Abstract

In his Aquinas Lecture of 1964, Pegis contends that a dynamic Thomism for our time must avoid, 1) merely detaching and then recomposing separable philosophical elements from the theological whole in which Thomas cast them, and 2) simply protracting the medieval ancilla theologiae status of philosophy for such a "theologically managed philosophy" cannot speak to our times. A living Thomism must develop Thomas' basic insights in a living personalistic context, assuming all the risks that creative inquiry entails. Thomism thus appears less a doctrine than a project, and the contemporary Thomist's aim can only be "to give a genuine philosophical life to the principles that St. Thomas used in another day and under the conditions of another culture." Pegis' discussion is lucid and its import cogent for those sympathetic to Thomism.—T. S. V.