Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion: Metaphysics and Practice

by Thomas Hibbs

Overview

In Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion, Thomas Hibbs recovers the notion of practice to develop a more descriptive account of human action and knowing, grounded in the venerable vocabulary of virtue and vice. Drawing on Aquinas, who believed that all good works originate from virtue, Hibbs postulates how epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, and theology combine into a set of contemporary philosophical practices that remain open to metaphysics. Hibbs brings Aquinas into conversation with analytic and Continental philosophy and suggests how a more nuanced appreciation of his thought enriches contemporary debates. This book offers readers a new appreciation of Aquinas and articulates a metaphysics integrally related to ethical practice.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253348814
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	05/31/2007
Series:	Philosophy of Religion
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Thomas Hibbs is Dean of the Honors College and Distinguished Professor of Ethics and Culture at Baylor University. He is author of Virtue's Splendour: Wisdom, Prudence, and the Human Good and Dialectic and Narrative in Aquinas: An Interpretation of the Summa Contra Gentiles.

Table of Contents

Contents
Preface: Metaphysics and Practice
Acknowledgments
1. Ethics as a Guide into Metaphysics
2. Virtue and Practice
3. Self-Implicating Knowledge: The Practice of Intellectual Virtue
4. Dependent Animal Rationality: Epistemology as Anthropology
5. Metaphysics and/as Practice
6. Metaphysics, Theology, and the Practice of Naming God
7. The Presence of a Hidden God: Idolatry, Metaphysics, and Forms of Life
8. Portraits of the Artist: Eros, Metaphysics, and Beauty
9. Metaphysics of Contingency, Divine Artistry of Hope
Notes
Bibliography
Index

What People are Saying About This

Loyola College in Maryland - Graham McAleer

[This book] is an extremely broad-minded engagement—and this must surely be very welcome—with the basic contours of contemporary philosophy as practiced in the U.S. today.

Editorial Reviews

"A remarkable teacher takes us on an exciting journey to recover Aquinas, following the contours of a graduate course to engage contemporary philosophers who might seem unlikely protagonists. Yet they become salient foils for unveiling the secret of Aquinas' metaphysical inquiry: a 'distinctive sort of intellectual activity closely allied to the imagination and always including appropriate emotional response' (p. 161). This daring venture both demands and displays a formidable familiarity with contemporary philosophy—from ethics to epistemology, metaphysics to theology, incorporating analytic with continental modes of reflection. With a judiciously critical eye given deft and gracious expression, we are moved gracefully among worlds of discourse, as we acquire the skills needed to compare them. Yet that is precisely what good teachers can do.April 2009"—David Burrell, C.S.C., Uganda Martyrs UniversityKampala, UGANDA

". . . this book suggests and models a new direction for the methodology of contemporary philosophical discourse.64 1/16/2008 (online)"—Janine Marie Idziak, Intnl Journal for Philosophy of Religion

". . . This is a heady mixture of philosophy, theology, and aesthetics. . . . Highly recommended."—Choice

"Hibbs . . . convincingly argues that the practice of seeking the good—both moral and intellectual—leads to and requires metaphysics, and not the reverse. . . . The book will help those who want to (1) revisit Aquinas's epistemology, metaphysics, and virtue ethic, especially in light of [Hibbs's] substantial previous work on these questions; (2) investigate [Hibbs's] broader theses about metaphysics; (3) generate a more convincing philosophical foundation and a more robust description of social accountability for virtue theory and narrative ethics; or (4) engage one or more of [Hibbs's] admirably diverse interlocutors (Plantinga, MacDonald, Murdoch, Joyce, Turner, Marion, Zagzebski, Pieper, Gadamer, MacIntyre, Nietzsche, and others).March 2009"—CRISTINA L. H. TRAINA, Northwestern University

"[This book] is an extremely broad-minded engagement—and this must surely be very welcome—with the basic contours of contemporary philosophy as practiced in the U.S. today."—Graham McAleer, Loyola College in Maryland

From the Publisher

A remarkable teacher takes us on an exciting journey to recover Aquinas, following the contours of a graduate course to engage contemporary philosophers who might seem unlikely protagonists. Yet they become salient foils for unveiling the secret of Aquinas' metaphysical inquiry: a 'distinctive sort of intellectual activity closely allied to the imagination and always including appropriate emotional response' (p. 161). This daring venture both demands and displays a formidable familiarity with contemporary philosophy—from ethics to epistemology, metaphysics to theology, incorporating analytic with continental modes of reflection. With a judiciously critical eye given deft and gracious expression, we are moved gracefully among worlds of discourse, as we acquire the skills needed to compare them. Yet that is precisely what good teachers can do.April 2009

Uganda Martyrs UniversityKampala, UGANDA - David Burrell

. . . This is a heady mixture of philosophy, theology, and aesthetics. . . . Highly recommended.

