School #34
Catholic/Thomistic
Thomas Aquinas, Aristotle
Catholic/Thomistic philosophy synthesizes Aristotelian metaphysics with Christian theology into a unified account of reality as created, ordered, and sustained by God. Thomas Aquinas's 'Summa Theologiae' (1265-1274) is the monumental achievement of this synthesis: drawing on Aristotle's 'Metaphysics' and 'Physics', Aquinas argued that every finite being is a composite of essence and existence, receiving its act of existing (esse) from God, who alone is pure act (actus purus) — the one being in whom essence and existence are identical. The Five Ways demonstrate God's existence from motion, efficient causality, contingency, degrees of perfection, and teleological order. His 'Summa Contra Gentiles' (1259-1265) developed the same themes in dialogue with Islamic and pagan philosophy. Creation is ex nihilo — from nothing — and all creatures participate in being according to their nature, ordered in a hierarchy from inert matter through vegetative and animal souls to rational souls made in the image of God.
Worldview
The Catholic/Thomistic thinker inhabits a created universe that is simultaneously rational and mysterious — ordered by divine wisdom according to discoverable natural laws, yet pointing beyond itself to a transcendent Creator whose infinite being exceeds all human comprehension. Reality is experienced as hierarchically structured: from inert matter through living organisms to rational souls and angelic intelligences, each level of being participates in God's goodness according to its nature. The fundamental orientation is one of grateful wonder before a creation that is real, good, and intelligible precisely because it is the work of an infinitely wise and loving God. To hold this ontology is to experience the natural world as sacramental — a sign pointing beyond itself to the divine source that sustains it in existence at every moment. Faith and reason are not antagonists but complementary paths to the same truth. The framework reads this as Personal metaphysical agency: the Triune God is a personal divine agent who hears, acts, and stands in relation to creatures — not merely the impersonal Act of Being but Father, Son, and Holy Spirit who freely create, redeem, and sustain. The framework reads this as Tradition-grounded moral authority: Scripture, the Magisterium, and the lived Tradition of the Church together constitute the rule of faith; the text is read within the interpretive community, not against it, and natural law is read in the same Tradition.
Moral Implications
Thomistic ethics is grounded in natural law — the rational creature's participation in the eternal law of God, discoverable through reason and confirmed by revelation. The good for human beings is defined by their nature as rational, social, embodied creatures made in the image of God and ordered toward union with Him as their ultimate end (beatitudo). The cardinal virtues (prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance) are natural excellences of rational agency, while the theological virtues (faith, hope, charity) elevate the soul beyond its natural capacities toward supernatural ends. Every human being possesses inherent dignity as a creature of God, establishing inviolable moral constraints on how persons may be treated. The moral life is understood as a journey of formation in virtue, guided by conscience, natural law, and the teaching authority of the Church.
Practical Implications
Catholic/Thomistic philosophy supports robust engagement with science, technology, and culture, understood as legitimate expressions of the rational capacities God has given human beings. The principle of subsidiarity guides social and political organization: higher authorities should not absorb functions that can be performed by individuals, families, and local communities. Bioethics is shaped by the conviction that human life is sacred from conception to natural death, placing limits on reproductive technology, euthanasia, and genetic manipulation. Environmental stewardship is a duty of responsible dominion: creation is entrusted to human care, not owned for exploitation. Education is oriented toward the formation of the whole person — intellect, will, and character — in the pursuit of truth, goodness, and beauty as reflections of the divine.
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I. Time
Time is substantival and finite — it was created by God ex nihilo along with the material universe and will have an eschatological end. Time is continuous, linear, and uni-directional, flowing from creation toward the Last Judgment. God is eternal (outside time) and knows all of temporal history in a single, timeless "now" (nunc stans). Human freedom operates within God's providential ordering of time.
Attributes
Extent: Both
Ontological Status: Substantival
Grain: Continuous
Freedom: Non-Deterministic
Traversability: Linear
Dimensionality: One
Direction: Uni-directional
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II. Space
Space is substantival, finite, flat, and local — it is part of God's created order, real and independent of the human observer. Space is three-dimensional and operates according to natural laws that reflect God's rational design (lex naturalis). God is omnipresent but not spatially extended; divine presence sustains space without being contained by it.
Attributes
Extent: Both
Ontological Status: Substantival
Curvature: Flat
Dimensionality: Three
Locality: Local
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III. Matter
Matter is substantival and finite — it is one of two principles of material being in Thomistic hylomorphism: prime matter (materia prima) receives substantial form to produce individual substances. Matter was created ex nihilo by God and is conserved through natural law within creation. It is local: material substances occupy determinate spatial positions and interact through natural causality.
Attributes
Extent: Finite
Ontological Status: Substantival
Conservation: Conserved
Dimensionality: Three
Locality: Local
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IV. Observer
The observer is a hylomorphic unity of body and soul — a rational animal situated in a specific time and place within God's created order. Knowledge begins with sense experience (nihil est in intellectu quod non prius fuerit in sensu) and is immediate in scope, yet the intellect can abstract universal truths from particular experiences, and faith illuminates what reason alone cannot reach. Knowledge accumulates through the intellectual tradition, Scripture, and the teaching authority of the Church. The observer is embodied and active: the human person is called to know, to love, and to participate in the divine plan through the exercise of reason and free will. Multiple observers share a common human nature and a common created reality ordered toward God.
Attributes
Time Instance: Single
Space Instance: Single
Extent of Knowledge: Immediate
Retainment of Knowledge: Total
Physicality: Embodied
Agency: Active
Number: Plural
Metaphysical Agency: Personal
Moral Authority: Revelation
Theological Method: Magisterial
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V. Energy
Finite and pre-existing — all energy is part of God's created order, real and independent of the observer. Conservation: Conserved — natural laws, including energy conservation, reflect God's rational ordering of creation (lex naturalis). Usage: Multiple — natural processes recycle and transform energy according to the finality built into creation by God.
Attributes
Extent: Finite
Ontological Status: Substantival
Conservation: Conserved
Dispersibility: Irreversible
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VI. Information
God's intellect contains all information (divine ideas) — every truth, every possibility, every fact is known exhaustively and eternally by the divine mind. The framework places this as conserved at both scales: God's intellect eternally contains all cosmic information, and the rational soul is created immortal — its personal-identity information is conserved in the beatific vision and in resurrection.
Attributes
Ontological Status: Substantival
Cosmic Conservation: Conserved
Personal Conservation: Conserved
Granularity: Continuous
Experiments This School Responds To (19)
The Trolley Problem
The doctrine of double effect explains the asymmetry: in the switch case the one death is foreseen but not intended; in the footbridge case the …
The Cosmic Microwave Background
A cosmology with a temporal beginning sits naturally with creation *ex nihilo*; Pope Pius XII publicly welcomed Big Bang cosmology in 1951 for this reason. …
Frankfurt Cases
Aquinas's view of voluntary action emphasises the rational structure of the choice, not the abstract modal alternatives; Frankfurt's conclusion is congenial, though Catholic moral theology …
Pasteur's Swan-Neck Flask
Theologically congenial: a clear empirical limit on what arises from matter alone, leaving the origin-of-life question open to teleological as well as naturalistic readings.
Hubble's Redshift Law
A cosmology with a temporal beginning is congenial to creation *ex nihilo*. Lemaître himself was a Catholic priest; Pius XII's 1951 endorsement set the tone …
The Violinist
Natural law: bodily union is not strictly analogous to forced surgical attachment; the duties of pregnancy follow from the natural goods at stake, not from …
The Drowning Child
Natural law grants duties of beneficence but recognises the principle of subsidiarity: obligations are ordered by relationship, ability, and proximity, without erasing universal claims.
The Repugnant Conclusion
Natural law denies the reducibility of moral evaluation to welfare aggregation; the human good is qualitative, not quantitative, and the conclusion follows from a defective …
Hilbert's Hotel
Aquinas-style finitism: actual infinities outside God are impossible. The hotel is consistent but unrealisable. (Craig's kalam cosmological argument descends from this position.)
