ACTA
PHILOSOPHICA
Volume 25, Fascicolo II (2016): 386-389.
Book Review by Orestes J. Gonzalez
(Full Text)
(Full Text)
Stephen
L. Brock, The
Philosophy of Saint Thomas Aquinas: A Sketch,
Eugene, Oregon, 2015, pp. xix + 195.
It
is well known that Saint Thomas Aquinas manifests most clearly his
own philosophical insights in contexts where he is explaining the
content of revelation. As a consequence, these philosophical
principles are uncovered only by extracting them from a massive
amount of theological work. With The
Philosophy of Saint Thomas Aquinas: A Sketch,
Stephen Brock joins scholars like John Wippel (The
Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas)
and Jan Aertsen (Nature
and Creature)
who have undertaken this task. Written as a general summary of
Thomas’s philosophical thought, the book is wider in scope than
those of Wippel and Aertsen which focused on metaphysics. Brock
provides helpful summaries of Thomas’s teachings on logic, the
philosophy of nature, moral philosophy, epistemology, metaphysics,
and natural theology to mention a few. While it may be just a sketch,
the book is not a primer for beginners. Every chapter is packed with
content and some even take up the interpretation of controversial
issues. In general Brock draws directly from Aquinas’s writings,
but his discussions seem to emphasize Aristotle’s influence on
Saint Thomas.
The
book opens with a chapter containing a brief biography of Saint
Thomas Aquinas which is followed by chapters focusing on mobile
being, living beings, human beings, purely spiritual beings, and
ethics.
In
Chapter One the author provides some historical context and sets the
stage for the issues discussed in the rest of the book. Brock states
unequivocally that Saint Thomas was above all a professional
theologian (p. xviii). But in this chapter he also makes clear that
Aquinas had a genuine interest in learning about the principles that
govern the workings of physical reality and in cultivating the
philosophical disciplines. Saint Thomas judges that philosophy is
highly useful in theology, because the human mind is more easily led
to that which is above reason by the knowledge of that which is most
intelligible to us (p. 19). Thus for Aquinas, the goal of becoming
proficient in the knowledge afforded by the natural sciences is
ultimately intended only as an aid to a better vision of reality as
whole and, especially, of non-physical reality (p. 24). Through
metaphysical inquiry the human mind is capable of reaching valid
knowledge of supra-sensible being. For Aquinas, Brock maintains, we
know through the natural light of reason about the immaterial
substances like angels and God only what we can infer about them from
our understanding of sensible reality (pp. 93, 108).
Chapter
Two, which deals with Aquinas’s understanding of mobile being,
directs the reader’s attention towards the concept of nature. In a
step by step explanation Brock explores the different senses of the
term “natura”
and claims that for Aquinas the most proper meaning of nature is a
body’s substantial form (pp. 44-46). Substantial form is what
functions in a composite as principle of generation, principle of
motion, and principle of activity (p. 29). Here Brock’s explanation
is particularly lucid and would be excellent reading for students
taking a course on the philosophy of mobile being as understood by
Aristotle and Saint Thomas.
The
distinction between inanimate and animate things manifests the
existence of a special kind of substantial form: the principle of
life, the anima
or soul. In Chapter Three on living beings, Brock outlines Thomas’s
explanation of how substantial forms in general, and souls in
particular—vegetative, sensitive and intellectual—can be said to
transcend matter. At the most basic level, «every substantial form
overcomes the divisibility of matter and makes a body an unqualified
unity, a substance in act» (p. 77). But with the introduction of the
principle of life there comes as well a gradual increase in the
elevation of the substantial form over matter: «The intellectual
soul stands at the peak of a whole hierarchy of forms, each higher
one being less conditioned by matter. The senses have a qualified
immateriality. Plant-souls are not tied to this
matter» (p. 77). Through the analysis of the powers which are
specific to each kind of soul, we are able to recognize different
degrees of perfection in living beings. Brock concentrates on the
cognitive powers, making extensive use of the principle that
“cognition and materiality are inversely proportional.” In this
discussion he provides an excellent explanation of how Aquinas
conceived the activity of the senses to be in some degree immaterial.
