NATURAL THEOLOGY (THEODICY). — It is the knowledge that man can have of God (v.) reason (v.).
It is distinguished from revealed and supernatural t. because the latter Revelation (v.), whereas natural t. is founded on the principles of reason and experience (v.). This division into two t. (natural and supernatural) is rather recent, because so-called natural t., insofar as it expounds the rational knowledge of the First Principle of things, metaphysics (v.) as its completion. The principal object of natural t. may be indicated in three groups of questions, in the following order: a) the existence of God; b) the nature of God and knowledge of the attributes of God; c) providence, or the evil (v.). Evidently, these are mutually connected problems, so that it is not permissible to stop at one while excluding or ignoring the other; moreover, it is clear that the most frequent atheism (v.) is the difficulty of reconciling the existence of a personal God, and hence his goodness and providence, with the existence of physical and moral evil. The term “theodicy,” in fact, which in neo-Scholasticism often corresponds to that of natural t., Leibniz (v.) to address the difficulty of the problem of evil, Kant (v.).
I. TERMINOLOGY
The term natural theology (theologia naturalis) is encountered for the first time in the pontiff Q. Muzio Scevola, consul in 95 B.C., and was subsequently taken up by Varrone (according to the testimony of s. Agostino; cf. De civit. Dei, IV, cap. 27; VI, capp. 2-10; VIII, cap. 5) in the encyclopedia entitled Antiquitates rerum humanarum et divinorum, in 41 books, of Stoic inspiration. Varrone distinguishes a threefold theology: mythical or fabulous, physical or “natural,” and civil, that is, political. “Mythical” theology is the work of poets, but unworthy of the divinity; natural theology is reserved to philosophers; civil theology concerns the religion of the State (De civ. Dei, loc. cit., cap. 4, 1-2). Nevertheless, natural theology, that is, the philosophers’ doctrine concerning the divinity, is judged superfluous and even harmful because it may turn the people away from civil religion and thus damage the State. S. Agostino, on the contrary, observes that natural, that is, philosophical, theology demonstrated the impropriety of mythology and introduced a truer notion of God, worthy of the Supreme Principle, understood as the Father of all human beings and not as the name of a particular people or nation, as civil theology claimed (cf. the discreet praise of the philosophers: ibid., II, 7).II. HISTORICAL OUTLINE
Understood as the conception of divinity elaborated by philosophical thought, natural theology developed in conformity with the distinctive orientations of the various schools throughout their historical development.The term t. (θεολογία) is applied by late Hellenism (Damascio) to Orpheus, who “derived the first Principle from Night” (frg. B 12: H. Diels, Fragm. d. Vors., I, 5th ed., Berlin 1934, p. 10, 27). Plato, in the outline of natural theology in De Republica, warns poets to adhere to appropriate patterns when they have to represent divinity (οἱ τύποι περὶ θεολογίας), namely, that God, as he truly is (οἷος τυγχάνει ὁ θεὸς ὤν), is essentially good and cannot be the cause of any evil: evil proceeds from other causes (Resp., II, 18, 379 a-c). In Aristotle, θεολογία can indicate both poetic-mystical speculation (cf. Meteor., II, 1, 353 a 35) and the concluding part of theoretical philosophy, which treats of the “separate and immobile” First Principle (ἐπιστήμη θεολογική: Met., XI, 7, 1064 a 33 ff.). In the first sense Aristotle contrasts those early poets (οἱ πρώτοι θεολογήσαντες), who indulged in anthropomorphic images, with the first who undertook to philosophize truly (οἱ πρώτοι φιλοσοφήσαντες); that is, he establishes an opposition between those who accommodated themselves to the popular mentality and those who instead followed the rigorous discipline of thought (cf. ibid., I, 2, 983 b 6, 11, 28). Orpheus, Pherecydes, Homer, Hesiod, and others belong to the former category (ibid., III, 4, 1000 a 9. For the texts, V. H. Diels, Fragm. d. Vors., cited edition, III, Index, 204 b. 23-26). Xenophanes can then be regarded as the first “metaphysical theologian” to expressly affirm the unity of God (the One), “the most excellent and noblest nature of all”: τὸ δὲ πάντων κράτιστον καὶ ἄριστον θεός (H. Diels, A 31; cited edition, I, p. 121, 31), as well as the fundamental ontological opposition between God and the world: God is the One, the Almighty, the Immutable, the Eternal, who rests in himself... “alei δ'ὲν ταῦτῳ μίμνει χινοόμενος οὐδέν (H. Diels, I, ibid., B 26, p. 135, 10). Parmenides seems to take a step forward by concentrating on the mystery of being and presenting the One as an object of religious veneration; and although God is not expressly endowed with personality, the concreteness of