Folia Theologica 17. (2006)
Hugh Barbour: Salvare Apparentia
314 H. BARBOUR theories have value nonetheless, even in philosophy: Aristotoles tamen utitur huiusmodi suppositionibus. In the ninth chapter of the first book of his Summa contra gentiles St. Thomas clarifies the nature of the rationes used to expound those truths of faith which exceed the capacity of reason: Sunt tarnen ad huiusmodi veritatem manifestandam rationes aliquae verisimiles inducendae, ad fidelium quidem exercituum et solatium, non autem ad adversarios convincendos: quia ipsa rationum insufficentia eos magis in errore suo confirmaret, dum aestimarent nos propter tam debiles rationes veritati fidei consentire. Verisimiles et debiles rationes! Could any modern critic of scholasticism have put it more bluntly? The fact is that St. Thomas is more keenly aware of the limits of ancient science than any rationalist, idealist, phenomenologist, existentialist or semiotician has ever has been. The relative unreliability of the theories of natural philosophy does not trouble him, rather it functions as a sort of praeambulum to the supremely supra-rational datum of revelation. VI. The Response to the Objections A serious query must be answered here, which perhaps has already occured to my hearers. It would seem that the original objections taken from the obsolescence of ancient cosmology have not really been answered in our respondeo, since it can be argued that the bulk of St. Thomas' teaching does not concern strictly revealed truths inaccessible to reason, but a vast number of questions about which reason can conclude with certaintly or at least opine. Thus the original videtur quod sic of our article on the obsolescence of a theology based on ancient cosmology will need a specific answer. Even granting what St. Thomas teaches about the rationes verisimiles used to deepen our understanding of strictly revealed truths, it still remains true that he holds that, as regards truths which are accessible to human reason, truly demonstrative arguments can be taken from the physics of Aristotle. If, then, the cosmology of Aristotle, which, after all, is the common patrimony of ancient science, is outmoded, then what becomes of these arguments? The answer to this question is all-important if one considers how much of St. Thomas' theology deals with such truths. To un-
