The Thomist Tradition: Avoiding Scylla and Charybdis

The Thomist Tradition: Avoiding Scylla and Charybdis

by Dr. Donald G Boland

As with every great philosopher and theologian, the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas, though perhaps the clearest expressed of all, has inevitably been subject to a variety of interpretations. There is one interpretation that leans to a naturalist/rationalist (secularist) interpretation of his thought. That one is well-recognized today. There is, however, another interpretation so strongly opposed to this extreme that it tends to fall into the other error of supernaturalism/ fideism. In this book, hopefully following not only the thought of St. Thomas but also his method, I have tried only to draw particular attention to this latter error.

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Listen to "Episode 68: Cynthia Toolin-Wilson interviews Donald Boland on his book The Thomist Tradition, Part 2 (September 24, 2020)" on Spreaker.

Listen to "Episode 66: Cynthia Toolin-Wilson interviews Donald Boland on his book The Thomist Tradition, Part 1 (September 18, 2020)" on Spreaker.

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REVIEWS

Thomas Storck, The Chesterton Review (Vol. XLIX, Nos. 1 & 2, Spring | Summer 2023). To access the review, click here.

TESTIMONIALS

“In his work On the Veiling of Virgins, Tertullian asserts that “Christ called Himself Truth, not Custom.” Consistent with this centrality of Christ, and hence of uncreated truth over ever-changing customs, Dr. Donald Boland helps us to navigate through this world of change by affirming truth obtained through reason and truth given to us by Revelation, both of which are in harmony with one another. The reader will not only be challenged intellectually by this work but also will be given multiple opportunities to refine one’s understanding of what and who is truth as a consistent reality. As a stable reality, truth gives ultimate meaning and purpose in life by providing a standard to determine what and how to prioritize among the many goods we encounter.” – Very Rev. Peter Samuel Kucer, MSA, President-Rector of Holy Apostles College & Seminary in Cromwell, CT, and author of God as Father and Priests as Fathers, Brothers, Bridegrooms, and Disciples and Catholic Church History: Pre-Christian to Modern Times

“Dr. Donald Boland offers us a penetrating critical reading of Tracey Rowland’s Culture and Thomist Tradition after Vatican II (2003), showing us that Thomism today is faced with an equal and opposite danger to the well-known error of a naturalist, rationalist or secularist interpretation of the Angelic Doctor’s thought. Today’s danger is closer to being a sort of muddled fideist or supernaturalist interpretation influenced by the confusing ideas of nouvelle theologians such as Henri de Lubac. Boland offers a wide-ranging and well-informed assessment.” – Dr. Philip Blosser, Professor of Philosophy, Sacred Heart Major Seminary

“In this engaging polemic, Donald Boland effectively reminds us that, as St. Thomas keenly understood, faith has no greater friend than reason. This reminder is sorely needed as some Thomists today have lurched to fideism (even supernaturalism) in their zeal to avert rationalism. Written in an idiom that suits the here and now, Boland shows how the perennial philosophy lives to instruct another generation.” – Dr. Curtis Hancock, Professor of Philosophy, Rockhurst University

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Donald G Boland Ll. B. Ph. D. is a founding member of the Centre for Catholic Studies Inc. in Sydney Australia and is one of its former Presidents. He practiced for a number of years as a lawyer having a degree in law from the University of Sydney. Over much the same time, having obtained a doctorate in philosophy from the University of St. Thomas in Rome, he has taught philosophy and law in both Catholic and secular educational institutions, such as the University of Technology, Sydney, the University of Newcastle, the Aquinas Academy, the Centre for Thomistic Studies Inc., now operating under the name of the Centre for Catholic Studies Inc., and various Catholic seminaries, such as those of the Marists and the Vincentians. His doctoral thesis was on the concepts of utility and value in economics as found in the works of Aristotle and St. Thomas Aquinas.

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Voyage to Insight

by Dr. Ronda Chervin

En Route Books and Media has reprinted Ronda Chervin and Lois Janis’ book Voyage to Insight with fresh, exciting graphics. It can be read straight through or you can add your own insights into the book and even dialogue about your ideas with Dr. Ronda online at chervinronda@gmail.com. Seeking truth but not sure where it is? Or you have a philosophy of life but you’re not sure how to convey it to others? Voyage to Insight provides a creative and insightful way to reach your goal. In an extended analogy to a sea voyage, you will learn about how different thinkers think about the Captain of the Ship (the human person); Navigating with logic, experience, or faith; the Shipwreck of skepticism and despair; the Sun of God and the Enchanted Islands of beauty, love and mysticism. Finally, you get to work out your ethics on a Utopian Island!

