The God of Philosophy and of the Bible: Theological Reflections on Regensburg

Abstract

THERE HAS BEEN AMPLE Commentary on Pope Benedict XVI's remarks about Islam in his Regensburg Address of September 12, 2006. But there has been very little sustained comment on the other major story that emerged from that lecture: the relationship between Christian faith and human rationality. For the Pope not only derided the kind of reason that proceeds without faith, he also took to task those who failed to grasp that faith is inextricably bound up with reason, even with a certain kind of philosophical thinking. This was the major story that went largely unreported and yet is of enduring importance for understanding Christian life and thought. conjunctive coherence of faith and reason is a position that has a long and venerable heritage extending through many of the earliest Fathers of the Church. They recognized that reason, logos, already said something important about God, even if this needed to be amplified, corrected, and transformed by revelation. Second-and third-century Christians such as Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen all had something to contribute on this question. On the other hand, the third-century theologian Tertullian famously asked, What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem, the Academy with the Church? Precious little, Tertullian thundered: Away with all attempts to produce a mottled Christianity of Stoic, Platonic and dialectic composition! We want no curious disputation after possessing Christ Jesus, no inquisition after enjoying the Gospel! (1) For the North African thinker, philosophy represented, at least often enough, an attempt to deform and mutilate transparent biblical truth. While many remember Tertullian's pointed remarks, fewer are likely to be familiar with a Tertullian redivivus, the medieval friar Jacopone da Todi, long considered the author of the beautiful Latin hymn about Mary, the Stabat Mater. In the middle of the thirteenth century, Jacopone was irritated with the growing number of Franciscan friars leaving Assisi for the allurements of learning available at the University of Paris, inspiring his mocking couplet The frati flock to Paris schools / And all Assisi's ardor cools. Philosophical reasoning, for Jacopone, deadens and defaces the fiery spirit of Christian piety. poet could not resist expanding on his sentiments: Plato and Socrates may contend And all the breath in their bodies spend Arguing with an end What's it all to me? Only a pure and simple mind Straight to heaven its way does find Greets the King ... while far behind Lags the world's philosophy ... (2) Church warmly embraced Jacopone's graceful Marian hymn but stayed at arm's length from his dyslogistic view of philosophy and reason. In fact, just as the Franciscan poet was railing against philosophical exposition, St. Thomas Aquinas was further developing the consensual tradition of the early Church: there exists a deep convergence between the best of philosophy and the Christian faith; grace perfects nature and reason, it does not destroy them. (3) Ever aware of St. Paul's assertion, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, Aquinas says that the apostle is not rejecting philosophy per se, but warning against trusting in one's personal erudition. (4) In his recent Regensburg lecture, Benedict's concern for a proper balancing of faith and reason reprised several of these significant issues. (5) encounter between the biblical message and Greek thought was providential, he argues, as witnessed by the vision of St. Paul in Acts 16 wherein his path to Asia is blocked while a Macedonian pleads for his aid. Paul's vision, in fact, may be interpreted as indicating a necessary and fruitful rapprochement between biblical faith and Greek inquiry. Pope recounts that the name of God revealed in Exodus 3:13 suggested to the Fathers of the Church a unity of belief and thought, of philosophy and faith. biblical name for God, I am, is here unified with a philosophical idea, the notion of existence and being. …