Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Angelic Doctor and The Greatest Theologian of the Church

Dominican, Common Doctor of the Church, also called the Angelic Doctor (1225–1274). The greatest theologian of the Church, author of the Summa Theologica.

Celebrate on March 7th.

Saint Thomas Aquinas is the greatest theologian of the Church, the incomparable glory of the Order of the Friars Preachers and of his century; there are countless official documents in which the Sovereign Pontiffs have praised the doctrine and recommended the study of the works of this philosopher and theologian of genius.

A child with a lively and thoughtful mind.

He was born in Rocca-Secca, in the Kingdom of Naples, in early 1225 or late 1224; he was the cousin of the Emperor Frederick II.

Count Landolph, his father, lived as a soldier in the castle of Rocca-Secca (barren rock), which towered over the small town of Aquino, a veritable eagle's nest, which faces the abbey of Monte Cassino. Countess Theodora Aquinas, a woman of admirable purity of life, handed over Thomas, quite innocent, to the hands of the Benedictines of the famous monastery; the child was then five years old.

At such a tender age, he already astonished his teachers with his thoughtfulness and the liveliness of his mind. Often, he addressed this question to the monks: "What is God?" Such a question would be the passion of his whole life. At eight years old, it already denotes his turn of mind. Let us note it well. He would not say: Who is God? as any child of his age would have said in his place, but rather: "What is God?" All the intellectualism of Saint Thomas Aquinas is already there.

He thus showed an extraordinary ardor to know God. He even often withdrew from the company of young nobles to study the manuscript where the rudiments of science were found. From then on, he was not very eager for worldly conversations, but rather meditative and taciturn, even distracted. He would keep this absorbed attitude all his life, as if indifferent to external objects. We will see him, for example, silent and preoccupied at the table of King Saint Louis, who loved him very much. Carried away by the force of a theological reasoning that he was pursuing internally, he suddenly interrupted the conversation around him and he struck on the table, as on his professor's chair, exclaiming: "This is decisive against the heresy of the Manicheans!"

At the age of ten he was enrolled in a course of literature and dialectics at Naples; he acquired some knowledge of the Greek language and studied physics, metaphysics and morality. The most arduous subjects were but play for this child. In the practical exercises which were imposed on the students, he was noted for his clarity, his depth and that gift of the clear and adequate formula which is so personal to him. He advanced no less in holiness.

The attraction of his soul to a religious life of contemplation and action, such as that led by the Dominicans of Naples, led him to their house. This was around the month of August 1243.

Harsh trials of his vocation and glorious triumph.

Thomas was eighteen years old when he gave the students of the Neapolitan University the strange spectacle of a son of a family, heir to a great name, going to bury under the frock of a mendicant Order a future that promised to be brilliant. But the consternation was even deeper at Rocca-Secca.

To turn the young man away from his vocation, the devil used a means which has often made him victorious: the hostile tenderness of a mother. Countess Theodora set out for Naples, wishing to bid a tender farewell to her dear deserter, but with the secret thought of making him change his resolution; for spite had made him forget his former pious dispositions. Such contradictions are seen every day. But the Friars Preachers, anticipating these designs, secretly sent the young monk off to Rome, where Theodora pursued him in vain, for, before seeing his mother again, Thomas had taken the road to France.

The Countess did not consider herself defeated; where blind tenderness had failed, violence would perhaps succeed. She wrote to her two other sons, Landulphe and Raynald, brilliant captains in the army of Frederick II, imploring them to seize their brother as he crossed the Alps and bring him back to her by force. They did, in fact, lay hands on him as he was resting on the banks of a stream, not far from Acquapendente.

From September 1243, Thomas became in Rocca-Secca the captive of Theodora, but not the prisoner of all the seductions of tenderness that a mother can invent. In his narrow cell, he became quite a man of study and prayer. He had been able to obtain some manuscripts: the Bible and several books of theology. He read and learned the Holy Scriptures in their entirety, so that when he left prison, he had almost elucidated all the difficult and obscure passages. He also learned by memory the text of the theology course of Peter Lombard, who died Bishop of Paris in 1160 and was gloriously nicknamed "the Master of Sentences". Finally, he studied Aristotle's treatise on Sophisms.

