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Title: The Silence of St. Thomas: Three Essays by Josef Pieper, John Murray, Daniel O'Connor ISBN: 1-890318-78-7 Publisher: Saint Augustine's Pr Pub. Date: April, 1999 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (3 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: The spirit and life of Aquinas
Comment: Pieper, in these three essays, describes what we have to learn from the works and life of Aquinas. The essays detail the scholastic arguements of the day and how Thomas, in the true spirit of open mindedness (his life and method are the definition of this oft abused term) brought some peace ond understanding to the various sides, a very serious matter in his day. The book explains how much of an Aristotilian Aquinas was, and more importantly how much he was not. Mainly by showing how the charactoristics of the Latin Averroists have been unjustly attributed to Aquinas by his detractors - the Latin Averoists (Averoes was an Arab) were whole hearted Aristotilians.
This book is an excellent addition to reading Etienne Gilson's "Unity of the Philosophical Experience" as Pieper gives further explanantions as to the behavior of the Augastinians and Latin Averroists. It could explain also why modern Muslims are so singularly textually dogmatic - it is in reaction to Averroist's attempting to rid religion of faith altogether - and thus the violent reaction in nixing reason and rationalism. It tells how Aquinas circumvented this problem. The last essay also compliments Gilson's book in that it shows what Existentialism has in common with Aquinas, some interesting things, despite some gapping fundimental differences at their very root and conclusion.
The first essay vividly descibes what an attitude of accademic pursuit and teaching should look like. Too many teachers are dogmatic and are only interested in pursuing and supporting an idea that is presently clear in their minds and propogating it, rather than treating the moment as an active pursuit of truth. Thomas was a model teacher and the book is an active discripition of his method.
The book also argues, with supporting evidence and reason, that Thomas' main work The "Summa Theologica" was intentionally left unfinished. Why it was left unfinished is at the root of what Aquinas was all about concerning philosophy and metaphysics - it is a process not a conclusion. Gilson's book describes what a conclusion is, as sometimes philosophers have rejected the idea that they have reached a conclusion, when in fact they have. Gilson effectively defines what a conclusion looks like.
Both are highly recommended books for Teachers, Historians, and Philosophers.
Rating: 5
Summary: Great supplemental reading
Comment: St. Thomas Aquinas, needless to say, is not easy to understand. In this little guide, which makes nice supplemental reading to get a look "behind the scenes" of the saint's philosophy, Josef Pieper first sketches a biographical outlines of Thomas' life and then delves into the negative element in his philosophy and concludes with the "timelessness" of Thomism, which makes it a perennial philosophy.
This book is primarily concerned with St. Thomas' epistemological assumptions (which were taken for granted, hence the "silence"), what knowledge meant for the saint, and how and to what extent it can be achieved. Pieper tackles Thomas' seemingly paradoxical stance on essences, and whether or not they can be known, for Thomas maintains both that we cannot know God in His essence and that God's essence is His existence.
Pieper shows St. Thomas' beautiful conviction that "it is part of the very nature of things that their knowability cannot be wholy exhausted by any finite intellect, because these things are creatures, which means that the very element which makes them capable of being known must necessarily be at the same time the reason why things are unfathomable" (p.60).
All in all, this book is a fine look at Thomas' profound epistemology, so rarely discussed in philosophical courses today. If you have an interest in the philosophy of St. Thomas, don't pass this one up!
Rating: 5
Summary: Illuminating
Comment: The unifying theme of the three essays composing this book is the paradox that the intelligibilty of things and their incomprehensibility both derive from their being creatures, that is, from their possessing natures that are communications of the ideas in the mind of God. Things can be known only because they are created, but at the same time, things are unfathomable because they are created: "one and the same factor explains both why things cannot be entirely grasped and why they can be known" (pp.95-6). Why is this so? I'll not deprive the reader of the pleasure of reading Pieper's book to find out.
For me, this book ended a long struggle to discover what St. Thomas Aquinas really taught about our knowledge of things. Pieper succeeds in reconciling Thomas's frequent statements that we cannot know the essence of any created thing with his repeated claims elsewhere that our minds are receptive of the forms (i.e., essences) of things.
While my attitude toward Pieper's understanding of St. Thomas's thought is not uncritical, I must concede that he is one of the best and most original (the two are not the same) of twentieth century Thomist philosophers. Unfortunately, he is sometimes (unjustly) put down by scholars as a mere popularizer. Let them read this book and be disabused; Pieper has much to teach them.
My ratings of other books by Josef Pieper: Guide to Thomas Aquinas ****; Leisure the Basis of Culture *****; Scholasticism *****
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Title: Guide to Thomas Aquinas by Josef Pieper ISBN: 0898703190 Publisher: Ignatius Press Pub. Date: 01 June, 1991 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Four Cardinal Virtues by Josef Pieper ISBN: 0268001030 Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press Pub. Date: 01 June, 1966 List Price(USD): $10.50 |
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Title: Faith, Hope, Love by Josef Pieper ISBN: 0898706238 Publisher: Ignatius Press Pub. Date: 01 March, 1997 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Happiness and Contemplation by Josef Pieper ISBN: 1890318310 Publisher: St. Augustine's Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 1998 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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Title: The Concept of Sin by Josef Pieper, Edward T. Oakes ISBN: 1890318086 Publisher: St. Augustine's Press Pub. Date: 01 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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