Thomas Aquinas A Very Short Introduction

Thomas Aquinas, one of the most famous and highly thought of Christian thinkers, was a controversial figure who was exposed and engaged in conflict. This Very Short Introduction looks at Aquinas in a historical context, and explores the Church and culture into which Aquinas was born. It also ask why Aquinas matters now.

St. Thomas Aquinas enables the reader to appreciate both Thomas's continuity with earlier thought and his creative independence. After a useful account of the life and work of St. Thomas, McInerny shows how the thoughts of Aristotle, Boethius, and Augustine and Pseudo-Dionysius were assimilated into the personal wisdom of St. Thomas. He also offers a helpful study of the distinctive features of Aquinas's Christian theology.

Thomas Aquinas, one of the most famous and highly thought of Christian thinkers, was a controversial figure who was exposed and engaged in conflict. This Very Short Introduction looks at Aquinas in a historical context, and explores the Church and culture into which Aquinas was born. It also ask why Aquinas matters now.

This concise book tells the story of the most important theological work of the Middle Ages, the vast Summa theologiae of Thomas Aquinas, which holds a unique place in Western religion and philosophy. Written between 1266 and 1273, the Summa was conceived by Aquinas as an instructional guide for teachers and novices and a compendium of all the approved teachings of the Catholic Church. It synthesizes an astonishing range of scholarship, covering hundreds of topics and containing more than a million and a half words--and was still unfinished at the time of Aquinas's death. Here, Bernard McGinn, one of today's most acclaimed scholars of medieval Christianity, vividly describes the world that shaped Aquinas, then turns to the Dominican friar's life and career, examining Aquinas's reasons for writing his masterpiece, its subject matter, and the novel way he organized it. McGinn gives readers a brief tour of the Summa itself, and then discusses its reception over the past seven hundred years. He looks at the influence of the Summa on such giants of medieval Christendom as Meister Eckhart, its ridicule during the Enlightenment, the rise and fall of Neothomism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the role of the Summa in the post-Vatican II church, and the book's enduring relevance today.

“The pedagogical aim which we have before us in this little book forces us to limit ourselves to the consideration of the great and central doctrines of Thomism, and to leave aside the innumerable applications of those doctrines which may be found scattered up and down the extensive works of Thomas Aquinas”

It may be surprising that the thought of a medieval theologian still informs many areas of intellectual debate, but there continues to be lively interest in the work of Thomas Aquinas. He considers the most radical questions for our thinking about education: what is a human being? what does it mean to learn? what does it mean to teach? what does it mean to know, to understand, and to search for the truth? In this text, Vivian Boland offers a short biography of Aquinas focused on his personal experiences as a student and teacher. The book then provides a critical exposition of the texts in which Aquinas develops his views about education and includes a short account of the reception and influence of his thinking. Finally, it considers in some detail the most significant points of contact between Aquinas's educational thought and current concerns – his conviction about the goodness of the world, his holistic understanding of human experience and his contributions to virtue theory – and highlights the continuing relevance and influence of this work and thinking within educational philosophy today.

Part One: The History (What do we know?) This brief historical introduction to Aquinas assesses his impact on the world as it was at the time and outlines the key ideas and values connected with him. It explores the social, political and religious factors that formed the context of his life and writings, and considers how those factors affected the way he was initially received. Part Two: The Legacy (Why does it matter?) This second part surveys the intellectual and cultural ‘afterlife’ of Aquinas, exploring the ways in which his impact has lasted. Why does he continue to be so influential, and what aspects of his legacy are likely to endure beyond today and into the future? The book has a brief chronology at the front plus a glossary of key terms and a list of further reading at the back. Contents: Preface Chronology Part One: The History 1. Who Was Aquinas? 2. Some Basic Words and Concepts 3. Why Believe in God? 4. What is God? 5. The Christian God 6. Human Beings Part Two: The Legacy 7. From the Time of Aquinas to the Twenty-First Century 8. Thinking About Aquinas Today Glossary of Key Terms Notes Further Reading Index

Thomas Aquinas was one of the greatest Western philosphers and one of the greatest theologians of the Christian church. In this book we at last have a modern, comprehensive presentation of the total thought of Aquinas. Books on Aquinas invariably deal with either his philosophy or his theology. But Aquinas himself made no arbitrary division between his philosophical and his theological thought, and this book allows readers to see him as a whole. It introduces the full range of Aquinas' thinking; and it relates his thinking to writers both earlier and later than Aquinas himself.

Includes substantial selections from the Second Part of the Summa Theologica and the Summa Contra Gentiles. Pegis's revision and correction of the English Dominican Translation renders Aquinas' technical terminology consistently as it conveys the directness and simplicity of Aquinas' writing; the Introduction, notes, and index aim at giving the text its proper historical setting, and the reader the means of studying St. Thomas within that setting.

Aquinas provides an in-depth analysis of basic philosophical concepts in the thought of Aquinas. These concepts include: being, essence, existence, form, matter, truth, goodness, freedom and necessity, knowledge, willing and choosing, and right action. These ideas are approached from an analytical point of view but the analysis is not exceedingly technical, which allows beginners to follow the discussion. Many other works consider only one aspect of Aquinas's thought such as his treatment of persons, his arguments for God's existence, or his theory of truth but Peterson's Aquinas combines readability with both depth and close analysis to give a comprehensive overview of Aquinas's work without sacrificing either accuracy or depth.