Further reading
Further reading
For translations of Thomas Aquinas try http://www.home.duq.edu/~bonin/thomasbibliography.html.
The standard biography by James A. Weisheipl, Friar Thomas d’Aquino: His Life, Thought and Work (Doubleday, 1974, second edition 1983), has been overtaken by Jean-Pierre Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 1: The Person and His Work, translated by R. Royal (Catholic University of America Press, 1996). However, it is well worth consulting Albert and Thomas: Selected Writings, translated and edited by Simon Tugwell (Paulist Press, 1982), which contains a good short biography and also sets Thomas in relation to his principal teacher, Albert the Great.
For the setting, see Later Medieval Philosophy (1150–1350) by John Marenbon (Routledge, 1987), which describes the academic institutions as well as the major figures. The Medieval Theologians edited by G. R. Evans (Blackwell Publishing, 2001) introduces the period even more comprehensively.
For good general accounts of Thomas’s thought, see The Thought of Thomas Aquinas by Brian Davies (Oxford University Press, 1992); Thomas Aquinas: Theologian by Thomas F. O’Meara (University of Notre Dame Press, 1997); and Saint Thomas Aquinas, Vol. 2: Spiritual Master by J. P. Torrell, translated by R. Royal (Catholic University of America Press, 2003).
Of the Summa Theologiae there are two translations: as The Summa Theologica in 22 volumes by the English Dominican Fathers, in fact Laurence Shapcote single handed, on his own as a missionary on the Rand (R & T Washbourne, 1911–25, the one on the web); and as Summa Theologiae Latin text and facing English translation, with introductions and notes, 60 volumes, edited by Thomas Gilby and T. C. O’Brien (Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1964–73; currently being reissued in paperback by Cambridge University Press).
The best entry point for new readers is Summa Theologiae: A Concise Translation by Timothy McDermott (Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1989; Methuen paperback, 1991), with excellent introductory essays scattered throughout, on which I have drawn. See also Holy Teaching: Introducing the Summa Theologiae of St Thomas Aquinas by Frederick Christian Bauerschmidt (Brazos Press, 2005): selected texts in translation interwoven with stimulating theological commentary.
Drawing on far more than the Summa there is an outstandingly good Selected Writings edited and translated with an introduction and notes, slanted towards philosophy, by Ralph McInerny (Penguin Classics, 1998).
In the recent wave of introductory essays the following should be noted, all concerned with Thomas as theologian: Aquinas on Doctrine: A Critical Introduction edited by Thomas Weinandy et al. (T&T Clark, 2004); Aquinas on Scripture: An Introduction to His Biblical Commentaries edited by Thomas Weinandy et al. (T&T Clark, 2005); and The Theology of Thomas Aquinas edited by Rik Van Nieuwenhove and Joseph Wawrykow (University of Notre Dame Press, 2005).
Thomas as philosopher is explored in The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas edited by Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump (Cambridge University Press, 1993). The best single volume is The Philosophy of Aquinas by Robert Pasnau and Christopher Shields (Westview Press, 2004).
Some not so easily accessed papers should be mentioned: in ‘Emanation in Historical Context: Aquinas and the Dominican Response to the Cathars’ (in Dionysius XVII, December 1999: 95–128), John Inglis makes the case that Thomas’s theology of the goodness of creation is a debate with the Catharist heresy; Mark Jordan’s provocative paper ‘The Alleged Aristotelianism of Thomas Aquinas’ is reprinted in his collection Rewritten Theology: Aquinas after His Readers (Blackwell Publishing, 2006); Wayne J. Hankey’s superb ‘Aquinas and the Platonists’ is in The Platonic Tradition in the Middle Ages: A Doxographic Approach edited by Stephen Gersh and Maarten J. F. M. Hoenen (De Gruyter, 2002); a theme beautifully developed by Fran O’Rourke, ‘Aquinas and Platonism’, in Contemplating Aquinas: On the Varieties of Interpretation edited by Fergus Kerr (SCM Press, 2003). Trying to make sense of Pope John Paul II’s talk of Thomas’s ‘philosophy of being’, I turned to some wonderful essays from 1952 onwards collected in William Norris Clarke, Explorations in Metaphysics: Being-God-Person (University of Notre Dame Press, 1994). For creation as the hidden element in Thomas’s thought, see The Silence of St Thomas by Josef Pieper (St Augustine’s Press, 1999).
For the most elaborate reconstruction of Thomas’s proof for the existence of God, see Norman Kretzmann, The Metaphysics of Theism: Aquinas’s Natural Theology in Summa Contra Gentiles I (Oxford University Press, 1997).
For the aftermath, see A Short History of Thomism (Catholic University of America Press, 2005) by R. Cessario; From Unity to Pluralism: The Internal Evolution of Thomism by Gerald McCool (Fordham University Press, 1992); and The Thomist Tradition by B. Shanley (Kluwer, 2002), dealing comprehensively with central topics in contemporary philosophy of religion from a Thomist point of view.
Among the many good recent books, see Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion: Metaphysics and Practice by Thomas Hibbs (Indiana University Press, 2007); Thomist Realism and the Linguistic Turn: Towards a More Perfect Form of Existence by John P. O’Callaghan (University of Notre Dame Press, 2003); Dependent Rational Animals by Alasdair MacIntyre (Open Court, 2001); Aquinas: Moral, Political, and Legal Theory by John Finnis (Oxford University Press, 1998); and Fran O’Rourke, Pseudo-Dionysius and the Metaphysics of Aquinas (University of Notre Dame Press, 2005).