his language concerning the experience of truth reveals a genuine religious experience (cf. frg. B 6, 6; H. Diels, cited edition, I, p. 233, 4). Eracilito celebrates the epiphany of God in the activity of nature: He is “day and night, winter and summer, war and peace, satiety and hunger” (frg. B 67; ibid., I, p. 165, 8 ff.), present everywhere, but with his seat in fire (Aristotle, De part. anim., I, 5, 645 a 17). It should be noted that most of the sophists, accused of “atheism” (v.), in reality chiefly criticized the crude anthropomorphic conceptions of the poets and the self-interested state religion of the politicians (cf. the trial of Socrates). One must therefore acknowledge a continuity in the development of theology in Greek thought, which from the outset appears dominated by the problem of God. In the great Socratic systems, the problem of the relationship between divinity and evil emerges explicitly, but in reality God is ignorant of evil: for Greek thought, God represents the sphere of rationality. Evil is attributed, when physical, to matter, and when moral, to ignorance (Plato) and contingency (Aristotle). It is with Stoic and Neoplatonic philosophy that natural theology receives its systematic foundation. The Stoic treatment of natural theology rests on the principle of identifying in God actuality as the λόγος of nature, while passivity belongs to matter. The principle of activity is the “craftsmanly fire” (πῦρ τεχνικόν), which penetrates all of nature from end to end; it is not fire that burns and consumes, but a vital fire that preserves, nourishes, supports everything, and provides everything with meaning, according to Virgil’s saying: “Spiritus intus alit, totamque infusa per artus mens agitat molem et magno se corpore misce” (Eneide, VI, V. 726 ff.). This omnipresent and omnipotent fire is God, the supreme mind: it contains within itself the “seminal reasons” (λόγοι σπερματικοί) according to which all things come into being through necessary predestination (καθ'εἰμαρμένην); and it is spirit (πνεῦμα) extending throughout the universe and assuming various names throughout the totality of matter (Aetius, Placita, I, 7, 33; H. Diels, Dox. gr., 2nd ed., 305, 15 ff.). Therefore the Stoics identify
God with the reality of the world. He is an “immortal, rational, perfect animal, or intellectual in the possession of happiness, entirely protected from every evil, who exercises providence over the world and the things in the world.” But he does not have “human form” (ἀνθρωπόμορφος); he is the craftsman (δημιουργός) of the whole and, as it were, the father of all (ὥστερ πατὴρ πάντων; Diogenes Laertius, VII, chap. 1); he is called Δία (Jupiter), because through (διά) him all things exist, and Zeus (Ζῆνα), because he gives life (ζῆν) to all things. Therefore, Zeno affirms, the substance of God is the universe as a whole and heaven. This physical immanence of divinity constitutes the perfect rationality of the cosmos, which in turn explains the Stoic conception of “fate” and provides the foundation for the sage’s imperturbability. This metaphysics of natural theology had its point of departure in the theory of knowledge. The Stoics locate the starting point of knowledge in the first “innate apprehensions” (ἔμφυτοι προλήψεις): these are not innate ideas, but derive immediately from experience through a “natural disposition” that makes man akin to God; hence the notion of God and religion belong to the essence of man. At this point the unity of the human race is secured: all, Greeks and barbarians alike, believe in divinity by virtue of the same notions, offer sacrifices, pray, and address vows. For Cleanthes, the principal arguments for the existence of God are the predictions of the oracles, the beauty of the stars, and the order and hierarchy of beings, which appear to be guided by an immanent finality. The corruption of the concept of God in polytheism arose from the personification of natural forces, from the passions, from the morbid imagination of the poets... and, in general, from the inability to rise to the contemplation of God in the Whole of the Universe (cf. Aetius, Placita, I, 6: πόθεν ἔννοιον ἔσχον θεῶν ἐνθρώποι; H. Diels, Dox. gr., 2nd ed., p. 294 ff.). In this grand speculation Poseidonios occupies a privileged place; his (lost) treatise Περὶ τῶν θεῶν was the source of Book III, I, Contra dogmatica of Sextus Empiricus and of Cicero’s De natura deorum, as well as of the already cited Virgil (cf. K. Reinhardt, Poseidonios, Munich 1921, p. 208 ff.). Poseidonios synthesizes the theology of Plato and Aristotle with that of the Stoics, also incorporating Pythagorean elements: “God is an intelligent and fiery spirit (πνεῦμα νοερὸν καὶ πυρώδες) who has no (corporeal) form, who turns toward whatever he wishes and communicates a likeness of himself to all things” (H. Diels, Dox. gr., 2nd ed., p. 302 b).