In vain Theodora had Thomas delivered a still more tenacious assault by her two sisters. He in turn took the offensive, and refuted their affectionate objections so well that he converted them. One of them, Marozia, following this triumph, was later to take the veil of the Benedictine nuns.

It remained for the two brothers of the young Saint to use a more perfidious weapon. These two fratricides, one can call them thus, on their own initiative tried to try an infamous trick, the one used as a last resort by Domitian or Nero. Convinced that they would have gained everything if they were to make his virtue succumb, they sent him a brazen creature, whose poisonous words would throw trouble into his heart. It was then winter. Thomas, without hesitation, seized a flaming brand from the hearth, rushed forward and put the vile courtesan to flight. Then, proud of his victory like a knight with his sword, he traced with the end of the brand, on the wall, a large and glorious sign of the cross.

The Temptation of Saint Thomas Aquinas, by Diego Velasquez

Then he asks God for the gift of a perpetual virginity superior to all attacks. An ecstatic sleep takes possession of him; and that same night he sees two angels appear who gird his loins with a cord of chastity. It is in memory of this fact that the Dominicans have the privilege of conferring the "cord of Saint Thomas", a precious safeguard of chastity, especially among young people.

Finally, after a year of captivity, the Count and Countess of Aquinas having turned a blind eye to his escape, Thomas descended during the night through a window of the dungeon. Fully saddled horses were ready at the foot of the tower, and the young man, returned to his spiritual family, took the road to Naples in all haste.

He was then just over nineteen years old.

Saint Thomas and Saint Albert the Great.

After this harsh novitiate, Thomas was sent to Cologne to attend classes which he was to attend in 1244 and 1245. Saint Albert the Great, the future Bishop of Regensburg, was his teacher there.

The Rhenish schoolchildren were greatly struck by the tall stature of the newcomer and his stubborn determination to remain collected and silent. They believed they saw in it the mark of a heavy and belated mind, and they laughingly called him: the mute ox of Sicily. Master Albert was "reading", that is to say, commenting on the difficult book of Saint Denis on the Divine Names. One of the students had compassion on the difficulty that the "mute ox" must have had in understanding such a high-level lesson, and he offered him repetitions. But the obliging tutor having completely lost his way in his subject, Thomas had to come to his aid and he repeated the master's lesson with surprising clarity, even with numerous additions, so that his companion, struck with sudden admiration, implored him to reverse the roles. Thomas consented, having promised secrecy. The condition, as we can well imagine, was not observed. Another time, the absent-minded Thomas lost, in front of his cell door, the writing of a very difficult problem that had been imposed on him. It was brought to Master Albert, who, convinced that he had among his auditors a man of genius, designated him the next day to defend a most arduous thesis. He proposed to him four very embarrassing difficulties. But the admirable supporter resolved them in an extremely brilliant manner, with the most perfect modesty, and Albert could not help concluding: "We call him a dumb ox, but his teaching will become such a bellowing that it will resound throughout the world."

Saint Thomas doctor.

Having completed his theology courses, he was sent to Paris, to the monastery of Saint-Jacques, where Albert was still his master. Then he returned to Cologne in 1248, no longer as a student, but as a professor; he taught there, under the title of "biblical reader", for four years. It was there that he composed his treatises on Being and Essence, on the Principles of Nature, and some other small works which would, even today, do the greatest honour to metaphysicians who had grown old in the study of philosophy. And he was twenty-five years old! Recalled again to Paris, to take his higher degrees of license (1251), he returned to the monastery of Saint-Jacques to publicly teach the text of the Master of the Sentences. It was at this time that he wrote his learned Commentaries on Peter Lombard. He taught there for a long time, then moved to Rome (1261), then again to Paris (1269) and finally to Naples (1272).

His numerous writings can be divided into several categories.

In his polemical writings, he responded to the attacks of William of Saint-Amour against religious life, monks and the mendicant Orders. He fought the error of the Fraticelli with no less energy to establish against them that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is definitive and that the present state of the Church is an immediate and complete preparation for the glory of heaven. To the dangerous theories in fashion, of Averrhoism, according to which all men have only one and the same intelligence, entirely in each and throughout all centuries, he responded with his pamphlet: On the Unity of the Intellect against the Averrhoists.

