Aquinas on Friendship PDF
Preview Aquinas on Friendship
AQUINAS ON FRIENDSHIP OXFORD PHILOSOPHICAL MONOGRAPHS EditorialCommittee anita avramides r.s. crisp michael rosen christopher shields ralph c.s. walker othertitlesintheseriesinclude Kant’sEmpiricalRealism PaulAbela AgainstEqualityofOpportunity MattCavanagh Causality,Interpretation,andtheMind WilliamChild MetaphorandMoralExperience A.E.Denham SemanticPowers MeaningandtheMeansofKnowinginClassicalIndianPhilosophy JonardonGaneri Kant’sTheoryofImagination BridgingGapsinJudgementandExperience SarahL.Gibbons OfLibertyandNecessity JamesA.Harris TheGroundsofEthicalJudgements NewTranscendentalArgumentsinMoralPhilosophy ChristianIllies PlatoandAristotleinAgreement? PlatonistsonAristotlefromAntiochustoPorphyry GeorgeKaramanolis ProjectiveProbability JamesLogue UnderstandingPictures DominicLopes TheBruteWithin AppetitiveDesireinPlatoandAristotle HendrikLorenz Wittgenstein,Finitism,andtheFoundationsofMathematics MathieuMarion TruthandtheEndofInquiry APeirceanAccountofTruth C.J.Misak TheGoodandtheTrue MichaelMorris Hegel’sIdeaofFreedom AlanPatten NietzscheandMetaphysics PeterPoellner TheOntologyofMind Events,Processes,andStates HelenSteward ThingsthatHappenBecauseTheyShould ATeleologicalApproachtoAction RowlandStout Aquinas on Friendship DANIEL SCHWARTZ CLARENDONPRESS·OXFORD 1 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxfordox26dp OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork ©DanielSchwartz2007 Themoralrightsoftheauthorhavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2007 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbyLaserwordsPrivateLimited,Chennai,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby BiddlesLtd,King’sLynn,Norfolk ISBN978–0–19–920539–4 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 InMemoryofmyFather, JulioSchwartz (1939–99) Iwas4or5,climbedtothefrontseatofthegreenPeugeot,stillinthe garage(coldmorningoutside),whenhetoldmeaboutUlysses’fellow sailors,howtheycoveredthemselvesundersheeps’fleecestoescapethe mighty,one-eyed,Polyphemus. Myfather. This page intentionally left blank Preface and Acknowledgements In the last few decades philosophers have rediscovered friendship as a distinct topic of interest. Aristotle’s thought has been, justifiably, the starting point for most philosophical work on friendship, and often its focus. This renewal of philosophical interest has seldom, however, translatedintointerestinwhatAquinasandothermedievalphilosophers hadtosayaboutfriendship.InterestinAquinas’sviewsonfriendshiphas sofarremainedconfinedmainlytotheologians.¹ThefactthatAquinas’s viewsonfriendshiparenoteasilyapproachable(wefindthemscattered throughouthiswork,oftenwithinhighlytheologicaldiscussions)bears part of the blame for this state of affairs. Probably, though, we should laysomeoftheblameonthewidespreadperceptionthattheChristian notion of friendship is far too removed both from the friendship theorizedbytheGreeksandfromthatwhichweexperienceinourlives. This book can best be described as a journey into the territory of Aquinas’s views on friendship. While the purpose of the book is to acquaint the reader with some of Aquinas’s views on friendship, there ¹ AlistofworksonAquinasonfriendshipfromthelasttwentyyearsshouldinclude: C.Steel,‘ThomasAquinasonPreferentialLove’,inT.A.F.KellyandP.W.Rosemann (eds.),Amoramicitiae:OntheLoveThatIsFriendship:EssaysinMedievalThoughtand BeyondinHonoroftheRev.ProfessorJamesMcEvoy (Leuven:Peeters,2004),437–58; J.McEvoy,‘TheOtherasOneself:FriendshipandLoveintheThoughtofStThomas Aquinas’, in J. McEvoy and M. Dunne (eds.), Thomas Aquinas: Approaches to Truth (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2002), 16–37,and his ‘Amitie´, attirance et amour chez S Thomas d’Aquin’, Revue philosophique de Louvain, 91 (1993), 383–408; A. W. Keaty, ‘Thomas’s Authority for Identifying Charity as Friendship: Aristotle or John 15?’,Thomist,62(1998),581–601;W.H.Principe,‘LovingFriendshipAccordingto Thomas Aquinas’, in D. Goicoechea (ed.), The Nature and Pursuit of Love (Buffalo: Prometheus, 1995), 128–41; C. Osborne, Eros Unveiled: Plato and the God of Love (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994), chs. 6 and 8; W. Cizewski, ‘Friendship with God: VariationsonaThemeinAristotle,Aquinas,andMacmurray’,PhilosophyandTheology, 6 (1992), 369–81; J. Porter, ‘De Ordine Caritatis: Charity, Friendship, and Justice inThomasAquinas’SummaTheologiae’,Thomist,53(1989),197–213;P.J.Wadell, FriendshipandtheMoral Life (NotreDame:University ofNotreDamePress,1989); F.Kerr,‘CharityasFriendship’,inB.Davies(ed.),Language,MeaningandGod:Essays inHonourofHerbertMcCabe(London:GeoffreyChapman,1987),1–23;G.L.Jones, ‘TheologicalTransformationofAristotelianFriendshipintheThoughtofStThomas Aquinas’,NewScholasticism,61(1987),373–99;J.Bobik,‘AquinasonFriendshipwith God’, NewScholasticism,60(1986),257–71and his‘Aquinas onCommunicatio,the FoundationofFriendshipandCaritas’,ModernSchoolman,65(1986),1–19. viii PrefaceandAcknowledgements is no