Today marks the 750th anniversary of the death of St. Thomas Aquinas. Saint Thomas is famous for his (literally) encyclopedic knowledge: between the Summa Theologiae and Summa Contra Gentiles, there are some 38,000 citations, including 25,000 biblical citations, 8,000 references to Christian authors (usually the Church Fathers), and 5,000 to non-Christian authors like Aristotle. In an age before typewriters or the internet, the sheer volume of Thomas’ output (to say nothing of the structured and thoughtful way in which he presented deep theology) is mind-boggling.
But while we may never match Thomas in his brilliance or his literary output, we can strive to be a bit more like him. After all, Thomas gave us a four-step roadmap for how to grow in wisdom. In a reflection he gave (probably in January 1271) on Luke 2:40, he remarked that “the growth of Christ was fourfold, namely years, wisdom, grace, and in human fellowship.” He then asks how it is that we can grow in wisdom, and he concludes that four things are needed: that we should “listen willingly, seek diligently, respond prudently, and meditate attentively.”
So how do we do that? Let’s consider each step in turn. First, we listen willingly according to the counsel of Sirach 6:32-33: “If you love to listen you will gain knowledge, and if you incline your ear you will become wise.” But that’s only possible when we have the humility to realize that we’re not wise yet: we have much to learn from others. Thomas points out that when Mary and Joseph find Jesus in the Temple, they find him listening: “sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions” (Luke 2:46). So before we try to set other people straight, we need first to cultivate an openness to listening to and learning from others.
But passively listening isn’t enough: we should be actively seeking out wisdom. And where should we seek it? Thomas suggests several answers. The first two are (1) those we know to be wiser than us, and (2) the writings of “the ancients” (like the Church Fathers). This matches Deuteronomy 32:7, which counsels us to “remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations; ask your father, and he will show you; your elders, and they will tell you.” But Thomas’ third teacher is surprising: creation itself, which is “telling the glory of God” (Ps. 19:1). And finally, Thomas argues that we grow in wisdom by sharing it with others: there’s no better way to learn a topic than to try to teach it!
Of course, sharing wisdom requires us to know how to “respond prudently” to what we’ve learned. A prudent response is one which corresponds to the intellectual ability of the respondent (that is, you) as well as the listener, and which isn’t needlessly long-winded. In other words, know when a topic is beyond you, or beyond the person with whom you’re sharing it. And don’t speak just to hear yourself talk!
Thomas then presents the Virgin Mary as a model of what it is to both “respond prudently” and “meditate attentively.” After all, “Mary kept all these things, pondering them in her heart” (Luke 2:19). Thomas quotes “a certain Greek” who pointed out how “Mary, the most prudent of women, truly the mother of wisdom, becomes the scholar of her child, and furthermore she does not perceive him as a boy nor as a man, but as God, so that as she had conceived the Word itself in her womb, so she then conceived all his deeds and words in her heart.” Let us turn, then, both to St. Thomas Aquinas and the Blessed Virgin Mary as models to show us how to grow in “wisdom, grace, and in human fellowship” as we grow in years!