Paths to the Triune God: An Encounter Between Aquinas and Recent Theologies

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0268034885 ISBN 13: 9780268034887

Publisher: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005

"Perhaps the greatest strength of Min's project is its sheer originality. I can hardly think of any journal articles, let alone books, that attempt to engage Aquinas from the perspective of contemporary liberation theology. Min has given us a distinctive and welcome addition to the literature on Aquinas, which should spark a lively debate among Thomists and liberation theologians alike." —Bruce D. Marshall, Southern Methodist University

 

"Paths to the Triune God is a work of theology of the first rank. It brings, in a clear and exact manner, Aquinas's sapiential theology to bear on issues of pressing contemporary concern and, in so doing, brilliantly makes the case for a renewed engagement with a central figure in the Catholic theological tradition." —Joseph P. Wawrykow, University of Notre Dame

 

In Paths to the Triune God, Anselm K. Min brings the theology of Thomas Aquinas into mutually critical dialogue with contemporary theological concerns. Min defends Aquinas's Trinitarian theology of reason and creation against modern detractors of natural theology while also calling attention to the lack of historical consciousness in Aquinas's writing. Min discusses Aquinas's affirmation of the salvation of the non-Christian through a moral life but also criticizes his sometimes naive approach to salvation history. Min presents Aquinas's Trinitarian theology of salvation through the incarnation and the possibility of a sacramental theology of religions for today while also taking seriously the scandal of his doctrine of reprobation. Min highlights Aquinas's contemplative conception of theology against contemporary preoccupations with praxis while also criticizing his intellectualist interpretation of human existence. 

 

Min also offers a substantive presentation of Aquinas's Trinitarian theology and a full-scale analysis and critique of the views of such contemporary social Trinitarians as Jürgen Moltmann, Wolfhart Pannenberg, and Cornelius Plantinga, Jr., all in light of Aquinas. He concludes that neither the purely sapiential theology of Aquinas nor the purely prophetic theology of contemporary liberation movements is adequate, arguing that contemporary theology must methodologically incorporate into its content a tension between wisdom and praxis.

About the Author:

Professor of philosophy of religion and theology at Claremont Graduate University, Anselm K. Min is the author of, among other works, Dialectic of Salvation: Issues in Theology of Liberation and The Solidarity of Others in a Divided World: A Postmodern Theology after Postmodernism.

Review:

"The author makes an important contribution to the fundamental question of method in theology and to Aquinas stories. He has clearly expressed the balanced richness of Aquinas' approach to theology and the complexity of contemporary approaches. Readers familiar with theology will gain much from this book." —Catholic Library World (September 2006)
“Anselm Min's splendid book will be prized not only by disciples of Aquinas but also by all theologians concerned with the fragmentary state of today's theology. Begun out of Min's concern for the 'woeful ignorance' and even 'contempt' of the classical tradition among some of his students, the work provides a 'postcritical retrieval' of key insights in Aquinas.” —Theological Studies 68, No. 1 (March 2007)

“Min is 'not naïve enough to believe that we can simply abandon contemporary theology and return to Aquinas.' By 'contemporary theology' he means a theology that is rooted, in some fashion, in a particular group's experience of oppression and that aims at accomplishing justice for the oppressed group. Aquinas's theology, by contrast, emphasized the unity of humankind in God's creative and redemptive plan. In this work Min seeks to combine the two into a theocentric humanism that retains some doctrinal essence of Christianity within a pluralist context that embraces left-leaning politics.” —Modern Theology, 2007