Pascal's Wager
A useful pre-evangelical preparation but not a substitute for genuine assent; faith and the will's assent under grace, not mere expected-utility calculation, are the proper …
Galileo's Moons of Jupiter
A theological accommodation challenge: the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic cosmology had Catholic theological backing. The Galileo affair (1633) shows the difficulty of revising synthesis under empirical pressure.
Tycho's Supernova
Forces a difficult accommodation: Aristotelian celestial immutability had been integrated into Catholic theology of the heavens. Tycho's observation requires a re-reading of how creation has …
Torricelli's Barometer
Forces a theological accommodation: the Aristotelian "horror vacui" was integrated into scholastic natural philosophy. The vacuum's realisation requires re-reading the metaphysics.
JWST's Surprisingly Mature Early Galaxies
A reminder that contemporary cosmology continues to refine its picture of the early universe; theological commitments remain compatible with a range of cosmological models, but …
The Hubble Deep Fields
The sheer scale of the visible universe has prompted theological reflection on creation and humanity's cosmic place. The empirical scale enlarges rather than threatens classical …
The Survival Lottery
Direct intentional killing of the innocent is absolutely prohibited regardless of consequences; the survival lottery is intrinsically wrong.
Anscombe's Intention
Anscombe (a Catholic philosopher) reactivated Thomistic-Aristotelian action theory: action under a description is structurally Aristotelian.
Olbers' Paradox
Compatible with creation cosmology: the universe has a finite past, consistent with creation in time.
WMAP and Planck CMB Anisotropy Maps
A finite-age universe with quantitatively-characterised origin is congenial to creation cosmology; theological commitments accommodate but do not depend on specific values.
Films Reading Through This School (5)
The Tree of Wooden Clogs
The film is operative thomistic Catholicism: sacramental life is woven into agricultural time, the village priest is a local presence rather than an ecclesiastical authority, …
Diary of a Country Priest
The film operates within a thomistic frame: sacraments are real, vocation is objective, and the priest's suffering is intelligible as participation in Christ's. Bresson does …
A Hidden Life
The film situates Franz inside a thomistic frame even as he refuses the institutional church's counsel: natural law, the rational recognition of an evil regime, …
Ida
The convent is filmed with thomistic patience: the rhythm of prayer, meal, and silence as the form of a real moral order. The film does …
Calvary
Beneath the liberal-theological erosion, Father James himself operates as a working thomist: natural law, the priority of conscience, the priest's duty to the parish even …
Debates Where This School Is Allied (16)
The Russell–Copleston Debate
Jesuit / scholastic theist
Erasmus–Luther on Free Will
Catholic humanist; libertarian-leaning
The Augustine–Pelagius Controversy
Doctor of grace; original sin
The Hobbes–Bramhall Debate
Anglican-Arminian; libertarian
Aquinas–Siger on Latin Averroism
Synthetic theologian-philosopher
Galileo and the Inquisition
Inquisitor; magisterial theologian
Voltaire–Leibniz on Theodicy
Theodicist; philosophical optimist
Anselm and Gaunilo on the Ontological Argument
Augustinian-Platonist theologian
Spinoza and Leibniz
Rationalist substance-pluralist
Aristotle vs Plato on the Forms
Hylomorphist; defender of immanent forms
Locke vs Stillingfleet
Anglican bishop; defender of orthodox Trinity
Calvin and the Trial of Servetus
Reformer; Genevan theological authority
Aristotle vs Democritus on Atoms
Hylomorphic philosopher of nature
Anscombe vs C.S. Lewis at the Socratic Club
Analytic philosopher; Catholic
Anscombe vs C.S. Lewis at the Socratic Club
Christian apologist; literary scholar
Augustine vs the Manichaeans
Latin Church Father; ex-Manichaean
Works that name Catholic/Thomistic in their embodiments
Foundational texts that draw on this school, with each work's declared weight.
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Summa Theologiae
Thomas Aquinas · 1265–1274 (left incomplete at Aquinas's death)
Summa Contra Gentiles (Early)
Thomas Aquinas · c. 1259–1265 (Paris and Italy)
Fides et Ratio (Late)
Pope John Paul II (Karol Wojtyła) · 14 September 1998 (encyclical letter)
Disputed Questions on Truth (Early-mature (Aquinas's first major work after the Sentences commentary))
Thomas Aquinas · 1256-59 (Paris, during Aquinas's first regency)
On Evil (Late (Aquinas's mature treatment of evil and the passions, parallel to the Summa))
Thomas Aquinas · 1269-72 (Paris, during Aquinas's second regency, contemporaneous with Summa Theologiae I-II)
Compendium of Theology (Late (begun during the Roman regency, unfinished at Aquinas's death))
Thomas Aquinas · 1265-67 (begun in Rome, broken off after Aquinas's 1273 mystical experience)
Veritatis Splendor (Mature)
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 1993 (Veritatis Splendor, issued August 6, 1993)
Evangelium Vitae (Late-mature)
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 1995 (Evangelium Vitae, issued March 25, 1995, the feast of the Annunciation)
Apologia Pro Vita Sua (Late)
John Henry Newman · 1864 (in seven weekly instalments)
Divine Comedy: Inferno (Late (Dante's exile years))
Dante Alighieri · c. 1308-1320 (composed during Dante's exile from Florence; completed shortly before his death in 1321)
Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry (Late (third volume of the After Virtue trilogy))
Alasdair MacIntyre · 1990 (the Gifford Lectures, University of Edinburgh, 1988)
The Seven Storey Mountain (Early (Merton's breakthrough book; the spiritual autobiography of his conversion))
Thomas Merton · 1948
Rerum Novarum (Late)
Pope Leo XIII · 1891 (15 May)
Purgatorio (Mature)
Dante Alighieri · c. 1314-19
Aquinas (Mid-career)
Frederick Copleston · 1955
Disputationes de Controversiis Christianae Fidei (Career-defining)
Robert Bellarmine · 1586-1593
City of God (Late)
Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 AD (composed in stages over thirteen years)
An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent (Late)
John Henry Newman · 1870
On the Trinity (Late)
Augustine of Hippo · c. 399–419 (composed across two decades)
The Imitation of Christ
Thomas à Kempis (traditional attribution; sometimes attributed to Geert Groote or composite) · c. 1418–1427 (Mount St Agnes monastery, Zwolle, Netherlands)
After Virtue
Alasdair MacIntyre · 1981 (1st ed.); 1984 (2nd ed.); 2007 (3rd ed., with new prologue)
Cur Deus Homo (Late)
Anselm of Canterbury · 1094–1098 (Capua and Canterbury)
Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (Mid-late (the second of the After Virtue trilogy))
Alasdair MacIntyre · 1988
Dependent Rational Animals (Late (the explicit Thomist completion of the After Virtue trilogy))
Alasdair MacIntyre · 1999
Monologion (Early (Anselm's first major work, before the Proslogion))
Anselm of Canterbury · c. 1076 (composed at the abbey of Bec; the first major work of mature scholastic theology)
Love and Responsibility (Early (his major pre-papal work; drawn from pastoral and academic teaching))
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 1960 (the first major theological-philosophical book of the future John Paul II; based on his pastoral and academic teaching)
No Man Is an Island (Mid)
Thomas Merton · 1955
Foundations of Christian Faith (Late)
Karl Rahner · 1976 (German; English 1978)
Gaudium et Spes (Late)
Second Vatican Council · 1965 (7 December)