A characteristic doctrine of the anthropological theology of Poseidonius is the conception of man as the «commission» συνδεσμός and circle of all things; man is like the bond between corruptible reality and the divinity, so that all things are joined in a single, uninterrupted bond (the cosmic «sympathy»), from the inorganic world to plants and animals, all the way to God: this is the most magnificent historical form of a t. n. in its original sense (cf. K. Reinhardt, Kosmos und Sympathie. Neue Untersuchungen über Poseidonios, Munich 1926, especially p. 111 ff.). Poseidonius’s influence is also Philo (v.) and on Christian writers themselves, such as Origen, the Cappadocians, Nemesius of Emesa, and Calcibius, who seem to develop the richness of the Christian conception upon the framework of the Stoic conception (cf. H. Koch, Prousia u. Paideusis, Studien über Origenes u. sein Verhältnis zum Platonismus, Berlin and Leipzig 1932, Appendix, p. 216 ff.). The speculations of Neoplatonism, from Plotinus to Proclus, constitute a t. n. that absorbs the whole of philosophy: the «divine» is in fact considered there not only in static form (like Plato’s «ideas») but also in relation to the becoming of reality, which is articulated in the processes of emanation of the hypostases (the One, the Intellect, the Soul... in Plotinus; the Unparticipated, the participations, and the participants in Proclus). The hidden and mystical aspect of Greek t. developed in parallel with philosophy, and through alternating movements of rapprochement and repulsion in relation to it, in the Orphic-Pythagorean doctrines concerning the «theogonies» (cf. M. J. Lagrange, Critique historique. I. Les mystères. L’orphisme, Paris 1937, p. 119 ff.).
Natural theology reaches its fulfillment under the influence of Revelation in patristic and medieval thought. Recent research into Stoic and Neoplatonic sources has shown the close continuity between Greek philosophy and Judeo-Christian speculation. A place of honor belongs to the Alexandrian Jew Philo, who (in conformity with Ex. 3:14) names God solely τὸ ὄν, excluding every determination (ἄποιος; cf. Leg. Alleg., I, 15; ed. Cohn-Wendland, I, Berlin 1896, p. 73, 27). Natural theology is called «wisdom» (ἐσφία), the knowledge of God «worship of God», and the «way that leads to God» (H. A. Wolfson, Philo, I, Cambridge, [Mass.] 1948, p. 148). Like the Stoics, Philo attributes to God care for the entire human race and for the universe as a whole (cf. De Prov., II, 44), without mentioning individuals: these, however, are not excluded from Providence, because he defends the truth of miracles that concern individual situations and persons. These uncertainties nevertheless disappear in Christian writers: God is not only transcendent spirit but also intellect, life, and love, not only in himself but also toward creatures (free creation), and particularly toward man (the Incarnation). Natural theology among the Fathers is not cosmological or political speculation, as in classical antiquity, but is oriented toward man and considers the individual. Natural theology is therefore a reflection of the certainty supplied by the teaching of faith concerning the existence and nature of God, the creation and preservation of things, the divine dignity of man, and the origin and final resolution of the problem of evil...: it is because of this positive influence of Revelation on patristic philosophy that «the providence of individual persons stands as the starting point of the divine economy» (the parable of the lost sheep). In particular, from Neoplatonism patristic theology adopted caution in the use of the «divine names»: thus St. Basil affirms a twofold class of divine names, some with positive meaning, names that «indicate the perfections proper to God», as when we call him good and just, creator and judge, and the like; others, on the contrary, indicate him with respect to things that do not pertain to him, e.g., incorruptible, invisible, immortal... (Contra Eun., I, 10: PG 29, 536). An outstanding example of natural theology is the Oratio theologica II of St. Gregory Nazianzen (περὶ θεολογίας: PG 36, 25 ff.), which develops the following points: 1) (§§ 1-12): the absolute incomprehensibility of the divine nature in itself. Nevertheless, reason can demonstrate the existence of God, creator and preserver of all things, perfectly «incorporeal» (ἐσύματος): by saying that God is «incorporeal», we do not thereby show that we know him as he is, but as he is not, and the same applies to the other attributes taken from creatures. 2) (§§ 13-16): the surest way of knowing God is that of Sacred Scripture, which calls him «spirit and fire, light and charity and wisdom and justice and intellect and Word...», in contrast to unworthy polytheism. 3) (§§ 17-21): the surest way is to ascend (under the guidance of Scripture) from our mind, which is «something deformed and divine» (τὸ θεοειδὲς τοῦτο καὶ θεῖον), to God, as from the «image to its archetype»: this is what Enoch, Elijah, and St. Paul did. 4) (§§ 22-31): the spectacle of the order and harmony displayed in the world, and especially in the realm of living beings, attests to the existence of the Creator.
