Work
Summa Theologica
Overview
The Summa Theologiae or Summa Theologica (transl. 'Summary of Theology'), often referred to simply as the Summa, is the best-known work of Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), a scholastic theologian and Doctor of the Church. It is a compendium of all of the main theological teachings of the Catholic Church. Presenting the reasoning for almost all points of Christian theology in the West, topics of the Summa follow the following cycle: God; Creation, Man; Man's purpose; Christ; the Sacraments; and back to God.
Although unfinished, it is "one of the classics of the history of philosophy and one of the most influential works of Western literature." It remains Aquinas's "most perfect work, the fruit of his mature years, in which the thought of his whole life is condensed."
The Summa is a more structured and expanded version of Aquinas's earlier Summa contra Gentiles, though the two were written for different purposes. Throughout the Summa, Aquinas aims to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with Catholic theology. Although he broadly cites the Bible, patristic, scholastic, Islamic, Jewish, and pre-Christian Greek and Roman sources, his most referenced non-scriptural authors are Aristotle (who he calls "the philosopher") and Augustine.
The Summa Theologiae was one of the main intellectual inspirations for Thomistic philosophy. It also had such a great influence on Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy that Dante's epic poem has been called "the Summa in verse." The Summa Theologiae continues to be a major reference in the Western and Eastern Catholic Churches, and the mainline Protestant denominations (Anglicanism, Lutheranism, Methodism, and Reformed Christianity) for those seeking ordination to the diaconate or priesthood, for professed male or female religious life, or for laypersons studying philosophy and theology at the collegiate level.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Philosophers who discussed Summa Theologica
- Francisco Suárez
- Mortimer J. Adler
- Augustine of Hippo
- Thomas Aquinas
- Aristotle
- Averroes
- Jacques Maritain
- Mary Daly
- Max Charlesworth
- Peter Crockaert
- Aloisio Galea
- Leonardo Polo
Related ideas
- Francisco de Vitoria
- Analogy
- Jesus
- Beatific vision
- Avicenna
- Greek language
- Anglicanism
- Book of Genesis
- Thomas Cajetan
- Heaven
- Al-Ghazali
- Interest
- Last Judgment
- Justice
- Islamic philosophy
- Jewish philosophy
- Happiness
- Ancient Greek philosophy
- Early Islamic philosophy
- Just war theory
- Latin
- Gentile
- Conscience
- Law
Place in the tradition
Part of Frederick Copleston.