When Alvin Plantinga published his seminal article ‘Reason and Belief in God’, he used Thomas Aquinas as a foil against which to present “Reformed Epistemology”. According to Plantinga, Aquinas was an “evidentialist” and a “classical foundationalist”, holding that only beliefs formed on the basis of introspection and sense-experience could be “properly basic” (i.e. rationally held without evidential support from further beliefs).Footnote 1 Propositional belief in articles of faith is rational, on this reading, because it is supported by evidence that God, who is omniscient and does not lie, has revealed the relevant propositions. This evidence consists especially of the performance of miracles by preachers of divine revelation, and in the case of Christian revelation the quasi-miraculous growth of the early Church despite persecution.Footnote 2 These signs act like the seal on royal letters to confirm the divine origin of preachers’ messages, and hence their truth.Footnote 3
Yet whilst Plantinga's initial exegesis of Aquinas has textual support and was typical amongst contemporary scholars, it was widely rejected, and eventually revised by Plantinga.Footnote 4 Subsequently, a widely-endorsed reading of Aquinas’ religious epistemology has emerged which draws strong comparisons between Aquinas’ position and Plantinga's “Reformed Epistemology”. Plantinga claims that certain Christian beliefs are “properly basic” (for all Christians can tell).Footnote 5 Similarly, Aquinas claims that through faith, one believes the articles of faith without inference, as one believes first principles through natural reason. Moreover, against some Neo-Scholastic interpreters, present-day commentators note Aquinas’ insistence that even in the process of conversion, faith is not irrational for one lacking naturally perceptible evidence for the locus of divine revelation based on external “signs”. Rather, as outlined below, an “interior instinct” (instinctus interior) produces a non-inferential judgement in the convert that faith is epistemically or practically appropriate.Footnote 6
More tentatively, scholars are beginning to agree on how this instinctus putatively makes faith rationally acceptable. Current discussion often references debates in analytic epistemology between “internalist” and “externalist” accounts of epistemic justification. In broad terms, according to “internalist” accounts, in order for one's beliefs to be justified one must be aware (or, potentially aware) of the rational grounds on which they are held. Consequently, internalists often think of justified beliefs as beliefs held on the basis of evidence for their truth. On “externalist” accounts, it is enough for one's beliefs to be justified that they are formed by processes which reliably and appropriately produce true beliefs, even if one is not aware that they are so produced.Footnote 7 In an exhaustive doctoral dissertation which compares Thomas’ analysis of faith to those offered by Plantinga and Richard Swinburne, James Brent argues that the instinctus fails to provide internalist justification for faith.Footnote 8 Brent further hints at this position in an article summarising Aquinas’ religious epistemology.Footnote 9 Since the instinctus only provides externalist justification for a convert's beliefs, internalist justification for faith is provided solely by the evidence of “signs” on Aquinas’ account.Footnote 10 Brent's argument resembles the position of Bruno Niedebacher,Footnote 11 and is consonant with discussions which explain the rationality of faith on Aquinas’ account in externalist terms.Footnote 12
In this paper, I dispute the claim that someone who comes to faith solely under the influence of the instinctus lacks internalist justification for her faith. To contextualise my argument (Section I), I summarise Aquinas’ understanding of faith, detailing evidence for the current consensus that Thomas allows that faith can be rational in the absence of naturally perceptible “signs” indicating the locus of revelation. In Section II, I outline a plausible interpretation of Aquinas’ claim that faith can be epistemically justified by an interior instinctus to believe, and its relation to “internalist” and “externalist” justification. I then argue that one driven by this instinctus has internalist justification for conversion (Section III). Firstly, I suggest that the non-inferential perception that one ought to believe, which the instinctus instils, might be characterised in modern jargon as an “appearance” that God has revealed the articles of faith. According to “Phenomenal Conservatism”, appearances render beliefs prima facie justified and are internally accessible. Thus, if my portrayal of the interior instinctus is accurate, faith inspired by it plausibly possesses prima facie internalist justification. Another way in which faith might be internally justified by the instinctus would be if one moved by this instinct were aware that it is divinely produced, so I next examine texts indicating this possibility.