Paradiso (Divine Comedy, Cantica III) (Late)
Dante Alighieri · c. 1316-21
Modern Moral Philosophy (Mature (the journal paper that reshaped Anglophone moral philosophy))
G. E. M. Anscombe (Elizabeth Anscombe) · 1958 (Philosophy 33, no. 124)
The Dialogue of Divine Providence (Late (composed in Catherine's last two years, in the midst of her efforts to reform the Church and end the Avignon papacy))
Catherine of Siena (Caterina Benincasa) · c. 1377-78 (composed by dictation in ecstatic states; Catherine could read with difficulty and probably could not write)
Against Praxeas (Late (composed in Tertullian's Montanist period but with orthodox Trinitarian content))
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus · c. 213 (in Tertullian's Montanist period)
On the Resurrection of the Flesh (Mature (one of Tertullian's longest and most carefully argued treatises))
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus · c. 210-12
Theology of the Body (Mature (the major catechetical project of John Paul II's early pontificate))
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 1979-84 (129 Wednesday General Audience addresses; published collectively as Man and Woman He Created Them: A Theology of the Body)
Cur Deus Homo (Late-mature)
Anselm of Canterbury · c. 1094-98
Amoris Laetitia (Late)
Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) · 2016 (March 19)
Spirit in the World (Early)
Karl Rahner · 1939 (Geist in Welt)
Hearer of the Word (Early)
Karl Rahner · 1941 (lectures 1937)
A History of Philosophy (Career-spanning)
Frederick Copleston · 1946–1974 (9 volumes)
Contemporary Philosophy: Studies of Logical Positivism and Existentialism (Mid-career)
Frederick Copleston · 1956
Revelations (Revelationes Caelestes)
Birgitta of Sweden · c. 1344–1373 (dictated over nearly thirty years; Latin translations by confessors)
Gaudete et Exsultate (Late-middle (papacy))
Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) · 2018 (19 March)
Redemptor Hominis (Early (papacy))
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 1979 (4 March)
Nicomachean Ethics
Aristotle (edited by Nicomachus) · c. 340 BC (lecture notes, Lyceum period)
Confessions (Early)
Augustine of Hippo · c. 397–400 AD
Pensées
Blaise Pascal · c. 1657–62 (Pascal d. 1662); first published 1670
Metaphysics
Aristotle (compiled posthumously by Andronicus of Rhodes c. 70 BC) · c. 350 BC (lecture notes, second Athenian period)
The Consolation of Philosophy
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius · c. 524 AD (in prison at Pavia, awaiting execution by Theodoric)
Proslogion
Anselm of Canterbury · 1077–78 (Abbey of Bec)
De Anima
Aristotle · c. 350 BC (second Athenian period)
Politics
Aristotle · c. 335 BC (lecture course, Lyceum)
The German Sermons (Late)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1295–1327 (preached in Strasbourg, Cologne, and elsewhere)
Revelations of Divine Love
Julian of Norwich · May 1373 (the showings); short text c. 1380; long text c. 1395 (revised over twenty years)
On Free Choice of the Will (Early)
Augustine of Hippo · c. 387–395 (Book I in Rome 388; Books II–III at Hippo c. 391–395)
Physics
Aristotle · c. 350 BC (second Athenian period)
Scivias (Early (the first of her three major visionary works))
Hildegard of Bingen · 1141-51 (composed in the decade after Hildegard's call to write, ten years after entering the monastic life)
On Christian Doctrine (Mid-late (composed across three decades))
Augustine of Hippo · 397 (Books 1-3.25); 426-27 (Books 3.25-4, completed near the end of Augustine's life)
Liber Vitae Meritorum (Mid (the middle volume of the visionary trilogy))
Hildegard of Bingen · 1158-63 (the middle work of the visionary trilogy, between Scivias and Liber Divinorum Operum)
Vita Nuova (Early (Dante's first major work))
Dante Alighieri · c. 1295
Convivio (Mid (early years of exile, preceding the Comedy))
Dante Alighieri · 1304-07 (composed during the early years of Dante's exile from Florence; unfinished — four of fifteen planned books completed)
The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics (Late)
Hans Urs von Balthasar · 1961-69 (Vol I-VII; English 1982-91)
Finite and Eternal Being (Late)
Edith Stein (St. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross) · 1936 (completed; published posthumously 1950)
A Secular Age (Late)
Charles Taylor · 2007 (Gifford Lectures 1998-99 at Edinburgh, extensively expanded)
Ordinatio (Late)
John Duns Scotus (the Subtle Doctor) · c. 1300
Sic et Non (Yes and No) (Early)
Peter Abelard · c. 1121
The Dark Night (La Noche Oscura) (Late)
St. John of the Cross (Juan de Yepes Álvarez) · c. 1582-85
The Interior Castle (Castillo Interior) (Late)
St. Teresa of Ávila (Teresa Sánchez de Cepeda y Ahumada) · 1577
An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine (Mid)
John Henry Newman · 1845 (rev. 1878)
Orthodoxy (Mid)
G.K. Chesterton · 1908
The Long Loneliness (Late)
Dorothy Day · 1952
Laudato Si' (Late)
Pope Francis · 2015 (24 May)
Translations and commentaries on Aristotle's Categories (Mature (the late translation programme Boethius announced and partly completed before his death))
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius · c. 510-23 (the translations and commentary cycle, completed in Boethius's last years before his 524 execution)
De Libero Arbitrio (Late (the treatise that publicly broke the Erasmus-Luther alliance, written after seven years of pressure for Erasmus to declare his position))
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1524 (De Libero Arbitrio ΔΙΑΤΡΙΒΗ sive Collatio, Froben, Basel)
Anti-Pelagian writings (Late (Augustine's last great theological controversy, occupying the final two decades of his life))
Augustine of Hippo (Aurelius Augustinus) · 412-30 (the long anti-Pelagian controversy); peak works 426-29
Against Marcion (Mature (Tertullian's longest and most systematic work))
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus · c. 207-12 (composed in three revisions; the third recension is the surviving text)
Philippians (Late)
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 60-62 CE (from prison — Rome, Ephesus, or Caesarea)
On Truth (Mature)
Anselm of Canterbury · c. 1080-85
On Free Will (Mature)
Anselm of Canterbury · c. 1080-85
Evangelii Gaudium (Late)
Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) · 2013 (November 24)
De Processione Spiritus Sancti (On the Procession of the Holy Spirit) (Late)
Anselm of Canterbury · 1102
Promise Me, Dad (Late)
Joseph R. Biden Jr. · 2017
Theological Investigations (Mid-to-late)
Karl Rahner · 1954-1984 (23 volumes, Schriften zur Theologie)
On the Theology of Death (Mid)
Karl Rahner · 1958
The Sign of Jonas (Mid)
Thomas Merton · 1953 (journal 1946-1952)
Religion and Philosophy (Late)
Frederick Copleston · 1974
De Potestate Summi Pontificis in Rebus Temporalibus (Late)
Robert Bellarmine · 1610
Letter to Foscarini (Late)
Robert Bellarmine · 1615 (12 April)
De Aeterna Felicitate Sanctorum (Late (devotional))
Robert Bellarmine · 1616
Let Us Dream (Late-middle)
Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) · 2020
Memory and Identity (Final)
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 2005 (book-length reflections)
Loaves and Fishes (Middle-to-late)
Dorothy Day · 1963
Mere Christianity
C. S. Lewis · 1941–44 (BBC talks); 1952 (single-volume book form)
The New Testament
Anonymous and pseudonymous; the named Pauline letters (Romans, 1–2 Cor, Gal, Phil, Phlm, 1 Thess) are widely accepted as authentically Paul's · c. 50–110 AD; canon stabilised by late 4th century
Metaphysics of The Book of Healing (Late)
Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna) · c. 1014–1027 (compiled during Avicenna's years at Hamadan and Isfahan)
