Basics of Systematic Theology
For Systematic Theology & Eschatology with Dr. T. Adam Van Wart, PhD July 22, 2020
Theology is a human endeavor which seeks scientific knowledge of God. As students of Catholic theology, we have made our first discovery: we can identify God because He has revealed Himself to us. We are not seeking to find Him, but to expand our knowledge of Him. We seek wisdom. We find this wisdom in the word of God Himself.
Dei Verbum states:
“the object of theology is the Truth which is the living God and His plan for salvation revealed in Jesus Christ”[1]
St. Thomas Aquinas tells us:
“Sacred doctrine derives its principles not from any human knowledge, but from the divine knowledge, through which, as through the highest wisdom, all our knowledge is set in order.”[2]
“This doctrine is wisdom above all human wisdom; not merely in any one order, but absolutely.”[3]
We are not limited to Sacred Doctrine. We have the works of the early Fathers of the Church, and of all the great theologians that have come before us. Their insights help us to understand Sacred Doctrine, and build upon it. In one sense, all the work of theology is commentary on the Word of God. Theology is not a closed book; we constantly seek greater understanding. As recently as 1990, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith reminded us that theology is not just something for the past:
“Theology has importance for the Church in every age so that it can respond to the plan of God ‘who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth’ (1 Tim 2:4).” [4]
They also gave us instruction as to how we ought study those who came before us:
“it is one of the theologian's tasks to give a correct interpretation to the texts of the Magisterium and to this end he employs various hermeneutical rules. Among these is the principle which affirms that Magisterial teaching, by virtue of divine assistance, has validity beyond its argumentation, which may derive at times from a particular theology.”[5]
To do theology well, we need to do more than just read a passage and make our pronouncement of its meaning. There are steps we must take if we are to do theology systematically and sapientially to achieve a beautiful theology.
In theology, truths are arranged into four categories. First is formal revelation; second, defined truths logically or historically implied by formal revelation, but not specifically defined in scripture; third, undefined truths affirmed by the theologically scientific community, but not formally proclaimed; and fourth, undefined truths which have not yet been settled.
In 1998, Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Letter Ad Tuendam Fidem set out changes to the Code of Canon Law addressing these categories and the theologians’ duty to be bound by the Magisterium. Canon Law states:
“A person must believe with divine and Catholic faith all those things contained in the word of God, written or handed on, that is, in the one deposit of faith entrusted to the Church, and at the same time proposed as divinely revealed either by the solemn magisterium of the Church or by its ordinary and universal magisterium which is manifested by the common adherence of the Christian faithful under the leadership of the sacred magisterium; therefore all are bound to avoid any doctrines whatsoever contrary to them.
“Each and every thing which is proposed definitively by the magisterium of the Church concerning the doctrine of faith and morals, that is, each and every thing which is required to safeguard reverently and to expound faithfully the same deposit of faith, is also to be firmly embraced and retained; therefore, one who rejects those propositions which are to be held definitively is opposed to the doctrine of the Catholic Church.”[6]
Theologians need proper formation, particularly in the areas of training, either by direct apprenticeship or by higher education. Theologians also need training to cultivate the habits of virtue; to practice regular prayer; and to be grounded and shaped in regular worship. A theologian, particularly one in formation, might find a Spiritual Director to be helpful, perhaps even more so in this time when pandemic may keep us from our regular worship.
Each of these areas of development holds their own importance, and are intertwined. A lack in any one of these areas could lead to producing an ugly theology, or at least an underdeveloped one.
