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miss this question, or to preclude any of the answers that might be made in response to it. |
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Whichever option one follows, there is still no persuasive reason to refuse to reread ST III.46.3 alongside a selected Advaita text, even if the juxtaposition highlights distance, inappropriateness and apparent incomparability. Since comparative reading does not depend on similarity, extreme dissimilarity is no reason to end such reading. |
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3. The Fruits of Recomposing the Theological Text:
Retrieving the Bible and the Commentaries on the Summa Theologiae |
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A retrieval of the textuality of comparison and a reformulation of comparison as first of all an exercise in reading brings to the foreground two aspects of the Summa Theologiae which, though never entirely neglected, have been relegated to the background in the the main currents of Thomism in this century. First, we will consider the role of the Bible as a powerful textual resource which helps constitute the Summa Theologiae as a Text. Returning to the Summa Theologiae after Advaita Vedanta enables us to examine Aquinas' use of the Bible, asking in particular how his reading of this important source, and his strategic use of quotations from it, affect his explanation and rewriting of the theological doctrines and themes received from his predecessors. Second, we retrieve the commentarial tradition which developed in response to the Summa Theologiae; we open the door to a reconsideration of the great commentarial and textbook tradition on the Summa Theologiae, in order to understand better how this Text's possibilities have been traditionally read and used. Let us consider in turn these scriptural and commentarial retrievals. |
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a. Retrieving the Citation of the Bible |
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One can affirm without controversy that the Bible is not unimportant to the Summa Theologiae in its overall plan and in its details; few would doubt that that the Summa Theologiae, though not a commentary on the Bible and not exegetical in the sense that the UMS is, nevertheless gives evidence of a worldview deeply influenced by the Bible.
23 A bit more contro- |
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