In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

ORIGINAL SIN, PRIVATION OF ORIGINAL JUSTICE IT IS a well-known fact among theologians that St. Thomas is claimed as their patron by followers of the most clearly opposed doctrines. The very same texts of the Saint are not infrequently understood in widely different meanings. So much so that ,one wonders at this irreducible division among Thomists. Is there any possibility at all of getting at the genuine teaching of the Common Doctor? One of the controverted interpretations regards St. Thomas' texts and his idea of original sin as privation of original justice. The disputed point is well known: does original justice whose privation constitutes original sin comprise in itself sanctifying grace, or is sanctifying grace adequately distinct, though not separable, from original justice? Both answers are given by Thomists and each of them claims faithfully to echo St. Thomas' teaching. Both theories argue from his texts and from intrinsic reasons based on his principles. Each also has an answer ready for the arguments of the opposite opinion. Is there any way out of the deadlock? Contemporary Controversy: Its History. Before 1915 modern Thomists commonly taught, as being the faithful interpretation of SL Thomas, that the essential and formal element of original justice is sanctifying grace. The latter, therefore, is but inadequately distinct from the former, as is a part from its whole. No one seemed to have any doubt or difficulty about this. And it was taken for granted, rather than concluded from a study of the original texts, that such was the authentic interpretation of St. Thomas' teaching: Since the concept of original sin as privation of this justice explained perfectly well how the hereditary fault is a sin in the proper sense of the word, that is, death of the soul because of the 469 4 470 P. DELETTER absence of sanctifying grace, such as the Tridentine decree on original sin demands it and still more explicitly the projected Canon of the Vatican Council, no one was led to suppose that the Common Doctor could have. taught any different doctrine. It was Fr. R. Martin, 0. P., who opened the controversy by calling into question this common interpretation. In an article on the doctrine of original sin in the Summa contra Gentiles 1 he showed, from a minute analysis of the three chapters on original sin (Book 4, chapters 50-52) and from the study of the sources, that St. Thomas held, with the Scholastics of the previous and of his own century, that sanctifying grace is not included in original justice, the privation of which constitutes original sin. Original sin is the privation of the preternatural integrity of nature only, and this privation entails the absence of sanctifying grace in the individuals who inherit that nature. Martin's study-because, no doubt, of the unsettled conditions of the First World War-provoked little comment. His thesis was taken up again in 1921 by Canon J. Bittremieux, professor at Louvain University, who extended the field of research to all the works of St. Thomas. He examined the question of the distinction between original justice and sanctifying grace according to St. Thomas/ and concluded in favour of Martin's thesis. A year later Fr. J. Kors, 0. P., devoted a volume of the Bibliotheque Thomiste to the same study.3 In it he combines both historical research in pre-Thomist teaching on original justice and original sin, and critical study of St. Thomas' own 1 R. Martin, 0. P., "La doctrina sobre el pecado original en Ia Summa contra Gentiles," Ciencia Tomista, VI (1915) 1, pp. 889-400; 2, pp. 228-286. He expressed the same opinion about St. Thomas' teaching in Revue des Sciences Philosophiques et 1'heologiques, V (1911), 825 f., and again ibid., IX (1920), 678. Other historical studies of his on the problem: " La question du peche originel dans Saint Anselme," ibid., V (1911), 785-749; "Les idees de Robert de Melun sur le peche originel," ibid., VII (1918), 700-725; VIII (1914), 489-466; IX (1920), 108-UO; XI (1922), 890-415; "Le peche originel d'apres Gilbert de Ia Porree et son ecole," Revue d'lfistorie Ecclesiastique, XIII (1912), 674-691. • J...

pdf

Share