Chapter 4
of Ellen T. Charry’s God and the Art of
Happiness (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010) on Saint Thomas Aquinas includes a review of Aristotle’s
teaching on happiness. “Happiness is not a matter of acquiring something outside
us, but of adopting a particular way of life….Happiness is being an excellent
person, and that is demanding; learning to “do” one’s life excellently takes
time…The path to happiness sis unflinchingly social, not private, because it
takes place in the context of interpersonal and public relationships and
behaviors. One must know what behaviors to cultivate, and this knowledge comes
from a good upbringing that inculcates moral discipline and good priorities, as
well as from a keen intellect that practices good judgment.”
“Thomas is
especially interested in knowing God, and, though he does not always call it
happiness, life’s goal is to know God perfectly…Perfect knowledge of God is
perfect happiness for Aquinas.”
“Aquinas is
unique among theologians in that mixed in with his eschatological vision is a
temporal construal of happiness that is experiential. He is the first Christian
theologian to embrace temporal flourishing in this life by enjoying material
goods – though it is a minor theme, one inspired by Aristotle.”
“Happiness…is
knowledge and not physical well-being. It is an intellectual activity that is
completed by delight in loving what we desire….Ultimate happiness is a spiritual
activity: it is seeking our ultimate good, which is, of course, God. Complete
happiness is knowing God utterly…Knowing God is not information about God but
an intimacy with divinity itself (the divine mind, essence, or nature) that satisfies
the soul’s deepest desire; it is simultaneously intellectual and emotional joy,
in which love infuses knowledge.”
“Since
happiness is knowing the divine mind, we are hamstrung using our mind alone
because our little minds cannot grasp the divine mind.” “By becoming spiritually
adept, one becomes emotionally secure and less needful of external sources of
gratification. This benefit is lost on those who miss the signs of God in this
world that would enable them to understand the true source of goodness.”
“Divine
illumination is the foundation of Aquinas’s doctrine of happiness: God is both
the means and the object of human happiness.”
All things
are purposeful and God uses secondary means to make creatures flourish in fulfillment
of their God-given purpose. “Acting on things for their good advances their
purpose, and as this happens we are also improving: enhancing the flourishing
of others enhances our own. This is enjoying ourselves and being happy in this
life.”
“Virtue is
necessary but not sufficient for temporal happiness. This is a deep break with
Christian Stoicism and Neo-Platonism. Even if it is an intellectual pleasure,
enjoyment is embodied and the body contributes to happiness (art. 5). Happiness
needs a healthy body because poor health can impede virtue and thus impede the
correct orientation or will toward selecting appropriate desires. At the same
time, ‘happiness of soul overflows into body which drinks of the fullness of
the soul’ (art.
5). Physical and spiritual pleasures work together because soul and body
are an indivisible unity.”
“Thomas
made two contributions to the developments of the Christian doctrine of
happiness. First, he integrated Augustine’s notion of happiness residing in the
enjoyment of God with divine illuminations, the beatific vision, and immortal life.
These were all Augustinian themes, but the bishop did not unify them. Aquinas incorporated
Aristotles’ valorizing of personal well-being into Augustinian theology to
create a genuine if limited Christian doctrine of terrestrial happiness while
sustaining central interest in eschatological happiness.
His second contribution is that he
recognized that terrestrial happiness prepares one for eternal bliss. Augustine
did not emphasize the continuity between material and spiritual happiness,
which Aquinas appreciated more. For his part, Boethius tried to wean us from
relying on good fortune and the ability to accumulate wealth, power, fame, and
reputation; Aquinas, by contrast, valued mundane happiness because he saw
continuity between temporal and eternal bliss: temporal happiness is a
foretaste of the heavenly banquet, and enables us to anticipate and yearn for
eschatological fulfillment even more. To the degree that achieving this goal
requires good attitudes, a well-disposed mind and body, and friends, divine
grace enables us to be happy in this life. Thomas viewed the great river of
time and space that we occupy as the arena in which the desire to celebrate our
life in the goodness of God’s creation, however imperfectly, enables us to develop
knowledge of God and hope for eternal bliss.”
“Illumination
is the gift of loving and wanting to know God utterly; it gives unifying purpose
to life.”
