Rewritten Theology

Responding to the recent upsurge of interest in Thomas Aquinas, this book goes straight to the heart of the contemporary debates about Thomism. Focuses on the concept of authority, both in terms of Aquinas’s own attitude to authority, and how the Church authorities have used Aquinas’s texts. Engages with appropriations of Aquinas’s work by a range of theologians, from liberal Catholics to the creators of radical orthodoxy. Argues for future readings of Aquinas which are substantially different from those which have gone before.

Preface. Abbreviations and Editions. 1 St. Thomas and the Police. 2 The Competition of Authoritative Languages. 3 Imaginary Thomistic Sciences. 4 Thomas’s Alleged Aristotelianism or Aristotle Among the Authorities. 5 The Protreptic of Against the Gentiles. 6 The Summa of Theology as Moral Formation. 7 What the Summa of Theology Teaches. 8 Philosophy in a Summa of Theology. 9 Writing Secrets in a Summa of Theology. Conclusion: Writing Theology after Thomas -- and His Readers. Index.