In an age when Christian thinkers were rediscovering the treasures of ancient philosophy, and more particularly of Aristotle, Thomas had the great merit of giving pride of place to the harmony which exists between faith and reason. Both the light of reason and the light of faith come from God, he argued; hence there can be no contradiction between them... Faith therefore has no fear of reason, but seeks it out and has trust in it. Just as grace builds on nature and brings it to fulfilment, so faith builds upon and perfects reason... Although he made much of the supernatural character of faith, the Angelic Doctor did not overlook the importance of its reasonableness; indeed he was able to plumb the depths and explain the meaning of this reasonableness... This is why the Church has been justified in consistently proposing Saint Thomas as a master of thought and a model of the right way to do theology3.
It was in order to do a more perfect, truer theological work that Saint Thomas had no qualms about parting with Avicenna's philosophy - recognised at the time by all, and especially by Saint Thomas' master, Albert the Great - so to return directly to Aristotle's. People objected that he was parting with a believer in favour of a pagan's philosophy. He certainly acted with quite some audacity. However, seeking the truth above all else, Saint Thomas was a man of great freedom: what gave him this freedom was his love for the truth. While his perspective was fully accepted and encouraged by the pope of that period, we should not forget that his audacity gave rise to criticism from the Sorbonne, and that this played a role in what was to become thomisme: very soon after Saint Thomas there was a return to Avicenna and to Henri de Gand. It is very difficult to remain on a summit in the search for the truth!
Going beyond his master, Albert the Great, thanks to his study of Aristotle, Saint Thomas returned to the theological study of the relationship between nature and grace in a radical fashion. We can see this when we compare the Commentary on the Sentences and the Summa Theologica.
Today, if we seek to go beyond the disputations between the various schools of thought, we must return to a true theology by searching deeper into both the Revelation and a first philosophy of being. Is it not indeed necessary today to take up this question at its source, by returning in particular to the Gospel of Saint John and in using a realistic philosophy which fully responds to the human intelligence's demands for truth? Let us try to understand how a true first philosophy of that-which-is - a philosophy which enables us to integrate a study of the human person within the effort of metaphysics4(which scolastic philosophy did not do) - enables us to reapproach this question in a new and more profound way.
1 Surnaturel, études historiques, Paris, Aubier-Montaigne, 1946 (the preface to the new edition, published in 1991 by Desclée De Brouwer, summarises the controversy which its publication gave rise to). See also H. De Lubac, Augustinisme et théologie moderne and Le mystère du surnaturel, Paris, Aubier-Montaigne (coll. Théologie, n° 63 and 64), 1965. [All these books are as yet untranslated to English - tran.]
2 "Scripture, therefore, is not the Church's sole point of reference. The “supreme rule of her faith” derives from the unity which the Spirit has created between Sacred Tradition, Sacred Scripture and the Magisterium of the Church in a reciprocity which means that none of the three can survive without the others" (John-Paul II, Fides et Ratio (FR), n° 55).
3John-Paul II, FR, n° 43.
4See M.-D. Philippe, "Le problème de la personne, sommet de la philosophie première", in: Revue Aletheia n° 4 (december 1993), p.9-39. See also The Three Wisdoms
De Broeders van Sint Jan hebben hun leven aan God gewijd, ten dienste van God en hun naasten. Zij willen leven volgens het Evangelie van Jezus Christus en zich door hun gebed en hun activiteiten inzetten voor jong en oud.