John of St. Thomas

John of St. Thomas

O.P.

Born	9 July 1589, Lisbon
Died	17 June 1644, Fraga
Religious name	John of St. Thomas (João Poinsot)
Religious family	Order of Preachers
Major works	Cursus philosophicus thomisticus; Cursus theologicus
Ecclesial status	Priest of the Order of Preachers; not canonized

John of St. Thomas, born João Poinsot, was a Portuguese Dominican theologian and philosopher whose Cursus philosophicus and Cursus theologicus became classic statements of commentatorial Thomism. He is a principal master of the school of Cajetan and Báñez, not a Doctor of the Church.

Theological status: Theological synthesis

Overview

John of St. Thomas O.P., born João Poinsot (also called John Poinsot in English; 9 July 1589 – 15 June 1644), was a Portuguese Dominican friar, Thomist theologian, and professor of philosophy. He is known for being an early theorist in the field of semiotics.

Life and name

João Poinsot was born at Lisbon, entered the Order of Preachers, and took the religious name John of St. Thomas. He taught in the Iberian Dominican network that had already produced Salamanca Thomism and the de Auxiliis generation. He died in 1644 while serving as confessor in the household of Philip IV during a military campaign. The life is that of a friar-theologian of the Catholic monarchy, not of a courtier who happened to write Latin.

The English form 'John of St. Thomas' is the received Catholic name. Poinsot is the family name restored by modern scholarship. Both denote one man. The religious name expresses his Dominican identity and his devotion; it does not confer a cult.

The two cursus

The Cursus philosophicus organizes logic, natural philosophy, and metaphysics in a Thomist order intended for teaching. It includes a developed doctrine of signs that later semioticians have studied with interest. The Cursus theologicus follows the Summa with the commentatorial method of conclusions, objections, and lengthy disputed articles. Together they offered a complete school where a student might not possess the whole Leonine Aquinas.

The strength of the cursus is completeness and technical control. Its risk is the same as that of every great manual: the student may learn the school and not the master. John intended the opposite. He wrote as a Thomist who thought Cajetan and the Dominican tradition had already done the labor of interpretation. Later historical Thomists used his completeness as a map and his authority as a question.

Place among commentators

John of St. Thomas stands with Cajetan and Báñez as a summit of second-scholastic Dominican Thomism. He is later than the first de Auxiliis generation and more systematic than many university relectiones. Garrigou-Lagrange and other neo-Thomists still assigned him as a principal guide. Existential and analytical readers have taken from him the doctrine of signs, the analysis of relations, or particular metaphysical theses while declining the whole baroque architecture.

He should not be collapsed into Cajetan. His questions, his doctrine of the sign, and his theological development have their own profile. Nor should he be treated as 'what Thomas would have said if he had written a seventeenth-century textbook.' That sentence is the occupational hazard of the commentatorial tradition.

Catholic reception

The Church has not beatified John of St. Thomas and has not made his cursus a required text. His authority is that of a proven scholastic master. Where his conclusions track defined doctrine, they share the doctrine's authority only as accurate theology, not as an independent source. Where they are school positions, they remain school positions.

He remains indispensable for anyone who would understand what 'Thomism' meant in the centuries between Cajetan and Aeterni Patris. To skip him is to misunderstand the manuals; to stop with him is to misunderstand Aquinas. Exact Catholic use reads both.

Biography

Born of noble parentage to a Portuguese mother and a father likely of Belgian descent employed by Albert of Austria. He was then sent early to the University of Coimbra, a university under the Jesuits and worked under Thomas de Torres de Madrid. He displayed talents of the first order, completed his humanities and philosophy, and obtained the degree of Master of Arts. He then entered the University of Louvain. Here, too, he showed remarkable ability, and earned the title of Bachelor of Theology at an early age. His admiration for St. Thomas proved to be a determining motive of his, which led to him joining the Dominican Order at Madrid in 1612 when he was 23 years old, taking the name of John of St. Thomas, by which he is known to history. Immediately after his novitiate, he began teaching his younger religious confrers as professor of philosophy and theology at the University of Alcalá. He soon took rank among the most learned men of the time, and was placed successively (1630 and 1640) in charge of the two principal chairs of theology in the university of that city. His renown drew the largest number of scholars that had ever attended its theological faculties. He taught for 33 years

No man enjoyed a greater reputation in Spain, or was more frequently consulted on points of doctrine and ecclesiastical matters. His theological and philosophical writings, which have gone through many editions, are among the best expositions of Thomas Aquinas's doctrine, of which he is acknowledged to be one of the foremost interpreters. Though he took an active part in the scholastic discussions of his times, his courtesy was such that he is said never to have hurt an opponent's feelings. So faithful was he to the traditions of his order and the principles of the Angelic Doctor that in his last illness he could declare that, in all the thirty years he had devoted to teaching and writing, he had not taught or written anything contrary to St. Thomas. His humility and his devotion to education caused him to refuse many dignities offered him by the Church and his order. In 1643 Philip IV offered him the office of royal confessor, a position which only religious obedience could induce him to accept. His writings comprise: Cursus philosophicus Thomisticus (9 vols.); Cursus Theologici (9 vols.), which is a commentary on the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas; Tractatus de Approbatione, Auctoritate, et Puritate Doctrinae D. Thomae Aquinatis; A Compendium of Christian Doctrine (in Spanish); and A Treatise on a Happy Death (in Spanish), written at the command of Philip IV. He caught a fever and died in Fraga, Spain at the age of 55.

