Thomas Aquinas, Disputed Questions on Truth (De Veritate)

1. Universal knowledge differs from particular knowledge. But the ancients knew the matters of faith as it were in general, believing them implicitly, whereas moderns believe them explicitly and in particular. Therefore, the faith of the ancients and moderns is not the same.

2. Faith concerns a proposition. But the propositions which we believe are not the same as the ones they believed, as, for instance, Christ will be born, and Christ has been born. Therefore, our faith is not the same as that of the ancients.

3. In matters of faith a definite time is a necessary element of belief. Thus, a man would be called an unbeliever if he believed that Christ had not yet come, but would come. But there is temporal variation in our faith and that of the ancients, for we believe about the past what they believed about the future. Hence, our faith and that of the ancients is not the same.

To the Contrary:

1'. In Ephesians (4:5) we read: "One Lord, one faith, one baptism."

REPLY:

We must firmly hold that there is one faith for ancients and moderns; otherwise, there would not be one Church. To support this position some have said that the proposition about the past which we believe and the one about the future which the ancients believed is the same proposition. But it does not seem right that the proposition should remain the same when its essential parts are changed. For we see that propositions are changed by reason of changes in the subject and verb.

For this reason, others have said that the propositions which we believe and which they believed are different, but that faith does not concern propositions but things. The thing, however, is the same, although the propositions are different. For they say that it belongs intrinsically to faith to believe in the resurrection of Christ, but only accidentally to faith to believe that it is or was. But this is obviously false, for, since belief is called assent, it can only be about a proposition, in which truth or falsity is found. Thus, when I say: "I believe in the resurrection," I must understand some union [of subject and predicate]. And I must do this with reference to some time which the soul always adds in affirmative and negative propositions, as is said in The Soul. Accordingly, the sense of "I believe in the resurrection" is this: "I believe that the resurrection is, was, or will be."

Therefore, we must say that the object of faith can be considered in two ways. First, we have the object in itself as it exists outside the soul. And it is properly in this sense that it has the character of object and is the reason why habits are one or many. Second, we have the object as it exists in the knower as participated by him. Accordingly, we have to say that, if we take as the object of faith the thing believed as it exists outside the soul, it is in this way that each thing is related to us and to the ancients. And faith gets its unity from the oneness of the object. However, if we consider faith as it is in our perception of it, it is multiplied according to different propositions. But faith is not differentiated by this diversity. From this it is evident that faith is one in every way.

Answers to Difficulties:

1. To know in general and in particular differentiates knowledge only with reference to the manner of knowing, not with reference to the thing known, from which the habit has its unity.

2. The answer to the second difficulty is clear from what has been said.*

3. Time does not change because of something in the thing, but because of relation to us or the ancients. For there is one time in which Christ suffered. Under different aspects it is called past or future for some people in comparison with things which precede or follow.