Reading the Song of Songs with St. Thomas Aquinas

Reading the Song of Songs with St. Thomas Aquinas

Author: Serge-Thomas Bonino

Publisher: CUA Press

Published: 2022-08-24

Total Pages: 177

ISBN-13: 0813235987

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St. Thomas Aquinas never commented on the Song of Songs. The purpose of this book is to demonstrate, however, that he meditated on it and absorbed it, so that the words of the Song are for him a familiar repertoire and a theological source. His work contains numerous citations of the Song, not counting his borrowings of vocabulary and images from it. In total, there are 312 citations of the Song in Aquinas’s corpus, along with citations of the Song that are found in citations that Aquinas makes of other authors (as for example in the Catena aurea). Understanding the purpose and placement of these citations significantly enriches our understanding of Aquinas as a theologian, biblical exegete, and spiritual master. The book contains an Appendix listing and contextualizing each citation. The study of the citations of the Song especially illuminates Aquinas’s spiritual doctrine. By citing the Song, Aquinas emphasizes the spiritual life’s path of dynamic ascent, through an ever increasing participation in the mystery of the nuptial union of Christ and the Church through love. The Song also highlights the eschatological tension or yearning present in the spiritual life, which is ordered to the fullness of beatific vision. Although Aquinas’s theology is highly “intellectual,” by citing the Song he brings out the affective character of the spiritual life and conveys the centrality of love in the soul’s journey toward Christ. He also draws together contemplation and preaching through his use of the Song.


Reading Job with St. Thomas Aquinas

Reading Job with St. Thomas Aquinas

Author: Matthew Levering

Publisher: Catholic University of America Press

Published: 2020-04-24

Total Pages: 425

ISBN-13: 081323283X

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Reading Job with St. Thomas Aquinas is a scholarly contribution to Thomistic studies, specifically to the study of Aquinas’s biblical exegesis in relation to his philosophy and theology. Each of the thirteen chapters has a different focus, within the shared concentration of the book on Aquinas’s Literal Exposition on Job. The essays are arranged in three Parts: “Job and Sacra Doctrina”; “Providence and Suffering”; and “Job and the Moral Life”. Boyle’s opening essay argues that Aquinas’s commentary seeks to show what is required in the “Magister” (namely, Job and God) for the effective communication of wisdom. Mansini’s essay argues that by speaking, God reveals the virtue of Job and its value in God’s providence; without the personal revelation or speech of God, Job could not have known the value of his suffering. Vijgen’s essay explores the commentary’s use of Aristotle for reflecting upon divine providence, sorrow and anger, resurrection, and the new heavens and new earth. Levering’s essay explores the commentary’s citations of the Gospel of John and argues that these pertain especially to divine speech and to light/darkness. Bonino’s essay explains why divine incomprehensibility does not mean that Job is wrong to seek to understand God’s ways. Te Velde’s essay explores how Aquinas’s commentary draws upon the reasoning of his Summa contra gentiles with regard to the good order of the universe. Goris’s essay reflects upon how, according to Aquinas’s commentary, sin is and is not related to suffering. Knasas’s essay argues that Aquinas does not hold that the resurrection of the body is a necessary philosophical corollary of the human desire for happiness. Wawrykow’s essay explores merit, in relation to the connection between sin and punishment/affliction as well as to the connection between good actions and flourishing. Spezzano’s essay shows that Job’s hope and filial fear transform his suffering, making him an exemplar of the consolation they provide to the just. Mullady’s essay reflects upon the moral problems and opportunities posed by the passions, along with the ordering of the virtues to the reward of human happiness. Flood’s essay shows how Aquinas defends Job’s possession of the qualities needed for true friendship (including friendship with God), such as patience, delight in the presence of the friend, and compassion. Lastly, Kromholtz’s essay argues that although Aquinas’s Literal Exposition on Job never extensively engages eschatology, Aquinas depends throughout upon the reasonableness of hoping for the resurrection of the body and the final judgment.


The Suffering Servant in Aquinas

The Suffering Servant in Aquinas

Author: Daniel Waldow

Publisher: CUA Press

Published: 2024-09-27

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 0813238889

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The "Suffering Servant" text of Isaiah 53 is a perennial topic of debate within Jewish and Christian biblical theology. Is the Suffering Servant an individual, a group, or both? How and why did he suffer? What role did God play in his suffering? How is his suffering related to human salvation? The answers to these questions often divide Jewish and Christian readers of Scripture as well as Christians across different denominations. In particular, Isaiah 53 tends to inform different Christian accounts of the origin, nature, and saving value of Christ's Passion. The Suffering Servant in Aquinas contributes to the debate on the meaning of Isaiah 53 and its bearing upon the Passion of Christ by examining how St. Thomas Aquinas engaged this biblical text. This book examines every explicit reference to Isaiah 53 that Aquinas makes in his biblical commentaries, Commentary on the Sentences, Summa Theologiae, and Opuscula. It analyzes how and why Aquinas interprets Isaiah 53 in the ways that he does. It focuses especially upon how Aquinas draws upon Isaiah 53 to shed light on the saving mystery of Christ's Passion. Readers will see how Aquinas articulates the relationship between God's will and Christ's suffering, the diverse forms of Christ's pain, the degree to which the Passion can be considered a "punishment," and the saving functions of the Passion as example, merit, satisfaction, and sacrifice. This book makes an original contribution to the growing field of Biblical Thomism. It examines Aquinas's exegetical methods as well as the role of Scripture within his speculative theology. And it properly contextualizes Aquinas's exegesis by considering the differences between his Latin version of Isaiah 53 and contemporary renderings of Hebrew and Greek versions. Readers will see that Aquinas's Christological interpretations of Isaiah 53 are both exegetically intriguing and theologically rich.


