Matthew J. Ramage,  Dark Passages of the Bible: Engaging Scripture with Benedict XVI and Thomas Aquinas

Charity diaconia of the Church is not an accidental involvement but belongs to its fundamental missions. This thesis can be supported in many ways. The author of this article finds the source of the obligation of Christians and the whole Church community to charity service in the nature of God. For Christians God is Love (1 John 4, 8.16). Even though some other names can be found, (Jahwe , Elohim, Adonai), his principal name that encapsulates all other ones is Love. Simultaneously, God which is Love showed his merciful nature (misericordiae vultus) in the course of salvation. He did it in a historical, visible and optimal way through his Son, Jesus Christ through the embodied God’s Son, Jesus Christ, who loved the mankind so much that he sacrificed his life for us, being tortured and killed at the cross. This selfless love laid the foundations for the Church, which, in essence, is a community of loving human and God’s beings. Those who do not love, even though they joined the Church through baptism, technically speaking, do not belong to the Church since love is a real not a formal sign of belonging to Christ’s disciples (cf. John 13, 35). Therefore, charitable activity is a significant dimension of the Church’s mission as it is through charity that the Church shows the merciful nature of its Saviour. A question that needs to be addressed may be expressed as follows: in what way the image of God, who is love, implies an involvement in charity of an individual and the Church? An answer may be found in the Bible, writings of the Church Fathers of and the documents of Magisterium Ecclesiae and especially the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis.

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The Ordinary Gloss on Jonah

PMLA ◽

10.1632/pmla.2013.128.2.424 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 128 (2) ◽

pp. 424-438

Author(s):

Ryan McDermott

Keyword(s):

Sixteenth Century ◽

Middle Ages ◽

Middle English ◽

Thomas Aquinas ◽

Divine Comedy ◽

Religious Literature ◽

The Bible ◽

Biblical Narratives ◽

Wide Range ◽

John Wyclif

THE ORDINARY GLOSS WAS THE MOST WIDELY USED EDITION OF THE BIBLE IN THE LATER MIDDLE AGES AND WELL INTO THE SIXTEENTH century. Medievalists know the commentary element as the Gloss to which theologians as diverse as Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, John Wyclif, and Martin Luther habitually referred. As the foremost vehicle for medieval exegesis, the Gloss framed biblical narratives for a wide range of vernacular religious literature, from Dante's Divine Comedy to French drama to a Middle English retelling of the Jonah story, Patience.

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Towards a Theological Overcoming of Anthropocentrism. The Vegetarian Choice

ETHICS IN PROGRESS ◽

10.14746/eip.2020.2.5 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (2) ◽

pp. 54-65

Author(s):

Paolo Trianni ◽

Sara Sgarlata

Keyword(s):

Thomas Aquinas ◽

New Method ◽

Christian Tradition ◽

Ethical Implications ◽

The Bible ◽

Sacred Scripture ◽

History Of ◽

Christian Thought ◽

Contrary Evidence ◽

Supportive Argument

The article intends to demonstrate that a theology of vegetarianism is possible, despite some contrary evidence present in the biblical texts. Like other theologies dealing with issues not directly voiced in the Bible, it becomes possible to interpret the biblical statements in a new way, on the bases of a specific methodology. As a result, an objective comprehension will go back inductively to Sacred Scripture. The article advocates for applying this new method as well as for introducing its ethical implications into the Christian tradition. An additional supportive argument in favour of establishing the new understanding can be found in the history of the Roman Church, besides the consolidated custom of carnivorous nutrition: there has been no shortage of positions in favour of vegetarian asceticism. This stance was also represented by Thomas Aquinas. By valorizing classic Christian authors in favour of vegetarianism (starting with Jerome), the inauguration of the theology of vegetarianism becomes legitimised. Such an inauguration would reorient Christian thought toward reconsidering cosmology, ecology and topical contemporary issues such as anthropocentrism and speciesism.

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The Inspiration of the Bible

10.1093/oso/9780198824183.003.0001 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Gerald O’Collins, SJ

Keyword(s):

Holy Spirit ◽

Thomas Aquinas ◽

Karl Barth ◽

Divine Revelation ◽

Word Of God ◽

The Real ◽

The Bible ◽

Efficient Cause ◽

The Holy Spirit ◽

The Church

Dealing with biblical inspiration within the scheme of the Word of God in its threefold form (as preached, written, and revealed), Karl Barth distinguished between divine revelation and the inspired Bible. He insisted that the revelation to prophets and apostles preceded proclamation and the writing of Scripture. He interpreted all the Scriptures as witness to Christ. While the human authors of the Bible ‘made full use of their human capacities’, the Holy Spirit is ‘the real author’ of what is written. Raymond Collins, in dialogue with Thomas Aquinas, Barth, and others, interpreted biblical inspiration in the light of the Second Vatican Council’s Constitution on Divine Revelation. He spoke of the Holy Spirit as the ‘principal, efficient cause’ (with the human authors as the ‘instrumental’ causes), rejected dictation views of inspiration, and examined the scope of biblical truth and the authority of the Bible for the Church.