Choice

Hibbs . . . convincingly argues that the practice of seeking the good—both moral and intellectual—leads to and requires metaphysics, and not the reverse. . . . The book will help those who want to (1) revisit Aquinas's epistemology, metaphysics, and virtue ethic, especially in light of [Hibbs's] substantial previous work on these questions; (2) investigate [Hibbs's] broader theses about metaphysics; (3) generate a more convincing philosophical foundation and a more robust description of social accountability for virtue theory and narrative ethics; or (4) engage one or more of [Hibbs's] admirably diverse interlocutors (Plantinga, MacDonald, Murdoch, Joyce, Turner, Marion, Zagzebski, Pieper, Gadamer, MacIntyre, Nietzsche, and others).March 2009

Northwestern University - CRISTINA L. H. TRAINA

. . . this book suggests and models a new direction for the methodology of contemporary philosophical discourse.64 1/16/2008 (online)

Intnl Journal for Philosophy of Religion - Janine Marie Idziak

"[This book] is an extremely broad-minded engagement—and this must surely be very welcome—with the basic contours of contemporary philosophy as practiced in the U.S. today." —Graham McAleer, Loyola College in Maryland

Graham McAleer

"A remarkable teacher takes us on an exciting journey to recover Aquinas, following the contours of a graduate course to engage contemporary philosophers who might seem unlikely protagonists. Yet they become salient foils for unveiling the secret of Aquinas’ metaphysical inquiry: a 'distinctive sort of intellectual activity closely allied to the imagination and always including appropriate emotional response' (p. 161).
This daring venture both demands and displays a formidable familiarity with contemporary philosophy—from ethics to epistemology, metaphysics to theology, incorporating analytic with continental modes of reflection. With a judiciously critical eye given deft and gracious expression, we are moved gracefully among worlds of discourse,
as we acquire the skills needed to compare them. Yet that is precisely what good teachers can do." —David Burrell, C.S.C., Uganda Martyrs University Kampala, UGANDA, MODERN THEOLOGY, April 2009

— David Burrell, C.S.C., Uganda Martyrs UniversityKampala, UGANDA

Modern Theology

"Hibbs... convincingly argues that the practice of seeking the good—both moral and intellectual—leads to and requires metaphysics, and not the reverse.... The book will help those who want to (1) revisit Aquinas’s epistemology, metaphysics, and virtue ethic, especially in light of [Hibbs's] substantial previous work on these questions; (2) investigate [Hibbs's] broader theses about metaphysics; (3) generate a more convincing philosophical foundation and a more robust description of social accountability for virtue theory and narrative ethics; or (4) engage one or more of [Hibbs's] admirably diverse interlocutors (Plantinga, MacDonald, Murdoch, Joyce, Turner,
Marion, Zagzebski, Pieper, Gadamer, MacIntyre, Nietzsche, and others)." —CRISTINA L. H. TRAINA, Northwestern University, Theological Studies, March 2009

— CRISTINA L. H. TRAINA, Northwestern University

Theological Studies

... this book suggests and models a new direction for the methodology of contemporary philosophical discourse.—Janine Marie Idziak, Intnl Journal for Philosophy of Religion, 64 1/16/2008 (online)

— Janine Marie Idziak

International Journal for Philosophy of Religion

In a series of penetrating essays, he [Thomas S. Hibbs] demonstrates how Thomas conceived of the philosophic life of "contemplation" as an activity or "practice involving a set of virtues." Moreover, he suggests that proponents of contemporary virtue-ethics and virtue-epistemology can learn much from the rich account of the intellectual and moral virtues sketched in the Thomistic position. This is a heady mixture of philosophy, theology, and aesthetics. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Graduate students and above.
—W.P. Haggerty, Associate Professor - Philosophy Program, Gannon University.

Choice Reviews