The chapter also discusses Aquinas’s understanding of how the human
intellect can be a power possessing total immateriality and yet
inhere in a substantial form that is meant to inform a body. Matter
does condition the human intellect but in an extrinsic way, for, in
order to understand something, the human intellect must abstract the
forms from sensible phantasms (p. 78).
The
fourth chapter on human beings centers on Aquinas’s account of
human cognition. The author explains how the human intellect rises to
some knowledge of supra-sensible being by making use of Aristotle’s
observation that the things that are first and more knowable to us
are not the same as those that are first and more knowable by nature
or in themselves. This explains why Aquinas holds that the science of
logic should be taught first, even though metaphysics is primary
simply. Thus, because learning builds on previous knowledge, some
knowledge must also precede the teaching of logic. Accordingly, Brock
suggests that the first elements of knowledge that human beings
understand are definitely metaphysical: «The ens
that is the very first object of understanding coincides with the ens
that is the subject of metaphysics» (p. 97, n. 62). In every human
being, there is an understanding of the basic principles prior to
being taught, and the role of the metaphysician is to “verify”
the principles themselves. «Science presupposes unteachable
knowledge, sheer understanding of certain things» (p. 95). From
knowledge of the universality associated with common being, the mind
of the metaphysician rises to the universality associated with God
and the separate, immaterial beings. Both logic and metaphysics
extend to everything, but the object of logic does not reside in the
things themselves while the object of metaphysics does.
In
Chapter Five Brock uses the notion of form to lead into the
metaphysics of esse.
In fact this chapter could be described as an ascent to God through
the notion of form. «I would venture to say that, for Thomas, it is
only this intellectual experience of form, as cause of being to
matter—that is, substantial form—which gives us the possibility
of framing some positive notion of immaterial reality» (p.
110). The analysis of form leads the author to conclude in a somewhat
neo-Platonic way that the common notion of esse
is not God’s esse
and that esse
commune
occupies a mediating place between God and existing things. Brock
indeed opposes strongly the identification of Aquinas’s esse
commune
with the divine form. But while doing so he still sees the need for
ascribing to esse
commune
the mediating role. Here Brock seems to be in disagreement with
Aertsen who (following Cornelio Fabro) holds that in the metaphysics
of participation, even this element of mediation of esse
commune
is dropped. Reading Aquinas under the light of the Aristotelian
contraction of ens
universale
into the diverse categories, Brock may not give sufficient attention
to
the
other contraction of being postulated by Aquinas, namely, the
contraction of being by participation. This other contraction is the
contraction of the infinite fullness of being itself (ens
per essentiam)
into finite being (ens
per participationem),
a doctrine that Saint Thomas conveys in a particularly insightful way
in this text of the Summa
theologiae:
«Being caused does not belong to being as such, therefore it is
possible for us to find a being which is uncaused» (I, 44, 1, ad 1).
It is significant in this regard that Cornelio Fabro is not cited in
the book nor does he figure in Brock’s list of great Thomistic
scholars.
The
final chapter on ethics focuses mainly on the relationship between
the practical and the speculative orders. Just as the first
principles of the particular sciences are founded on and presuppose
the general principles of metaphysics so do the first principles of
the province of being that is considered in moral philosophy.
A
recurring theme in Brock’s book is the thesis that in philosophical
matters Aquinas’s way of thinking is Aristotle’s way of thinking.
This is reminiscent of the late Thomist, Lawrence Dewan (1932-2015),
who said about himself that he was much more inclined than his own
teachers (Etienne Gilson and Joseph Owens) to stress the continuity
of thought between Aristotle and Thomas. In this book, Brock affirms
that «On many metaphysical themes I have found the writings of
Lawrence Dewan, O.P. especially illuminating» (p. 91, n. 36). And
according to Brock, Dewan’s treatment of the centrality of form in
metaphysics almost amounts to a rediscovery.
Notwithstanding
this tendency to interpret Saint Thomas in an Aristotelian key,
Brock’s explanations are uniformly clear and helpful. Sifting out
and distilling the philosophical principles from the theological
works of Saint Thomas Aquinas is no easy task. Among other things it
requires years of study, talent and hard work. Brock’s book
represents a well organized and a well argued analysis of the most
important notions and principles that guided the philosophical mind
of Thomas Aquinas.
Orestes
J. Gonzalez
Editor
of Actus
Essendi
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