The Abolition of Man
C. S. Lewis · 1943 (Riddell Memorial Lectures, Durham, 1942)
Laws (Latest)
Plato · Composed late in life (final years before 347 BC); unrevised at his death
Categories
Aristotle · c. 350 BC (early in the Aristotelian corpus, opening the Organon)
Enchiridion Militis Christiani (Early (Erasmus's first major work))
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1503 (with a famous expanded 1518 preface that became a humanist-Reformation manifesto)
The Need for Roots (Posthumous)
Simone Weil · 1943 (written for Free France in London in the months before Weil's death; published posthumously 1949)
Waiting for God (Posthumous)
Simone Weil · 1942 letters to Father Perrin; published posthumously 1950
Seeds of Contemplation (1949) / New Seeds of Contemplation (Mid-late (Merton's mature contemplative theology))
Thomas Merton · 1961 (expanded revision of Seeds of Contemplation, 1949)
The Acting Person (Mid (his major academic-philosophical work, before his 1978 papal election))
Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II · 1969 (the philosophical magnum opus of his pre-papal academic career)
Liber Divinorum Operum (Late (the culmination of her visionary trilogy))
Hildegard of Bingen · 1163-73 (composed in the last decade of Hildegard's life, after the Scivias and the Liber Vitae Meritorum)
On the Heavens
Aristotle · c. 350 BC
Parisian Questions (Mid-late)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1300-1326 (the scholastic-Latin works composed across Eckhart's academic career)
Four Quartets (Late (Eliot's mature Anglo-Catholic period))
Thomas Stearns Eliot · 1936 (Burnt Norton); 1940 (East Coker); 1941 (The Dry Salvages); 1942 (Little Gidding); 1943 (collected publication)
Vom Abgeschiedenheit (On Detachment) / Counsels on Discernment (Early)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1295-98 (Eckhart's early German-vernacular work, written for the religious community at Erfurt)
Symphonia harmoniae caelestium revelationum (Mid-late)
Hildegard of Bingen · c. 1150-79
Eudemian Ethics
Aristotle · c. 350 BC
Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander (Late)
Thomas Merton · 1966
Didascalicon (On the Study of Reading) (Early)
Hugh of St Victor · c. 1127
Ars Magna (Ars Generalis Ultima) (Late)
Ramon Llull (Raimundus Lullus) · 1305-08 (final form; developed from 1271)
The Voice of the Voiceless (Late)
Óscar Romero · 1977-80 (collected pastoral letters)
De Officiis (Late (Cicero's last completed philosophical work, written in the months before his proscription and execution))
Marcus Tullius Cicero · 44 BC (composed at Tusculum, October-December 44 BC, in the months between Caesar's assassination and Cicero's own death in December 43 BC)
Miracles: A Preliminary Study (Mature (after Mere Christianity and Screwtape; the most philosophical of Lewis's apologetic works))
C. S. Lewis · 1947 (Bles, London; revised 1960 chapter 3 after Anscombe's 1948 Socratic Club critique)
Reden der Unterweisung (Early (Eckhart's first major vernacular work, written before the trials of his last decade))
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1294-98 (Eckhart's early period as Prior of Erfurt and Vicar of Thuringia, before the first Paris regency)
Romans (Mature (Paul's most extensive and systematic letter))
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 56-58 CE (composed in Corinth, near the end of Paul's third missionary journey)
1 Corinthians (Mature)
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 53-55 CE (composed in Ephesus during Paul's third missionary journey)
2 Corinthians (Mature)
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 55-56 CE (composed in Macedonia after a difficult Corinthian crisis)
1 Thessalonians (Early)
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 50-51 CE (earliest surviving Pauline letter)
Laudato Si' (Late)
Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) · 2015 (May 24)
Fratelli Tutti (Late)
Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio) · 2020 (October 3)
De Casu Diaboli (On the Fall of the Devil) (Mid)
Anselm of Canterbury · 1080-86
The Search After Truth (Early-to-mid)
Nicolas Malebranche · 1674-75 (expanded through 1712)
Treatise on Morality (Mid)
Nicolas Malebranche · 1684
Ars Magna (Ars Generalis Ultima)
Ramon Llull · 1305–1308
The Book of the City of Ladies
Christine de Pizan · 1405
Tome of Leo (Epistola XXVIII)
Pope Leo I (Leo the Great) · 449 CE
Gutenberg Bible (Mature (the culmination of approximately 15 years of experimentation with movable type))
Johannes Gutenberg (Johannes Gensfleisch zur Laden) · c. 1452–1455 (printed in Mainz; approximately 180 copies produced)
Philosophies and Cultures (Late)
Frederick Copleston · 1980
Theological Tractates (Opuscula Sacra) (Mid-to-late)
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius · c. 510-524
Collected Philosophical Papers (Late)
G. E. M. Anscombe (Elizabeth Anscombe) · 1981 (papers c. 1950-1980)
The Hebrew Bible (Tanakh)
Anonymous / composite (many authors, redactors, scribal communities over a millennium) · c. 1200 BC (oldest core) – c. 165 BC (Daniel); canon stabilised c. 100 AD
Phaedo
Plato · c. 380 BC (middle dialogue)
The Guide of the Perplexed
Moses Maimonides (Rambam) · c. 1185–1190 (Cairo)
The Mystical Theology
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite (probably a Syrian Christian theologian, c. 500 AD) · c. 500 AD (probably Syria)
Faṣl al-Maqāl (The Decisive Treatise) (Late)
Ibn Rushd (Averroes) · c. 1179 (Córdoba, Andalusia)
On Interpretation
Aristotle · c. 350 BC (early in the Organon)
The Problem of Pain (Mid (post-conversion, pre-Narnia))
C. S. Lewis · 1940
Letter from Birmingham Jail (Mid (the canonical theological-political document))
Martin Luther King Jr. · April 16, 1963 (written in jail in response to a published statement by eight Alabama clergymen criticising King's direct-action methods)
Gravity and Grace (Posthumous (Weil died in 1943 at age 34))
Simone Weil · 1947 (posthumous; assembled from Weil's notebooks by Gustave Thibon)
Prior and Posterior Analytics
Aristotle · c. 350 BC (the core logical works of the Organon)
Praise of Folly (Mid (Erasmus's most widely read book))
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1509 (composed during a visit to Thomas More); 1511 (first published)
Tahāfut al-Tahāfut (Mid-late (Averroes's major systematic philosophical defence))
Ibn Rushd (Averroes) · c. 1180
Provincial Letters (Late)
Blaise Pascal · 1656-57
Mysticism: Christian and Buddhist (Late)
Daisetsu Teitarō Suzuki · 1957
Promises to Keep (Mid)
Joseph R. Biden Jr. · 2007
Mystics and Zen Masters (Late)
Thomas Merton · 1967
A Theology of Liberation (Early (Gutiérrez's breakthrough work; the founding text of the school))
Gustavo Gutiérrez · 1971 (Spanish); 1973 (English)
A Community of Character (Mid)
Stanley Hauerwas · 1981
Being Given (Late)
Jean-Luc Marion · 1997 (French; English 2002)
Intention (Mid)
G.E.M. Anscombe · 1957
Sources of the Self (Mid)
Charles Taylor · 1989
Itinerarium Mentis in Deum (The Mind's Road to God) (Mid)
St. Bonaventure (Giovanni di Fidanza) · 1259
Summa Logicae (Late)
William of Ockham · c. 1323
On the Incarnation (De Incarnatione Verbi Dei) (Early)
St. Athanasius of Alexandria · c. 318
On the Holy Spirit (De Spiritu Sancto) (Late)
St. Basil of Caesarea (the Great) · c. 375
Theological Orations (Orations 27-31) (Mid)
St. Gregory of Nazianzus (the Theologian) · 380
Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith (De Fide Orthodoxa) (Late)
St. John of Damascus · c. 743
Utopia (De Optimo Reipublicae Statu deque Nova Insula Utopia) (Mid)
St. Thomas More · 1516
