Contemplation according to St. Thomas Aquinas - To Contemplate is to Know and Love!

To consider, to appreciate, to observe attentively, to transcend from the physical to the immaterial, to rise from the natural to the supernatural… what exactly is contemplation? To answer this question, we could define contemplation as the act of reflecting on something in search of its deepest meaning. Is that all it is? Although correct, this concept is still incomplete because, if we analyse the question from the theological standpoint, we will see that, from antiquity, contemplation was understood not only as the search for the essence of things through reason, but as the knowledge of them in their relationship with the Creator, reaching their apex in the vision of God himself.¹ For this reason St. Thomas Aquinas rightly ponders: “That which belongs principally to the contemplative life is the contemplation of the divine truth, because this contemplation is the end of the whole human life.”² Consequently, the contemplative life must consist in loving God, since charity makes our heart burn with the desire to see the face of the Creator.³ Allied to love, the natural inclination to know leads man, by observing the effects, to go back to the causes. Thus, by using intelligence and will to know, through creatures, the Causa causarum – that is, the Divine Craftsman – he will attain in the future life the last end of the intellectual creature: to see the essence of God.⁴ Contemplation should, therefore, be the primary occupation of one who loves, and love should be the end of everyone who wishes to contemplate God. The Angelic Doctor deals more deeply with contemplation in his commentary on the Gospel of St. John, in which he presents the Beloved Disciple as the prototype of the contemplative who transmits in a sublime way what he, moved by charity, has observed of the God-Man. Nevertheless, to different degrees we are all called to this contemplation. How can we attain this level of perfection?

Intelligence and will united in contemplation

The act of contemplating is proper to the intellect since it involves the object of the understanding, which is truth. However, St. Thomas shows⁵ that this act cannot be said to belong to the intellect alone, since the impetus to perform this operation belongs to the will, which moves all the other faculties, including the intellect. With divine wisdom, the Saviour expressed this reality when He said: “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also” (Mt 6:21). In fact, the man who finds the “treasure hidden” (Mt 13:44) of the knowledge of God is moved by love to abandon everything in order to obtain it; the heart becomes the great mover of his actions to attain the good sought by the intellect. Thus, since delight is experienced when the object of love is attained, the end of the contemplative life consists in the delight of knowing the desired object. With each new level of knowledge, love becomes more intense, since knowledge produces love, and love, in turn, longs to know more and more.

Cogitation, meditation and contemplation

We should also consider that man arrives at the intuition of truth in a progressive way, through many acts. Thus, although the contemplative life is consummated in a single act, namely, knowledge and love of the truth, it comprises multiple acts that prepare for this supreme action. Following the teaching of Richard of St. Victor, St. Thomas⁶ differentiates between the terms cogitation, meditation and contemplation throughout this process. Cogitation is the examination of the many elements from which one intends to extract a simple truth. This term can include both the sensitive perceptions by which we know certain effects, and the imagination or the discourse of reason about the different signs that lead to the knowledge of the desired truth. Meditation, on the other hand, is the process of reason which starts from principles in order to arrive at the consideration of a determined truth; and contemplation, in itself, is the simple intuition of the truth. Again according to Aquinas, man arrives at the contemplation of truth in two ways: by a favour received or an effort made. Regarding the first, it he notes that it can come from human sources – either through oral or written teaching, which requires listening or reading – or it can have a supernatural origin. When the gift comes from God, the involvement of prayer is necessary, which is why the Psalmist declares that he raises his prayer to the Lord from the dawn (cf. Ps 88:13). In the second way, in which man applies personal effort to achieve contemplation, meditation becomes necessary.

The invisible reality contemplated in the divine effects

The contemplative life thus comprises two elements: the principal and the secondary. The first is the contemplatio of divine truth, the end of all human actions and the fullness of eternal joy. However, this contemplation will only be perfect in the life to come, when we shall see God face to face.

Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament - Tabor Formation House, Caieiras (Brazil)

As long as we are pilgrims in this vale of tears, we possess but an imperfect contemplation of divine truth, which is like a reflection in a mirror. It is through the divine effects that we come to God – and this is the second element of contemplation – knowing the invisible realities only through created things. For this reason, the consideration of creatures should not be an exercise of sterile curiosity, a squandering of vitality or dissipation of spirit, but should be a means, impelled by charity, of transcending to what is eternal.⁷