Finally, in Section IV, I argue that even if the experience of being moved by the instinctus does not immediately suffice to (internally) justify one's conversion, one who experiences the instinctus should be able to conclude that faith is rationally justified, given Aquinas’ broader philosophical anthropology. On Brent's reading, the instinctus presents faith as good for the human person generally, but not for her intellect particularly. Yet granting Thomas’ account of wellbeing, it seems unlikely that faith is beneficial for humans if Christian beliefs are false. Accordingly, one who perceives through the interior instinctus that faith is practically justified can thereby rationally believe that her faith is appropriately truth-directed.
I
I begin by briefly summarising Aquinas’ understanding of faith. According to Thomas, faith is a theological virtueFootnote 13: a supernatural disposition (habitus) infused by GodFootnote 14 which moves a believer to a supernatural end, in this case by assenting to divine truth.Footnote 15 Although ultimately grace offers humans the chance to achieve an intimate, unmediated knowledge of God in the beatific vision, in this life humans are offered a foretasteFootnote 16 of beatific knowledge by assenting to divine truth as mediated by divinely revealed propositions (faith's “material” object).Footnote 17 For assent to these “articles of faith” to qualify as an exercise of faith, it must be made solely on the basis that they are divinely revealed (faith's “formal object”).Footnote 18 After the coming of Christ, adults must believe explicitly in Christ as saviour and the Trinity to be saved,Footnote 19 and Christians should assent to the contents of Scripture as interpreted by the Church.Footnote 20
In assenting to a proposition with faith, one's assent is psychologically certain (i.e. without “fear of the opposite”), so that faith is stronger than probable assent or opinio.Footnote 21 Rather, faith shares the firmness of assent possessed by immediate knowledge of quiddities (intellectus) and conclusions logically inferred from such knowledge which are the object of scientific knowledge (scientia).Footnote 22 Yet unlike intellectus and scientia, faith is not elicited because it is per se evident to one's intellect that the articles are true, or because they are deduced from truths know per se. Faith is instead effected by the will, which by God's graceFootnote 23 moves the intellect to believe with greater certainty than the evidence compels.Footnote 24 Belief in the articles of faith is therefore “basic”, like belief in first principles.Footnote 25 One might describe faith as a basic doxastic practice: a method of belief-formation which is not rationally underpinned by any other.
One might wonder whether on Aquinas’ account faith can be epistemically rational, particularly given his emphasis on the role of the will. Granted, Thomas argues that if a proposition is divinely revealed it must be true, since God is omniscient and cannot lie.Footnote 26 Yet how can one firmly and rationally believe- or, will to believe- that God has revealed a proposition?
Some commentators have suggested that Aquinas’ answer is, in Plantinga's terminology, “evidentialist”.Footnote 27 On such readings, Aquinas holds that rationally believing a proposition with faith requires evidence that God has revealed the proposition (typically, through human intermediaries). This evidence should prove acceptable to classical foundationalists because it consists of phenomena including miracles worked by prophets, the fulfilment of prophecy and the quasi-miraculous growth of the Church.Footnote 28 Whilst these phenomena are impossible or improbable unless divinely caused, they are naturally perceptible to the senses. Three categories of text from Aquinas support this view.Footnote 29 Firstly, some passages (often citing Mark 16:20) indicate that faith is generated by the perception of signs which demonstrate that God has revealed propositions through human intermediaries.Footnote 30 Hence, “We believe the prophets and apostles because the Lord has been their witness by performing miracles, as Mark says”.Footnote 31 Further passages suggest that the perception of such signs renders faith in revealed propositions rational.Footnote 32 Finally, some texts even imply that unless one possesses such evidence that God has revealed propositions, one cannot rationally believe them.Footnote 33 According to STIIaIIae 178.a1, for example, “The word [of preachers] needs to be confirmed in order that it be rendered credible. This is done by the work of miracles, according to Mark 16:20”.Footnote 34 These latter texts provide strong support to “evidentialist” readings of Aquinas.