The Dream of the Earth (Late)
Thomas Berry · 1988
Church: Charism and Power (Igreja: carisma e poder) (Mid)
Leonardo Boff · 1981
Christ the Liberator: A View from the Victims (Late)
Jon Sobrino · 1999 (Spanish); 2001 (English)
The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (La Théorie physique: son objet, sa structure) (Late)
Pierre Duhem · 1906
Colloquia (Mature (the work that grew through Erasmus's most productive decades and was repeatedly enlarged))
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1518 (first edition Familiarium Colloquiorum Formulae); enlarged 1519, 1522, 1524, 1526, 1529, 1533
Opus Tripartitum (Late (Eckhart's most ambitious Latin project, undertaken in the years before the 1326 trial))
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1311-26 (planned during Eckhart's second Paris regency, never completed; only fragments survive)
Physica and Causae et Curae (Mid-mature (Hildegard's middle period, between her three major visionary works))
Hildegard of Bingen · c. 1150-58 (Rupertsberg, between Scivias and Liber Vitae Meritorum)
al-Kashf ʿan Manāhij al-Adilla (Mature)
Ibn Rushd (Averroes) · c. 1180
Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina (Mature (composed at the height of the developing controversy with Rome))
Galileo Galilei · 1615 (composed; circulated in manuscript; first published 1636 in Strasbourg)
Galatians (Mature)
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 48-55 CE (either earliest or middle Pauline letter)
Philemon (Late)
Paul of Tarsus (Saul / Saint Paul) · c. 60-62 CE (composed in prison alongside Colossians)
The Allegory of Love (Mature)
C. S. Lewis · 1936 (Oxford UP); Hawthornden Prize 1936
The Discarded Image (Last)
C. S. Lewis · Lectures delivered Oxford 1950s; published posthumously 1964 (Cambridge UP)
De Vulgari Eloquentia (Mid-mature)
Dante Alighieri · c. 1304-05 (two of four planned books)
De Monarchia (Late)
Dante Alighieri · c. 1313-18 (during Dante's exile)
Correspondence with Arnauld (Mature)
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz · 1686-1690
Ash-Wednesday (Mid)
Thomas Stearns Eliot · 1927-1930
Murder in the Cathedral (Mid)
Thomas Stearns Eliot · 1935
Dialogue on the Power of the Pope and the Emperor (Late)
William of Ockham · c. 1334-1346
De Veritate (On Truth) (Mid)
Anselm of Canterbury · 1080-86
We Drink from Our Own Wells (Mid)
Gustavo Gutiérrez · 1983 (Spanish), 1984 (English)
The Power of the Poor in History (Mid)
Gustavo Gutiérrez · 1979 (Spanish), 1983 (English)
Edition of Augustine (Late)
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1528-29
Edition of Cyprian (Mature)
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1520
Treatise on Nature and Grace (Mid)
Nicolas Malebranche · 1680
Dialogues on Metaphysics and on Religion (Mid-to-late)
Nicolas Malebranche · 1688
The Science of the Cross (Late)
Edith Stein (St. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross) · 1942 (incomplete at her arrest and martyrdom)
Essays on Woman (Mid)
Edith Stein (St. Teresia Benedicta of the Cross) · 1928-1932 (lectures and essays)
Zen and the Birds of Appetite (Late)
Thomas Merton · 1968
The Asian Journal (Late (final))
Thomas Merton · 1968 journal; published 1973 posthumously
Sentences
Peter Lombard · c. 1150
Letter to Demetrias
Pelagius · c. 414 CE
On Behalf of the Fool
Gaunilo of Marmoutiers · c. 1078
Platonic Theology (Mature (Ficino's philosophical magnum opus, composed during the height of his work at the Florentine Academy))
Marsilio Ficino · 1469–1474 (completed 1474; published 1482)
A Just Vindication of the Church of England (Late (Civil-War exile))
John Bramhall · 1654
On the Prescription of Heretics (Pre-Montanist)
Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus · c. 203
An Introduction to Wittgenstein's Tractatus (Mid-career)
G. E. M. Anscombe (Elizabeth Anscombe) · 1959 (2nd ed. 1971)
Letters (Career-spanning)
Hildegard of Bingen · c. 1146-1179
The Catching of Leviathan (Late)
John Bramhall · 1658 (appended to Castigations)
On the Virgin Conception and Original Sin (Late)
Anselm of Canterbury · c. 1099-1100
The Church and the Second Sex (Early)
Mary Daly · 1968 (rev. 1975)
Timaeus (Late)
Plato · c. 360 BC (late dialogue)
The Enneads
Plotinus (edited by Porphyry c. 301) · Composed c. 254–270 AD; edited by Porphyry c. 301
Symposium
Plato · c. 385–380 BC (middle dialogue)
Apology (Early)
Plato · c. 399–395 BC (shortly after Socrates's death)
Phaedrus (Late)
Plato · c. 370 BC (late-middle dialogue)
On the Nature of the Gods (Late)
Marcus Tullius Cicero · 45 BC
Democracy in America
Alexis de Tocqueville · Volume I 1835; Volume II 1840 (based on Tocqueville's 1831–32 American journey)
Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems
Galileo Galilei · 1632 (Florence; placed on the Index of Prohibited Books later that year)
Crito (Early)
Plato · c. 399–395 BC (composed shortly after Socrates's death)
Theodicy (Late)
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz · 1710 (the only philosophical book Leibniz published in his lifetime)
A Plain Account of Christian Perfection (Late)
John Wesley · 1766 (with revisions through 1777; published as a unified text in 1777)
Life Together (Mid (between the Cost of Discipleship and the prison theology))
Dietrich Bonhoeffer · 1939 (drawn from the Finkenwalde seminary, 1935-37)
Sanctorum Communio (Earliest (Bonhoeffer's dissertation at age 21))
Dietrich Bonhoeffer · 1927 (Bonhoeffer's doctoral dissertation, completed at age 21)
De Providentia (Late)
Lucius Annaeus Seneca · c. 64 AD (late in Seneca's life, shortly before his forced suicide)
Adagia (Long (composed across Erasmus's entire mature career))
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1500 (1st edition, c. 800 adages); 1536 (final edition, c. 4,151 adages)
Hamlet (Mid (mature middle period))
William Shakespeare · c. 1600-01
King Lear (Mid-late (the major tragedies))
William Shakespeare · c. 1605-06
Ninety-Five Theses (Early (the founding act of the Reformation))
Martin Luther · October 31, 1517 (posted to the door of All Saints' Church, Wittenberg)
On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church (Early (1520, foundational year))
Martin Luther · 1520
The Waste Land (Mid (the canonical modernist poem))
Thomas Stearns Eliot · 1921 (during Eliot's nervous breakdown and convalescence in Switzerland); 1922 published (edited substantially by Ezra Pound)
Tradition and the Individual Talent (Early (Eliot's major early critical statement))
Thomas Stearns Eliot · 1919 (first published in The Egoist, September-December 1919)
Greek New Testament (Novum Instrumentum) (Mid)
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1516
Time and Modality (Early (Prior's first major synthesis of tense logic, derived from his 1955-56 Oxford Locke Lectures))
Arthur N. Prior · 1957
Church Dogmatics (Mid)
Karl Barth · 1932-67 (14 volumes, unfinished)
Formalism in Ethics and Non-Formal Ethics of Values (Mid)
Max Scheler · 1913-16 (Yearbook for Philosophy and Phenomenological Research)
The Mystery of Being (Late)
Gabriel Marcel · 1949-50 (Gifford Lectures at Aberdeen)
Reflections on the Revolution in France (Late)
Edmund Burke · 1790
The Concept of the Political (Mid)
Carl Schmitt · 1932 (revised from 1927 essay; English 1976)
Long Commentary on De Anima (Late)
Averroes (Ibn Rushd) · c. 1190
De Docta Ignorantia (On Learned Ignorance) (Late)
Nicholas of Cusa (Nikolaus von Kues) · 1440
The Divine Names (De Divinis Nominibus) (Late)
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite · late 5th or early 6th century
Isagoge (Introduction to Aristotle's Categories) (Late)
Porphyry of Tyre · c. 270
On First Principles (Peri Archōn / De Principiis) (Early)
