This year marks the 750th anniversary of the death of St. Thomas Aquinas. Along with St. Augustine of Hippo, St. Thomas is recognized as the greatest Catholic theologian. His holiness is also remarkable. He was noted for his trust in divine providence, his humility and his devotion.

Thomas’ achievement can be measured by his masterwork, the Summa Theologica. Although it was never completed by the author, its three parts cover the range of knowledge of his time. Due to its depth, Pope Leo XIII declared Aquinas a model for theology and philosophy studies. Pope Pius X evidently viewed him as the summit of orthodoxy when he said, “We now say to all such as are desirous of the truth: ‘Go to Thomas, and ask him to give you from his ample store the food of substantial doctrine wherewith to nourish your souls unto eternal life.’”

Thomas was a Dominican, truly the most accomplished Dominican in the eight centuries of the order. It has been said that he gave the order a second start. Where St. Dominic founded a congregation of preachers, Thomas has drawn thousands of men to the order to study philosophy and theology. Certainly, because of his influence, the Dominicans have been able to maintain one of their members, the “theologian of the Papal Household,” to this day.

To the extent that Thomas has contributed to the success of the order of St. Dominic, he also received from it more than the necessities of life and fraternal support. This brief review hopes to show how the order contributed to Thomas as a religious and as a thinker. What attracted him to the order? Why did he want to remain a Dominican when he could have accepted the rank of bishop that he was reportedly offered many times?

Thomas’ Youth

To proceed, a brief account of our subject’s youth is needed. Thomas Aquinas was born into a family of Italian nobility, probably in 1225. At five or six years old, his parents presented him to the famous Benedictine monastery Monte Casino as an oblate to learn about monastic life. It is said that they wanted their son to be made abbot one day. At Monte Casino, the boy received his initial education. However, in 1239, the Benedictines sent him to Naples along with other oblates to avoid problems with the emperor’s army that was coming to occupy the monastery. They intended for Thomas to complete his studies at the newly formed university there. In Naples, Thomas was introduced to the Dominicans along with the ideas of the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle.

The Dominicans impressed Thomas so much that he asked to join the order. After being invested in the white habit, the Dominicans, suspecting opposition from his family, sent him first to Rome, then to Bologna for the novitiate. On the way, Thomas’ brothers, soldiers of the emperor, captured him and took him to a family castle. There he spent more than a year of home arrest and was reportedly tempted by a prostitute to forget his Dominican vocation.

Not being able to shake Thomas’ ambition to be a Dominican, the Aquinas family returned him to Naples. From there, the order sent him to Paris, where he studied with the Dominican scholar St. Albert the Great. He completed his studies in Cologne under Alberto’s tutelage.

In-depth Studies

The apparent coincidence of Thomas with the Dominicans and the study of Aristotle seems more like a providential arrangement. Aristotle was the ascendant philosopher of the time. His attention to earthly things provided a reliable instrument for understanding the new reality of the 13th century. Meanwhile, Thomas’ synthetic mind was being prepared to coordinate worldly and heavenly realities. The Dominicans encouraged in-depth study to demonstrate the truth of the Catholic faith to its detractors.

Europe was changing with the movement of products/materials from the East, brought along the routes opened by the Crusaders. As the atmosphere was warming, then, the earth produced more food to fuel the growth of cities. There the artisans, some of whom assuredly immigrated from the countryside, formed guilds for social protection without dependence on the nobility. Furthermore, universities, recently established in key cities, attracted men from different nations to exchange ideas.

The Dominican friars were a new foundation, barely 23 years old when Thomas reached Naples. St. Dominic had sent his friars to university cities to educate themselves and to recruit candidates. Being free from rigid ties to traditional modes of learning and eager to study, the friars assimilated Aristotle’s analysis. Above all, it was the friars’ openness to new ideas that attracted the brilliant young Aquinas to the order of St. Dominic. It appeared to him as a surer way to deeper understanding than that of the monks still anchored in the countryside with schools weighed down by traditions.