Yet despite these passages, most commentators reject this exegesis and contend that the “evidentialist” reading undermines Thomas’ wider epistemological commitments. Some commentators argue that Thomas cannot have required rational faith to be grounded in the evidence of signs, because this would undermine his commitment to the act of faith being essentially supernatural and completely certain. Since by Aquinas’ admission the evidence that God has revealed propositions does not render this fact certain to the intellect, it is difficult to understand how the certain assent of faith can be rationally grounded in such evidence,Footnote 35 although one might argue it is practically rational to believe with greater confidence than the evidence warrants. Moreover, choosing to believe a proposition because it is testified to by a competent authority does not seem to be a supernatural act. Thus, evidentialist readings may sit ill with Aquinas’ emphasis on the supernatural nature of faith.Footnote 36 Further, as noted above, evidentialist readings do not easily account for the comparisons which Aquinas draws between assent to the articles of faith and assent to first principles.Footnote 37
However, whilst these points tell against evidentialist readings which claim that faith is always (synchronically) rationally grounded in the evidence of signs, they fail to disprove one Neo-Scholastic evidentialist interpretation.Footnote 38 On this reading, the natural perception of evidence for divine revelation does not enter into or rationally undergird the act of faith itself. Rather, the perception of such evidence is required for a natural “judgement of credibility” (i.e. belief that one can rationally believe a proposition because it is revealed), which necessarily precedes a rational act of faith. When one begins to exercise the habit of faith, however, the doxastic practice of faith becomes basic, and is not grounded in the evidence which supported the judgement of credibility. Accordingly, some Neo-Scholastics maintained that the act of faith is essentially supernatural and that its certainty surpasses the evidence for the fact of revelation, whilst retaining an evidentialist requirement in their account of faith's generation.
Yet further texts demonstrate that even this moderate evidentialist interpretation is false. Crucially, Aquinas explicitly considers the question of whether one can or should believe revealed propositions in the absence of miracles confirming their provenance. On several occasions, he maintains that one is obliged to come to faith in such circumstances.Footnote 39 In Qdl. II.4.1, Aquinas writes that since Christ was the First Truth, people would have been obliged to believe him had he not performed miracles. God motivates faith in three ways: by external preaching, by miracles, and through an inner calling (“per interiorem vocationem”)Footnote 40 which “pertinet ad virtutem prima veritatis”.Footnote 41 This calling allows Christ's authority to be recognised in the absence of miracles. Moreover, Aquinas elsewhere claims that it is more commendable to come to faith without the evidence of signs.Footnote 42 Given these disavowals of the requirement that faith must be rationally underpinned by evidence acceptable to classical foundationalists, most scholars reject Plantinga's original portrayal of Aquinas as an “evidentialist” and “classical foundationalist”.
II
Notably, however, Aquinas does not hold that faith ungrounded in miraculous evidence is without rational grounds. Faith is rationally acceptable without such evidence because it is the product of an inner “instinct” (instinctus),Footnote 43 “inclination” (inclinatio)Footnote 44 or “calling” (vocatio).Footnote 45 Thomas quotes Aristotle to argue that those “moved [to act] by divine instinct” do not need to consider the action's propriety according to human reason, because they are moved by a “higher principle”.Footnote 46 Whilst we have seen passages in which Thomas apparently claims that faith is irrational unless grounded in miraculous evidence, further passages suggest that the interior instinctus parallels the role of miracles in rendering the articles credible, and even counts as miraculous itself.Footnote 47 In seemingly “evidentialist” passages, Aquinas perhaps merely omits mention of the instinctus as an alternative ground for faith.Footnote 48
What is the nature of this instinctus and how might it render faith rational? The former question is often overlooked in current literature. The term “instinct” (instinctus) is used by Thomas in various contexts.Footnote 49 Aside from its connection to divinely inspired faith and action, the term describes a means by which demons tempt humans,Footnote 50 and notably the manner in which animals are moved to actionFootnote 51 by perceiving “intentiones non sentatae”: i.e. objects of perception not derived from sense data.Footnote 52 These intentiones are often spurs to action, as in the case of sheep, which instinctively perceive through their “estimative power” that wolves should be fled from.Footnote 53
An interior instinctus also guides believers to fulfil God's plans. It inspires prophecy,Footnote 54 and actions which seem inappropriate to natural reason but are directed to supernatural goods (e.g. martyrdomFootnote 55 or self-mutilationFootnote 56). Broadly, therefore, “instinctus” might be characterised as “an interior principle of appetitive… movement”.Footnote 57 More narrowly, “natural” instinct forms a spontaneous judgement that an action is appropriate, without that judgement being produced by the free and rational process whereby humans evaluate actions as means to selected ends.Footnote 58 Rather, the judgement produced by “instinct” fails to specify the end at which the action is aimed.Footnote 59
It seems that on Aquinas’ account the instinctus which impels one to faith likewise produces the basic judgement that belief in the articles is appropriate. This is suggested by the close relationship between the instinctus which drives the initial adoption of faith and the lumen fidei, which makes one who possesses the habit of faith see which propositions are apt for belief.Footnote 60 According to Aquinas, the lumen fidei produces a “connatural” awareness that propositions are to be believed.Footnote 61 By analogy, one who possesses a virtue can intuitively grasp that an action is in/appropriate even if she cannot formalise a moral argument for this conclusion.Footnote 62 As Brent argues, therefore, the instinctus is an inclination which leads one to faith by likewise producing a simple, non-inferential judgement that the articles of faith should be believed, perhaps without any immediate perception of the end at which such belief aims.Footnote 63 As with connatural perception that an action is appropriate, however, this inclination can be sinfully ignored.
