Aquinas on Christ's Will to Die and Our Salvation

Abstract

Aquinas on Christ's Will to Die and Our Salvation Piotr Roszak Why the Psalms Matter for Biblical Thomism Saint Thomas Aquinas, after composing commentaries on several books of the Old and New Testament, commenced work on his commentary on the Psalms.1 The Psalms commentary originates in a period when commenting on the Psalms was a popular practice; in fact, many theologians began their careers with such works.2 Thomas, on the other hand, turns to the Psalms while in the prime of his theological career. Why did he start so late? There are no clear answers, but perhaps the history of commentaries on the Psalms throughout the Middle Ages may shed light on Thomas's approach. Aquinas wrote Super Psalmos at a time that Martin Morard describes as a change of "epochs."3 It seems that high Scholastic interest focused upon [End Page 199] Saint Paul and the synthesis of biblical theology.4 Neither Albert the Great nor Bonaventure produced written commentaries on the Psalms, and only in the fourteenth century do the Psalms return as a biblical book commented upon at medieval universities. Thomas's distinctive take on the Psalms therefore invites the following questions: what kind of theological message do they reveal for Thomas's sacra doctrina and how does it affect what is labeled as "biblical Thomism"? It is worth emphasizing that the term "biblical Thomism" does not simply refer to exploring forgotten texts of Aquinas.5 Rather, it consists essentially in following the method or "form" of the Angelic Doctor's thoughts as the coordinates on which his doctrinal reflections can be located. Biblical Thomism gravitates toward biblical texts, circles around them, and builds a synthesis based on the testimony of Divine Revelation. It thus seeks to understand Aquinas's biblical reasoning and thereby elucidate his speculative approach. Understood in this way, biblical Thomism approaches theology as the "resonation" of the Word of God.6 This resonation echoes the Fathers and gives birth to a synthesis via a continuous "unifying process" around the biblical center using all available knowledge and its consistent interpretation. Returning to Thomas's commentary on the Psalms, then, we can only understand his style of interpretation by means of this unifying process. Thus, reading his Super Psalmos must unfold in tandem with reading those [End Page 200] works of Saint Thomas in which he refers and quotes specific Psalms.7 The great number of these quotations in Aquinas's answer to the theological question (often in the sed contra, but also in the corpus of the article) make the tissue of that question biblical, testifying to the psalmist's argumentative value. At the same time, to grasp the full message of Aquinas, it is also necessary to take into account the Magna glossatura of Peter Lombard and to compare it to the tertia pars of the Summa theologiae [ST], which was written at the same time as the Super Psalmos. Precisely for that reason, our topic here will be a theme that is raised in both of these works: the Passion of Christ as a way of realizing our salvation. Therefore, in the hope of regaining Aquinas's soteriological framework, we will rephrase Saint Anselm, raising the question "cur Deus crucifixus?" Why the Cross? Psalm 21 in the Vulgate—"Deus, Deus meus quare me dereliquisti?"—offers a particularly suitable pericope for such analysis. For Aquinas, Psalm 21 offers a lens through which to read the course of the Passion. From a hermeneutic point of view, Thomas interprets it ad litteram as a text illuminating the Passion of Christ, and he treats it figuratively as the story about David and his sufferings. As a type of lamentation, this psalm is interpreted by Aquinas as an integral part of five psalms that refer to Christ's Passion.8 Therefore, each psalm, although starting with groaning, anticipates salvation and thanksgiving. Thomas sees this same pattern in the way that Christ begins the prayer on the Cross; it is not an expression of despair but a recitation of the "way of salvation" that marks the beginning of his suffering. Hence, the perspective of interpretation, also supported by the title given the...