Summa Theologiae
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae
Thomas Aquinas, of the Order of Preachers
Objection. Objection. On the contrary. I answer that. Thousands of times, in order, without ever losing the thread.
- Catch rate
- 8 / 255
- Base research
- 198
- Stat total
- 322
Base stats
Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.
Why these numbers
The game's own explanation, as a reader sees it in the backpack.
Thousands of articles, every one of them stating the objections before the answer. There is more of this book than of anything else on the shelf.
The five ways start from things anybody can see — motion, cause, a world that did not have to exist — and walk from there. Arguments that need no shared Scripture travel a long way.
Every article answers its objections in order and by name. A book that has already written down the case against itself is very hard to surprise.
Vast. Nobody reaches for the Summa quickly, and it does not pretend otherwise.
Cited for this book
The first question asked in the whole work is whether theology should exist at all beside philosophy, and the answer governs everything after it: reason is not faith’s rival and not its replacement. Aquinas stopped writing in December 1273 and never finished; asked why, he said only that what he had seen made his writing look like straw.
Development
A book develops as it is read — the fragment becomes the work, the work becomes the corpus.
Moves learned
By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.
| Lv | Move | Type | Cat. | Pwr | Acc | PP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Five Ways | Natural Theology | Argument | 78 | 100% | 10 |
| 1 | Random Verse | Bible | Argument | 10 | 100% | 30 |
| 1 | Chapter… | Bible | Scripture | — | — | 12 |
| 36 | Beyond What Reason Reaches | Faith | Argument | 64 | 100% | 15 |
| 40 | Grace Perfects Nature | Rationality | Argument | 68 | 100% | 15 |
| 46 | Than Which Nothing Greater | Rationality | Argument | 82 | 90% | 5 |
Read it: Grace Perfects Nature
The passages the Scriptorium holds on screen, word for word from a public-domain translation. Written in Latin.
“It was necessary for man’s salvation that there should be a knowledge revealed by God besides philosophical science built up by human reason.”
Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q.1, a.1 (trans. English Dominican Fathers, public domain).
“Since therefore grace does not destroy nature but perfects it, natural reason should minister to faith as the natural bent of the will ministers to charity.”
Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q.1, a.8 (trans. English Dominican Fathers, public domain).
“The existence of God can be proved in five ways. The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion… it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.”
Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q.2, a.3 (trans. English Dominican Fathers, public domain), elided.
“Therefore we cannot but postulate the existence of some being having of itself its own necessity, and not receiving it from another… This all men speak of as God.”
Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, q.2, a.3, the third way, from contingency (trans. English Dominican Fathers, public domain), elided.
The first question in the whole work is whether theology should exist at all beside philosophy, and the answer governs everything after it: reason is not faith’s rival and not its replacement.
Aquinas stopped writing in December 1273 and never finished. Asked why, he said only that what he had seen made his writing look like straw.