One might wonder how the fact that faith is preceded by a non-inferential perception that one should believe can make faith epistemically appropriate. Modern commentators sometimes turn to analytic epistemology to trace ways in which faith might be epistemically fitting. Frequently within analytic epistemology, the epistemic propriety of belief is discussed in terms of “justification”. Justification can be understood in two ways. Roughly, a subject has propositional justification for belief that p if she is equipped to appropriately form the belief that p (say, by possessing sufficient evidence). A subject has doxastic justification for belief that p if she in fact appropriately believes that p.
There are two broad understandings of what it is for a belief to possess (doxastic) justification.Footnote 64 According to “internalists”, the believer must be aware (or, potentially aware) of at least some of the conditions which contribute to the belief's justification. Thus, internalists usually hold that at base, justification depends on first-person access via introspection to mental states (viz. those indicating that the belief is true or justified) which are “internal” to the believer. Externalists, by contrast, do not maintain the existence of such an “awareness requirement” on justification. They claim that beliefs can be “justified” by factors which are external to the believer or inaccessible via introspection, such as the environment or causal factors which contribute to their production. In line with their positions, internalists and externalists give different explanations of what renders a belief justified. Internalists tend to consider a belief justified if it is probable according to the believer's evidence or best epistemic lights. By contrast, externalists generally consider beliefs justified if they are produced by doxastic practices which reliably and non-accidentally produce true beliefs. Whilst I lack space here to examine the considerations favouring each view, both positions are defended in modern epistemology.
Whilst Thomas did not consider the propriety of beliefs produced by the interior instinctus in these terms, commentators often claim that “basic” belief in the articles of faith would possess “externalist” justification on Aquinas’ account.Footnote 65 The instinctus which impels believers to adopt the habit of faith is infused by God, so that by following it they will adopt a doxastic practice which reliably yields true religious beliefs. Whilst I lack space to give detailed analysis, the practice of believing in line with the promptings of the instinctus would, therefore, be reliably aimed at truth in a manner which plausibly fits “externalist” constraints on justification/knowledge such as Plantinga's proper-functionalist criteria for “warrant”.Footnote 66 Accordingly, religious beliefs formed through following the promptings of the instinctus would possess externalist justification/warrant.
However, it seems less obvious that beliefs arrived at under the influence of the instinctus would have internalist justification. Admittedly, the instinctus produces a non-inferential judgement that it is appropriate to believe certain propositions because they are revealed. Yet such a judgement would apparently render belief practically rather than epistemically rational. The judgement does not suggest that God has spoken through the relevant channels, and that their pronouncements are therefore true. Accordingly, it does not seem that one moved by the interior instinctus thereby has reason to believe that the instinctus is aimed at the adoption of a truth-yielding doxastic practice. Thus, Brent argues that internalist epistemic justification for one's religious beliefs is not conferred by the interior instinctus.Footnote 67 Rather, Christian faith is only justified in an internalist sense through miraculous evidence of revelation, consideration of which is not essential to the act of faith but a separate (albeit important) intellectual act.