The ultimate goal: happiness

Although perfect contemplatio is enjoyed in only eternity, the contemplation of God through His creatures already affords a beginning of beatitude which, having started in this life, reaches its fullness in the next. In this sense, St. Thomas asserts that it is impossible for man’s happiness – his perfect good, which, being the final end, appeases the desire – to be found in created goods. For the object of the will, which moves man in his desire to obtain it, is the universal good, and the object of the intellect is universal truth. Therefore, nothing can quiet man’s desire except the universal good, which is not found in anything created, but in God. The Angelic Doctor then concludes that “final and perfect happiness can consist in nothing else but the vision of the Divine Essence.”⁸ Moreover, the perfection of intelligence is measured by the knowledge of the essence of a thing. If, however, the intellect knows the essence of an effect, but is not able to know the essence of the cause, it cannot be said to have known it entirely. Now if the human intellect, knowing the essence of some created effect, succeed in knowing no more of God than that He exists, its perfection has not yet absolutely reached the first cause, and in it remains the natural desire to investigate it. Therefore, man does not yet enjoy the fullness of happiness, nor will he, until attaining perfection in the vision and knowledge of God.⁹ St. Thomas also states, based on St. Augustine, that no one can see God during this life, while subject to the bodily senses. To be raised to the vision of the divine essence, man must in some way die to this world, either by separating himself totally from the body or by dispensing with the carnal senses. Indeed, one can be in the present life in two ways: in an actual way, when one makes actual use of the bodily senses, or in a potential way, when the soul, although united to the mortal body as form, does not make use of the bodily senses nor even of the imagination. In the first case, contemplation can never attain to the vision of the divine essence; but in the second, yes, and this is what happens in rapture.¹⁰ But pure theory, although beautiful and sublime, can only be assimilated if translated into concrete examples, capable of enlightening men on the elevated path which, through contemplation, leads to the Creator.

Elevated, ample and perfect: the Johannine “contemplatio”

With the genius of a great theologian and the admiration of a Saint, Aquinas presents the Beloved Disciple as a model of contemplation. Already in the prologue to his work Lectura super Ioannem, in which he comments in a masterly way on the Fourth Gospel, he points out the high degree of contemplation possessed by the Virgin Apostle, emphasizing that “while the other Evangelists dealt mainly with the mysteries of Christ’s humanity, John shows especially and particularly in his Gospel the divinity of Christ, […] without thereby neglecting the mysteries of His humanity.”¹¹

Vision of St. John the Evangelist on the Island of Patmos - Diocesan Museum of Santarém (Portugal)

John – whom Jesus loved most, the one who contemplated on earth the glory of the Father’s Envoy, who rested his head on the heart of the Incarnate Word, who finally received as a depository His greatest treasure at the foot of the Cross – experienced with his bodily senses the divine effects in the God-Man and, on the other hand, was transported and contemplated the heavenly court and the glory of the Creator (cf. Rv 4:2). This is why St. Thomas affirms: “Because John transcends created beings – the very mountains, heavens and Angels – and reaches the Creator of all, […] it becomes manifest that his contemplation was most sublime.”¹² Applying a passage from Isaiah to the Johannine contemplation, the Angelic Doctor describes it as “elevated, ample and perfect.”¹³ The prophet recounts that he saw the Lord seated on a throne of glory; His majesty covered the earth, and the train of His robe filled the temple. On the basis of these words, Aquinas describes the three aspects of the contemplation of the Beloved Disciple: it is elevated, because, transcending creatures, it attains to the Word of God – “I saw the Lord sitting on a throne high and elevated”; ample, because it extends to the consideration of His power over all things – “all the earth is full of His glory”; and perfect, since it led him to adhere with affection and understanding to the supreme Truth contemplated – “His train filled the Temple” (6:1, 3). The Gospel of the Virgin Apostle constitutes the most beautiful manifestation of the highest point of his contemplation in conveying the incomprehensibility of the Word, who was from the beginning with God, and who is God himself (cf. Jn 1:1-2). “John not only taught how Jesus Christ, the Word of God, is God exalted above all things, and how through Him all things were made, but also that through Him we are sanctified and adhere to Him by the grace He infuses into us.”¹⁴ St. John reached such a depth of vision and was raised to the peaks of knowledge through charity. His love for the Incarnate Word made it possible for him, while living on this earth, to ascend to the heavenly heights, where he embraced the expanse of the firmament and was inebriated with the delight of the unchanging Truth, thus experiencing perfect contemplatio! ◊      

Notes

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¹ Cf. CONTEMPLATION. In: BERARDINO, Angelo Di (Org.). Dicionário patrístico e de antiguidades cristãs. Petrópolis: Vozes, 2002, p.337.

² ST. THOMAS AQUINAS. Summa Theologiæ. II-II, q.180, a.4.

³ Cf. Idem, a.1.

⁴ Cf. ST. THOMAS AQUINAS. Compendium Theologiæ. L.I, c.104.

⁵ Cf. ST. THOMAS AQUINAS. Summa Theologiæ. II-II, q.180, a.1.

⁶ Cf. Idem, a.3.

⁷ Cf. Idem, a.4.

⁸ Idem, I-II, q.3, a.8.

⁹ Cf. Idem, ibidem.

¹⁰ Cf. Idem, II-II, q.180, a.5.

¹¹ ST.. THOMAS AQUINAS. Lectura super Ioannem. Prologus, n.10.

¹² Idem, n.2.

¹³ Idem, n.1.

¹⁴ Idem, n.8.