Enquiries into Religion and Culture (The Works of Christopher Dawson)

XI On Spiritual Intuition in Christian Philosophy

158 xi On Spiritual Intuition in Christian Philosophy the problem of spiritual intuition and its reconciliation with the natural conditions of human knowledge lies at the root of philosophic thought, and all the great metaphysical systems since the time of Plato have attempted to find a definitive solution. the subject is no less important for the theologian, since it enters so largely into the question of the nature of religious knowledge and the limits of religious experience . the orthodox Christian is, however, debarred from the two extreme philosophic solutions of pure idealism and radical empiricism, since the one leaves no place for faith and supernatural revelation, and the other cuts off the human mind entirely from all relation to spiritual reality. yet even so there remains a vast range of possible solutions which have been advocated by Catholic thinkers from the empiricism of the mediaeval nominalists to the ontologism of Malebranche and rosmini. leaving aside the more eccentric and unrepresentative thinkers , we can distinguish two main currents in Catholic philosophy. on the one hand, there is the Platonic tradition that is represented by the greek Fathers, and, above all, by st. augustine and his mediaeval followers such as st. Bonaventure; on the other, the aristotelian tradition which found classical expression in the philosophy of st. thomas aquinas. But it is important not to exaggerate the divergences between the two schools. Both of them seek to find a via media between the two extreme solutions. st. Bonaventure is not a pure Platonist, nor st. thomas a pure aristotelian. the former rejects the doctrine of innate ideas, while the latter finds the source of intelligibility in the divine On Spiritiual Intuition 159 ideas, and regards the human mind as receiving its light from the divine intelligence.1 Hence, although thomism insists on the derivation of our ideas from sensible experience, it is far from denying the existence of spiritual intuition. on this point i will quote the words of a French dominican, Père Joret: “let us not forget,” he writes, “that the human intelligence, also, is intuitive by nature and predisposition. no doubt, as it is united substantially with matter, it cannot thenceforth know except by proceeding from sensible realities and by means of images. But, apart from this, our intelligence is intuitive. its first act at the dawn of its life, at its awakening, is an intuition, the intuition of being, or, more concretely, of ‘a thing which is,’ and, at the same time, as though it already unconsciously carried them in itself, there suddenly appear with an ineluctable certainty the first principles” of identity, contradiction, causality, and the like. it is from our intuition of first principles that all our knowledge proceeds. st. thomas says: “as the enquiry of reason starts from a simple intuition of the intelligence, so also it ends in the certainty of intelligence, when the conclusions that have been discovered are brought back to the principles from which they derive their certitude.” Père Joret insists on the importance of this intuitive faculty as the natural foundation of religious experience. it is not itself mystical , but it is the essential natural preparation and prerequisite for mysticism . the failure to recognise this, which has been so common among theologians during the last two centuries, has, he says, been deplorable not only in its effects on the study of mysticism, but in its practical consequences for the spiritual life.2 it is easy to understand the reasons for this attitude of hesitation and distrust with regard to intuitive knowledge. if the intuition of pure being is interpreted in an excessively realist sense, we are led not merely to ontologism, but to pantheism—to the identification of that being which is common to everything which exists with the transcendent and absolute Being which is god. and this danger has led to the op1 . st. thomas himself insists on the fundamental agreement of the two theories. Non multum autem refert dicere quod ipsa intelligibilia participantur a Deo, vel quod lumen faciens intelligibilia participetur. Cf. gilson, Pourquoi S. Thomas à critiqué S. Augustin, p. 119. 2. F. d. Joret, o.P., La Contemplation Mystique d’après St. Thomas d’Aquin. Bruges, 1923, pp. 83–90. 160 Enquiries posite error of minimising the reality of the object of our intuition, and reducing it to a mere logical abstraction. Here again it is necessary to follow the middle way. the...