Maimonides, faith
and the highest reason are sure to coincide (see ARABIAN PHILOSOPHY).
According to Ghazali, in his _Destruction of Philosophers_, the various
schools of philosophy cancel each other; reason is bankrupt; faith is
everything. (So nearly Jehuda Halevi.) According to Averroes, reason
suffices, and faith, with (what he considers) its dreams of immortality
and the like, is useful only for the ignorant masses. Christian
theology, however, strikes out a line of its own. Moslems and Jews were
applying Aristotelian philosophy to rigorously monotheistic faiths;
Christianity had been encouraged by Platonism in teaching a trinity of
divine persons, and Platonism of a certain order long dominated the
middle ages as part of the Augustinian tradition. In sympathy with this
Platonism, the medieval church began by assuming the entire mutual
harmony of faith and reason. Such is the teaching, along different
lines, alike of St Anselm and of Abelard. But, when increased knowledge
of Aristotle's texts (and of the commentaries) led to the victory of a
supposed Aristotelianism over a supposed Platonism, Albertus Magnus, and
his still more distinguished pupil Thomas Aquinas, mark certain
doctrines as belonging to faith but not to reason. They adhere to the
general position with exceptions (in the case of what had been
considered Platonic doctrines). From the point of view of philosophy,
this was a compromise. Faith and reason partly agree, partly diverge.
The tendency of the later middle ages is to add to the number of the
doctrines with which philosophy cannot deal. Thomas's great rival, Duns
Scotus, does this to a large extent, at times affirming "two truths."
The latter position, ascribed by the schoolmen to the Averroists,
becomes dominant among the later Nominalists, William of Occam and his
disciples, who withdraw _all_ doctrines of faith from the sphere of
reason. This was a second and a more audacious compromise. It is not
exactly an attempt to base Christian faith on rational scepticism. It is
a consistent policy of harbouring inconsistencies in the same mind. A
statement may be true in philosophy and false in theology, or vice
versa. To the standpoint of Aquinas, however, the Church of Rome (at
least in regard to the basis of doctrine) has more and more returned.
The councils of Trent and of the Vatican mark the Two Truths hypothesis
as heretical, when they affirm that there _is_ a natural knowledge of
God and natural