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Ozoliņš, Jānis Tālivaldis
2013.
Aquinas, Education and the East.
p.
9.
Article contents
St Thomas's sermon Puer Iesus: a neglected source for his understanding of teaching and learning1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2024
Abstract
There are a number of places in his works where Thomas Aquinas writes about teaching and learning. Following a summary account of his understanding of education, this paper presents and discusses a neglected source on these matters. The sermon Puer Iesus, probably preached in January 1271, contains thoughts on pedagogy that are, in the words of its Leonine editor, ‘original and of great interest’. The sermon offers a broad sketch of human development in which the adolescence of Christ, the ‘most excellent of teachers’, is appealed to as an inspiration and an example. It raises Christological and pedagogical questions and it is the latter that are considered here. Encouraging his student congregation to listen generously, enquire diligently, respond prudently and meditate attentively, Aquinas outlines for them a practical method of learning that is at once critical and contemplative.
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- Copyright © The Author 2007. Journal compilation © The Dominican Council/Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2007, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA
Footnotes
1
This paper was presented at an Aquinas Study Day at Blackfriars, Oxford in March 2007. It has benefited from the discussion that followed its presentation.
References
2 ‘The healing work of teaching: Thomas Aquinas and education’, in Kelly, Gabrielle OP and Saunders, Kevin OP, editors, Towards the Intelligent Use of Liberty: Dominican Approaches in Education ATF Press, Adelaide (to be published in 2008)Google Scholar
3 St Thomas Aquinas (Continuum Library of Educational Thought) Continuum, London and New York (to be published in November 2007)
4 Jordan, Mark D., Rewritten Theology: Aquinas After His Readers Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2006CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Boyle, Leonard E., The Setting of the Summa theologiae of Saint Thomas Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, Toronto, 1982Google Scholar. With Jordan's work, Boyle's insight has perhaps developed legs and gone places he would not have anticipated, but the basic insight is worth holding on to.
5 The preceding paragraphs summarise an account of Aquinas on teaching and learning that I have developed more fully in two recent articles, ‘What happens when minds meet? Thomas Aquinas on the mystery of teaching and learning’, Doctrine and Life 56.6 (July-August 2006) 3-17Google Scholar and ‘Truth, knowledge and communication: Thomas Aquinas on the mystery of teaching’, Studies in Christian Ethics 19.3 (2006) 287-304CrossRefGoogle Scholar
6 St Thomas Aquinas: How to Study. Commentary by Victor White OP Aquin Press, London, 1947Google Scholar
7 Sertillanges, A.G. OP, The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods Translated from the French by Ryan, Mary, with a new foreword by James V. Schall SJ, The Catholic University of America Press, Washington DC, 1998Google Scholar. A pious reason why Dominicans particularly hoped De modo studendi might be authentic is because it is the only place in writings attributed to Aquinas where St Dominic is mentioned by name.
8 In the ‘Parma’ edition of Aquinas’Opera Omnia (Parma, 1869)Google Scholar the sermon is found in Volume XXIV, pages 220-24 and in the ‘Vivès’ edition (Paris, 1879) in Volume XXXII, pages 663-71. See .Torrell, J.-P, Initiation à saint Thomas d'Aquin, sa personne et son oeuvre: Initiation 1. 2eédition revue et augmentée d'une mise a jour critique et bibliographique Fribourg / Paris, 2002, pages 522-23,630Google Scholar [English translation by Royal, Robert, Saint Thomas Aquinas. Volume 1: The Person and His Work. Revised Edition Washington DC, 2005, pages 358-59, 438]Google Scholar
9 For a good sense of the turbulent events at Paris before and after the condemnation of December 1270, and Aquinas' involvement in them, see Steenberghen, Fernand van, Aristotle in the West Louvain 1955, pages 198-229Google Scholar; Weisheipl, James A., Friar Thomas d'Aquino: His Life, Thought and Works Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1974, pages 241-92Google Scholar (especially pp. 272-85); Tugwell, Simon, Albert and Thomas: Selected Writings Paulist Press, 1988, pages 225-32Google Scholar; and Torrell, op.cit., pages 261-86, 358 [ET pages 179-96,244-45]. Van Steenberghen hints that there was a calm in the immediate aftermath of the condemnation (op.cit., p.210): my suggestion is that Thomas preached this sermon during that calm.
10 The word puer drops in from Luke 2:43
11 For recent treatments of Aquinas's views on the human knowledge of Christ see J.-P.Torrell, ‘Le savoir acquis du Christ selon les théologiens médiévaux. Thomas d'Aquin et ses prédècesseurs’Revue Thomiste 101 (2001) 355-408 and ‘Saint Thomas d'Aquin et la science du Christ. Une relecture des Questions 9-12 de la Tertia Pars de la Somme de Théologie’, Saint Thomas au XXe siècle, Edition Saint-Paul, 1995, 394-409; and Kevin Madigan, ‘Did Jesus Progress in Wisdom? Thomas Aquinas on Luke 2,52 in Ancient and High Medieval Context’Traditio 52 (1997) 179-200. See also the insightful notes on ST III 9-12 in Liam G. Walsh, St Thomas Aquinas Summa Theologiae Volume 49 (3a. 7-15) The Grace of Christ London and New York, 1974, pages 82-151
12 Catena aurea: commentary on the Four Gospels collected out of the works of the Fathers. Volume III: St Luke The Saint Austin Press 1997, pages 102-105Google Scholar
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