Book Review: Ethics as a Work of Charity: Thomas Aquinas and Pagan Virtue

Abstract

Ethics as a Work of Charity: Thomas Aquinas and Pagan Virtue. By David Decosimo. Encountering Traditions. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2014. xiii + 354 pp. $65.00 (cloth).David Decosimo pitches his book on Thomas Aquinas and pagan virtue as a text which contributes, in its broadest sense, to the task of working through the following ethical question: how should the church position itself in regard to individuals outside of it? What language-and which categories-can the church use in order to describe the acts and lives of those who do not put their faith and trust in Christ, and who do not know themselves to be animated by the grace of the Triune God? In his introduction, Decosimo describes how Christian encounters with outsiders are often characterized by problematic and underdeveloped patterns of moral judgment. Christian convictions concerning the truth of the gospel, the seriousness of human sin, and the identity of Christ as the one Redeemer would seem to generate a very specific notion of what it means to live a good life. If Christianity teaches that a new person is born at the point of baptism, there must be a real and vital difference between the acts and orientation of a Christian life, and the acts and orientation of those without the faith. Surely, then, such non-Christians are to be judged as deficient in their habits and ways, as incapable of true goodness?It is at this juncture, and with these questions in mind, that Decosimo draws on the thought of Thomas Aquinas. In his view, Aquinas fruitfully welcomes pagan or non-Christian virtue, producing a coherent picture of how it is unified in its pursuit of political and natural human goods, how it does not necessarily or intrinsically deny God as the final end of all creation, and how its practice is therefore worthy of genuine respect. And Aquinas does this, Decosimo contends, without diluting his own commitment to the gospel, and without his understanding of human goodness simply disintegrating into Pelagianism. Indeed, Aquinas's welcome of pagan virtue includes the judgment that such virtue is indeed wholly other to the infused, grace-given virtue which animates Christian lives, and is directed through charity towards beatitude.Moreover-and this is just as important-Decosimo also reads Aquinas as practicing and teaching charity to outsiders through his very act of discussing and debating the problem of pagan virtue. In Aquinas's textual dealings with his authorities, including both Augustine and Aristotle (representing tradition and pagan outsider respectively), Decosimo detects a fine capacity to treat their arguments fully and generously, even where he disagrees. …