Aquinas and the Summa Theologiae: The Healing Work of Teaching

That Aquinas' type of scholasticism might be therapeutic in character is suggested by Vivian Boland, who calls it ‘the healing work of teaching.’Footnote ⁶ He refers here to the phrase often used to describe Aquinas' teaching, sana doctrina, which is routinely translated as ‘sound teaching,’ but which, he suggests, would be better translated as ‘healthy teaching.’ That Aquinas does conceive of teaching as about human health is manifest in his discussion of human teaching in general and the particular work of the Summa. As Boland points out, Aquinas himself makes use of the medical analogy for teaching:

For Aquinas this analogy serves to make clear the proper relationship between teacher and learner. In the healing art the primary agent is the sick person himself or herself. It is his or her natural capacity to become well and to be healthy that medicine is meant to help and foster. In like manner, in the work of teaching it is the learner who is the primary agent, and it is his or her capacity for learning that teaching is meant to nurture and bring to fruition.Footnote ⁸

In the Summa, Aquinas places his discussion of human teaching in the wider context of God's government of the created world. Teaching thus becomes a way in which human beings share in the divine government, through bringing others to a greater understanding of God and his created world, including the place of human beings within it. By extension, human teaching is a sharing in the healing work of Jesus of Nazareth, regarded by Aquinas as the most excellent of teachers, bringing freedom and life through his teaching as well as curing the sick of their bodily ailments.Footnote ⁹

Aquinas starts the Summa Theologiae as a whole with a discussion of a particular sort of teaching: sacred teaching (sacra doctrina) and its necessity for human beings, its nature and extent.Footnote ¹⁰ Aquinas argues that sacred teaching is necessary ad humanam salutem.Footnote ¹¹ Again the standard translation of this phrase as ‘human salvation’ misses the therapeutic character of such teaching and the richness of what Aquinas intends by salus is better expressed by ‘human health,’ in the widest sense of human flourishing.Footnote ¹²

Sacred teaching is necessary for human health, Aquinas argues, because human health comes through the knowledge of God, which constitutes final happiness for human beings.Footnote ¹³ And, in the first place, sacred teaching means the revealed knowledge of God that exceeds the natural capacity of the human intellect to learn unaided and which is necessary for us if we are to make any progress towards God. In a wider sense sacred teaching is intellectual reflection on this revealed knowledge, such as that is found in the Summa itself. Revelation teaches us about the goal of human life and the means to it, while intellectual reflection clarifies its meaning and works out how human thoughts and actions are to be directed in conformity with it.

Sacred teaching in whatever form is, then, a healing work directed to a healing end, human happiness. In the case of sacred teaching, the work of medicine and the work of teaching are no longer analogues but a single unified reality, since God is the ultimate source of both human healing and human teaching.Footnote ¹⁴

Aquinas and the Summa Theologiae: The Summa as a Pedagogy of Happiness

That the Summa is intended to be a pedagogy is indicated at the very beginning of the work. Aquinas states that the Summa is intended ‘to instruct beginners’ (incipientes erudire). Moreover, it is a new type of account, meant to overcome shortcomings in the teaching methods of existing works:

The Summa, then, is intended to ‘hand over what belongs to Christian religion in that manner which befits the instruction of beginners,’ suited to their capacities and one that will lead them step-by-step to knowledge.

The basic building blocks of this ordered account are the series of micro-debates, the articles, that form the Summa from beginning to end. Each of these micro-debates replicates textually the oral disputations held in the medieval schools, the houses of study and learning. Each one focuses on a particular topic, considers one set of views (the objections), then a counter view, then sets forth the considered opinion of the teacher, and finally answers the earlier views put forward in the light of this opinion. As they carry the teaching forward the micro-debates of the articles are grouped together into the larger units of the questions and then again into the larger topics and sections that go to make up the Summa as a whole.

And the smaller and greater units refer the learner back and point him or her forward as the discussion carries on. The introductions to the larger units map out the learning territory, indicate the steps by which the discussion will proceed and locate it within the wider context of the text. In other words, they reproduce the system that Cabezón depicts as one of the characteristics of scholasticism, the ‘basic orderliness they believe to be found in the world’ through ‘a logical flow to the ‘narrative,’ seen as essential to pedagogy.’Footnote ¹⁶ The chief aim of sacred teaching, Aquinas says, is to hand over ‘knowledge of God, and not only as he is in himself, but also as he is the beginning of things and their end, especially of the rational creature,’ and so the Summa has three major parts dealing, he says, ‘first, of God; secondly, of the movement of the rational creature to God; thirdly, of Christ, who as man is our way of getting to God’ (Intro to 1.2). And the ordered account of the Summa is meant to be worked through as it stands, in the order of its presentation and in its entirely.