Reconfiguring Thomistic Christology

Reconfiguring Thomistic Christology

Author: Matthew Levering

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2023-02-28

Total Pages: 343

ISBN-13: 1009221450

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Unites eschatologically charged biblical Christology with metaphysical and dogmatic Thomistic Christology, by highlighting shared typological Christologies.


Reading Texts, Seeking Wisdom

Reading Texts, Seeking Wisdom

Author: David F. Ford

Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 312

ISBN-13: 9780802827630

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Eighteen leading scripture scholars and theologians engage with key issues and texts to do with scripture and theology. They look at how the Bible and theology have come together in the past - in Judaism, the early Church, the Middle Ages, early modernity, and the 20th century. How is current biblical scholarship to be related to past insights and modern methods? Contributors debate how wisdom is to be related to faith and to reason.


A Seven Year Cycle Reading Plan

A Seven Year Cycle Reading Plan

Author: C.S. Fairfax

Publisher: Lulu.com

Published: 2018-02-13

Total Pages: 264

ISBN-13: 1387592769

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Read through time, enjoying the good, the better, and the best books from each of the seven eras below: Year 1: Ancient History to 476 A.D. Year 2: The Middle Ages, 477 to 1485 A.D. Year 3: The Age of Discovery, 1485-1763 A.D. Year 4: The Age of Revolution, 1764-1848 A.D. Year 5: The Age of Empire, 1849-1914 A.D. Year 6: The American Century, 1915-1995 A.D. Year 7: The Information Age, 1996- Present Day At the end of seven years, repeat! A Seven Year Cycle Reading Plan is a booklist compiled of hundreds of books from each era in history organized into categories of interest. This volume also includes copious room for you to add your own favorite titles!


Angels and Demons

Angels and Demons

Author: Serge-Thomas Bonino

Publisher: CUA Press

Published: 2016

Total Pages: 345

ISBN-13: 0813227992

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Angels occupy a significant space in contemporary popular spirituality. Yet, today more than ever, the belief in the existence of intermediary spirits between the human and divine realms needs to be evangelized and Christianized. Angels and Demons offers a detailed synthesis of the givens of the Christian tradition concerning the angels and demons, as systematized in its essential principles by St. Thomas Aquinas. Certainly, the doctrine of angels and demons is not at the heart of Christian faith, but its place is far from negligible. On the one hand, as part of faith seeking understanding, angelology has been and can continue to be a source of enrichment for philosophy. Thus, reflection on the ontological constitution of the angel, on the modes of angelic knowledge, and on the nature of the sin of Satan can engage and shed light on the most fundamental areas of metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics. On the other hand, angelology, insofar as it is inseparable from the ensemble of the Christian mystery (from the doctrine of creation to the Christian understanding of the spiritual life), can be envisioned from an original and fruitful perspective.


Singing in the Reign

Singing in the Reign

Author: Michael Patrick Barber

Publisher: Emmaus Road Publishing

Published: 2001

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 9781931018081

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Christians know the Psalms, sing the Psalms, and pray the Psalms more than any other book of the Bible. Yet, even as believers have grown more devoted to individual psalms, they have lost the big picture-the single sense that unites all the psalms as one coherent book. Michael Barber is at the forefront of an emerging movement in biblical theology. With this book, he is recovering the narrative plot that was the common heritage of Jews and Christians in the ancient world. Barber shows how King David serves as an example for the chosen people as they struggled in exile. As David was rescued by the Lord, so would Israel be restored as a kingdom for all ages. This is the story of Christ as well, whom Barber reveals as the "new David." And, in Christ, it is the story of every Christian. The Psalms bring us-in our reading and in our prayer-from suffering and pleading to glory, triumph, and praise. Barber's analysis follows upon an extensive introduction by Scott Hahn, Ph.D., detailing the historical, cultural, and theological background of the Psalter.


Cultural History of Reading [2 volumes]

Cultural History of Reading [2 volumes]

Author: Sara E. Quay

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2008-11-30

Total Pages: 1083

ISBN-13: 0313071675

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What is it about some books that makes them timeless? Cultural History of Reading looks at books from their earliest beginnings through the present day, in both the U.S. and regions all over the world. Not only fiction and literature, but religious works, dictionaries, scientific works, and home guides such as Mrs. Beeton's all have had an impact on not only their own time and place, but continue to capture the attention of readers today. Volume 1 examines the history of books in regions throughout the world, identifying both literature and nonfiction that was influenced by cultural events of its time. Volume 2 identifies books from the pre-colonial era to the present day that have had lasting significance in the United States. History students and book lovers alike will enjoy discovering the books that have impacted our world.


Commentary on the Sentences, Book IV, 1-13

Commentary on the Sentences, Book IV, 1-13

Author: Thomas Aquinas

Publisher:

Published: 2017-08-22

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781623400385

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The Sentences of Peter Lombard was the standard theological text from the twelfth through the fifteenth century (and even well beyond that in some places); producing a commentary on it was the equivalent of a doctoral dissertation, since it qualified the commentator to teach at the university level. Accordingly, all of the famous medieval scholastics, from Alexander of Hales to John Duns Scotus to William of Ockham, produced their own commentaries on the Sentences. Appearing for the first time in English, this volume features a bilingual Latin-English edition of Aquinas' first major work, the Commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard.