God's Grace and Human Action: 'Merit' in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas [1 ed.] 0268010315, 9780268010317

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God's Grace and Human Action

God's Grace and Human Action 'Merit' in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas

Joseph P. Wawrykow

University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame

University of Notre Dame Press Notre Dame, Indiana 46556 www.undpress.nd.edu

Copyright © 1995 University of Notre Dame

Paperback edition published in 2016

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Wawrykow, Joseph Peter. God's grace and human action: 'merit' in the theology of Thomas Aquinas I by Joseph Peter Wawrykow. p.

cm.

Includes bibliographic references.

ISBN 13: 978-0-268-01031-5 (hard: alk. paper)— ISBN 10: 0-268-01031-5 (hard: alk. paper)—

ISBN 13: 978-0-268-04433-6 (pbk : alk. paper)— ISBN 10: 0-268-04433-3 (pbk : alk. paper)— ISBN 13: 978-0-268-08054-9 (web pdf) 1. Merit (Christianity) 2. Grace (Theology) 3. Thomas, Aquinas, Saint.

1225?-1274-Contributions in theology. I. Title. BT773.W38 1995 234-dc20

95-18777 CIP

oo The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the

Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.

Contents vi

Preface Acknowledgments

x

Chapter 1. The Literature on Merit and Related Concepts

1

Section I. The Literature on Merit Section II. The Literature on Related Concepts

6 34

A. Grace and Merit

34

B. Hope and Merit

56

Chapter 2. The Early Teaching on Merit

60

Section I. The Scriptum Super Libros Sententiarum A. In II d. XXVII q. I, aa. 3-6

60 63

B. ln III d. XVIII

101

C. Hope and Merit

129

Section II. De Veritate Chapter 3. The Mature Teaching on Merit Section I. The Background to the Discussion of Merit

137 147 149

A. God's Creative and Redemptive Plan

149

B. Grace

164

Section II. Merit in the Summa: I-II 114 (and related texts)

177

Section III. The Merit of Angels, and, of Christ

233

Section IV. Hope (and Merit)

247

A. Summa Theologiae

247

B. Other Writings of the Mature Period

255

Chapter 4. Concluding Observations: Thomas and His Authorities

260

Section I. Aquinas and Augustine

266

Section II. Thomas and Scripture (especially Paul)

276

Selected Bibliography

285

Preface IN THE FOLLOWING PAGES, I

have examined 'merit' in the theological

writings of Thomas Aquinas. Medieval discussions of merit are important for at least two reasons. Taken in itself, the treatment of merit can provide an important barometer of central theological and anthropological convic­ tions-about medieval notions of the dignity and possibilities of human existence, about the seriousness with which different authors consider the fact of sin and its lingering effects even in the life of the justified, and about the ways in which God can come to figure in human existence through grace. But the medieval discussions have taken on added significance because of their use in the Reformation and since. Luther's insistence on "justification by faith alone" was at the same time an attack on Catholic claims about the religious value of morally good acts; the sixteenth-century Catholic rejection of Luther also entailed the re-affirmation of the notion of merit, with its official proclamation at the Council of Trent. It is thus not surprising that modern scholars, both Protestant and Catholic, have shown a certain fascination with merit. Some of the medie­ val analyses of merit, so significant in the working out of the divisions between the churches during the Reformation, have as a result been studied in considerable detail and indeed adequately. One might cite here the researches of Werner Dettloff into the teachings on merit of Scotus and Ockham and their followers, work that has found its echo in other scholars 1 such as Bernd Hamm. But while the topic of merit not been wholly neglected, it is the underlying conviction of this book that the teachings of Thomas Aquinas about merit have only imperfectly been understood. Indeed, that Thomas had more than one teaching on merit, corresponding to different stages of his theological development, has itself not been sufficiently appreciated. The imperfect state of research on Thomas's approaches to merit has thus had a twofold effect. The main lines of Thomas's soteriology, including his sense of the precise roles played in human salvation by God and the human person, remain only partially 1

Werner Dettloff, Die Lehre van der Acceptatio divina bei Johannes Duns Scotus mit besonderer Berilcksichtigung der Rechtfertigungslehre (Werl, 1954), and Die Entwicklung der Akzeptations- und Verdienstlehre van Duns Scotus bis Luther (Munster, 1963); Bernd Hamm, Promissio, Pactum, Ordinatio (Tiibingen, 1977). I have subjected Hamm's discussion of Aquinas on merit to critical scrutiny in my first chapter.

Preface

Ull

sketched. And lacking a precise depiction of what Thomas himself taught or an explanation of the version of merit that had evolved by the time of the Summa Theologiae, evaluations of the reception of Thomas-in the later middle ages, during the Reformation, indeed, even in the present­ remain stuck at a somewhat elementary stage. The present close study of Aquinas on merit accordingly has a twofold audience in mind. The book is directly addressed to those who seek to understand more adequately an important part of Thomas's theology, viewed in its own terms. The primary goal of the book is to delineate the precise function performed by merit in Aquinas's account of salvation and, concomitantly, to chart the development in his understanding of merit evident in the course of his theological career. This study has been moti­ vated by my concern to evaluate Thomas's success in combining his assertion (in this teaching on merit) of the religious value of human action done in obedience to God's will with his unequivocal affirmation (at least by the time of the Summa Theologiae) that human salvation at every stage (predestination, initial justification, perseverance on the path to God, beatitude) is dependent on the free and gracious involvement of God in the life of the individual. It is hoped that a second set ofreaders will also find this book ofinterest, those concerned primarily with the Reformation and the later reception of high medieval teachings. By necessity, however, my book must stay for these readers at the level of an invitation to further study, merely sugges­ tive of the value of a better-informed examination of the ways in which later theologians encountered the thought of Thomas Aquinas on merit. Comparative comments are kept to a minimum in this book; apart from some suggestions about the differences between Thomistic ordinatio and Scotist acceptatio, I have not brought Thomas into dialogue with other medieval authors. Nor do I attempt here to demonstrate that later medie­ val and Reformation responses to Thomas, even those of his self-described adherents, may fall short of the mature teaching in significant ways. Before establishing his teachings, that argument would undoubtedly have been premature. Rather, mindful of the need for a thorough study of Thomas himself, I have been forced to be content with the careful, at times painstaking, re-evaluation of what Thomas wrote on merit. The invitation to scholars of the later middle ages and of the Reformation to reconsider the fate of the mature teaching comes, then, precisely in the delineation of this rather distinctive account of merit. My suspicion, one that needs testing by others, is that Thomas's later readers, both Catholic and Prot­ estant, were in fact blind to much that was crucial in the mature teaching. Armed with this analysis of Aquinas on merit, modern scholars of the Reformation will perhaps be inspired to investigate anew the quality of 2

later readings of Thomas on merit and grace. 2

For the attempt to show what light might be cast by this new interpretation of Thomas's mature teaching about merit on the teaching of John Calvin, an

VUL

GOD'S GRACE AND HUMAN ACTION

In preparing this study it did not suffice to examine only the ex professo treatments or major passages on merit in Thomas's corpus. Rather, I have read through Thomas's theological writings virtually in their entirety, impelled by the conviction that one can fully understand Thomas on merit at different stages of his career only when familiar with the development in his positions on such related doctrines as providence and predestination, grace, and hope. As will become evident over the course of the book, the genesis apparent in Thomas's teaching about merit to a large degree mirrors that in these related doctrines. Tempting as it is, with the advent of the Index Thomisticus, to allow the computer to do one's research, what might be gained in "statistical accuracy" through exclusive reliance on the Index would, in the end, be more than offset by a loss of a feel for the texture and flow of Thomas's theological argument. Sensitivity to Thomas's con­ cerns and to the spirit of his theology of merit can be achieved only by studying in their entirety the works in which Thomas discusses merit. Attention to the changing nuances in his analysis of the crucial related concepts which serve as the background to merit and to the inter-relation­ ships between these concepts and merit makes it possible to know what Thomas means by merit and determine why he has proposed the teaching which he has. Hence, I turned to the Index only at the end of my study of the writings themselves to insure that no pertinent texts had been over­ looked and, moreover, to see whether Thomas had also discussed merit in any unexpected places (he does not). The book is divided into four chapters. The first, through its extensive and sometimes detailed orientation to the literature, indicates the assured results of earlier research into merit (and related concepts), the questions that remain open, and the main lines of argument that will be pursued in the subsequent chapters. The first chapter also provides the opportunity to acknowledge my debt to such scholars as Lynn and Pesch (on merit), Bouillard and Lonergan (on grace), and Pfiirtner (on hope). The second and third chapters offer close readings of the discussions of merit in the various works of the Thomistic corpus, considered in rough chronological order; hence, in Chapter 2, I discuss Thomas's teaching about merit in the Scriptum Super Libros Sententiarum, and, in the De Veritate, and, in Chapter 3, his analysis in the Summa Theologiae.3 The structure of these avowed opponent of Thomas on merit, about sanctification, see my "John Calvin and Condign Merit," Archiu fur Reformationsgeschichte 83 (1992): 3

73-90. Of the three major systematic works (the Scriptum on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, the Summa Contra Gentiles, and the Summa Theologiae) only the Summa Contra Gentiles, written between 1259 and 1264, lacks an extensive analysis of merit. In this work, Thomas is content to make only brief comments about merit, to the effect that it pertains to God's providence to reward and punish and thus that human activity can merit the reward of heaven offered by God; see Book III, chapters 139 and 140. However, the Summa Contra Gentiles is in many ways a seminal work, for in it Thomas

Preface

LX

chapters differs slightly. By the time of the discussion of merit in the Summa Theologiae, Thomas has developed an account of merit that is thoroughly integrated into his basic understanding of God-human rela­ tions and of human salvation. Hence, before turning in the third chapter to the extended comments in the Summa on merit, it is first necessary to set the stage, beginning the chapter with Thomas's ideas about creation and grace. The discussion of merit in the earlier Scriptum and the De Veritate, on the other hand, stands on its own, and hence I have proceeded in Chapter 2 directly to the early account of merit. The final chapter is much more tentative and speculative in tone; here, I briefly suggest how the contemplation of Thomas's use of his principal sources, Augustine and scripture, may shed additional light on the genesis and inspiration of the mature teaching. To anticipate the main claims: Certain features of Thomas's thought on merit remained constant throughout his career. "Juridical" aspects are always present. In the Scriptum and in the Summa, 'merit' consistently refers to the establishment of a right in justice to a reward from God. This view of merit is scripturally based in that Thomas advances a teaching on merit to explicate the biblical texts affirming God's just reward of good behavior. Even more striking, however, are the new insights informing Thomas's mature teaching about merit. First, the Summa emphasizes predestination and grace. The person who merits before God has been freely chosen by God to enjoy eternal life. Moreover, as the result of God's free predestination, God grants the elect the grace required to move him to the actions meritorious of eternal life. The new stress on predestination and grace reflects both Thomas's speculative gains on grace and the will and his reading of certain decisive writings of the later Augustine, in particular the De Praedestinatione Sanctorum and the De Dono Perseuer­ antiae. Second, the Summa delineates the sapiential dimensions of merit. In accordance with the plan of the divine wisdom, God employs meriting to manifest the divine goodness in a special way, by the salvation of the individual through his meritorious actions. Thomas's portrayal of merit in sapiential terms permits him to conclude that the attainment of salvation though merits testifies not only to the dignity of the human person but even more to the goodness of God. has fashioned new descriptions of concepts which will figure prominently in the formulation of his mature teaching on merit. It is in the Summa Contra Gentiles that he ascribes to providence and predestination for the first time a causal certitude which extends not only to general effects but even to all individual events. Moreover, he replaces in the Summa Contra Gentiles the relatively static view of grace offered in the Scriptum with a much more dynamic understanding, which stresses God's direct application of the human person to activity. Thus, in the following chapters, attention is drawn in the appropriate places to the contribution of the Summa Contra Gentiles to the changes in Thomas's theology of grace and of the relations of God and the human person.

Acknowledgments THIS BOOK ORIGINATED

as my 1988 Yale University doctoral dissertation.

My dissertation advisor, Professor George Lindbeck, has been a reliable source of enthusiasm and wisdom from the project's inception. Of the readers of the dissertation, R. Emmet McLaughlin, now of Villanova University, read the text and notes with special care and offered invaluable editorial suggestions. The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Coun­ cil of Canada and Yale University furnished generous fellowships during the initial years of my graduate education. The research and writing of the dissertation was supported by fellowships from the Charlotte W. New­ combe Foundation and the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation. The revisions, most of which were done at the University of Notre Dame, were completed during my stay at the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton; I am grateful to the Director, Professor Daniel Hardy, and his staff for their hospitality. I have benefited greatly from the comments and suggestions of those colleagues at the University of Notre Dame who are interested in the theology of Thomas Aquinas: Professors David Burrell, C.S.C., John Cavad­ ini, Kent Emery, Jr., Mark D. Jordan, and Thomas F. O'Meara, O.P. The faults remaining in this book are undoubtedly due to my own obstinacy. I am also grateful to the Chairman of the Department of Theology, Professor Lawrence Cunningham, for helping to create and sustain an environment in which research and teaching in the history of Christian thought and practice are valued. Parts of Chapters 3 and 4 have appeared in articles in Augustinian Studies 22 (1991) and Medieval Philosophy and Theology 2 (1992); I am grateful to the editors for granting me permission to use this material. Finally, I wish to convey my appreciation to my mother and parents-in­ law for their encouragement, and to my wife, Dianne T. Phillips, for her unfailing inspiration.

Chapter 1

The Literature on Merit and Related Concepts THIS CHAPTER has two principal goals. First, I review the secondary literature on merit in Thomas Aquinas, in order to identify the major problems and disputed questions confronting the interpreter of this aspect of Thomas's thought. Second, I examine some of the literature on related aspects of Thomas's theology. One of the gravest flaws of the literature on merit in Aquinas is that it views his teaching on this concept in isolation from the general flow of his thought. As I shall argue, however, it is only in its relation to other doctrines in his theology that Thomas's teaching on merit can be fully appreciated. In particular, we cannot adequately grasp what Thomas means by 'merit' and establish what role it performs in his thought without reading his discussion of merit in terms of and in dialogue with his teachings on grace and hope. Indeed, many of the developments in Thomas's teaching about merit reflect and incorporate the parallel developments in his thought about grace and hope. Hence in the second part of this chapter, I examine the literature on related themes which I find especially valuable for the correct interpretation of Aquinas's theology of merit. Section I. The Literature on Merit Modern students of Aquinas have by and large neglected Thomas's teaching on merit. 1 Apart from occasional discussions of isolated aspects 1

A number of writers on merit have noted the paucity of studies of this notion in Thomas. See, for example, B. Catao, Salut et Redemption chez S. Thomas d'Aquin: L'acte sauveur du Christ (Paris, 1965), p. 49, n. 2: "La notion de merite, bien qu'elle ait une place importante dans la theologie catholique et dans la catechese courantes, ne semble pas avoir attire !'attention des chercheurs modernes. La bibliographie en est encore extremement pauvre"; and A. Miralles, "La Perspectiva Sapiencial de la Teologia del Merito en Santo Tomas de Aquino," Studi Tomistici 13 (Rome, 1980): 293: "El estudio teol6gico del merito no esta de moda en la actualidad. Basta sequir la literatura teol6gica de las dos ultimas decadas para comprobar que no atrae la atencion este capitulo de la doctrina cristiana sobre la gracia." Miralles repeats the observation in "El Gobierno Divino en la Teologia del Merito de Santo Tomas de Aquino," Teresianum 35 (1984): 73. On the other hand, B. Hamm, Promissio, Pactum, Ordinatio (Tubingen, 1977), p. 313, notes that in

2

GOD'S GRACE AND HUMAN ACTION

of Thomas's analysis of this difficult area of theological discourse, as well as studies which review in passing this part of his soteriology, there have been but three book-length studies of merit in Aquinas in this century, and each of these works is seriously flawed. 2 The earliest of these, Die Verdi­ enstlichkeit der menschlichen Handlung nach der Lehre des hl. Thomas von Aquin ( 1931)3 by J. Weijenberg, is more a neo-scholastic philosophical defense of twentieth-century teaching about merit along Thomist lines than a serious historical treatment of the thought of Thomas himself. 4 Indeed, to the extent that Weijenberg incorporates genuine Thomistic insights, it is exclusively to the Thomas of the Summa Theologiae that he has turned. Yet, even his use of the Summa is unsatisfactory, for Weijen­ berg's polemic has caused him to distort Thomas's analysis of merit. For example, Weijenberg directed his argument against contemporary philo­ sophical trends which seek to deny personal freedom (p. 38f. ) or to reject objective moral norms which guide human behavior (p. 41f. ; pp. 48ff.) As a result, much of Weijenberg's book rehearses those questions in the Summa (especially in the Prima Secundae) in which Thomas establishes the possibility of the good moral act in conformity with the will of God. Anq in his own analysis of the 'meritability' of human action Weijenberg places the stress on human freedom to do the good, that is, the "subjective" aspects

2

3

4

comparison with the literature on many other medieval thinkers, Thomas's teachings on grace and merit have received a relatively large amount of attention. I discuss Hamm's analysis of Thomas's teaching on merit in some detaillater in this chapter. In the first section of the chapter, I first review the major contributions in the secondary literature to the understanding of merit in Aquinas and then conclude with a brief enumeration of the main problems which confront the student of this aspect of Thomas's thought. I have not discussed in this chapter every article which treats in some fashion Thomas on merit; when an article examines a somewhat narrow or technical topic, I have postponed evaluating it until the appropriate place in a later chapter. Thus, for example, I shall comment on B. de Margerie, "La securite temporelle du juste," Studi Tomistici 2 (Rome, 1974): 283-306 and on B. Marino, "La reviviscenza dei meriti secondo la dottrina del dottore Angelico," Gregorianum 13 ( 1932): 75-108, in Chapter 3. J. Weijenberg, Die Verdienstlichkeit der menschlichen Handlung nach der Lehre des hl. Thomas uon Aquin (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1931 ). The page numbers in the text refer to this book. Near the end of Die Verdienstlichkeit (p. 2 10), Weijenberg reflected on his method and purpose: "Wir waren bestrebt, nicht nur methodisch in die Fusstapfen des grossen Meisters zu treten, sondern auch den wahren Sinn seiner Lehre-so oft die Gelegenheit sich darbietet-zu betonen," this last against the misunderstandings of modern philosophy. In his study of merit, P. De Letter, De ratione meriti secundum Sanctum Thomam (Rome, 1939), p. xviii, referred briefly to Weijenberg's book; De Letter notes that Weijenberg's book is more theological ( philosophical) in intention than historical and that Weijenberg makes reference to the Fathers and church documents, as well as to Thomas's own teaching, to make the case for merit. =

The Literature on Merit and Related Concepts

3

of merit. 5 Concomitantly, Weij enberg downplays the role of grace in merit, limiting it to "elevating" the morally good act to the supernatural order, to mere "adorning" of the good act in such a way that it can lay claim to a supernatural reward. 6 Thomas, of course, acknowledges that in the present dispensation it is the morally good act done in freedom which is meritori­ ous. But as his discussion of merit in the Summa at the end of the treatise on grace suggests, Thomas puts much greater emphasis than does Weijen­ berg on the role of grace in establishing the possibility of merit. Thomas's analysis of grace in the Summa, as the inner effective working of the Holy Spirit on the will, is similarly much more dynamic than Weijenberg allows. In addition to his inadequate treatment of grace in the Summa and his failure to grant grace the leading role in merit, Weijenberg's value as an interpreter of Thomas on merit is further diminished by his tendency to establish key points of his argument (ostensibly based on the thought of Aquinas) by reference to the explicit statements not of Thomas himselfbut of early twentieth-century Catholic theologians, who, needless to say, may differ in crucial respects from the teaching of Saint Thomas. 7 5

6

7

Weijenberg, Die Verdienstlichkeit der menschlichen Handlung, p. 158f., refers to free, morally good acts as the "material" cause of meritability. In the discussion of grace in the second section of this chapter, the notion of "material" causality, and the related "formal" causality of grace, will be explained. As will become clear, material and formal causality in terms of graced acts indeed have a place in Thomas's analysis. But by the time of the Summa, Thomas prefers to view the relation between grace and free acts more in terms of efficient causality. Weijenberg has more or less ignored this aspect of the relation between divine and human causality. For a characteristic statement on this issue, see Weijenberg, Die Verdienstlichkeit der menschlichen Handlung, p. 1 16: "Das neue Leben der Gnade erhebt den Menschen in diese von Gott gewollte ubernati.irliche Ordnung, sie macht ihn des gottlichen ubernati.irlichen Lebens teilhaftig, und auf diese Weise gibt sie seinen guten Handlungen ausser der naturlichen und moralischen, einen neuen, hoheren Wert m. a. W. sie sind verdienstlich bei Gott und for das ewige Leben, sie haben Recht auf einen ubernaturlichen Lob." A similar statement is found on p. 109. On p. 172, Weijenberg refers to the need for both grace and free will in obstensibly more satisfactory terms by stating that grace is the main, free will the secondary, principle of meritorious action. However, given Weijenberg's tendency to view meritorious acts exclusively in terms of material and formal causality, this statement should be taken to mean that grace principally makes morally good acts meritorious because it grants them supernatural value. Grace does not work'in isolation but elevates the individual's morally good achievements, which provide the matter of merit. In other words, Weijenberg here is not referring to grace's efficient causality in producing these good acts which are meritorious. For Weijenberg's understanding of merit as establishing a right to reward, see, e.g., pp. 151 and 154. In his review of Weijenberg's book in the Bulletin Thomiste 1933, p. 772 (#94 7), Y. Congar has evaluated Weijenberg's work in rather negative terms: "L'auteur est loin d'avoir traite OU meme touche toutes les questions que pose la doctrine du merite . . . . Au point de vue doctrinal, l'ouvrage est insuffisant;

4

GOD'S GRACE AND HUMAN ACTION

A more competent study of merit in Aquinas is Prudentius De Letter's monograph, De Ratione Meriti secundum Sanctum Thomam ( 1939). 8 The book is divided into three chapters, each of which, in the scholastic style, is arranged in a series of articles. The first chapter discusses what De Letter calls the "ratio moralis" of merit in Aquinas, by which he means the ordination of human acts to retribution by divine justice; the second chapter examines the "ratio physica" of merit according to Thomas, that is, grace and charity, the "ontological principles" (p. 49) ordained to a super­ natural end; and the final chapter describes the relations between these two rationes in the teaching of St. Thomas. Although De Letter's work marks an improvement over Weijenberg's, since De Letter is more careful to base his examination of Thomas's teaching on what Thomas himself wrote, his treatment of merit too suffers from a number of deficiencies. First, De Letter has introduced a number of terms into his description of Thomas's position not found in Thomas's own teaching. As De Letter acknowledges in his conclusion,9 the terms ratio moralis and ratio physica, for example, are not Thomas's but rather are employed in contemporary Catholic teaching on merit. Used to describe Thomas's teaching, such terms are somewhat misleading. More grievously, De Letter's work fails as history because of its incompleteness, inattention to chronology and lack of awareness of the development in Thomas's treatment of merit. De Letter only examines Thomas's ex professo discussions of merit in the Scriptum Super Sententiis and the Summa Theologiae. But Thomas discussed merit at some length elsewhere, and there is no reason to assume, as De Letter does, that his teaching remained identical. Additionally, De Letter's belief that Thomas's teaching on merit did not undergo development (with one exception) permits him to mix indiscriminately statements from the Scrip­ tum with arguments from the Summa, ignoring not only the decade separating the completion ofthe Scriptum and the beginning ofthe Summa but also the methodological inappropriateness of such a procedure. 10

8 9

10

au point de vue historique, il est franchement faible. On aura peine a lui reconnaitre une veritable valeur scientifique." Prudentius De Letter, De ratione meriti secundum Sanctum Thomam (Rome, 1939). The page numbers in the text refer to this book. See De Letter, De ratione meriti secundum Sanctum Thomam, p. 149, where he remarks that it is the contemporary practice among theologians to refer to the "moral" or "juridical," and to the "physical" or "ontological" aspects of merit. See also p. xviii, where De Letter admits that he has organized the discussion of merit in Aquinas in the modern way, that is, in the manner in which contemporary Catholic theologians tend to discuss merit. As will become evident in the following discussion of the literature on merit, there is an almost unanimous consensus among interpreters of Thomas that his thought on merit remained the same throughout his career. This belief allows his students either to restrict their comments to his teaching in a single work (usually the Summa Theologiae) or to mix statements from various works indiscriminately. But it is clear that Thomas's understanding of merit evolved. By establishing his teaching about merit in each of his major works

The Literature on Merit and Related Concepts

5

De Letter, like Weijenberg, is guilty of distorting the thought of Aquinas on merit. As De Letter observes, in the Scriptum Thomas argues that the form of justice governing theological merit is distributive, while in the Summa , it seems rather to be a kind of commutative justice involved. 11 De Letter therefore devotes most of his first chapter to recording the argu­ ments used by Thomas in the Scriptum to establish merit as an instance of distributive justice, and then embarks on his own attempt to identify the species ofjustice governing merit in the Summa. It is clear that justice is involved to some extent in merit at all stages of Thomas's career-after all, even in the Summa, merit means the establishment of some kind of claim or right to a reward in justice. 12 But unlike De Letter Thomas in the Summa is hardly concerned to identify the species ofjustice governing this aspect of human-divine relations-it plays no part in his deliberations on merit in I-II 1 14, and he seems only to have mentioned that it is in fact "commutative" justice in merit in passing, elsewhere in the Summa (II-II 61, 4 ad 1). Thus, by focusing his energies on the precise identification of the kind ofjustice involved in Thomas's analysis in the Summa, De Letter has concentrated on a facet of Aquinas's thought about merit which no longer plays the central role it did in the Scriptum, that is, the determina­ tion of the kind of justice involved in merit. What is perhaps even more striking about De Letter's analysis is that his discussion of the kind of justice involved in merit is not complemented with a study of the cause of Thomas's changed ideas on justice in relation to merit. De Letter appears unaware of the implications underlying Thomas's eventual rejection of distributive justice in merit (a justice which requires that God observe a kind of equality of proportion between the divine reward and the merits of various people) in favor, by the time of the Summa, of what can be termed 11

12

approached chronologically, the genesis of his thought reveals itself. Although distributive justice predominates i n the discussion of merit in the Scriptum and commutative justice in the Summa, De Letter has also observed (De ratione meriti secundum Sanctum Thomam, p. 35) that in both works Thomas at times can argue that each kind of justice is operative in merit. The "flux" in Thomas's analysis is due, says De Letter, to his sense that God cannot be adequately fitted into any human category; the complexity of God-human relations as they are found in merit prevents Thomas from ascribing merit too firmly to one or the other type of justice. On the basis of In Sent. III d. 18, a. 2, sol., De Letter says that meriting is to make something owed to one which is rendered by justice. However, De Letter also notes (p. 104) a second "definition" of merit in Aquinas, which describes merit in terms of disposing oneself for a reward: "Mereri est igitur reddere se capacem recipiendi finem, seu reddere se