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A ALIANÇA SOCRÁTICO-MOSAICA PÓS-METAFÍSICA, DESELENIZAÇÃO, TERCEIRA NAVEGAÇÃO

Síntese Revista de Filosofia ◽

10.20911/21769389v36n116p325-353/2009 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 36 (116) ◽

pp. 325

Author(s):

Vittorio Possent

Keyword(s):

Thomas Aquinas ◽

Greek Philosophy ◽

Western History ◽

New Covenant ◽

Faith And Reason ◽

Benedict Xvi ◽

Religious Thinking

O diálogo entre pensamento secular e pensamento religioso permanece uma encruzilhada recorrente na história do Ocidente (cfr. o debate Habermas-Ratzinger e Bento XVI em Regensburg). No diálogo entram em jogo a crise pós-metafísica da razão e a deselenização, entendida como ruptura da aliança socrático-mosaica, ou seja do acordo entre fé e razão em torno da idéia de verdade. Tal aliança religa filosofia grega (Sócrates) e discurso bíblico (Moisés): a diferença mosaica entre verdadeiro e falso nas religiões se encontra com a diferença socrática entre verdadeiro e falso na razão. A quaestio de veritate e o tema da religio vera não são portanto estranhos ao âmbito da Revelação, enquanto a moderna crítica da religião sustenta que a religião se refere apenas à piedade e ao culto (Spinoza). No interior daquela aliança situa-se o destino da metafísica. Após a ‘segunda navegação’ da metafísica helênica, aconteceu com a filosofia do ser/ actus essendi de Tomás de Aquino uma ‘terceira navegação’, atuada por uma metafísica trans-ôntica que leva a termo a centralidade ontológica do energeia/actus. Para mobilizar a razão pós-moderna contra o derrotismo e o niilismo que a assediam, importa uma retomada da aliança socrático-mosaica. O seu novo pacto poderá acontecer reconhecendo a capacidade veritativa da razão natural, além do âmbito das ciências e da ética, no qual muitos quereriam deter-se.Abstract: The dialogue between secular and religious thinking is still a recurring theme in Western History (see the Habermas/Ratzinger debate and the lecture by Benedict XVI in Regensburg). Within this dialogue, the post-metaphysical crisis of the reason and the dehellenization process are at play, the latter being understood as the breaking of the Socratic-Mosaic alliance, that is, of the agreement between faith and reason regarding the question of truth. Such an alliance reconnects Greek philosophy (Socrates) and biblical discourse (Moses): the Mosaic difference between true and false with regard to religions encounters the Socratic difference between true and false concerning reason. Therefore, the quaestio de veritate and the topic of religio vera are not absent from the context of Revelation, although the modern criticism of religion holds that religion is only a question of piety and cult (Spinoza). The destiny of metaphysics is situated within that alliance. After the second navigation of the Greek metaphysics, a third navigation took place with Thomas Aquinas’ philosophy of being/actus essendi, setin motion by a trans-ontic metaphysics leading to the ontological centrality of the energeia/ actus. In order to mobilize the postmodern reason against the defeatism and nihilism by which it is assailed, it is important to return to the Socratic-Mosaic alliance. This new covenant is possible due to the veritative capacity of modern reason which goes beyond the realms of science and ethics, areas where many would like to remain.

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„Błogosławieni solidarni”

Horyzonty wolności ◽

10.15633/9788374388320.13 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 139-150

Author(s):

Mateusz Ziemlewski

Keyword(s):

Human Development ◽

Social Issues ◽

Human Person ◽

Main Idea ◽

Musical Form ◽

Pope Benedict Xvi ◽

Benedict Xvi ◽

The Bible ◽

Caritas In Veritate ◽

The Social

The issue of social issues was not alien in the theological reflection of Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger. A kind of opus magnum in the output of Pope Benedict XVI is the encycli-cal from 2009: Caritas in veritate. The Pope touches upon contemporary problems that concern humanity, trying to point to the most important capital which is a human being. At the same time, he indicates that for the defense of integral human development, it is necessary to agree and respect his spiritual layer. The Pope warns that humanism without God becomes inhuman humanism. An expression of solidarity is respect for religious free-dom, and the greatest enemy of solidarity, according to Benedict XVI, is marginalization. In 1983, in Bydgoszcz, there was a confrontation of the social movement of “Solidarity” with the civic militia. In response, Henryk Mikołaj Górecki dedicated his work to Byd-goszcz Miserere op. 44. The composer’s religious creativity in times of forcing the idea of practical materialism reminded us of a deeper (spiritual) layer of reality. The words taken from the Bible and the Roman Missal, accompanied by a four-part choir, lead the listener through meditation on the human person and life. The article points to the main idea of both authors not to degrade man to the material and biological. The evidence points to the theological way of the Pope’s command and the musical form of the message of religious content by H. M. Gorecki.

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