Origen of Alexandria · c. 230
The Mirror of Simple Souls (Le Mirouer des Simples Âmes) (Late)
Marguerite Porete · c. 1295
Oration on the Dignity of Man (Oratio de hominis dignitate) (Mid)
Giovanni Pico della Mirandola · 1486
New Science (Late)
Giambattista Vico · 1725 (1st edn); 1730 (2nd); 1744 (3rd, definitive)
Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint (Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkt) (Early)
Franz Brentano · 1874
Philosophy of Liberation (Filosofía de la Liberación) (Mid)
Enrique Dussel · 1977
The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (Essai sur la théologie mystique de l'Église d'Orient) (Mid)
Vladimir Lossky · 1944
Mere Christianity (Mid)
C.S. Lewis · 1952 (based on BBC radio talks 1941-44)
Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (Mid)
Marshall McLuhan · 1964
Don Quixote (El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha) (Late)
Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra · 1605 (Part I); 1615 (Part II)
An Essay on Man (Late)
Alexander Pope · 1733-34
Foundations of a General Theory of Manifolds (Grundlagen einer allgemeinen Mannigfaltigkeitslehre) (Mid)
Georg Cantor · 1883
Ulysses (Mid)
James Joyce · 1914-21 (composed); 1922 (published)
The Fragility of Goodness (Mature (the book that established Nussbaum as a major figure))
Martha Nussbaum · 1986 (Cambridge UP; revised 2001 with substantial new preface)
Aion (Late (one of Jung's last and most ambitious works, written in his mid-seventies))
Carl Gustav Jung · 1951 (Aion: Untersuchungen zur Symbolgeschichte, Rascher, Zurich; English trans. R.F.C. Hull, Collected Works vol. 9, pt II, 1959)
De Re Publica (Mid-mature (Cicero's political philosophical synthesis, composed during the breakdown of the late Republic))
Marcus Tullius Cicero · 54-51 BC (composed during a period of political withdrawal from active life)
Tusculan Disputations (Late (composed in the year of Cicero's daughter's death, in his most intense period of philosophical writing))
Marcus Tullius Cicero · 45 BC (Tusculanae Disputationes; composed at Tusculum after the death of his daughter Tullia)
Greek New Testament (Novum Instrumentum) (Mature (the work that established Erasmus's international reputation and reshaped biblical scholarship))
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1516 (Novum Instrumentum omne, Froben, Basel — first edition); revised 1519, 1522, 1527, 1535
On Learned Ignorance (Mature (the founding work of Cusa's philosophical career, composed at age 39))
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · 1440 (composed on the return voyage from the failed Council of Florence union with the Greeks)
The Vision of God (Mature (one of Cusa's most condensed and beautiful late works))
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · 1453 (composed for the Benedictine monks of Tegernsee, sent with an icon of an all-seeing face)
Vom Edlen Menschen (Mature (probably from the Strasbourg years before the trial))
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1308-13 (Strasbourg or Paris period)
On Generation and Corruption (Mature)
Aristotle · c. 350 BC (during Aristotle's mature Lyceum period)
Macbeth (Mature)
William Shakespeare · c. 1606
Measure for Measure (Mature)
William Shakespeare · c. 1603-04
Surprised by Joy (Late-mature)
C. S. Lewis · 1955 (Geoffrey Bles, London)
Discourse on Metaphysics (Mature)
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz · 1686 (composed February 1686; first published 1846)
The Iliad, or the Poem of Force (Late)
Simone Weil · 1939 (written), 1940-41 (published in Cahiers du Sud)
Treatise on Predestination, Foreknowledge, and Future Contingents (Mature)
William of Ockham · c. 1321-24
Commentary on the Sentences (Early)
William of Ockham · c. 1317-1319 (Oxford lectures)
Vom Abgeschiedenheit (On Detachment) (Mature)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1300 (German treatise)
Commentary on John (Mature)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1313-26 (Paris and Cologne periods)
Commentary on Genesis (Mature)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1305-25 (mature period)
Commentary on Wisdom (Mature)
Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim) · c. 1305-25 (mature period)
Edition of Jerome (Mature)
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1516
Edition of Origen (Late)
Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam · 1536 (posthumous)
The Hidden God (De Deo Abscondito) (Mid)
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · c. 1444
On the Beryl (De Beryllo) (Mature)
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · 1458
On the Not-Other (De Non Aliud) (Late)
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · 1462
De Apice Theoriae (Late)
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · 1464
Confessio
Patrick of Ireland (Patricius) · c. 450–461 CE
Institutes of the Christian Religion (Late)
John Calvin · 1536 (first ed.); 1559 (final, expanded ed.)
The Quran
Considered by Muslims the direct word of God; transmitted through Muhammad; collected under 'Uthmān (c. 650) · c. 610–632 AD (the period of the Prophet's mission); 'Uthmānic codex c. 650
The Analects
Compiled by Confucius's disciples and their disciples · Compiled c. 5th–3rd century BC; core sayings reflect Confucius (551–479 BC)
Monadology (Late)
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz · 1714 (written in French for Prince Eugene of Savoy); published 1720 in German
Mencius
Meng Ke (Mencius); compiled by his disciples · c. late 4th century BC (compiled shortly after his death c. 289 BC)
The Incoherence of the Philosophers
Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad al-Ghazālī · 1095 (Baghdad, immediately before his crisis and withdrawal)
Physics and Philosophy
Werner Heisenberg · 1958 (Gifford Lectures, St Andrews, 1955–56)
Meno (Early)
Plato · c. 386–380 BC (transitional dialogue)
The Brothers Karamazov (Late)
Fyodor Dostoevsky · 1879–1880 (serialised in The Russian Messenger)
The Cost of Discipleship (Early)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer · 1937
Political Liberalism (Late)
John Rawls · 1993 (revised 1996, with new introduction)
The Revival of the Religious Sciences (Late (post-crisis))
Abū Ḥāmid al-Ghazālī · c. 1097-1106 (composed during al-Ghazali's years of withdrawal after the 1095 spiritual crisis)
Discourse on the Method (Mid (1637, in mature middle age; preceding the Meditations of 1641))
René Descartes · 1637 (published anonymously as the preface to three scientific essays — Optics, Meteorology, Geometry)
Works of Love (Late (after the pseudonymous works; the major direct theological work))
Søren Kierkegaard · 1847 (published under his own name, not pseudonymous)
The Nature and Destiny of Man (Mid-late (Niebuhr's major systematic work))
Reinhold Niebuhr · 1941 (vol. I, Human Nature); 1943 (vol. II, Human Destiny) — based on the Gifford Lectures, Edinburgh, 1939
The Sovereignty of Good (Mid (her major philosophical statement, alongside Metaphysics as a Guide to Morals 1992))
Iris Murdoch · 1970 (collecting essays from 1956-67)
The Epistle to the Romans (Early (the breakthrough work))
Karl Barth · 1919 (first edition); 1922 (second edition — the famous and influential one, almost completely rewritten)
The Perennial Philosophy (Late (Huxley's mature spiritual-philosophical synthesis))
Aldous Huxley · 1945
Strength to Love (Mid (the major collection of sermons))
Martin Luther King Jr. · 1963 (collected sermons; some preached at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church Montgomery in the 1950s)