Those sympathetic to Aquinas’ religious epistemology should find this analysis noteworthy, but potentially concerning. On the one hand, this reading supports broadly “externalist” presentations of Aquinas’ epistemology, which undermine claims that Aquinas is a classical foundationalist. Yet this reading further implies that Thomas’ religious epistemology rests on a heavily-disputed understanding of justification. However, I now argue that Aquinas’ commitment to the (epistemic) propriety of believing in line with the interior instinctus need not render him an externalist.Footnote 68
III
If the interior instinctus causes a basic judgement that faith is somehow appropriate, how might this render faith “internally” justified? I now explore two possible interpretations of Aquinas’ comments about the instinctus which suggest that the experience of being moved by the instinctus provides quite immediate justification for Christian beliefs. Firstly, I suggest that the perception that it is appropriate to believe the articles of faith might, in modern terms, be compared to the “appearance” that they are divinely revealed. According to some epistemologists, this would make belief that the articles are revealed prima facie justified. Secondly, I explore evidence indicating that one moved by the instinctus might be intuitively aware that they are being moved to faith by God.
As explained above, the interior instinctus and lumen fidei make the articles of faith appear credible in a non-inferential way.Footnote 69 One way in which this might happen is if it “seems” or “appears”Footnote 70 to the believer that God has revealed the articles of faith, or else that the habit of faith yields true beliefs.Footnote 71 “Appearances” play an important role in the justification of many of our beliefs according to proponents of “Phenomenal Conservatism” and related positions.Footnote 72 Phenomenal Conservatism (PC) holds that:
If it seems to S that p, then, in the absence of defeaters, S thereby has at least some degree of justification for believing that p.Footnote 73
How should we understand this notion of “seeming”? Some discussions of PC suggest that for it to seem to S that p is for S to be inclined to believe p.Footnote 74 However, whilst most epistemologists connect appearances and inclinations to belief, some cite reasons to distinguish the two. Firstly, in cases such as optical illusions which one knows to be illusory, it can “seem” that p even though one lacks inclination to believe that p. Perhaps, following Trent Dougherty, we should distinguish between two sorts of “seeming”: the perception of phenomena which typically incline one to believe a proposition (seeming “as though”) and the inclination to believe itself (seeming “that”).Footnote 75 Yet there can be inclinations to believe which are not appearances at all, such as those based on or constituted by pure desire to believe. In contrast to instances of wishful thinking, the inclination to believe based on or constituted by “seeming” involves “felt veridicality”:“the feel of a state whose content reveals how things really are”.Footnote 76 Perhaps an appearance has a similar phenomenology to the mental state which Plantinga describes as “impulsional evidence” or “doxastic experience”: an experience in which a “belief…seems right, acceptable, natural; it forces itself upon you; it seems somehow inevitable”.Footnote 77 Thus understood, appearances are internally accessible mental states, of which the subject is typically conscious. Consequently, PC is compatible with awareness requirements on justification affirmed by internalists: if PC holds, beliefs justified by appearances are justified in an internalist sense.Footnote 78
The reader might note that Plantinga's description of “impulsional evidence” for a proposition above seems tantalisingly close to Aquinas’ description of the instinctus which produces a non-inferential judgement that propositions should be believed with faith. One might construe this latter perception in modern terms as the appearance that these propositions are divinely revealed (and therefore true). Or perhaps, it would be better to say that there is impulsional evidence for engagement in the doxastic practice of faith itself. That is, it “seems right, acceptable, natural” to assent to the articles with faith; this practice appears to “reveal how things really are”. If this is a plausible characterisation of the phenomenology occasioned by the instinctus, then since faith would be grounded by an appearance on Aquinas’ account, it would be prima facie justified in an internalist sense according to PC. Whilst PC is controversial amongst internalists,Footnote 79 showing that faith grounded in the interior instinctus or lumen fidei has justification on PC shows that such faith might possess justification according to some prominent internalist accounts.
However, one might reasonably object that if the interior instinctus makes the practice of faith seem truth-yielding, the believer would come to faith through persuasion of the intellect (which is an appetite for the true) as opposed to by an act of the will (which is an appetite for the good). Yet Aquinas clearly maintains that faith is produced and given firmness by the will, even when claiming that the lumen fidei imbues basic belief in the articles, analogous to belief in first principles gained through the lumen naturale.Footnote 80 Thus the interior instinctus induces one to adopt the habit of faith by producing the judgement that it is good to assent to the articles with faith,Footnote 81 rather than to a judgement that the practice of faith reliably yields true beliefs or that God has revealed the articles.Footnote 82
Admittedly, Aquinas may consider that faith can come through intellectual conviction that God has revealed a proposition. Demons, whose knowledge of God's actions is superior to ours, cannot help but understand that God has revealed certain propositions.Footnote 83 Thomas possibly countenances that similarly, humans can embrace faith through overwhelming miraculous evidence that propositions are revealed.Footnote 84 Yet as noted above, Aquinas views belief elicited by miracles as less meritorious than belief through following the interior instinctus. One might argue that if the instinctus were construed as an appearance that faith is truth-yielding or that God has revealed propositions, coming to faith on this basis would not be more commendable than belief motivated by miracles.
