# Calvin on Aquinas



## py3ak (Oct 3, 2006)

Does anyone know where the quote is where Calvin criticizes Aquinas for making scripture yield to Aristotle?

I have searched and searched through the Institutes and didn't find it, although I am positive I read it a few months ago. Of course, the lurking possibility haunts my waking moments that it was in one of the commentaries. Any help?


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## caddy (Oct 3, 2006)

No, but Cavin's works can be added to e-Sword and you can do a word search from there--in case you have not already explored that route.

Aristotle is mentioned in 

Book 1 Chapter 5
" " Chapter 8
" " Chapter 15 


Book 2 Chapter 2 Part B
Book 2 Chapter 5
Book 4 Chapter 17 Part B


Book 1 Chapter 5:
5. But my business at present is not with that stye: I wish rather to deal with those who, led away by absurd subtleties, are inclined, by giving an indirect turn to the frigid doctrine of *Aristotle*, to employ it for the purpose both of disproving the immortality of the soul, and robbing God of his rights. 

Just to site one such reference


[Edited on 10-3-2006 by caddy]


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## R. Scott Clark (Oct 3, 2006)

To my knowledge, all the direct references to Thomas are in the footnotes supplied by McNeill in the Battles edn.

I don't think Calvin had a copy of the Summa in Geneva and the library did not shelve a copy until after Calvin's death.

Calvin had some knowledge of Thomas from his time in Paris, but how much he knew of Thomas is an open question. 

Remember, he did not go through the theology faculty in any of his universities. He was, more or less, self-taught. He seems to have direct knowledge of Lombard's Sentences and quotes them directly in 1.13. He knew the Fathers pretty well and quoted and refered to them directly. He knew Bernard best of all the medieval theologians.

rsc


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## py3ak (Oct 3, 2006)

It may have been a more generic reference to the schoolmen. 
And thanks for the tip, Steven. I have got a searchable Calvin --I tried Aristotle, the Philosopher, Aquinas, Thomas....


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## R. Scott Clark (Oct 3, 2006)

Muller argues in The Unaccommodated Calvin that most of Calvin's references to "the schoolmen" are really to the Sorbonne and not to the medievals. Sometimes Calvin names medieval names, but Muller is right.

rsc



> _Originally posted by py3ak_
> It may have been a more generic reference to the schoolmen.
> And thanks for the tip, Steven. I have got a searchable Calvin --I tried Aristotle, the Philosopher, Aquinas, Thomas....


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## ReadBavinck (Oct 3, 2006)

> _Originally posted by R. Scott Clark_
> To my knowledge, all the direct references to Thomas are in the footnotes supplied by McNeill in the Battles ed



So, these footnotes are reliable?

Christopher

[Edited on 10-3-2006 by CJ_Chelpka]


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## RamistThomist (Oct 3, 2006)

> So, these footnotes are reliable?
> 
> Christopher



While McNeill/Battles knows infinitely more than I do about Calvin, they are also influenced by their own presuppositions (somewhere they state that, "See here? Calvin denies covenant of works."). You have to be on the look out for statements like that.

They are fun to read, teh footnotes. How accurate tehy are, I don't know.


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## R. Scott Clark (Oct 3, 2006)

Well, some are and some aren't. See Muller's criticisms in the above-mentioned volume.

McNeill was a great historian but he associated Thomas too closely with Calvin. I've criticized this tendency in R. Scott Clark, "Calvin and the Lex Naturalis," Stulos Theological Journal 6 (1998): 1–22.

Battles read Calvin almost solely in relation to humanism and not in relation to scholastisim. Battles was probably a Barthian when at Pittsburgh Theol Sem. I don't know if he remained thus.

rsc




> _Originally posted by CJ_Chelpka_
> 
> 
> > _Originally posted by R. Scott Clark_
> ...


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## py3ak (Oct 3, 2006)

Well, now, that's just great, Dr. Clark. You've made me doubt my memory here, shaken my self-confidence and delayed a blog post.

Does what I posted above sound like anything you've read? Any Reformer or Puritan just take a sideswipe at Aquinas for putting Aristotle's opinions as a legitimate objection to a certain interpretation of Scripture?


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## R. Scott Clark (Oct 4, 2006)

Never let the facts get in the way of a good blog - at least thats the way it seems on some of them!

Yes, I'm sure one could find someone saying this, but who and where, I don't know off the top. It's possible that Calvin said it, but without finding chapter and verse I wouldn't impute that to him.

rsc


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## py3ak (Oct 4, 2006)

Arrgh! Your cursed academic qualifications are making a post with a good picture combo sit uselessly in my drafts folder. 
Still, commend me: at your word I at least hesitated!


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## brymaes (Oct 4, 2006)

> No, but Cavin's works can be added to e-Sword and you can do a word search from there--in case you have not already explored that route.



Where can I find that?


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## Peter (Oct 4, 2006)

That sounds more like Bahnsen's assessment of St. Thomas then Calvin's but it did remind me of a critical word from a Puritan I read a little while ago. 

Edward Lawrence on Transubstantiation against the Papists.



> And Thomas Aquinas, their angelical doctor, as they call him, (of whom they tell a tale, -that his doctrine of the sacrament was confirmed by a miracle: A wooden crufix miraculously saluted him with these word, "Thou hast written well of me, Thomas" [freaky]) doth assert and plead for this dirty ribaldry, saying, that "it doth no more detract from the dignity of Christ to be eaten by dogs and mice than his being willing to be crucified for our sins." A goodly argument for such an acute Schoolman; as if, because Jesus Christ in the state of his humiliation was willing to be crucified for our sins, therefore in the state of his exaltaiotn he is willing that his glorified body in heaven should be eaten by dogs and mice! But thus they talk, as if their doctors had sat in the council with devils in the gates of hell, to debauch the faith of Christians, and to disgrace the body of Christ


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## Civbert (Oct 4, 2006)

> _Originally posted by theologae_
> 
> 
> > No, but Cavin's works can be added to e-Sword and you can do a word search from there--in case you have not already explored that route.
> ...


http://www.e-sword.net/index.html


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