It is not possible, however, to speak among the Fathers of a natural theology existing in its own right, because this presupposes a classification of knowledge that would arise only toward the end of the patristic period (with St. John of Damascus), thanks to the assimilation of Aristotelian logic; rather, one should speak of an extension of theological reflections through the adoption of precise concepts from classical philosophy (Platonic, Stoic, etc.). The first explicit controversies concerning the autonomy of metaphysical natural theology in relation to theology properly so called are to be found in the Muslim world between two currents: philosophical rationalism (Jalofah), culminating in Averroes, and theology (halām), the mystical fideism of Avicenna and especially of al-Gazzāll (cf. L. Gardet - M. M. Anawati, Introd. à la théol. musulmane, Paris 1948, especially pp. 133 ff., 316 ff.). The Arab controversy would nourish the formation of natural theology in the Middle Ages, especially from the thirteenth century onward, when the translations of Averroes and Avicenna entered the West; to these must be added two Jews, Avicronon and Moses Maimonides, proponents of theological agnosticism and occasionalism criticized by St. Thomas.
Latin Scholasticism, in its orthodox orientation, remains faithful to the patristic teaching, especially that of St. Augustine, the Pseudo-Dionysius, St. Gregory the Great, and the Damascene, who more directly inspire medieval theology. Progress concerns, at most, the method, which is taken from Aristotle with the contribution of the Arabs (Avicenna, Averroes, and Moses Maimonides). It differs according to the orientation of the various schools: Augustinianism resorts preferably to the doctrine of illumination, attempting with St. Anselm (v.) the a priori argument and hence a certain direct process; faithful to Aristotelianism, St. Thomas instead develops the a posteriori analogy (v.); nominalism (v.) distrusts both a priori and a posteriori proofs and entrusts the knowledge of God solely to faith, anticipating Protestant fideism.
Una menzione a parte merita il lullista Raimondo di Sabunda (m. nel 1432 ca.; [v.]) autore della Theologia naturalis seu verius thesaurus divinarum considerationum ex naturae fontibus haustarum, tum theologis tum philosophis atque universis scientiarum aritumque studiosis plurimum profuturus (Venezia 1581), il cui prologo fu messo all'Indice nel 1595 e toltovi da Leone XIII nel 1900. Il motivo della condanna sembra sia stato non tanto la difesa dell'autorità quasi esclusiva attribuita alla S. Scrittura nella conoscenza della fede, quanto il fatto che il « libro della natura » vi è presentato come sorgente non solo della conoscenza degli attributi naturali di Dio ma anche per quanto concerne la « salvezza, la perfezione e il progresso della vita eterna ». P. es. nel cap. 46 (sviluppato nei capp. 47-55) la creazione ad extra... « manifestat et arguit aliam productionem summam, occultam et aeternam in Deo, quae est de sua natura et suo proprio esse. In qua producitur Deus de Deo et per quam ostenditur summa Trinitas in Deo » (ed. cit., p. 33 b). Al capp. 63-64 la Trinità è dimostrata con l'argomento ontologico (pp. 52-54; cf. cap. 264, p. 286 b, lo stesso per il mistero dell'Incarnazione). L'opera fu elogiata da Hegel per il suo vigore speculativo (cf. Gesch. der Philos., in Werke, XV, Berlino 1844, p. 175) e ispirò il teologo romantico Martin Deutinger a tentare una sintesi fra il pensiero cristiano e il principio moderno della autocoscienza (cf. I. Fellerer, Das Verhältnis von Philos. u. Theol. nach M. D., Bonn 1940, p. 57 sg. Un discepolo del Deutinger, il Sighart, curò una nuova ed. della Theol. nat. di Raimondo [Frisinga 1852]), che nel sec. XVII ebbe l'onore di essere tradotta e difesa dal Montaigne (Essais, II, cap. 12; ed. Faguet, II, Parigi s. d., p. 47 sgg.).
