• Sed contra: 2 Timothy, all divinely inspired Scripture is useful for teaching, refuting, correcting, instructing to justice. Teaching and refuting sound theoretical (Aristotle: the wise man’s duty is to teach truth and refute error); correcting and instructing to justice sound practical — which gives rise to a.4, seemingly both. Scripture is not among the disciplines found by human reason; so another divinely inspired knowledge is useful apart from them.

6. The body: two reasons (“an end that exceeds the grasp of his reason”) #

1. Man is ordered to God as an end exceeding reason’s grasp: “eye has not seen, ear has not heard” (Isaiah, repeated by St Paul; “nor entered the heart of man” — heart meaning mind). Aside: a fragment of Heraclitus prizes most what can be seen, heard and learned — “he has no knowledge of this.” The end must be foreknown by those who direct intentions and actions to it; man is not an automaton (“God who created you without you will not save you without you”). Necessary in the sense of cannot be: like the foretaste of first philosophy for the philosopher.
2. Even what reason can find about God (an article of faith, per Vatican I, that God can be known by natural reason — not that many would, or well) needs revelation, in the second sense, since these things can be without it. Confirmation from providence: Plato and Aristotle reached some knowledge of God without revelation — Plato in the Timaeus saw eternity has no before and after (endless time is not eternity). Had only Christians used reason so, one might say “you’re deceiving yourself.” Parallel from the Fathers: the non-conversion of many Jews, not good in itself, yields the good of hostile witnesses to the antiquity of the Old Testament books prophesying Christ — “the testimony of the enemy is the most convincing” (George III, angry at the Revolution, on Washington stepping down: “he’ll be the greatest man in the world”). Likewise the Ten Commandments are not merely religion: Aristotle, disbelieving his religions, holds adultery always wrong, no mean, “bad in its definition”; in the Topics one who will not honour father and mother needs punishment, not persuasion. God gave it to Moses, which confirms, but it is not knowable only that way — “God didn’t speak to Aristotle on Olympus” as far as we know. Reasons the truth about God comes to few: few have the ability; those who do are distracted by life’s necessities; those with ability and leisure face a long road (Euclid to the king: no royal way). Also long time, and many errors, shown by men’s disagreement. Since the whole salvation of man depends on this truth, revelation was necessary that salvation come convenientius and certius.

• Conclusion: sacred doctrine is necessary in both end-senses (logic in one, the foretaste of wisdom in the other), but not intrinsically: because I am a man I do not necessarily believe, and God does not use violence — “like St Paul: knocks him off his horse. Didn’t move him to faith, moved him to the ground.”
• Student: are the objectors objecting to revelation or to theology? They go together: this knowledge is based on revelation, so rejecting one removes the other.

7. Replies (“a diverse way of knowing”) #

• Ad 1: what is above man’s knowledge is not to be sought by reason but received by faith when God reveals it; Thomas cites the same book of Ecclesiasticus later (v. 25): many things above the sense of man are shown you; in these sacred teaching consists.
• Ad 2: the same things can be known in different ways (and the philosopher will not know everything we know about God). A diverse way of knowing makes diverse sciences: the astronomer and the natural scientist both prove the earth round — Aristotle from the earth’s round shadow on the moon, a mathematical middle abstracted from matter; the naturalist because earth tends to the centre and so ends up round, a middle from the kind of matter. More known example: eye and touch both know this thing is round, two ways of knowing one thing (but the earth example is closer, being about sciences). So nothing prevents another science treating what philosophy treats, as knowable by the light of revelation. Revealed theology differs in genus from the theology that is a part of philosophy: natural theology is a species of looking philosophy; this is not.

8. Article 2: is it a science? (“how do you translate scientia into English”) #

• Now that the thing exists, what it is: the genus. “Science” today suggests experimental science, a poor likeness. Scientia translates epistēmē; he sometimes says “reasoned-out knowledge”, or knowledge as opposed to opinion, knowledge in the strict sense, certain; since this doctrine is argumentative there is reasoning out — “but be careful.”
• Thomas will use Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics distinction: a science whose principles are evident within it vs. one that borrows principles on faith from another (astronomy takes geometry’s truths on the geometer’s word; the biologist takes the chemist’s conclusions on human belief). Sacred doctrine is subordinate to God’s knowledge of Himself and the blessed’s who see Him as He is — a science like astronomy, not like geometry.
• Obj. 1: every science proceeds from principles known of themselves — either to all, or to the wise in a science. Wise example: every perfect number is composite — obvious to him, not to Magnus, who does not know a perfect number (one equal to the sum of what measures it evenly; six is the first: 1+2+3); a prime is measured only by one, so no perfect number is prime. Known to all: the whole is more than a part — no one eats a meal without knowing whole and part. But sacred doctrine proceeds from articles of faith (three persons in God, God became man), not conceded by all: “not everyone has faith” (2 Thessalonians). So not a science.
• Obj. 2: science is not of singulars, but sacred doctrine treats the doings of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob — history, biography, not science. Aristotle in the Poetics: fiction is more philosophic than history, philosophy being of the universal, history of the singular, fiction closer to the universal: Romeo and Juliet is not how one Verona couple were but how young lovers are; the chorus at Oedipus’ fall says “O you generations of men”; a hesitant man is still called a hamlet. Fiction is in between — the universal singularised, the singular universalised — but nearer the universal. His love-and-friendship course went from each student’s individual experience of love to Thomas’ universal treatment through Shakespeare, who is closer to their experience than Thomas but closer to Thomas than their experience. The class ends here; obj. 2 not yet answered.