Works

• Ioannes a S. Thoma, O. P. (1883). Cursus philosophicus Thomisticus (in Latin). Paris: Ludovicus Vivès. OCLC 7132509. Volumes 1, 2, and 3 available gratis online.
• Ioannes a S. Thoma, O. P. (1931–1964). Cursus theologici (in Latin). Paris, Rome: Desclée. OCLC 18001569. Volumes 1, 2, and 3 available gratis online.
• John of St. Thomas (2004). Introduction to the Summa Theologiae of Thomas Aquinas: The Isagogue of John of St. Thomas. Trans. McInerny, Ralph. South Bend, Ind.: St. Augustine's Press. OCLC 46928729.
• John of St. Thomas; Cuddy, Cajetan; Farrell, Walter; Hughes, Dominic (2016). The Gifts of the Holy Spirit. Tacoma, WA: Cluny Media. ISBN 978-1-944418-22-9.
• Poinsot, John (1985) [1632]. Tractatus de Signis. The Semiotic of John Poinsot. Trans. Deely, John. Berkeley: California University Press. OCLC 277224194. Retrieved 2011-06-17.

From the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia

(Family name John Poinsot), theologian, born at Lisbon, 9 June, 1589; died at Fraga, Spain, 17 June, 1644. Of noble parentage, he was sent early to the University of Coimbra, displayed talents of the first order, completed his humanities and philosophy, and obtained the degree of Master of Arts. He then entered the University of Louvain. Here, too, he showed remarkable ability, and won the title of Bachelor of Theology at an early age. He joined the Dominicans at Madrid in 1612 or 1613, taking the name of John of St. Thomas, by which he is known to history. As professor of philosophy and theology in a monastery at Alcalá, he soon took rank amongthe most learned men of the time, and was placed successively (1630 and 1640) in charge of the two principal chairs of theology in the university of that city. His renown drew the largest number of scholars that had ever attended its theological faculties. No man enjoyed a greater reputation in Spain, or was more frequently consulted on points of doctrine and ecclesiastical matters. His theological and philosophical writings, which have gone through many editions, are among the best expositions of St. Thomas's doctrine, of which he is acknowledged to be one of the foremost interpreters. Though he took an active part in the scholastic discussions of his times, his courtesy was such that he is said never to have hurt an opponent's feelings. So faithful was he to the traditions of his order and the principles of the Angelic Doctor that in his last illness he could declare that, in all the thirty years he had devoted to teaching and writing, he had not taughtor written anything contrary to St. Thomas. His humility and his devotion to education caused him to refuse many dignities offered him by the Church and his order. In 1643 Philip IV offered him the office of royal confessor, a position which only religious obedience could induce him to accept. His writings comprise: "Cursus philosophicus Thomisticus" (9 vols.); "Cursus Theologicus" (9 vols.)—a commentary on the "Summa Theologica" of St. Thomas; "Tractatus de Approbatione, Auctoritate, et Puritate Doctrinae D. Thomae Aquinatis"; a "Compendium of Christian Doctrine" (in Spanish); and a "Treatise on a Happy Death" (in Spanish), written at the command of Philip IV.

Quétif and Echard, Scriptores Ord. Praed., II (Paris, 1721), 538; Touron, Hommes illustres de l'ordre de St. Dominique, V (Paris, 1749), 248; Hurter, Nomenclator, I (2nd ed., Innsbruck, 1892), 375; Année Dominicaine, II June, 358-365.

External links

• General Bibliography by Marco Forlivesi
• The rediscovery of John Poinsot – Annotated bibliography about the contributions of John of St. Thomas to semiotics
• Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus – Latin text by John of St. Thomas
• Josef Bordat (2009). "Johannes a Sancto Thoma". In Bautz, Traugott (ed.). Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL) (in German). Vol. 30. Nordhausen: Bautz. cols. 1498–1499. ISBN 978-3-88309-478-6.
• John of Saint Thomas at the Encyclopædia Britannica

Further reading

• Bourke, Vernon J. (1996). "John Of St. Thomas (1589–1644)". In Edwards, Paul (ed.). The Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Vol. 34. p. 284. Retrieved 31 October 2023.
• Deely, John (1994). "What happened to philosophy between Aquinas and Descartes?". The Thomist. 58 (4): 543–568. doi:10.1353/tho.1994.0000. S2CID 171228067. Retrieved 2011-06-17.
• Deely, John (2008). Descartes and Poinsot: The Crossroad of Signs and Ideas. Scranton, PA: University of Scranton Press. ISBN 9781589661745.
• Deely, John (2009). Augustine and Poinsot: The Protosemiotic Development. Scranton, PA: University of Scranton Press. ISBN 9781589661738.

Bibliography

• Hughes, D. (2003). "John of St. Thomas". In Marthaler, B. L. (ed.). New Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 7: Hol–Jub (2nd ed.). Detroit: Thomson Gale. pp. 983–984. Retrieved 27 December 2024.