Whilst this objection to my suggested characterisation of the interior instinctus is powerful, I am unsure that it is conclusive. Firstly, the will can play an important role in attending to impulsional evidence. Where this evidence is not overwhelming, it can be ignored and “put out of one's mind” as much as other forms of evidence. Secondly, although Aquinas claims that the assent of faith is effected by the will, he occasionally suggests that the instinctus gives rise to the perception that faith is truth-directed. When describing the obligation to believe in Christ through the interior instinctus in the absence of miracles, Aquinas writes that the instinctus can show (ostendere) that Christ possesses authority as a lawmaker just as this can be shown by miracles or Scriptural proofs.Footnote 85 Whilst Thomas doesn't explain this possibility, a natural interpretation is that just as miracles can make it appear that a prophet is divinely inspired, the instinctus can generate an appearance that Christ is exercising divine authority.
Another passage suggesting that one brought to faith by the instinctus is conscious that faith is truth-directed comes from Thomas’ Commentary on John. Commenting on the Samaritans who eventually believe through Jesus’ own testimony in John 4,Footnote 86 Aquinas writes that after people have come to faith (say, through the “testimony of the law and the prophets”, or missionary preaching), they believe “because of the truth itself”,Footnote 87 which is the proper motive for faith.Footnote 88 From the context, Aquinas clearly means this to be the fitting and conscious motive for believers. Admittedly, Aquinas may merely be affirming a commonplace in his religious epistemology: that faith necessarily involves conscious assent to propositions because they are revealed.Footnote 89 However, it is noteworthy that Aquinas immediately moves on to discuss the commendable faith of the Samaritans who believed in Jesus’ heavenly origin through His testimony without requiring the performance of miracles as evidence. If Aquinas views this latter group as experiencing a phenomenology at the inception of their faith comparable to that experienced by those who eventually believe solely on Christ's testimony, it would seem that those who come to believe on the basis of Christ's preaching alone (at the instigation of an inner call) have a similar grasp that they are responding to the “truth itself”.
The clearest indication that the instinctus of faith might imbue an appearance that faith is truth-directed arises from a passage in Aquinas’ commentary on Pseudo-Dionysius, which Brent characterises as his clearest description of the phenomenology of the lumen fidei.Footnote 90 Aquinas writes:
“He who by faith is united to the truth knows well how good it is for him to be united to the truth in such manner (sic)- even though many reprehend him as having gone out of his senses (extasis passim) and of being a fool and a madman. For truly it is hidden from those reprehending him for his errors that he has suffered an ecstasy of truth – as if placed beyond all sense knowledge and conjoined to supernatural Truth. The believer knows himself to be no fool, as they say, but to be liberated by the pure and unchangeable truth, and to be withdrawn from the unstable and changing current of error.”Footnote 91
Here, Aquinas suggests that the believer not only perceives (through divine testimony) that the articles of faith are true, but experiences herself as being in proper cognitive contact with (“united” to) the truth, rather than suffering cognitive malfunction as a “madman”. One might say that she experiences her beliefs as being reliably truth-directed. If this perception is non-inferential (which admittedly, Aquinas does not clarify), then given the parallels between the inner instinctus to believe and the “lumen fidei”, it seems likely that the former too would include a non-inferential perception (i.e. an “appearance”) that to believe those presenting themselves as God's messengers is to believe the truth.Footnote 92
Even if the interior instinctus does not, on Aquinas’ account, generate an appearance that propositions are revealed, there is another way in which the experience of being impelled to believe by the instinctus might generate an appearance which would give internalist justification to faith. Perhaps, it might non-inferentially seem to one moved by the instinctus that she is being moved to faith by God. Brent rejects this possibility,Footnote 93 worrying that such faith would be based on a “sign” of divine activity, and thus mere “acquired faith” like that based on miraculous evidence. He further notes that Aquinas claims that we only know faith to be a theological (i.e. infused) virtue from Scripture. Yet to the contrary, the possession of evidence for a belief does not mean that evidence causes that belief, and it is clear from Brent's account that one can know that faith is practically appropriate (and hence, a virtue?) from the inner instinctus alone.