Paperback $14.95 | Kindle $9.99

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Listen to "Episode 9: Dr. Cynthia Toolin-Wilson interviews Dr. Ronda Chervin concerning her book Voyage to Insight (January 18, 2020)" on Spreaker.

TESTIMONIALS

Ronda Chervin provides her readers with a practical, hands-on orientation to understanding who we are as rational creatures. Her use of maritime imagery and navigational charts is brilliant because one doesn’t just disappear from point A and reappear at point B. There’s travel that needs to be planned, and this book focuses on that travel, that voyage to insight. – Dr. Sebastian Mahfood, OP, co-author with Dr. Ronda Chervin of Catholic Realism.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ronda Chervin has a Ph.D. in philosophy from Fordham University and an M.A. in Religious Studies from Notre Dame Apostolic Institute. She is a convert to the Catholic faith from a Jewish but atheistic background. She has been a professor at Loyola Marymount University, St. John’s Seminary of the Los Angeles Archdiocese, Franciscan University of Steubenville, Our Lady of Corpus Christi, and presently teaches at Holy Apostles College and Seminary in Connecticut. More than fifty books of hers have been published by Catholic presses in the area of philosophy and spirituality. Dr. Ronda presents on EWTN and Catholic radio. She is a dedicated widow and grandmother. Her many books include Quotable Saints,Seeking Christ in the Crosses & Joys of Aging, Catholic Realism and Voyage to Insight.

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A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics, Volume 2: An Introduction to Ragamuffin Thomism

A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics, Volume 2: An Introduction to Ragamuffin Thomism

by Dr. Peter Redpath

Nothing short of a metaphysical disturbance and metaphysical revolution of the highest order can resolve the West’s and the world’s current cultural, political, and civilizational problems. Dr. Redpath’s contribution to resolving this metaphysical crisis has been chiefly to add to the vision of his mentors the dimension that the only way to reunite science and wisdom is through uniting philosophy and science, and the only way to reunite philosophy and science is through a new interpretation of Western intellectual history, especially that of the nature of ancient philosophy and of the teachings of St. Thomas.

While in the first volume of this series, Dr. Redpath endeavored to accomplish this re-interpretation, in this second volume, he has sought chiefly to consider essential implications regarding the nature of the reunion between philosophy and science and the teachings of St. Thomas. He expects that he has helped his mentors give birth to a radically new interpretation of St. Thomas (what some colleagues of his and he have started to call “Born Again Thomism” or “Ragamuffin Thomism”) as well as a radically new interpretation ofphilosophy and science. Download Chapter 1 of Volume 1 for free and buy the book to read the rest.

Paperback $19.99 | Hardback $32.99 | Kindle $9.99

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TESTIMONIALS

“A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics is a rich book, and Redpath has a clear style. He breaks complicated issues into short, intelligible units. He repeats difficult points, and then he repeats them again, rephrasing them to make them understandable. This is a book I wish I’d had in my earlier years of studies. In reading it, I found that many notions and points I had often wondered about, or about which I needed more explanation, were much clearer after Redpath dealt with them. For us metaphysicians, this is a book of refreshment and a review of what we thought we knew….A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics is one of those rare, to-the-point books that argues forcefully about the heart of things. The book is remarkably whole. It relates the order of the mind and the order of things in a way we seldom see in a brief space. Yes, it remains a difficult book. We must take time to read it….The advantage of this book is its constant, step-by-step guidance to knowing how to achieve such an end of understanding what is, if we would have it. This is the highest service a professor can perform for those who wonder, for those who seek to know reality.” – Fr. James V. Schall, New Oxford Review, May 2018, Volume LXXXV, Number 4.