His words #

• prologue: “the Latin word, I guess, meaning forward”
• order of learning: the sequence in which things must be learned; lost, one cannot teach well
• quodlibet: “what you will” — any question put to you
• sacra doctrina: sacred teaching / sacred knowledge; emphasis on the teacher
• mathematics: named from the student, mathētēs
• breviter et lucide: brief and enlightening (“brevity is the soul of wit”)
• looking philosophy / doing philosophy: theoretical and practical [ed.: speculative and practical]
• wisdom (the fifth, sixth, ninth “book of wisdom”): [ed.: Metaphysics]
• Natural Hearing: [ed.: Physics]
• meta ta physica: after the books in natural philosophy
• necessary for being vs. necessary for well-being: two end-senses of “necessary”
• foretaste of wisdom: what he gives beginners in metaphysics
• antonomasia: Aristotle called “the Philosopher”
• modus narrativus, orativus et laudativus: narrative; prayerful and praising modes
• convenientius, certius: more suitably, more certainly
• scientia / epistēmē: “reasoned-out knowledge”, or knowledge as against opinion, certain
• perfect number: equal to the sum of what measures it evenly; six the first
• known to themselves: [ed.: per se nota], to all or to the wise

Texts #

Read in class

• Thomas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 1, prologue (Latin read and rendered)
• Thomas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 1, a. 1 (objections, sed contra, body, replies)
• Thomas, Summa Theologiae I, q. 1, a. 2 (objections 1–2)
• Ecclesiasticus 3 (“do not seek those things that are above you”; later v. 25)
• 2 Timothy (all Scripture divinely inspired is useful…)
• Isaiah / St Paul (“eye has not seen…”)
• 2 Thessalonians (“not everyone has faith”)

Mentioned

• Aristotle, Metaphysics V (four senses of necessary; names of causes), VI (theology), IX (true convertible with being), Nicomachean Ethics VI (scientia/sapientia), Ethics on adultery, Topics (honouring parents), Posterior Analytics (subalternate sciences, inferred), Poetics (fiction more philosophic than history), Physics I, II, IV
• Thomas, prologues to the Psalms and to St Paul; Commentary on the Sentences (modes of proceeding); quaestiones disputatae; quodlibets
• Augustine, De Doctrina Christiana; Porphyry (writing for beginners); Dionysius, Divine Names and Symbolic Theology; Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy; Plato, Timaeus (eternity); Heraclitus fragment; 1 Corinthians (milk); John’s Gospel ending; Vatican I Constitution; Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet; Sophocles, Oedipus the King; Job, Psalms, Apocalypse

His questions #

• How are beginners impeded by what has been written? Useless multiplication of questions; not treated in the order of learning; repetition breeding boredom and confusion.
• Why does the name “necessary” come attached to the names of causes? Because there is a connection between necessary and cause; three senses go with extrinsic causes, one with intrinsic.
• Is logic necessary for the philosopher? Yes, but for doing philosophy well, not for doing it at all.
• Which sense of necessary is Thomas using in the first article? Both end-senses, in respect of different things; not the intrinsic sense.
• Is it necessary for me to have a car to get to this class? For getting here well, yes — walking would take too long and winter might stop him.
• Why does this teaching have more right to be called theology than first philosophy? In first philosophy God is only the end, being the subject; here God is also the subject (a. 7).
• Does Magnus see that every perfect number is composite? No, since he does not know what a perfect number is; it is known of itself only to the wise.
• Are the objectors objecting to revelation itself or just to theology? They go together, since this knowledge is based on revelation.
• How do you translate “scientia” into English? Not “science” as today; “reasoned-out knowledge” or certain knowledge as against opinion, with care.
• Are you convinced? Left open (class moves on).