Mishneh Torah (Mid (the major legal work, between the early Commentary on the Mishnah and the late Guide of the Perplexed))
Moses Maimonides (Rambam) · c. 1170-80 (the second of Maimonides's three major works; preceding the Guide of the Perplexed of c. 1190)
The Cross and the Lynching Tree (Late (Cone's major late book))
James Cone · 2011
No Future Without Forgiveness (Late (the major reflective work after the TRC))
Desmond Tutu · 1999 (the personal-theological reflection on the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, 1995-98)
Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion (Late (Berlin lectures))
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel · 1821-31 (delivered as lectures); 1832 (compiled and published posthumously)
De Brevitate Vitae (Mid)
Lucius Annaeus Seneca · c. 49 AD
Discourse on Metaphysics (Mid (Leibniz's breakthrough philosophical statement))
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz · 1686 (sent to Antoine Arnauld; not published in Leibniz's lifetime)
Confessions of a Mask (Early (the breakthrough novel that established Mishima's literary reputation))
Yukio Mishima · 1949 (Mishima's breakthrough novel, written at age 24)
Kitáb-i-Íqán (Mid (pre-declaration in 1863))
Bahá'u'lláh (Mírzá Ḥusayn-ʻAlí Núrí) · 1862 (composed in Baghdad in two days and two nights, in response to questions from one of the Báb's maternal uncles)
The Freedom of a Christian (Early (1520 is Luther's most productive year of foundational treatises))
Martin Luther · 1520 (published in both Latin and German; the third of the three great 1520 Reformation treatises)
A Time for Choosing (Early (launched Reagan's political career))
Ronald W. Reagan · October 27, 1964 (broadcast nationally on behalf of Goldwater)
Tear Down This Wall (Late (Reagan presidency at its rhetorical peak))
Ronald W. Reagan · June 12, 1987 (delivered at the Brandenburg Gate, West Berlin)
Creation and Fall (Early-mid)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer · 1932-33
Psychology and Alchemy (Late)
Carl Gustav Jung · 1944
Answer to Job (Late)
Carl Gustav Jung · 1952
An American Life (Late)
Ronald W. Reagan · 1990
Principles of Nature and Grace (Late)
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz · 1714
De Tranquillitate Animi (Mid-late)
Lucius Annaeus Seneca · c. 60 AD
De Vita Beata (Mid-late)
Lucius Annaeus Seneca · c. 58 AD
Parmenides
Plato · c. 370 BC
Sophist
Plato · c. 360 BC
Commentary on the Mishnah (Early-mid)
Moses Maimonides (Rambam) · c. 1158-68
Theology of Hope (Early)
Jürgen Moltmann · 1964 (German; English 1967)
Systematic Theology (Late)
Wolfhart Pannenberg · 1988-93 (3 vols; English 1991-98)
The Politics of Jesus (Mid)
John Howard Yoder · 1972 (2nd edn 1994)
The Essence of Manifestation (Early)
Michel Henry · 1963 (French; English 1973)
Heretical Essays in the Philosophy of History (Late)
Jan Patočka · 1975 (Czech samizdat; revised; English 1996)
Truth and Other Enigmas (Mid)
Michael Dummett · 1978 (essays 1954-77)
Liberalism and the Limits of Justice (Early)
Michael J. Sandel · 1982 (2nd edn 1998)
Kitāb al-Najāt (Book of Salvation) (Mid)
Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā) · c. 1024-27
The Life of Moses (De Vita Moysis) (Late)
St. Gregory of Nyssa · c. 390
Periphyseon (On the Division of Nature) (Mid)
John Scotus Eriugena · c. 867
Ethics (Ethik) (Late)
Dietrich Bonhoeffer · 1940-43 (unfinished; first German edition 1949)
Ambigua to John (Ambigua ad Iohannem) (Late)
St. Maximus the Confessor · c. 628-30
Hymns of Divine Love (Hymnoi tōn Theiōn Erōtōn) (Late)
St. Symeon the New Theologian · c. 1020
Triads (Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts) (Late)
St. Gregory Palamas · 1338-41
Two New Sciences (Discorsi e Dimostrazioni Matematiche, intorno à Due Nuove Scienze) (Late)
Galileo Galilei · 1638
The Passions of the Soul (Les Passions de l'âme) (Late)
René Descartes · 1649
Warranted Christian Belief (Late)
Alvin Plantinga · 2000
An Essay on Free Will (Mid)
Peter van Inwagen · 1983
Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection (Pouvoirs de l'horreur) (Mid)
Julia Kristeva · 1980
Speculum of the Other Woman (Speculum, de l'autre femme) (Mid)
Luce Irigaray · 1974
Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life (Late)
Giorgio Agamben · 1995
Seven Interpretive Essays on Peruvian Reality (Siete ensayos de interpretación de la realidad peruana) (Mid)
José Carlos Mariátegui · 1928
Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza (Mid)
Gloria Anzaldúa · 1987
Natural Goodness (Late)
Philippa Foot · 2001
The Education of Henry Adams (Late)
Henry Adams · 1907 (private printing); 1918 (public)
Black Elk Speaks (Late)
Nicholas Black Elk (Heȟáka Sápa), recorded by John G. Neihardt · 1932
Paradise Lost (Late)
John Milton · 1667 (1st edn, 10 books); 1674 (2nd edn, 12 books)
One Hundred Years of Solitude (Cien años de soledad) (Mid)
Gabriel García Márquez · 1967
Swann's Way (Du côté de chez Swann) (Mid)
Marcel Proust · 1913
The Magic Mountain (Der Zauberberg) (Late)
Thomas Mann · 1912-24 (composed); 1924 (published)
The Sound and the Fury (Mid)
William Faulkner · 1929
The Age of Anxiety: A Baroque Eclogue (Mid)
W.H. Auden · 1944-46 (composed); 1947 (published)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (Nesnesitelná lehkost bytí) (Late)
Milan Kundera · 1984
The Doctor and the Soul: From Psychotherapy to Logotherapy (Mid)
Viktor Frankl · 1946
Second Treatise of Government (Late)
John Locke · 1689
Upheavals of Thought (Late-mature (Nussbaum's magnum opus, eight years in the writing after the Gifford Lectures))
Martha Nussbaum · 2001 (Cambridge UP; based on the Gifford Lectures, Edinburgh, 1993)
On Conjectures (Mature (the systematic epistemological development of the docta-ignorantia framework))
Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus) · c. 1442-43 (composed shortly after De Docta Ignorantia, dedicated to Cardinal Cesarini)
Brief Outline of Theology as a Field of Study (Mature)
Friedrich Schleiermacher · 1811 (first edition); substantially revised 1830 (second edition)
Quodlibetal Questions (Mature)
William of Ockham · c. 1322-1325
Personas with Catholic/Thomistic as a declared influence
60% Thomas Aquinas
50% Dante Alighieri
50% Karol Józef Wojtyła / Pope John Paul II
50% Catherine of Siena (Caterina Benincasa)
50% Frederick Copleston
50% Robert Bellarmine
45% Thomas Merton
45% Anselm of Canterbury
35% Simone Weil
35% Hildegard of Bingen
35% Julian of Norwich
35% Blaise Pascal
35% Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius
35% Alasdair MacIntyre
30% Meister Eckhart (Eckhart von Hochheim)
30% Thomas Stearns Eliot
30% Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam
30% Karl Rahner
30% Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio)
30% Dorothy Day
30% G. E. M. Anscombe (Elizabeth Anscombe)
30% John Bramhall
30% Gaunilo of Marmoutiers
30% Birgitta of Sweden
25% William of Ockham
25% Samuel Clarke
25% Edward Stillingfleet
25% Sir Thomas More
20% Martin Luther King Jr.
20% C. S. Lewis
20% Augustine of Hippo
20% Galileo Galilei
20% Gustavo Gutiérrez
20% Quintus Septimius Florens Tertullianus
20% Nicholas of Cusa (Nicolaus Cusanus)
20% Nicolas Malebranche
20% Edith Stein (Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross)
20% Pelagius
20% John Duns Scotus
20% Ramon Llull
20% Pope Leo I (Leo the Great)
20% Gerbert of Aurillac (Pope Sylvester II)
15% Aristotle
15% René Descartes
15% John Scotus Eriugena (Iohannes Scottus Eriugena)
15% Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
15% John Wesley
15% Iris Murdoch
15% Mulla Sadra (Sadr al-Din al-Shirazi)
15% Vladimir Solovyov
15% Peter Lombard
15% Christine de Pizan
15% Marsilio Ficino
10% George W. Bush
10% Joseph R. Biden Jr.
