Aquinas in Context Fall 2015: Aquinas and Bonaventure
on Divine Creation and Human Knowledge
Prof. Andrea Robiglio, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
Prof. Richard C. Taylor, Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI USA
Thomas Aquinas Fall 2014:
Theomorphism or Anthropomorphism? Conceiving God in Aquinas and his Arabic Sources
Prof. Richard C. Taylor, Marquette University, Milwaukee
(email: richard.taylor@hiw.kuleuven.be or Richard.Taylor@Marquette.edu)
Prof. Andrea Robligio, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium
(email: Andrea.Robiglio@hiw.kuleuven.be)
Last website update 29 November 2013
Live Classroom Course Meeting Times*:
28 August - 18 September: Thursday 9:00 - 11:00 am U.S. Central Time
25 September - 18 December 9:00-11:00 am US Central Time / 16h-18h European Central Time
Brief Course Description
In recent years the powerful influence of the Arabic tradition on the development of the philosophical reasoning and insightful doctrines of Aquinas has been firmly established in international conference meetings and publications on Aquinas and ‘the Arabs’. In connection with that work, this course will begin with five weeks of a graduate introduction to Aquinas and then become an international collaborative graduate seminar with the subtitle, “Theomorphism or Anthropomorphism? Conceiving God in Aquinas and his Arabic Sources.” Team taught by professors at Marquette and the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, this course will have assigned readings, video lectures, an online discussion board, student presentations (beginning in the sixth week), and weekly live video meetings for two hours of discussion involving students at Marquette and KULeuven as well as other selected international auditors. The content focus will be on issues, proofs, attributes, divine actions and more with particular reference to the initial (and often lasting) reasoning of Aquinas formed in connection with his use of ideas and arguments from the Arabic tradition. The course will close with four weeks of lectures on conceptions of God developed by later thinkers in engagement with the account of Aquinas. The structure of the course will follow the model found at https://academic.mu.edu/taylorr/Aquinas_Fall_2013_MU_KUL/Course_Description.html.
Marquette grading will be based on course participation (50%) and a final professionally prepared course paper of 20-25 pp. (50%).
Fall 2014 Aquinas: The Nature & Attainment of Happiness
Fall 2013 Aquinas: Metaphysics
Fall 2012 Aquinas: Soul & Intellect
Fall2011 course, Aquinas and the Arabic Philosophical Tradition on ‘Creation’
Click HERE.
Brief Course Description
After a general introduction to key issues in the philosophical thought of Aquinas and Bonaventure, the course will focus on two topics: the philosophical understanding of ‘creation’ and, more generally, the nature of ‘human knowledge’. We shall focus on two major works of two thinkers of the Middle Ages: Thomas Aquinas (1225 ca. - 1274) and Bonaventure of Bagnoregio (1221-1274). They were both Mendicant Friars, one Dominican, the other Franciscan, and both taught at the University of Paris and commented on the Sentences of Peter Lombard in the same years. Our initial focus will be precisely on their Sentences Commentaries, still scantly studied in detail even though they are rich resources for understanding their thought.
For both of these theologians the Arabic philosophical tradition played an important role in the formation of their understandings of creation and human knowing. For this reason we will consider in detail creation and human knowing in that philosophical tradition and track the use of it by Bonaventure and Aquinas.
This is a global collaborative course taught by Prof. Andrea Aldo Robiglio at KU Leuven and Prof. Richard C. Taylor at Marquette University, as a hybrid course. That is, it will be taught using online tools and classroom with face-to-face discussion in live video with Prof. Taylor at Marquette University present virtually with us in class. We will also occasionally be joined by renown experts in Medieval philosophy.
All detailed information concerning the articulation of the topic, the required readings and further bibliography will be provided in the Course Syllabus.
A Remark on Method
In recent years the powerful influence of the Arabic tradition on the development of the philosophical reasoning and insightful teachings of Aquinas has been firmly established in international conference meetings and publications by members of the Aquinas and ‘the Arabs’ International Working Group and other scholars. It has also become abundantly clear that Aquinas is most fully understood through the method of source based contextualism involving the location of the thought of Aquinas in relation to the sources he himself studied in forming his own philosophical and theological doctrines. This is the approach that will be followed in this course.
Désiré-Joseph Cardinal Mercier (1851-1926)
in the garden of the KUL Institute of Philosophy
al-Farabi Avicenna Averroes Aquinas Bonaventure Augustine