At the same time, the heart of the Summa is really the massive second part, which deals with the moral life. One influential view of the historical context in which Aquinas chose to compose the Summa put forward by Leonard Boyle is that the Summa was the product of Aquinas' own concerns as a teacher, responsible for setting up a new house of studies in the Dominican priory of Santa Sabina in Rome.Footnote ¹⁷ The Summa was composed as a teaching manual to train Dominican students for their pastoral commission to teach the Christian faith and hear confessions. They were ‘the beginners’ Aquinas is thinking about in the prologue. And following Boyle's suggestion, Mark Jordan argues that the Summa should be understood as addressing the need to set the moral life within the wider context of the Christian faith: the doctrines of God, Trinity, creation and Incarnation.Footnote ¹⁸ The new account of the Summa is intended, he argues, ‘to incorporate moral and pastoral topics within the pattern of the great Christian creeds.’Footnote ¹⁹ For Jordan the Summa is thus a pedagogy in the moral life:

The teaching is to be a single, continuous solicitation to acquire and exercise the habit of theology in all its parts.Footnote ²⁰

It is here that the focus on happiness becomes evident. At the very beginning of the second part, Aquinas comes back to consider the final goal of human life as the end to which the whole of the moral life has to be directed and this turns into an extended discussion of human happiness as that goal, which then extends into the whole discussion of human actions and the virtues. Mark Jordan sees the location of this discussion as itself a deliberate act of pedagogy:

Human happiness is, then, the starting point for the whole discussion of the moral life, which is itself the central focus of the Summa's teaching. As Fergus Kerr argues, human happiness or beatitude can be seen as the key to understanding both Aquinas' account of ethics and the Summa as a whole, the connection that links together the doctrine of God, theological ethics and the Christology.Footnote ²² As he puts it:

As a pedagogy structured around the search for human happiness, the Summa begins with the question of sacred teaching's necessity for the human health that is happiness. In the first part it commences its section on the unity of God with an affirmation that the knowledge of God is necessary for human happiness (ST 1.12) and it ends the account of the unity of God with a discussion of the happiness of God himself (ST 1.26). It starts the second part on the moral life with a discussion of happiness as the final goal of human life, the end that orders the whole of moral theology (ST 1-2. 1-5). And it starts the third part on the Incarnation of Christ with the statement that Christ is the ‘one who shows’ human beings through his humanity the way to ‘attain the happiness of eternal life’ (ST 3, Prologue), a happiness that Christ enjoys himself (ST 3.10).Footnote ²⁴

Rāmānuja and the Śrī Bhāṣya: The Healing Tonic of Vedāntic Teaching

Within the different schools of the Indian tradition of the Vedānta the principal work through which teaching is conveyed is the Brahma Sūtra Bhāṣya. A Vedāntic bhāṣya is a commentary on the Brahma Sūtras, the aphoristic text that is held to give the foundational teaching of the Vedāntic tradition, centred on the revelation contained in the Upaniṣads, which are taken by Vedānta to reveal knowledge of Brahman, the ground of being, knowledge of the true nature of the finite self (ātman) and of the relationship between them. The realisation of this knowledge brings with it release (mokṣa) from the cycle or rebirth (saṃsāra). A bhāṣya constructs a systematic account out of the various statements found in the Upaniṣads as being the correct interpretation of the terse sūtras, which stand in need of further explanation. A bhāṣya thus offers a counterpart to the ordered account of the Summa. Of the different schools of Vedānta the one best known in the West remains that of Advaita (Non-dualism) and the Bhāṣya of Śaṅkara (788-820 ce); but equally important is the Śrī Bhāṣya of Rāmānuja, whose own system came to be known as Viśiṣṭādvaita (Non-dualism of the differentiated).

As with the Summa, so the Vedāntic bhāṣya has often been treated as a mine from which ideas might be extracted, without concern for the particular way the bhāṣya presents its teaching. A corrective to this in recent Western scholarship has come with renewed emphasis on the Vedānta as Uttara Mīmāṃsā, the Later Exegesis (its traditional name in the Indian tradition) and a recognition that, as the Later Exegesis, Vedānta is centred on proper exegesis of the Upaniṣads and on the practice of correct meditation on these texts. Its primarily concern is with the formation of Vedāntic learners, so that they can actually pursue knowledge of Brahman as the final goal of human life.Footnote ²⁵

For Rāmānuja the Sūtras gives what we might call a healing tonic for the self, languishing in saṃsāra. In his introduction to the Śrī Bhāṣya and subsequent commentary on the first four Sūtras (1.1.1-4) Rāmānuja develops his own account of what the sacred teaching of the Vedānta is for and how it brings this about, its necessity and scope:

It is the nectar-like teaching of the Upaniṣads which ‘restores to life the self whose strength of life has departed because of the blazing fire of saṃsāra’ that the Bhāṣya explains and communicates.