“Standing on the shoulders of the intellectual principles that he has synthesized from classical thinkers like Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas and twentieth-century intellectual giants like Mortimer J. Adler, Jacques Maritain, Armand A. Maurer, and Charles Bonaventure Crowley, Redpath has, in the tradition of Adler, composed a monumental work that challenges as false and civilizationally dangerous prevailing opinions of leading philosophical scholars, scientists, and ethicists ‘falsely-so-called’ about the nature and history of the subjects in which they profess to have an expertise.” – Max Weismann, Co-founder, with Mortimer J. Adler, of the Center for the Study of The Great Ideas

“This present book, ‘written,’ as the author tells, ‘in the hope of ending the centuries-old separation between philosophy and science and science and wisdom,’ has only one counterpart known to me, and that is The Way toward Wisdom by the late Benedict Ashley, O.P.. The thematic synchronicity of these two volumes so close in time may well suggest that a veritable Tsunamic revision of modern philosophy’s ‘standard picture’ is approaching the shore of our time! Ragamuffin Thomism may well prove to be the next major wave in philosophy’s future.” – John N. Deely, Saint Vincent Seminary and College

“This volume II brings the wisdom of volume I to new heights. For a modern person, struggling with the complexities of today’s world, Metaphysics sounds like an antique, useless, with no personal value. Redpath shows how Christian Metaphysics is a central piece in the development of personal and organizational leadership. Christian Metaphysics provides what modern sciences were incapable of doing: unveiling the best of life, what are the secrets of happiness, the elements to empower every person and organization, to develop a vision, motivate and energize everyone towards such vision, in summary: leadership. Christian Metaphysics is a central piece in discovering the best life, to unify each person’s psychology, to reintegrate the society, towards its best. This book is unique, for anyone, to develop wisdom and leadership.” – Dr Juan Pablo Stegmann

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Peter A. Redpath (retired Full Professor of Philosophy at St. John’s University, New York) is author, editor, co-editor of 22 books and many dozens of articles and book reviews. An internationally recognized scholar, since 1980 he has given over 200 invited guest lectures nationally and internationally. Among his many accomplishments, he is CEO of the Aquinas School of Leadership, LLC; former Founder and Chair of the Thomistic Studies Graduate Concentration in Christian Wisdom for Holy Apostles College and Seminary (USA); an Affiliate Scholar with the University Abat Oliba Graduate program (Barcelona, Spain). Peter is also co-founder of the Gilson Society (USA) and the International Etienne Gilson Society, the Adler-Aquinas Institute, and the Angelicum Academy and Great Books Academy homeschool programs (both founded with the help of Mortimer J. Adler); former executive editor of the Value Inquiry Book Series (VIBS) for the Dutch publisher Editions Rodopi, B.V., and special series editor for Rodopi and Brill/Rodopi. Presently, he is a member of the editorial board of Brill Publishing’s Philosophy and Religion (PAR) series, a member of the Advisory Board of the Lyceum Institute, and Officer in Charge of Medieval Christian Philosophy and Academic Liaison to the Holy See for Global Scholarly Publications. For a list of articles published on the Catholic World Report, see http://www.catholicworldreport.com/author/redpath-peter/

One of the books Dr. Redpath has edited and highly endorses is Origin of the Human Species by Dr. Dennis Bonnette. Dr. Bonnette has also written an article on the topic entitled, “The rational credibility of a literal Adam and Eve.” When combined with the article, the book provides a Thomistic interpretation of mainstream evolution theory that is consonant with Catholic teaching, including that regarding our first parents.The article is found in the peer reviewed Spanish philosophical journal, Espiritu. For a list of articles published on the Catholic World Report, see http://www.catholicworldreport.com/author/redpath-peter/

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A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics, Volume 1: Written in the Hope of Ending the Centuries-old Separation between Philosophy and Science and Science and Wisdom

A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics book cover

A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics, Volume 1: Written in the Hope of Ending the Centuries-old Separation between Philosophy and Science and Science and Wisdom

by Dr. Peter Redpath

This book’s chief aim is novel and radical: to reunite philosophy, science, and wisdom (which had initially been separated several centuries ago by René Descartes) through a synthesis of two new interpretations, one of the nature of ancient Greek philosophy and science, and, two, of the metaphysical teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas about philosophy and science. Download Chapter 1 of Volume 1 for free and buy the book to read the rest.

Paperback $19.99 | Hardback $32.99 | Kindle $9.99

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On December 11, 2012, Prof. Peter A. Redpath discussed his book A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics in which he examines the essential connection between philosophy, science, and wisdom, severed with the birth of “modern science.”