Moreover, in other contexts, Aquinas seemingly holds that those moved to act through the interior instinctus can be aware that God is directing them. One example is the case of prophets. Thomas holds that in paradigm instances of prophecy, a prophet is both made certain of the truth of the proposition which God reveals to her and made certain that God has revealed the proposition.Footnote 94 However, there is also an “imperfect” species of prophecy, in which prophets are driven by “divine instinct” to endorse propositions. Aquinas claims that in the case of prophecy driven by instinctus, the prophet does not always have the same degree of certainty so that “sometimes… he is unable to distinguish fully whether his thoughts are conceived of the Divine instinct or his own spirit”.Footnote 95 This leaves open the possibility that by contrast, it is sometimes quite apparent to such prophets that they are being moved by divine instinctus. Thomas does not explain how those who prophesy properly speaking are aware that God is revealing something, but he cites Augustine's comment in Confessions VI.13 that his mother could discern her own prophecies from natural dreams by “a certain feeling, which in words she could not express”.Footnote 96 In other words, God causes the prophet to immediately perceive (say, through a forceful appearance) that He is revealing a proposition to her. Perhaps, therefore, God sometimes similarly makes it apparent to prophets moved by divine instinctus that God is revealing a proposition for prophecy.
Another context in which Aquinas mentions the divine instinct further raises the possibility that those moved by the instinctus are immediately aware of its origin. In defending the propriety of immediately acting upon a perceived vocation to religious life without engaging in prolonged deliberation,Footnote 97 Thomas notes that one might be moved by an instinctus of the Holy Spirit. In this case, one is evidently obliged to obey the instinctus immediately, as if one had received a command from Christ in person. Since the interior instinctus is a powerful spur to action, hesitation to act upon it is either the result of attempted resistance, or a lack of awareness.Footnote 98 It is slightly unclear from the Latin whether, as I consider probable, Aquinas means to say that this lack of awareness (ignorare) is the result of plain ignorance (presumably, of the instinct's nature/origin) or a deliberate attempt to ignore the promptings of the instinctus. Particularly if the former interpretation is correct, this implies that the subject of interior inspiration can (by contrast) be aware of its origin, and therefore capable of conscious resistance. Thomas does not explain how such putative awareness might come about; but it might well be non-inferential, as the passage stresses that one ought not to hesitate over the Spirit's interior promptings.
These passages only tentatively suggest that Aquinas holds that one can be non-inferentially aware of the divine origin of the interior instinctus, and that those brought to faith by the instinctus might be thus aware. Notably, Aquinas does not expend time discussing one's entitlement to believe that instinctive desires to engage in religiously important actions are divinely inspired. Rather, he regards it as evident to even non-Christians that prompt obedience to the interior instinctus is obligatory. This may be because as suggested below, Thomas has reason for optimist concerning the reliability of our cognitive faculties.
IV
I have suggested two ways in which being moved to faith by the interior instinctus might immediately provide reason to believe that faith is a reliably truth-directed doxastic practice. I now further argue that given Aquinas’ broader metaphysical and epistemological commitments, one who experiences an inner calling to faith should on reflection consider that faith is epistemically appropriate. Since one brought to faith by the instinctus may not engage in such reflection, my argument will not show that converts receive internalist doxastic justification for their beliefs from the instinctus. However, it will show that they possess (prima facie) internalist propositional justification for their religious beliefs through their experience of it. Thus, it is wrong to claim that reflection on miraculous “signs” confirming revelation is necessary to provide internalist justification for faith.
As Martin Pickavé notes, Aquinas does not consider scepticism about the reliability of our cognitive faculties at length.Footnote 99 This accords with both his belief in Providence, and Aristotelian suggestions that humans naturally desire knowledge, and that natural desires are not typically unfulfillable.Footnote 100 Given Aquinas’ rejection of scepticism, it is plausible that someone who experiences the interior instinctus should regard it as truth-directed. Thomas perhaps indicates this when, laconically, he describes the obligation to follow the instinctus to faith: “an inner impulse to act well is the work of God, and those who resist it sin”.Footnote 101 Yet as seen above, some interpreters hold that the interior instinctus merely generates the judgement that faith is morally as opposed to epistemically fitting. Therefore, even if the instinctus is a reliably truth-directed faculty which justifies the true belief that faith is morally appropriate, this need not imply that the articles of faith are true.
