The Significance of Albert the Great’s View of Sacrament within Medieval Sacramental Theology

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ALBERT THE GREAT'S VIEW OF SACRAMENT WITHIN MEDIEVAL SACRAMENTAL THEOLOGY 'TIHE SEVENTH CENTENARY of the death of Alert the Great offers us the opportunity to recognize new his outstanding achievements as a natural scientist , philosopher and theologian. This article focuses precisely upon Albert as theologian, as a theologian of the sacramental life of the Church. We will look at his vision of the sacraments, and at its place and significance within the history of sacramental theology. To understand Albert's contribution we will first survey sacramental understanding previous to him and contemporary with him, and then we will look at Albert's theology as contained in his Summa de Sacramentis. St. Augustine's Sacramental Theology The common term used by the Greek-speaking Christians of the early Church to designate their sacred rites and ceremonies , especially those associated with baptism and the eucharist was mysterion.1 Latin-speaking Christians beginning with Tertullian used the term sacramentum to express the same reality and continued as well to employ mysterium as the Latin equivafont of the Greek mysterion. Among the Latin Fathers of third and fourth centuries the terms sacramentum and mysterium were used interchangeably although each had his preferred expression for the sacraments of the Church. The reality of the sacramentum or mysterium is twofold, the visible and sensible part of the rite which constitutes the symbol and the invisible and spiritual effect which is indicated 1 II. M. Feret, " 'Sacramentum, res ' dans la langue theologique de S. Augustin," Revue des sciences philosophiques et theofogiques, 29 (1940), 219. 560 ALBERT'S VIEW OF SACRAMENT 561 by the symbol. One of Augustine's lasting contributions to sacramental theology was to distinguish these two elements of the ordinances of the Church: " Today we receive visible food, but the sacrament (sacramentum) is one reality, the virtue of the sacrament (virtus sacramenti) another reality. " 2 Augustine's writings present two meanings for the worci "sacrament": the first is general and applies to any kind of sign that signifies spiritual reality; the second is specific and pertains to the religious rites of the Old and the New Testament .3 With regard to the first usage, since he operated within a Platonic world view where all phenomena reflect the noumena , Augustine believed that any object or event could be sacramental, that is, a sign of an inner reality.4 Augustine defines sacrament in the specific sense: " But there is a sacrament in any celebration when the commemoration of the event is so accomplished that it is understood to signify what must be received worthily." 5 In continuity with the tradition of the Latin Fathers, Augustine uses the term sacramentum and mysterium interchangeably.6 In the Augustinian view of sacramental reality, it is Christ who binds together both the general and the specific notions of sacrament whether the term mysterium or the term sacramentum is employed . What is the relationship between the sacramentum, the visible sign, and the virtus sacramenti,. the spiritual effect? How does the sign become a life-giving reality wherein Christ is operative? In Augustine's theology the material elements, such as water in bavtism, become a sacrament when the sanctifying words of consecration are pronounced: •In Evange!lium Joannis tractatiis. 26, II. PL 85: 1611. Franciscus Moriones, Enchiridion Theologicum Sancti Augustini (Madrid: La Editorial Cat6lica, 1961), n. 1911. Hereafter cited as Moriones. 3 P. Pourrat, Theology of the Sacraments, trans. from the Third French Edition (St. Louis: Herder, 1941), pp. 22-28. 4 M. D. Chenu, Nature, Man and Society in the Twelfth Century, trans. by Jerome Taylor and Lester K. Little (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1968), p. 120. 5 Ep. 55, I, 2. PL 88: 205; Moriones, n. 1921. • C. Couturier, "' Sacramentum' et 'Mysterium' dans I'oeuvre de Saint Augustin ," Etudes Augustmiennes (Paris: Montaigne, 1958), p. 267. 56~ THOMAS D. MCGONIGLE, O.P. What is the baptism of Christ? A washing with water in the word. Take away the water, there is no baptism. Take away the word, there is no baptism.7 Take away the word, and what is the water but only water. When the word comes to the element, it becomes a sacrament,, a visible word...