1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910957338503321

Autore

Rosental Creighton

Titolo

Lessons from Aquinas : a resolution of the problem of faith and reason / / Creighton Rosental

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Macon, GA, : Mercer University Press, c2011

ISBN

0-88146-361-2

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (273 p.)

Disciplina

231/.042092

Soggetti

Faith and reason - Christianity - History of doctrines

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. [241]-249) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Introduction to the problem of faith and reason -- Aquinas's acount of reason -- Aquinas's account of faith -- Interaction of faith and reason -- Putting it all together : Aquinas's solution to the problem of faith and reason.

Sommario/riassunto

Thomas Aquinas has long been understood to have reconciled faith and reason. Typically, he is understood as having provided justification for faith by means of proof, particularly, that the Five Ways prove the existence of God. Under this interpretation, faith becomes a species of justified belief, and the justification for faith rests upon the success of the Five Ways (or, alternatively, on the success of other justificatory evidence). In this book, Creighton Rosental argues that Aquinas¿s account of faith is not one of justified belief, at least as it is understood in contemporary philosophy. Instead, Rosental argues, faith has its own basis for epistemic ¿reasonableness¿ ¿ a reasonableness that does not derive from ordinary evidence or proof. Rather than requiring evidence accessible to the natural light of reason, Aquinas holds that faith has its own sort of ¿evidence¿¿that which results from the light of faith. Aquinas ¿Aristotelianizes¿ faith and argues that faith has the Aristotelian epistemic virtue of certitude, and in so doing reconciles faith and Aristotelian reason, at least as Aristotle was understood by Medieval philosophers.  This reconciliation resolves important tensions between Aristotelian science and Christian doctrine. Further, Rosental examines three contemporary accounts of what counts as an epistemically ¿responsible¿ belief (namely, justified belief, practical



rationality, and warrant) and argue that under Aquinas¿s account, faith should be counted as rational, and in an important, though modified sense, as justified. Rosental¿s book is an erudite and accessible reading of this most fundamental issue in Thomistic studies.