To reject all of Aquinas’ work on the doctrine of revelation would prove a great disservice to the Church. In many Baptist churches, the ministry of the Holy Spirit is largely ignored and disregarded out of fear and rejection of some of the mystical notions that have been associated with the Spirit. The Church must acknowledge and teach the importance and significance of the doctrine of illumination. Knowledge of the Triune God and His Word are impossible apart from the illumination of the Word by the Spirit. Aquinas’ teachings on how the Spirit illuminates and the necessity of comprehension in the study of Scripture both align with the Bible and provide useful and needed discourse on this much neglected topic.
All in all, Aquinas places far too much value on the Church hierarchy and the use of the intellect alone in his doctrine of revelation. Though he rightly affirms the supremacy and inspiration of Scripture, Aquinas fails to put them in their proper place in Christian living. Aquinas was perhaps a victim of his times, as the Middle Ages was a period dominated by hierarchy, not only of intellect but also of human value. It was believed that the king was not only more important to society than the beggar, but his life was of greater worth to God as well. Needless to say, within the context of the Church the worthless lives of the laity were believed to be incapable of intellectual thought, let alone of doctrinal and Scriptural comprehension. Aquinas’ doctrine of revelation, therefore, was both a product of the world in which he lived as well as the capstone of its theological foundations.
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