attempt to provide an exhaustive description of Aquinas’s theory of friendship (if we can, at all, speak of such a thing). This is more a terrestrialexpeditionthanareconnaissanceflight. TheaimisnotmerelytopresentAquinas’sobservations,comments, andreflectionsonfriendship,butrathertoengagethemphilosophically. To do so, Aquinas’s arguments are sympathetically reconstructed and subjected to critical examination. I also seek to collect along the way those of Aquinas’s thoughts that may be helpful in guiding our own reflectionsonfriendship. ThisbookisintendednotonlyforstudentsofAquinas’stheological, moral, and political thought and historians of ideas, but also for those readerswho,whilenotprimarilyinterestedinAquinas,wishtodiscern the possible roles performed by friendship within the realms of ethics andpolitics. My own interest in Aquinas and in friendship developed gradually as I grew acquainted with his works. It was only when I managed to transcendmyownprejudicesabouttheologyandscholasticphilosophy that I became able to appreciate the beauty of Aquinas’s thought, its breadth, rigour, and depth. Aquinas is far from infallible, but it is easiertoidentifytheflawsinhisworksifoneapproacheshistextswith sympathyratherthanhostility. From the cluster of interrelated problem-based investigations emer- ges—Icontend—anotionoffriendshipthatismoreflexibleandmore abletoaccommodatedisagreementandlackofmutualknowledgethan that proposed by Aristotle. I argue that Aquinas’s reworking of the elementsofAristotelianfriendshipispartlyaresultofchallengesposed byChristianideasoffriendshipwithGodandoffriendshipwithfellow believers(charity). Aquinas’s deviations from Aristotle also stem, of course, from his owngeniusandfromhisreceptivenesstonon-Aristoteliantreatmentsof friendshipandlovesuchasthosefoundinpaganandChristianStoicism and Neoplatonism, biblical and patristic sources, and in the works of hiscontemporaries. From a historical point of view, Aquinas’s thoughts on friendship help further discredit romanticized images of European medieval soci- ety which picture these societies as cohesive and close-knit. Aquinas’s views on friendship can be seen to some extent as a reaction to the shadowofdoubtwhichconflict,misunderstanding,disagreement,and split, both at ecclesiastical and political levels, cast over the reality of Christian friendship. According to Aquinas, such conflicts are often PrefaceandAcknowledgements ix consistentwith a form of friendship and involve no moral fault, stem- ming,rather,fromineliminablefeaturesofthehumancondition(mostly epistemologicallimitations). Aquinas’s friendship may also provide a model of friendship that is more suited to present-day societies than that which Communitarian- mindedtheoristsfindandpraiseinAristotle.Foronething,Thomistic friendship seems to require less in the way of unanimity or shared opinionsthanthatofAristotle.ButevenifwefailtoendorseAquinas’s model of friendship,his discussions of friendshipremain exemplary in thattheybeartestimonytotheeffortsofabrightmindsetonenriching andmodifyingAristotelianfriendshiptosuittherealitiesandintellectual andspiritualpreoccupationsofhisowntime. This book is based on the dissertation I wrote for my doctorate at Oxford. Two of the original chapters have been thoroughly rewritten (Chapters6and7)andanewchapterhasnowbeenadded(Chapter1). In addition I have introduced many changes to the rest, making alterationstocontentsaswellasremovingmuchinessentialmaterial. ThebookopensinChapter1withanoverviewofthelargerthemes towhich belongthemorefocused studiesthatmake up therest of the chapters. Chapter 2 focuses on concord, or union of wills, as a central featureofAquinas’snotionoffriendship.NextI addressfourdifferent problems engendered by the view that friends will the same things: (i) we may not know what the friend wills or why he wills it; (ii) we may know what he wills, but we find ourselves in circumstances that makeitunfittingforustowillthesame(Chapter3);(iii)thefriendmay tellusofhiswillbut wecannotbesure ofhissincerity;(iv) wedonot know what the friend will will, which is important because friendship is future oriented, largely based on future expectations (Chapter 5). Chapter 4 examines the following question: if, as is shown, friendship is compatible with many different sorts of disunion of wills, when do we actually fail to satisfy the requirement of union of wills? Further, inwhichcasesissuchfailuremorallyblameworthy?Theanswertothis questionevolvesintoadiscussiononthenatureandeffectsofpride. Thepopular perceptionthatfriendshipisoflittlepoliticalrelevance becauseitconcernsarealmotherthanthatofjustice—thepre-eminent political virtue—impels me to probe into the relationship between friendshipandjustice.Doesfriendship,forAquinas,excluderecourseto justice? What can belearned about theconnectionbetween friendship andjusticefromAquinas’sviewthat‘thereisnomeritwithoutcharity’ (Chapter6)?Chapter7explorestheroleplayedbypenitentialformsof
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