On the importance of the theological virtues, Aquinas held
“charity makes us adhere to God for His own sake, uniting our minds to God by the emotion of love. . . Now we derive from God both knowledge of truth and the attainment of perfect goodness. Accordingly faith makes us adhere to God, as the source whence we derive the knowledge of truth, since we believe that what God tells us is true: while hope makes us adhere to God, as the source whence we derive perfect goodness, i.e. in so far as, by hope, we trust to the Divine assistance for obtaining happiness.”[7]
Theology’s primary condition is faith. Faith is that on which the task of theology is founded. Faith has two fundamental aspects. The first is the objective, content component, which is the faith taught by the Catholic Church. This is often differentiated in print by being referred to as “The Faith.” The second aspect is the subjective, responsive component, that is, one’s own faith. I think few of us would claim to know everything about The Faith, but our own faith is based on both natural revelation and our knowledge of The Faith. The Bible defines faith:
“Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen.”[8]
Aquinas states “since the object of fear is an evil, sometimes, on account of the evils he fears, man withdraws from God, and this is called human fear; while sometimes, on account of the evils he fears, he turns to God and adheres to Him.”[9] This illustrates the difference between the objective “The Faith” and the subjective, one’s own faith. If we withdraw from God, we are acting on the subjective, because there is nothing in the objective that suggests separating ourselves from God is ever good.
Natural revelation has a place in theology, as theology addresses all that God has made. People who have never had an opportunity to know God can still discern Him in all the surrounds us. When we look to the stars and believe there is a power that caused them to exist, we find revealed to us in nature our wonder and awe at all that God has created.
Natural revelation is one type of revelation, and is in itself incomplete. Had God not revealed Himself to us, we could not know Him by natural revelation alone. Feingold states
“Creation comes forth (exitus) from God so that it can return (reditus) to Him in knowledge and love.” [10]
“God’s Revelation allows our knowledge of Him to penetrate to His intimate life and to His gratuitous acts in salvation history.”[11]
In addition to natural revelation, we have special revelation, that is, the Word of God. The Bible contains the inspired Word. Feingold states
“the Catholic faith firmly professes that ‘inspirational,’ in the strict theological sense, is not present in any book other than those in the Old and New Testaments.”[12]
Further, Feingold tells us, this inspiration is “the exclusive property of the Bible”[13]
Marshall tells us:
“Animated by the Holy Spirit, faith recognizes the voice of God in the teaching and proclamation of the Church, and believes what God says because God, who is the truth itself, says it. Yet faith also knows that no appeal to authority, even divine authority, yields understanding. Divine authority teaches us what is true about God, but not why it is true.”[14]
Marshall continues:
“Basic Christian teaching requires that whatever perfections are found in the world among the material objects connatural to our intellect must be thought of as created by God.”
We also have the teachings of the Magisterium, which not only supplement special revelation, but also help us to understand it. Dei Verbum states we must hear the word of God with reverence and proclaim it with faith.[15] The 1993 publication of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, "The Interpretation of the Bible in the Church," gives us further guidelines. Feingold reviews these, stating that we must read and interpret with critical reasoning, using the interpretative tools available to us, such as text criticism, literary criticism, genre criticism, form criticism, and canonical criticism.[16]
Canonical criticism in particular is a useful tool in theological apologetics, as it calls for reading in context, so that no part of the Bible may be taken out of context and read to contradict another part.
Griffiths states that theology in its broadest sense is “engaging in reasoned thoughts and discourse about god.”[17] He gives a more narrow definition for Catholic theology”
“Catholic theology is constituted as such by the fact that its discourse about the Lord is self-consciously and intentionally responsive to what the Lord has given of himself to his bride, the Church. That gift is given and evident paradigmatically and essentially in the Lord's gift of himself as Jesus Christ, and in the events preparatory to and flowing from that gift—which is to say the election of Israel and the founding and sustaining of the Church. More particularly, and since theology is distinct from worship, which is responsive to that same gift, Catholic theology is responsive to the Lord’s doctrinal self-gift, which is to say the gift of a lexicon and a syntax for thinking and speaking about the Lord, and of a substantive set of teachings about the Lord's nature and activity.”[18]
Catholic theology is, then, man returning to God in reflective thought those truths which God has revealed to us about Himself. We have been given a means to consider God, and a particular way to do so.
We cannot truly speak of God as He is, for we can understand Him only in our humanity. Therefore, we speak of God largely analogically. Pseudo-Dionysius explains how we are limited.