To the group of apologetic works, intended to refute the pagans, the Mohammedans and the schismatics, belong especially the four books of the Summa contra Gentiles, an incomparable preface to the Summa Theologica; in it he demonstrates to the unbelievers that they have not a single serious reason for refusing to enter the temple of faith.

The manuscript of the Summa contra Gentiles, at the Saint Louis exhibition in Paris, in 2014–2015. © LPL

Among his exegetical works, we must recall the famous Golden Chain, a true jewel of biblical science and piety, whose innumerable links, formed with the most beautiful texts of the holy Fathers and ecclesiastical writers, illustrate the four Gospels and the Epistles of Saint Paul. To the poetic writings belongs the Office of the Blessed Sacrament, a masterpiece of didactic, liturgical and mystical poetry of which a word must be said.

Urban IV had resolved to extend to the entire universe the beautiful feast of the Blessed Sacrament, celebrated for some years in the diocese of Liège alone. For this great mystery, he wanted a most excellent office. With this in mind he turned to Thomas Aquinas, and the latter, combining to the highest degree artistic genius and theological genius, composed this incomparable office in which the figures of the Old Law and the realities of the New are enshrined in a very simple and at the same time very solemn form, full of piety, strength and light. For, even when he prays, says a contemporary, Saint Thomas illuminates.

Concerning the composition of this office, an edifying anecdote is often cited, the absolute truth of which cannot, however, be attested: the Pope is said to have entrusted the same task to both Saint Thomas Aquinas and another no less illustrious doctor, a Franciscan, Saint Bonaventure. The two religious are said to have presented themselves at the same time before Urban IV, bringing their manuscripts, and while Brother Thomas, the first, read his composition, Brother Bonaventure, full of admiration and humility, tore up his own.

Saint Thomas reads the Office of the Blessed Sacrament to Pope Urban IV. Saint Bonaventure tears up his copy.

But the capital work of Saint Thomas Aquinas is the immortal Summa Theologica, a scientific exposition of Christianity; a vast body (summa) of all theology divided into three parts: the first, called by the author "natural", the second "moral" and the third "sacramental". The first is devoted to God and his works. The second has as its object the essential relationship of man with God, his final end. The third sets out the mysteries of the Incarnation and the Redemption, and the doctrine on Grace; then comes a treatise on the Sacraments, unfinished.

The Summa Theologica marks the culmination point, the highest peak that human and Christian thought have ever reached. The doctrine is explained there with unequalled clarity, force and method. Such was the esteem of the Fathers of the Council of Trent (16th ^century ) for this admirable work that a copy was placed on their table next to the Bible.

In the courses that the master taught while regent in Paris from 1261 to 1258, the doctrine unfolds with an even movement, in infinite and methodically cut divisions where the tranquil possession of self is affirmed. Never a word higher, an unfinished division which would suggest that on that day, perhaps, he was insulted at the door of his convent by an antagonist belonging to the University; he remains calm, with that inner serenity which is not of the earth, for it has been said: "Nothing approaches so much the clear and beatific vision of heaven as the Summa Theologica. " Saint Thomas never approaches a question without giving it all the light of which it is capable, he does not attack an error without destroying it at its roots. Admirably, since the 13th ^century not an error has arisen that he did not foresee, as by a sort of prophetic spirit, and refuted without reply. Protestantism was refuted in the Somme long before its appearance. This is why Leo XIII, wishing to put a dam on the errors of modern thought, found no other means than the restoration of the doctrine of Saint Thomas, and affirmed its necessity.

Master of studies, he is, in fact, to the most eminent degree. All those who have spoken since Saint Thomas owe to him what is good in them, and whoever has wanted to deviate from him has always gone astray.

The man and the saint.

Physically, Thomas Aquinas was of a very tall stature, quite corpulent. His swarthy complexion recalled, as a contemporary naively said, the colour of wheat. He had a broad, well-defined head, a very pronounced forehead, prolonged by a slight bald spot.