10% Martin Luther
10% John Calvin (Jean Cauvin)
10% William Shakespeare
10% Heȟáka Sápa (Black Elk)
10% Raghavendra Swami
10% Kurt Gödel
10% Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite
10% Patrick of Ireland (Patricius)
-15% Mary Daly
-25% Peter Singer
How Catholic/Thomistic resolves each dilemma
56 resolved positions across 4 dimensions, including 3 distinctive where the majority of schools go the other way · 1 unaligned.
Each dimension is sorted so minority positions come first. Mainstream positions are folded into an expandable list.
Time · 9 dilemmas, all mainstream
Do you really choose?
The future is open and you are a genuine origin of it.
69%
Are addicts responsible for their addiction?
The addict could have chosen otherwise — that's why recovery is real.
69%
Should we hold AI systems responsible for what they do?
An AI without a free will is not the kind of thing that can be responsible.
69%
How much weight do future people deserve?
Future people are as real as you are — and their interests count for as much.
47%
Is regret rational?
The past is as real as the present; regret is a real attitude toward a real thing.
47%
Do we owe extinct species something we cannot give them?
Extinct species are as real as we are; they have standing.
47%
Is the universe running out of usable energy?
Time both has and lacks bounds depending on the level you ask at; finitude is conventional.
26%
Are natural resources fundamentally finite, or only practically so?
The finitude question is level-dependent; resource ethics happens at the level that constrains us.
26%
Could we owe future generations more than is materially possible to provide?
The owing-and-possibility question is level-dependent; we owe what is appropriate at the level we act on.
26%
Matter · 7 dilemmas, all mainstream
Is the world created from nothing?
Yes — matter was created and is conserved as a real substance.
56%
Is the physical world fully real?
Yes — the physical world is fully real, mind-independent, persisting.
56%
Does matter have intrinsic moral standing?
Matter is morally considerable insofar as it is created or conserved good.
56%
What is money?
Money is a real institution with intrinsic features.
55%
What is a nation?
A nation is a real moral community with intrinsic character.
55%
What makes someone male or female?
Sex is a real biological kind with given content.
55%
Should we edit the human germline?
Human nature is a real biological kind given by reproductive biology or by creation; editing the germline transgresses what is given.
55%
Observer · 37 dilemmas · 3 distinctive
Mind, agency, and the knower's relation to the known.
Distinctive · only 13% of schools agree
(28/208)
What kind of religious-theological authority does the tradition recognize?
Religious traditions differ not only in what they believe, but in how authority is structured — and what counts as the right kind of argument.
Institutional teaching tradition is the authority.
Scripture, tradition, and the institutional magisterium together carry revealed truth.
Roads not taken
The category does not apply — the school is non-religious. (42%) ·
Direct experiential union is the authority. (16%) ·
Historical-critical method is the authority. (10%)
Distinctive · only 16% of schools agree
(33/208)
Who is the moral primary — the individual, the community, the cosmos, the class, or the species?
Different traditions take fundamentally different things to be the basic moral-political unit.
The cosmic-religious order is the moral primary.
Persons have their place in a hierarchy of being or a cosmic ordering.
Roads not taken
The discrete person is the moral primary. (38%) ·
The community of persons is the moral primary. (28%) ·
The species or biosphere is the moral primary. (11%)
Distinctive · only 19% of schools agree
(40/208)
Does history have a direction or meaning?
Is history the unfolding of progress, the recovery of lost truth, a cyclical recurrence, the approach of consummation — or none of these?
History is oriented toward a decisive consummation.
Time culminates in judgment, kingdom, resurrection, or ultimate fulfillment.
Roads not taken
History is not where the deepest truth lives. (36%) ·
History is the gradual unfolding of improvement or liberation. (23%) ·
History recurs in cosmic cycles. (17%)
33 mainstream positions
Could causation work backwards?
Causation runs one way — the arrow of time is real and structural.
68%
Is the asymmetry between memory and anticipation a real feature of time, or just of us?
The asymmetry is real because time itself has a real direction.
68%
Is the arrow of time a real feature of the cosmos, or only of how we describe it?
The arrow is real and structural; the asymmetry isn't an artifact of description.
68%
Is environmental damage ever truly permanent?
Damage is real and permanent on the relevant timescales. There is no recovery; there is only limitation.
66%
Can a civilization recover from collapse?
Civilizational complexity is hard to build and easy to lose; recovery is at best partial.
66%
Does the second law of thermodynamics mean something morally?
Entropy is what time is. The moral weight, if any, is the weight of working against the current.
66%
Is truth universal, tradition-bound, situated, or constructed?
Truth is mind-independent, universal, accessible in principle to all.
66%
When does a person begin?
A person exists from conception — when a new being comes into existence.
55%
What is marriage?
Marriage has a given form — it’s a kind of thing we recognize, not make.
55%
What is our place in nature?
Active in a real nature — we cultivate, steward, transform.
50%
Should we colonize space?
Cultivating worlds beyond Earth is the next form of stewardship.
50%
Is genetic engineering of food stewardship or domination?
Genetic modification is cultivation by other means.
50%
Is reality fundamentally digital?
No — continuous divine sustaining act, the Tao that knows no joints, the One's self-disclosure.
44%
Are there indivisible units of experience?
No — continuous divine presence; consciousness is the unbroken witness.
44%
Is memory stored or reconstructed?
Held in continuous divine or ancestral remembering — neither stored discretely nor purely reconstructed.
44%
What happens to "you" when you die?
A soul continues into another mode of being.
38%
Can prayer for someone far away affect them?
Prayer reaches because God or a cosmic ordering acts on the prayed-for.
38%
Are coincidences ever more than coincidence?
What looks like coincidence is providence — there is no such thing as a real coincidence.
38%
Are the dead morally present to the living?
The dead are present through divine memory, communion of saints, or ancestor presence.
37%
Is divine omniscience compatible with human freedom?
The human observer is in time, but God's vantage is not — and foreknowledge is not foreordering.
34%
Does meditation reveal something genuinely timeless?
Meditation participates in a real eternity — divine or cosmic — that the bounded human observer ordinarily cannot reach.
34%
Does prayer change God's mind?
God sees from outside time; prayer doesn't change God's mind, but it is part of how providence is enacted.
34%
Could an AI have a mind that matters?
No — minds are not the kind of thing we engineer.
31%
Do animals have moral standing comparable to humans?
Moral standing comparable to humans requires what only humans have.
30%
Could a fetal brain organoid in a petri dish be conscious?
Without ensoulment, an organoid is tissue, not a person.
30%
What makes someone the same person over time?
You are a soul — what persists through change is the non-bodily aspect.
30%
Is the late-stage dementia patient still the person their spouse married?
The soul persists; the cognitive change is the body's, not the person's.
30%
If a teleporter copied and destroyed you, would you have survived?
The soul accompanies the person; engineering can't transfer it.
30%
Should we trust expert testimony when we can't verify it?
Defer to credentialed traditions; experts are the modern analog.
30%
Is religious revelation a real source of knowledge?
Revelation is the paradigm case of authoritative knowledge.
30%
Does an LLM 'know' the things it correctly produces?
An LLM has no soul to whom revelation could be addressed; the question doesn't apply.
30%
Does environmental harm in another country bind me morally?
Distance doesn't dilute obligation; communion of saints / divine relation spans the cosmos.
29%
How is knowledge of reality produced?
Through a priori reasoning and conceptual demonstration.
24%
Information · 4 dilemmas, all mainstream
Is anything truly lost when someone forgets?
Information is conserved — the personal pattern is held even when an individual mind loses it.
39%
Does deleting your data online destroy something real?
Information at the cosmic level isn't destroyed; deletion only obscures access.
39%
Could the dead, in principle, be brought back?
The information that constitutes a person is conserved; restoration is in principle possible.
39%
Is forgiveness ontologically possible?
The offense persists ontologically; forgiveness is real moral work, but it doesn't erase what was.
39%
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