And as the first Sūtra indicates, the Later Exegesis that comprises both the Sūtras and Bhāṣya is concerned with satisfying the brahmajijñāsā, the ‘desire to know Brahman,’ a desire that arises when it is realised that the knowledge taught in the Upaniṣads alone can bring release from the ‘blazing fire of saṃsāra.’ Moreover, as Rāmānuja goes on to argue, the sacred teaching of the Upaniṣads, interpreted by the Later Exegesis, is necessary for this since the knowledge of Brahman is beyond the reach of other instruments of human knowledge.Footnote ²⁷

The Sūtras guide us in the right exegesis of the Upaniṣads and they make Brahman known. But they also guide us in terms of how to practice meditation. For Rāmanuja, meditation (dhyāna or upāsana) is said to be a kind of bhakti (devotion). It has the form of ‘steady remembrance’ (druvānusmṛti), which comes to have the same form as vision of Brahman, thus moving the Vedāntic learner on to the final goal of unrestricted vision of Brahman in the released state:

In itself the Bhāṣya and the learning it offers are intended for those who are qualified by birth and ritual status to study the Vedas, those who belong to the three higher castes. Later Śrī Vaiṣṇava tradition calls this path bhakti-yoga (discipline of devotion), distinguishing it from the easier alternative path of prapatti (surrender) open to all.Footnote ²⁹ Those who undertake bhakti-yoga are committed to a rigorous and life-long programme of devotional meditation along with the performance of ritual and other actions proper to their status and the practice of yogic discipline conducive to the arising of the knowledge sought. The ‘steady remembrance’ of Brahman is something that comes about only gradually within the individual practitioner.Footnote ³⁰

For his part Rāmānuja does not use the medical analogy as such either to analyse the human condition or to explain what is involved in teaching and learning. However, the medical analogy as Aquinas uses it, and indeed his understanding of the healing work of sacred teaching, could appropriately be extended to Rāmānuja's understanding of Vedāntic teaching. For Rāmānuja the Vedāntic teaching is also a healing means to a healing goal, a healing tonic for the self languishing in the bondage of saṃsāra. Moreover, the teaching is there to enable the learner to go through a process of learning for himself. The primary focus and the primary agent in the learning process is the one who ‘desires knowledge of Brahman.’

Rāmānuja and the Śrī Bhāṣya: Bhāṣya as a Pedagogy for Happiness

It is precisely as Later Exegesis that the pedagogical character of a Vedāntic bhāṣya can be seen. Francis Clooney describes Vedānta as constructing a ‘Text’ from the Upaniṣads, the Sūtra and bhāṣyas. The Vedāntic learner is one who has to learn how to read this Text properly. As he comments on Advaita Vedānta:

To understand Advaita properly is to hear it, listen to it, submit to it, engage in it, practice it – that is, to ‘read’ it properly, to become its approved ‘reader.’Footnote ³²

The pedagogical character of any Vedāntic bhāṣya becomes clear when we consider the way the Bhāṣya groups the sūtras together and gives shape to the Sūtra text as a whole. As in the Summa, the Bhāṣya is constructed as a series of micro-debates which themselves reflect textually the kind of oral instruction carried out in the Vedāntic schools. The Bhāṣya takes one or a number of sūtras to form the framework around which this micro-debate is formed (adhikaraṇa), with a subject of discussion, an initial doubt about the answer, then a first view, then replies and counter views, before a final conclusion resolving is made. The adhikaraṇas are then grouped into larger units and the sūtras as a whole are divided up into four major sections (adhyāya): the first showing that the Upaniṣads teach Brahman and what they teach about Brahman, the second refuting the objections made by other traditions of thought and refuting those traditions themselves, the third dealing with meditation as the means to release and the forth setting out the released state itself.