“We can use only what scripture has disclosed.”[19] “
“With our minds made prudent and holy, we offer worship to that which lies hidden beyond thought and beyond being.”[20]
Pseudo-Dionysius goes on to say that we cannot use our imaginations to form a vision of God:
“But as for now, what happens is this. We use whatever appropriate symbols we can for the things of God. … We call to a halt to the activities of our minds and, to the extent that is proper, we approach the ray which transcends being.”[21]
Pseudo-Dionysius reminds us of our limitations. Consider the Apostles at the Transfiguration. They were unable to comprehend what they were seeing, and responded in such human terms that even the Evangelist says Peter was “not knowing what he said.”[22] If Peter, standing next to Christ, cannot comprehend, how can we?
Pseudo-Dionysius holds that what we worship we cannot comprehend. Aquinas, for his part, concedes this, but holds that we need not comprehend; we worship simply by knowledge of the existence of God.[23]
Theology’s guise is beauty, and is comprised of integrity, harmony and proportionality.[24] Hart calls beauty
“a category indispensable to Christian thought.”[25]
He states
“In the beautiful God’s glory is revealed as something communicable and intrinsically delightful...”[26]
A beautiful theology is truthful. We cannot pick and choose the truth; we cannot randomly quote the Bible to support a view, while ignoring another quote which would not support it. Our theology is harmonious when we avoid contradiction, for contradiction leads to error. Our theology has proportion when we treat truths with consideration of their importance. That is not to suggest that some truths are not important, simply that all truths are not of the same importance. That Jesus turned water into wine at Cana has more theological weight than pondering whether Mary knew that was what He would do when she told Him they were out of wine!
Theology’s horizon is hope. Aquinas tells us that hope’s
“principal object is eternal happiness as being possible to obtain by the assistance of God.”[27]
Hope is appropriate to us here on earth, because it looks to the future when we are united with God in the beatific vision. Once we have obtained that ultimate which is what we hope for,
“when happiness is no longer future, but present, it is incompatible with the virtue of hope. Consequently hope, like faith, is voided in heaven, and neither of them can be in the blessed.”[28]
We pursue theology with hope that on our horizon is that perfection of happiness of the beatific vision. The beatific vision is beyond our earthly understanding.
Theology’s form is cruciform love. A theology not formed by love would be self-serving. It would reflect not objective but solely the reflective. Its output would be like “a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.”[29] It would be theology without integrity, harmony or proportionality.
In doing the work of theology, we do well to emulate the Blessed Mother.
Thus St. Mary is our pattern of Faith, both in the reception and in the study of Divine Truth. She does not think it enough to accept, she dwells upon it; not enough to possess, she uses it; not enough to assent, she develops it; not enough to submit the Reason, she reasons upon it; not indeed reasoning first, and believing afterwards, with Zacharias, yet first believing without reasoning, next from love and reverence, reasoning after believing.”[30]
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. "Instruction On The Ecclesial Vocation Of Theologian". Vatican.Va, 1990. http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/
documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19900524_theologian-vocation_en.html.
Feingold, Lawrence. Faith Comes From What Is Heard. Reprint, Steubenville, Ohio: Emmaus Academic, 2017.
Griffiths, Paul J. "Theological Disagreement: What It Is & How To Do It". Lecture, San Diego, CA, 2014.
Hart, David Bentley. The Beauty of The Infinite. Reprint, Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 2004.
Marshall, Bruce D. "Christ The End Of Analogy". In The Analogy Of Being: Invention Of The Antichrist Or The Wisdom Of God?, 294-327 (white first page proofs). Thomas Joseph White. Reprint, Grand Rapids, MI: W. B. Eerdmans, 2011.
Marshall, Bruce D. "The Theologian's Ecclesial Vocation". First Things, 2013.
Newman, John Henry. Fifteen Sermons. Reprint, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1997.
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, Colm Luibheid, and Paul Rorem. The Complete Works. Reprint, New York: Paulist, 1987.
St. Thomas Aquinas. "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: Hope, Considered In Itself (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 17)". Newadvent.Org. Accessed 28 January 2020. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/3017.htm.
