Evil in Dionysius the Areopagite, Alexander of Hales and Thomas Aquinas

Abstract

: This paper examines Alexander of Hales ’ use and reconciliation of appa-rently dissonant quotations from Dionysius on two related questions, the knowability of God and the origin of evil. Noting that Alexander, as a junior colleague of Robert Grosseteste, was one of the first to make extensive use of Dionysius, it shows that he normally cites him in conjunction with Augustine and other Latin writers rather than according an independent authority to him. It is also argued that, although Alexander in some respects anticipates the conclusions of Aquinas, which are also reinforced by appeals to Dionysius, he is more inclined to admit the substantiality of evil. Theology is distinguished from philosophy, not only by its loftier subject-matter, but by its principled subordination of reason to tradition in the investigation of that sub-ject-matter. No professing Christian before the 18 th century called the inerrancy of the Scriptures into question, and any church that purported to be catholic held fast to the decrees of at least four oecumenical councils, while according presumptive authority also to certain individuals whom it esteemed as fathers, doctors or apologists for the true faith. For the scholastics Augustine was the cynosure of a Latin constel-lation whose lesser stars were Hilary, Ambrose, Jerome, Gregory the Great, Isidore of Seville and (by about 1200) as recent a saint as Anselm; they too, if less often quoted, were not to be contradicted, and the same was true of the easterners John Chrysos-tom and John Damascene, who were now and then co-opted (through Latin versions) to give the stamp of universality to the same truths.We should not infer that all orig-inality was precluded: authority might determine what the church was to believe, but not what means of proving it might be employed by a given exponent, while there were numerous corollaries and implications of these normative tenets on which it was possible for good Christians to differ. To be original meant not so much to estab-lish new beliefs as to show,