Audio version of the above talk located on the International Etienne Gilson Society Website:

SCHOLARLY REVIEWS

Dr. Raymond Dennehy, International Philosophical Quarterly (Volume 56, Issue 3, September 2016, 381-383) – (click here to read it).
Fr. James V. Schall, SJ, New Oxford Review (May 2018) – (click here to read it)

TESTIMONIALS

“A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics is a rich book, and Redpath has a clear style. He breaks complicated issues into short, intelligible units. He repeats difficult points, and then he repeats them again, rephrasing them to make them understandable. This is a book I wish I’d had in my earlier years of studies. In reading it, I found that many notions and points I had often wondered about, or about which I needed more explanation, were much clearer after Redpath dealt with them. For us metaphysicians, this is a book of refreshment and a review of what we thought we knew….A Not-So-Elementary Christian Metaphysics is one of those rare, to-the-point books that argues forcefully about the heart of things. The book is remarkably whole. It relates the order of the mind and the order of things in a way we seldom see in a brief space. Yes, it remains a difficult book. We must take time to read it….The advantage of this book is its constant, step-by-step guidance to knowing how to achieve such an end of understanding what is, if we would have it. This is the highest service a professor can perform for those who wonder, for those who seek to know reality.” – Fr. James V. Schall (Professor Emeritus in the Department of Government at Georgetown University), New Oxford Review, May 2018, Volume LXXXV, Number 4.

“Standing on the shoulders of the intellectual principles that he has synthesized from classical thinkers like Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas and twentieth-century intellectual giants like Mortimer J. Adler, Jacques Maritain, Armand A. Maurer, and Charles Bonaventure Crowley, Redpath has, in the tradition of Adler, composed a monumental work that challenges as false and civilizationally dangerous prevailing opinions of leading philosophical scholars, scientists, and ethicists ‘falsely-so-called’ about the nature and history of the subjects in which they profess to have an expertise.” – Max Weismann, Co-founder, with Mortimer J. Adler, of the Center for the Study of The Great Ideas

“In his book, A Not So Elementary Christian Metaphysics, Dr. Peter Redpath offers insightful analysis as to how modern science came to replace the classical philosophy and theology that had reigned in Western thought prior to the time of Rene Descartes. Redpath points out that no true science is possible without metaphysics first to offer apodictic foundations upon which to build the scientific edifice. Still, Descartes separated science from the world of theology and philosophy, thus starting it on a long historical road that ends in traditional ontological questions about human life, its origin, and destiny being now claimed solely the province of utopian socialists using modern methods of mathematical physics. The author skillfully illuminates the intellectual moves made by modern philosophers that led finally to the abysmal error that traditional religion and philosophy are today considered relics of an ‘infantile past.’ Redpath’s adroit exposure of this twisted intellectual path to modern folly makes for rewarding reading.” – Dr. Dennis Bonnette, retired, Niagara University in Lewiston, New York

“The power of Redpath’s historical survey and analysis is reminiscent of Hegel at his most sweeping.” – Jude P. Dougherty, Dean Emeritus of the School of Philosophy at The Catholic University of America

“Within the context of his penetrating review, Redpath gives stunning reinterpretations of Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas to show that each of them recognized philosophy and science to be mainly studies of the problem of understanding the one and the many. His analysis of Aristotle and St. Thomas’s teaching about the nature of science is revolutionary. Within the process of these reinterpretations, he challenges commonly-received opinions among scholars about the nature and origin of the problem of universals, the nature of analogy and Christian philosophy, and the role that Descartes and Rousseau play in the development of modern thought. He persuasively argues that Rousseau is a neo-Averroist and that Rousseau’s teaching about the ‘General Will’ is simply an analogous transposition to the political sphere of Averroes’s teaching about the unity of the intellect. He even goes so far as to claim that the popular reduction of science to physics and the divorce of science from philosophy and wisdom is a result of the displacement in modern thought of metaphysics by utopian socialism (of various stripes). In short, he radically alters prevailing undertandings of philosophy, science, politics, and their history. In doing so he opens the path to their reunification. To say that this book is groundbreaking is an understatement. It is nothing short of a radical reinterpretation of Western intellectual history. As such, it should be an essential part of any serious scholar’s library.” – Dr. Curtis Hancock, Rockhurst University

“Common sense tells us the mind seeks unity and truth. While the universe is composed of many elements, the universe is nonetheless a universe(meaning one.) Our mind seeks truth in understanding commonality. The Greeks understood that the mind sought wisdom by the integration of reality. The modern age as it evolved to materialism and atheism chose to separate science from philosophy from each other ,being dismissive of philosophy since it was intangible. The issue is simple, but scientists and philosophers who are legendary created labyrinthian epistemological systems that bear no semblance to reality. Redpath, being a brilliantly disciplined philosopher with the common sense of a native of Brooklyn, NY cuts through the confusion in a volume that will rock ersatz philosophers!!!” – Joseph Indelicato, Caritas Consulting