However, Aquinas’ developed teleological account of human goodness lacks space for faith to contribute to our well-being if Christian beliefs are false.Footnote 102 According to Thomas, natural reason shows that human goodness consists ultimately in the contemplation of God.Footnote 103 By our natural powers, we might obtain a natural contemplation of God as first cause. However, natural reason also suggests the possibility of a beatific knowledge of God, unmediated through propositions.Footnote 104 This latter possibility would be the greatest possible good for humans,Footnote 105 yet its ability to be realised depends on graceFootnote 106 and can only be known through revelation.Footnote 107
It seems implausible that faith could contribute positively to the realisation of either human end unless Christianity (or at least, its core portrayal of God) is true. Aquinas claims that faith helps to realise our ultimate good because belief in revelation is necessary as an intellectual preparation for and practical guide towards beatitude.Footnote 108 Indeed, in De Veritate, the desire for beatitude promised and attainable by faith provides the motivation to believe.Footnote 109 If humanity lacks a supernatural end, Christian faith will plausibly distract humans from the attainment of natural happiness and foster presumptuous false hope in God's generosity. Alternatively, if humanity possesses a supernatural end despite the falsity of wider Christian beliefs, it seems unlikely that faith in (e.g.) the Trinity and associated religious practices will prepare humans for knowledge of God, who might differ considerably from the God of Scripture.
Further, commenting on St. Paul's argument in 1 Corinthians 15:14 that faith is vain if Christ was not raised, Aquinas himself suggests that if this central article of faith is false, Christians are disadvantaged by faith.Footnote 110 Although Thomas is commenting on Scripture, it is clear from his commentary that he regards St. Paul's argument as an instance of natural reasoning which is suitable to convince those doubting a central article of faith. Aquinas follows St. Paul's argument that the falsity of faith in Christ's Resurrection would have two unfortunate consequences. Firstly, St. Paul and other evangelists would have sinned gravely, by bearing false witness and by attributing something false to God.Footnote 111 Since for Aquinas faith involves outward confession of the gospel,Footnote 112 if faith were false not only missionaries but ordinary Christians would presumably sin by falsely attributing actions to God. Moreover, he subsequently defends St. Paul's claim that unless Christ is risen, Christians “are of all men most to be pitied”.Footnote 113 Thomas lists and rejects potential benefits which might accrue to Christians if they believe in Christ's Resurrection falsely.Footnote 114 Having suggested that under such circumstances Christians will lack well-grounded hope for redemption and bodily resurrection, Aquinas further claims that faith will harm Christians by obliging them to suffer persecution (presumably, rather than to apostatise). If Christianity is false, Aquinas contends that such suffering cannot be of value by direction to a further good.Footnote 115 It cannot be directed to preserving the intellectual good of faith (since ex hypothesi faith is false) or to the natural practical goods of health and comfort. Whilst one might object that Christianity might contingently accrue worldly benefits to believers in societies where faith occasions privilege (as in 13th Century Europe), Thomas could respond that faith will at least disadvantage one by giving one a disposition to suffer persecution.
Since on Aquinas’ account Christian faith does not seem beneficial unless its core doctrines true, the prima facie justified belief that faith is practically fitting which the interior instinctus bestows (at least, according to PC) should give propositional justification for belief that the central articles of faith are true.
V
To conclude, I have suggested various ways in which, on Aquinas’ account, belief in the articles of faith can receive internalist justification through the experience of being moved by the “interior instinct”. Contrary to recent suggestions, internalist justification for faith is not solely provided by miraculous evidence for the gospel's provenance. This does not mean that there is no role for miraculous evidence for revelation in Aquinas’ religious epistemology. Plantinga, who believes that a sensus divinitatis provides both internal justification and warrant for theism, notes that arguments from natural theology can nevertheless strengthen theistic belief and its warrant (and, one might add, encourage non-theists to belief in God).Footnote 116 Analogously, Aquinas might hold that miraculous evidence for revelation can encourage Christians and non-Christians to accept the gospel, which they might otherwise justifiably believe at the prompting of a divinely-infused instinctus.Footnote 117