His whole person, the nobility of his gait from which all trace of pride was absent, denoted a perfect balance between the physical and the moral. In reality his body was completely subject to the spirit. Is it not, in fact, an astonishing miracle that this life constantly filled with prayer, oration, preaching, the multiple exercises of the religious state, and nevertheless so fertile in works of unequaled depth and erudition? However intelligent a man may be, he will succeed only with difficulty in reading and especially in understanding the works of Saint Thomas, in as few years as the great Doctor took to prepare, compose and dictate them.

Such genius is not only the gift of a happy nature. The principle is much higher, it belongs to the supernatural order: Thomas is in all truth the Angelic Doctor.

Angelic, he was by his purity and we know the battles he had to endure. The common opinion is that he died in all the glory of his virginity, and it results from the documents filed at the canonization process, that his general confession at the time of death had been like the confession of a five-year-old child, because he had never committed a single mortal sin. His virginal innocence was communicated, said one witness, even to those who looked at him, and another witness testified that it had been enough for him to recommend himself to the Saint to be delivered from grave temptations.

Angelic, St. Thomas also deserves this title awarded by posterity, because he received directly from God himself an immediate communication of the science of angels. Indeed, he hears more than he argues and has more intuition than reasoning. He is more angel than man. When he encountered doubtful points, he went to pray before the altar with many tears; then, returning to his room, he easily continued his sublime writings.

Is it necessary to say it? The learning of St. Thomas never altered his gentleness and affability. When he descended from the heights of contemplation, he was of a smiling and joyful commerce.

To a perfect courtesy, recalling the descendant of one of the noblest races of Italy, he joined an admirable habit of reserve and dignity, not seeking to create external relations, avoiding all useless words, not interfering in temporal affairs unless extremely necessary.

At the table, the delicacy of the food was of no importance to him. He ate only once a day and very little, so that his fast was perpetual. During meals, he was often in contemplation and his food could be changed without his noticing.

He slept very little. Instead of resting like the others after Compline, he would say long prayers in the church, and as soon as the bell was about to ring Matins, he would hastily and skillfully return to his cell to come down with the community. When he celebrated Holy Mass, he could frequently be seen weeping with love at the time of Communion.

Saint Thomas ceases to write. — His death.

At the age of forty-nine, the Angelic Doctor had completed the immense task that God had entrusted to his genius and his love. One day, while praying ardently before a Crucifix in the convent of Naples, he heard these words come from the lips of the Savior: "You have written well of me, Thomas; what reward do you desire to receive?" And the Saint, filled with love, cried out: "None but yourself, Lord."

"You wrote well of me, Thomas."

He was called as a theologian by Pope Gregory X, at the Council of Lyons (1274). It was while going there that he fell ill at the Cistercian monastery of Fossanuova, diocese of Terracina, in the Roman province. On entering, he announced his death, repeating with the Psalmist: "This is the place of my rest forever..."

The monks surrounded him with care; Thomas paid the debt of gratitude by explaining to them, on his deathbed, the Song of Songs. He received the last sacraments with great devotion. On March 7, 1274, this brilliant light was extinguished.

The death of Saint Thomas Aquinas, bas-relief from the Fossa-nova monastery © LPL

The canonization of Saint Thomas was not long in coming. As early as 1318, apparitions and miracles due to his intercession had decided the Apostolic See, then based in Avignon, to begin the canonical process. The definitive sentence was rendered by Pope John XXII on July 18, 1323, in the cathedral of Avignon.

At the request of the Dominican Master General Elie de Raymond, Pope Urban V forced the Cistercians of Fossanuova in 1368 to return the body and head of Saint Thomas Aquinas to his religious family; these relics were transferred to Toulouse. His right arm, offered in Paris, then passed to the convent of Saints Dominic and Sixtus in Rome.

He is usually represented with a sun on his chest, symbolizing the truth within him, perhaps also because of the marvelous stars that appear several times in his story, either during his lifetime or after his death.

Saint Pius V placed Saint Thomas among the Doctors of the Church, with the special title of "Angelic Doctor", in 1567; Leo XIII, on August 4, 1880 , gave him as patron to Catholic schools, while subsequent Pontiffs have never ceased to prescribe the study of this Master of masters.

Source: LA Porte Latine