“Dr. Redpath observes that all science/philosophy ‘chiefly aims at improving human possession of truth’ and adopts Mortimer Adler’s reflection that ‘the relation between truth and error is always that of a one to many. The truth is always singular, while the errors it corrects are manifold’ (p.210). In this work, Dr. Redpath accurately identifies the conditions for knowing the truth and at the same time combats the manifold errors that flow from the modern and postmodern misunderstanding of science/philosophy and attendant separation of science from philosophy. Metaphysical realism unites all the sciences under a final end and is inseparable from them. The principles of metaphysics are common to all the arts and sciences. Tearing down this wall of separation between philosophy and science is a necessary condition for reversing the decay of Western culture. Redpath begins the task.” – Michael B. Mangini, Attorney-at-Law

“This book is a “must read” for anyone wanting to develop a fine critical thinking on modern Western culture. Dr. Redpath provides a view of the evolution of modern thinking, by looking at the impact that abandoning Christian Metaphysics had on modernity, on current sciences and philosophy. Christian Metaphysics not only has a central role in providing unity to human knowledge, to build wisdom, to integrate sciences, which leads to the integration of the human being and the societies; but more than that, it rediscovers the best of the world, of man, the meaning of life, the road to happiness.” – Dr. Juan Pablo Stegmann

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The Moral Psychology of St. Thomas Aquinas: An Introduction to Ragamuffin Ethics

The Moral Psychology of St. Thomas Aquinas: An Introduction to Ragamuffin Ethics

by Dr. Peter Redpath

Through a radical reinterpretation of classical philosophy as an organizational psychology, The Moral Psychology of St. Thomas: An Introduction to Ragamuffin Ethics just as radically reinterprets St. Thomas Aquinas’s moral teaching to be a behavioristic psychology chiefly designed to synthesize right reason and right pleasure to help a person excel at living life as a whole. In the process of so doing, this work demonstrates how the skill of prudential living is a necessary condition for becoming a grand master of leadership in any and every profession.

Paperback $39.95 | Hardback: $64.95 | Kindle: $9.99

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INTERVIEWS

Catholic Cave Interviews with Peter Redpath:

April 17, 2017

May 15, 2017

REVIEWS

Jason Morgan, New Oxford Review (June 2020). “Aquinas for the Rest of Us”
Marvin Peláez, Studia Gilsoniana 7:2 (April-June 2018): 373-389. A Response to Brian Welter’s Review of Peter Redpath’s The Moral Psychology of St. Thomas: An Introduction to Ragamuffin Ethics [Download as PDF here]
Brian Welter, Studia Gilsoniana 6:4 (October–December 2017): 633–637 [Download as PDF here]
Jude Dougherty, The Wanderer (June 10, 2017) A Book Review . . . The Order Of Nature And The Good Life

TESTIMONIALS

“Brilliant, as usual!” – John N. Deely, author of Medieval Philosophy Redefined

“If you’re a leader, you need to read this book. In Ragamuffin Ethics, Dr. Redpath provides a powerfully effective psychology for energizing organizations to become their best. His teachings have fundamentally changed my life, and how I coach our clients at top organizations throughout the country.” – Peter C. DeMarco, Executive Coach, CEO of Priority Thinking, and author of the forthcoming book, The Good Will Leader

“This is the only work in modern times that can be said to bring together three seemingly incompatible words: practical, science, and moral.” – Eduardo Bernot, Aquinas Leadership International

“The modern person needs to make decisions, however she or he has received a limited and fragmented knowledge to do that. Dr. Redpath provides an integrated view of modern science, relying on the wider view of philosophy, inviting other sciences, that way providing an integrated and consistent view of personal psychological as well as organizational dimensions. This work clarifies every topic with a fresh view of Aristotle and Saint Thomas Aquinas wisdom, enlightening with a profound analysis, and critical thinking, the roads to making ethical decisions. Redpath’s work is an extraordinary contribution to modern moral psychology, presenting the strengths and limitations of modern philosophy, by highlighting the power of Christian Metaphysics in building personal and organizational leadership, ethics, values, virtues, discernment.” – Dr. Juan Pablo Stegmann

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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