Aquinas, Original Sin, and the Challenge of Evolution by Daniel W. Houck

Abstract

Reviewed by: Aquinas, Original Sin, and the Challenge of Evolution by Daniel W. Houck Celia Deane-Drummond Aquinas, Original Sin, and the Challenge of Evolution. By Daniel W. Houck. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Pp. ix + 284. $99.99, £75.00 (hardback). ISBN: 978-1-108-49369-7. This book opens and closes with Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles— specifically, his account of Tess giving birth to an illegitimate son, Sorrow, whose death as an infant was doubly traumatic for her. There was the sorrow of death itself, but that sorrow was amplified by Tess’s fear that, having not been baptized by a priest, and because of the illegitimacy of his birth, Sorrow would be condemned to a tortuous hell. This opens up an account of different readings of original sin. A reader would be mistaken, however, to suppose that storytelling or literary images of original sin are integral to this book. Instead, Houck tries to navigate an in-depth conversation with very different potential audiences, from evangelical Protestants to traditional Roman Catholics and Thomist scholars. He also engages with evolutionary theory and other objections to classical accounts of original sin and the Fall. As the title suggests, Thomas Aquinas is Houck’s main and consistent classic source, though, coming from an evangelical starting point, he also pays close attention to scriptural interpretation, specifically St. Paul’s account of sin in Romans. Not only does he engage in an in-depth analysis of Thomistic sources, but he also, to a degree, adopts Aquinas’s method, tracing carefully all the possible objections to his argument and one by one trying to convince the reader of the cogency of his own specific position. The argument in a nutshell is the following. First, Houck argues for a retrieval of aspects of a Thomistic account of original sin and the Fall, moving from a Thomistic notion of original justice to the idea of original sin as a deprivation of supernatural grace, a position which he names “New Thomism.” Second, he argues that this is compatible with both traditional theological views of human origins and the Fall and with those theological positions which seek to accommodate accounts of evolution. Against the backdrop of Sorrow’s plight, Houck raises all the possible objections to the idea of original sin as inherited guilt: (a) its lack of explicit [End Page 165] foundation in a correct exegesis of Romans 5:12; (b) alternative classic views, such as that of Gregory of Nyssa, who believed the kingdom of heaven was the natural end of humanity; (c) that original sin is pernicious; or even (d) that it does not make sense within modern culture informed by the sciences, particularly the evolutionary sciences. Houck argues that such objections do not really grapple sufficiently with the complexity of the origin of the idea of original sin, debates about the historicity of the Fall, and how it can still be construed in a way that makes sense, even for those who are prepared to accept evolutionary ideas. For Houck, a denial of original sin obscures the universal need of redemption, and affirming original sin without an account of the Fall seems to compromise the belief that creation is fundamentally good. He compares his modified Thomistic approach on original sin, which stresses the lack of sanctifying grace, with alternative modified views of original sin, such as that it is a disposition to sin, or that it means being born into a sinful condition, or that it is personal sin. The first chapter delves into an Augustinian approach to original sin, drawing on both primary sources and medieval debates. The second chapter is particularly significant, as it shows a development in Thomistic thought on original sin, from an earlier position which distinguishes between the role of the human will in the state of original justice and the work of supernatural grace, to later writings where Aquinas implies that the formal cause of original justice is sanctifying grace. Houck argues that Aquinas’s mature view suggests that the disposition to original justice could not have been sexually transmitted, since by definition sanctifying grace is supernatural. The third chapter develops the...