St. Albert’s Tutelage

If openness to new ideas was the main reason that led Thomas Aquinas to enter the Order of Preachers, perhaps he remained there with great satisfaction due to St. Albert the Great. Recognized as one of the greatest philosophers of the Middle Ages, Albert also had deep interests in theology and, especially, the natural sciences. The capacious intellect of the young Aquinas could not but grow under his tutelage. From the beginning, Albert supported his most capable disciple. In time, he would defend Thomas from his critics. He would not endure the mockery of Thomas’ companions calling his student a “dumb ox”; much less could he tolerate the traditionalist theologians who tried to have Thomas condemned after his death.

Also, the practice of contemplating before preaching would have attracted Thomas to the Dominicans. For Dominicans, at least ideally, preaching is more than a commentary on the Word of God with application to current life. St. Dominic, whose portrait ruminating on the Scriptures is perhaps the favorite of most Dominicans, instilled in his friars the spirit of contemplation — that is, Dominicans are about entering into an intimate conversation with the Word. As a result, they can share with others the fruits of this dialogue — what the Lord wants to relate to the faithful. The spirit of Dominican preaching is captured in this phrase found in the Summa: “Contemplare et contemplata aliis tradere” (“contemplate and pass on to others what you have contemplated”). St. Thomas brought this habit of being to the classroom as well as to the pulpit.

Thomas prayed every time he began intellectual work. Before disputing with another theologian on a given topic, teaching, writing or dictating, and certainly preaching, he first retired to pray. His prayer was moving. He shed abundant tears in his conversation with the Lord to obtain a palpable understanding of the sacred mysteries.

Evangelical Poverty and Detachment

Another reason for Thomas to enter the order of St. Dominic may surprise some. Almost always pictured as rotund in girth, Aquinas does not have the look of an ascetic. However, according to one of his most luminous biographers of recent times, Thomas had a great appreciation for evangelical poverty — that is, the life of detachment per the Gospel.

As a fundamental principle of the Dominicans, poverty should not be discounted in any way. St. Dominic, as much as St. Francis of Assisi, loved poverty and saw it as necessary for the Order of Preachers for ascetic, apostolic and practical reasons. Ascetically, poverty conformed the friar to Christ, who “had nowhere to lay his head.” Apostolically, voluntarily accepted poverty testifies to the conviction of the preacher when he speaks of the providence of God. Practically, detachment frees the preacher to attend to his primary duty, the contemplation and preaching of the Word. Additionally, Dominic witnessed a continuing line of young men drawn to the order because they were challenged to leave everything to follow Christ.

Thomas had no reservations about leaving both a noble family and a prestigious monastery to live in evangelical poverty. That he did so partly out of his eagerness to follow Dominic’s ideal can be inferred from a document written some 12 years after his receipt of the Dominican habit. Defending the mendicants in the dispute with the secular clerics, Thomas reflected on the crucified one. He wrote: “Of all Christ did or suffered during his mortal existence, his venerable cross is offered to us as the prime example that we must imitate. … Now, of all that he teaches us, absolutely first is poverty; Christ was deprived of every exterior good, even to the point of bodily nakedness. … It is that kind of nakedness on the cross that those who embrace voluntary poverty wish to follow, particularly those who give up all gain.”

It does not seem unfair to say that the Order of Preachers fostered Aquinas’ greatness as much as he continues to draw attention to the order. The Dominican ideals of contemplative prayer, eagerness to share contemplation, interest in new ideas and desire to live the evangelical life, assumed wholeheartedly, will elevate anyone to holiness. In a subject with abilities as enormous as Thomas Aquinas’, they led to a life that has left its mark both in heaven and on earth.

FATHER CARMEN MELE is a Dominican priest ministering in Puerto Rico. He writes two homily blogs, at cbmdominicanpreacher.blogspot.com (weekday and Sunday homilies) and padrecarmelo.blogspot.com (Sunday homily in Spanish).