St. Thomas Aquinas. "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: How God Is Known By Us (Prima Pars, Q. 12)". Newadvent.Org. Accessed 28 January 2020. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1012.htm.
St. Thomas Aquinas. "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The Gift Of Fear (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 19)". Newadvent.Org. Accessed 28 January 2020. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/3019.htm.
St. Thomas Aquinas. "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The Nature And Extent Of Sacred Doctrine (Prima Pars, Q. 1)". Newadvent.Org. Accessed 28 January 2020. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1001.htm.
St. Thomas Aquinas. "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The Subject Of Hope (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 18)". Newadvent.Org. Accessed 28 January 2020. https://www.newadvent.org/summa/3018.htm.
The Holy Bible: Revised Standard Version, Second Catholic Edition. San Francisco, CA:Ignatius Press, 2005.
Vatican II Council. "Dogmatic constitution on divine revelation: Dei verbum." Solemnly promulgated by His Holiness Pope Paul VI on November 18, 1965. Accessed June 15 2005. http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19651118_dei-verbum_en.html
[1] Vatican II Council, Dei Verbum (hereafter DV), Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation, par 8, in Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, ed. A. Flannery (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1975), 24.
[2] St. Thomas Aquinas, "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The Nature And Extent Of Sacred Doctrine (Prima Pars, Q. 1)", Newadvent.Org, accessed 28 January 2020, https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1001.htm.
[3] Ibid
[4] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, "Instruction On The Ecclesial Vocation Of Theologian", Vatican.Va, 1990, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/
rc_con_cfaith_doc_19900524_theologian-vocation_en.html.
[5] DonumVeritatis para 34
[6] Canon 750, Sections 1 and 2, Code of Canon Law http://www.vatican.va/archive/cod-iuris-canonici/eng/documents/cic_lib3-cann747-755_en.html#BOOK_III.
[7] St. Thomas Aquinas, "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: Hope, Considered In Itself (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 17)", Newadvent.Org, accessed 28 January 2020, https://www.newadvent.org/summa/3017.htm.
[8] Hebrews 11:1 (Revised Standard Version, 2nd Catholic Edition)
[9] St. Thomas Aquinas, "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The Gift Of Fear (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 19)", Newadvent.Org, accessed 28 January 2020, https://www.newadvent.org/summa/3019.htm.
[10] Lawrence Feingold, Faith Comes From What Is Heard (repr., Steubenville, Ohio: Emmaus Academic, 2017), 5
[11] Feingold, 93
[12] Feingold, 282.
[13] Feingold 282.
[14] Bruce D. Marshall, "The Theologian's Ecclesial Vocation", First Things, 2013.
[15] Dei Verbum, Preface
[16] Feingold, 330-374
[17] Paul J. Griffiths, "Theological Disagreement: What It Is & How To Do It", (Lecture, repr., San Diego, CA, 2014). p.2
[18] Griffiths,. p.3
[19] Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, Colm Luibheid and Paul Rorem, The Complete Works (repr., New York: Paulist, 1987). 588C
[20] Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite ,589B
[21] Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, 592D
[22] Luke 9:33 1 (Revised Standard Version, 2nd Catholic Edition)
[23] St. Thomas Aquinas, "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: How God Is Known By Us (Prima Pars, Q. 12)", Newadvent.Org, accessed 28 January 2020, https://www.newadvent.org/summa/1012.htm.
[24] David Bentley Hart, The Beauty Of The Infinite (repr., Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 2004).16
[25] Hart.16
[26] Hart. 17
[27] St. Thomas Aquinas, "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: Hope, Considered In Itself (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 17)".
[28] St. Thomas Aquinas, "SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The Subject Of Hope (Secunda Secundae Partis, Q. 18)", Newadvent.Org, accessed 28 January 2020, https://www.newadvent.org/summa/3018.htm.
[29] 1 Cor 13:1 (Revised Standard Version, 2nd Catholic Edition)
[30] John Henry Newman, Fifteen Sermons (repr., Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1997), 313.
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