As he organises the sūtras into these greater units, Rāmānuja makes the pedagogy explicit. At each major break he indicates what the sūtras are doing, summarising what has been learned so far and what is now about to be taught. The one who ‘desires to know Brahman’ is meant to work through the Bhāṣya in the order it is written, follow it through step-by-step, to be informed and transformed by it so as to engage in meditation properly and fruitfully. He is to follow the discussion of each adhikaraṇa as it is given, see how they refer forward or back to other sūtras, see how they are linked together one after the other, see how they are grouped together into the larger units.

The Vedāntic learner, like the student of the Summa, is called to give his ‘lived time to the retelling of the narrative.’ To know Brahman through Vedānta requires that the Bhāṣya itself is read through and worked through, as it employs various different strategies to link the sūtras and the adhikaraṇas together. Clooney characterises Vedāntic reading as a practical and performative activity, meaning a process of working through the text that requires the reader to engage with and be transformed by the text.Footnote ³³

Moreover, just as the Summa's central focus within its own pedagogy is on the practical, in the form of the moral life, so at the centre of the Sūtra text and hence of the Bhāṣya is the third major section dealing with the practicalities of meditation.Footnote ³⁴ Already at the beginning of the Bhāṣya Rāmānuja has stated that meditation is the means to get knowledge of Brahman and indicated what form it takes. In his introduction to the third major section he first looks back over the last two major sections, saying that their main purpose was to establish that the Upaniṣads do teach that Brahman is the object of mediation. He looks forward to the third section as teaching the nature of meditation which the means to obtain Brahman:

And then at the beginning of the fourth major section he states that its theme is the fruits of the meditation that has been taught. The practical business of meditation, then, is at the heart of the pedagogy of his Bhāṣya.

One distinctive feature and strategy of Rāmānuja's Śrī Bhāṣya is his exploitation of the very fabric of the pedagogy itself in order to vindicate his teaching about Brahman and Brahman's relationship with the world. Rāmānuja's Śrī Bhāṣya not a new type of teaching work but continues an established history of Vedāntic commentary on Brahma Sūtras, and his task is to show that it is the authentic interpretation of the Sūtra. And at certain points in the Bhāṣya he introduces what we might call a ‘complex coherence’ into the commentary that only succeeds because he makes use of what counts as a single unit of discussion within the Bhāṣya. In certain adhikaraṇas (the smallest unit of discussion) he first advances one view of the relationship between Brahman and the world in order to affirm the established interpretation of the Sūtra, but then advances a somewhat different one later on in the same adhikaraṇa, which gives his own final teaching.Footnote ³⁶ If such statements were extracted from the adhikaraṇa frame, Rāmānuja's account would seem incoherent, as has often been alleged. But kept within the same adhikaraṇa it becomes clear that they have to be read together, that the reader has to go through the unit of discussion to the end before he can understand what Rāmānuja is doing. In such a way the need to work through the Bhāṣya as it stands is manifest.

And this is an example of what Francis Clooney has called the ‘performative’ character of Indian scholasticism in general.Footnote ³⁷ By this he means that the ‘systematic or ordered composition’ they produce, to go back to Cabezon's description of scholasticism, is meant for the formation of members of an existing community in how to think and act:

In the case of Rāmānuja, the Śrī Bhāṣya works within the values of Vedānta, its revealed texts, its Sūtra text, its established norms for correct exegesis, and aims to show members of that community how his account is the authentic teaching of the Vedānta.

Finally, then, is the Śrī Bhāṣya a pedagogy for happiness? We have seen that the motivating force that drives someone to undertake the Later Exegesis is the ‘desire to know Brahman,’ a desire which arises from the recognition that knowledge of Brahman brings release from the limitations and frustrations of rebirth. Yet the knowledge of Brahman brings more than just release as such; it also brings bliss (ānanda) and the promise of this bliss is an important theme running through the account. For Rāmānuja bliss is just the pleasing aspect of knowledge and to be a knower is to be one who experiences bliss (Ś.Bh.1.1.1).Footnote ³⁹ The self languishing in saṃsāra is denied the bliss it might have because its knowledge is restricted by its association with embodiment. The motivation for meditation is grounded in the unsatisfactory nature of the embodied self's life and awareness of the transcendent blissful perfection of Brahman (Ś.Bh.3.1-2). Bliss is one of central essential qualities of Brahman which is to be included in all meditations (Ś.Bh.3.3.11-17, cp 1.1.13). As the self comes to know Brahman it comes to share in the attributes that Brahman itself has, its essential qualities, including its bliss. In the state of release the finite self realises its own true nature qua self as being knowledge and bliss, free from the constraints placed by its various embodiments (Ś.Bh.4.4.17). Thus the desire for bliss is always there in the ‘desire to know Brahman.’Footnote ⁴⁰