Il primo protestantesimo, pur diminuendo le forze della ragione, non respinge del tutto la t. n. e ciò in forza di Rom. 1, 20. Secondo la Formula Concordiae Lutero « accurate monuit longe aliam Dei cognitionem ex evangelio quam ex lege hauriri, quia etiam gentes ex lege naturae aliquam Dei cognitionem habuere, nec tamen eum recte vel agnoverunt vel coluerunt » (J. T. Müller, Die symbolische Bücher der evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche, Gütersloh 1928, p. 638 b). A partire dallo stesso Melantone che ammette un'etica e una t. n. la questione è fuori causa, come dichiara nel sec. XVII il teologo Huetter: « In Deum ipsum non ingratos modo, sed et contumellosos esse, qui vel notitias naturales negare, vel praestantissimum eorum effectum, philosophiam nimi- rum, opus carnis, sive peccatum nominare hodie non erubescunt » (in H. E. Weber, Reformation, Orthodoxie und Rationalismus, ivi 1951, p. 17). Si dica altrettanto per la « fiammella del libero arbitrio » (ein kleines Fuencklein der freien Willens) ch'è rimasta nell'uomo per tendere a Dio in qualche modo anche dopo la caduta, come attesta il pietista Jo. Arndt (cf. Das wahre Christentum, I, cap. 41, § 26, Lipsia 1764, p. 218 a). Ambigua è la posizione di Calvino, secondo il quale l'uomo decaduto può ancora distinguere fra il bene e il male, ma non trovare la via per salire a Dio: infatti, benché egli ammetta che Dio ha inserito una conoscenza naturale di sé nelle menti umane — e ciò spiega perché non c'è popolo che non abbia una religione — tuttavia questa conoscenza non è sufficiente per salire a Dio se non è guidata dal magistero della Scrittura, perché la mente umana è
corrotta (cf. Institutio christianae religionis, I, 3 e 6; ed. di Ginevra 1569, p. 3 sgg.). Tradizionale resta invece la definizione di Bacone: «Theologia naturalis philosophia etiam divina recte appellatur. Difinitur autem haec ut sit talis scientia, seu potius scientiae scintilla, qualis de Deo haberi potest per lumen naturae et contemplationem rerum creaturum» (De augmentis scient., II, 2; ed. Spedding-Ellis, I, Londra 1879, p. 544). La t. n. deismo (v.) di Herbert di Cherbury (1581-1648) mediante le cinque verità enunciate nel De veritate del 1624: 1) esiste un nume supremo; 2) dev'essere dall'uomo venerato; 3) la virtù ha costituito sempre la parte precipua del culto di Dio; 4) i vizi e i delitti vanno espiati; 5) dopo questa vita attende il premio o la pena (cf. M. M. Rossi, Alle fonti del deismo e del materialismo moderno, Firenze 1942, p. 6): Toland (v.) che nega l'esistenza di qualsiasi mistero trascendente la mente umana (cf. Clidophorus, in Works, Londra 1720, p. 63 sgg.).
L'ambiguità della posizione di Calvino circa la t. n. ritorna oggi rispettivamente nell'interpretazione di E. Brunner e di K. Barth: mentre il primo ha fatto ampie concessioni alla posizione tomista della conoscenza naturale di Dio, il secondo ha negato la possibilità di un «punto d'insersione» (Ankneupfungspunkt) ed ha qualificato la dottrina tomista dell'analogia come «invenzione dell'Anticristo» (Dogmatik, I, 5ª ed., Zurigo 1947, p. VIII).
La neoscolastica prese il termine di t. n. (theologia naturalis) da Wolff che la definì come «scientia eorum quae per Deum possiblia intelliguntur» e le attribuisce per oggetto l'esistenza, gli attributi e gli effetti di Dio (Philosophia rationalis sive logica methodo scientifica pertractata, §§ 57 e 96, Verona 1779, pp. 15 a. 23 sgg.). Ma la filosofia cristiana, prendendo il termine di t. n. dall'illuminismo, ne rigetta il metodo e lo spirito razionalista, in conformità del magistero ecclesiastico.
Il problema della natura e del metodo della t. n., dipendono infine dalla nozione stessa di filosofia e dalla possibilità della ragione umana di attingere l'assoluto; e inoltre dal concetto di rivelazione divina che permetta di chiarire ragione e fede (v.).
scops. Praelectiones theol. natur., 2 voll., Parigi 1932-35; id., Schema Theodiceae, I, ivi 1941; R. A. Motte, Théodicée et théologie chez si Thomas, in Rev. des sc. philos. et théol., 26 (1937), pp. 5-26; M. Rast, Theol. naturalis, Friburgo in Br. 1939.