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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 September 2014
The primary objective of this investigation will be to examine Newman's distinction between human faith and divine faith with the hope of arriving at some insights which will help clarify the ambiguities found in Newman's writings on this subject. Based upon a critical analysis of Newman's writings, this article will examine how Newman understands the relationship between human faith and divine faith in terms of their different material and formal objects. The interpretation presented in this article also has significance for the contemporary analysis of other aspects of Newman's notion of faith, for instance, the nature of the affirmations, the role of the will, and the role of grace in both human and divine faith.
1 Many of these papers are now published in Newman, John Henry, The Theological Papers of John Henry Newman on Faith and Certainty, ed. de Achaval, Hugo M. and Holmes, J. Derek (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976).Google Scholar Hereafter this source will be referred to as Theological Papers.
2 Some notable examples are Fey, William R., Faith and Doubt: The Unfolding of Newman's Thought on Certainty (Shepherdstown, WV: Patmos, 1976), 38-49, 174–76;Google ScholarFerreira, M. Jamie, Doubt and Religious Commitment: The Role of the Will in Newman's Thought (Oxford: Clarendon, 1980), 131–38.Google Scholar Also, Pailin, David A., The Way to Faith: An Examination of Newman's Grammar of Assent as a Response to the Search for Certainty in Faith (London: Epworth, 1969)Google Scholar, discusses the relationship between human faith and divine faith (79-82).
3 John Henry Newman, “Paper on the Certainty of Faith,” 1847, unpublished, Birmingham Oratory Archives, B.9.11; a letter to Edward Healy Thompson dated October 11, 1853, the “1853 Paper on the Certainty of Faith”; the “Papers in Preparation for A Grammar of Assent, 1865-1869.” The last two works are published in Newman, Theological Papers.
4 Newman himself mentions having read these two works while in Rome (Newman, John Henry, Letters and Diaries of John Henry Newman, ed. Dessain, Charles Stephen [London: Thomas Nelson, 1961], 290 and 293).Google Scholar For a discussion of the influence of Roman theology on Newman's writings on faith between 1845-59 see Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 40–44.Google Scholar
5 For a fuller description of the major elements of the Roman view of faith which Newman encountered see Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 43–44.Google Scholar
6 Newman, “Paper on the Certainty of Faith.” This document includes a manuscript entitled “On the Nature of Faith,” as well as a rough draft of the material for the preface to the French translation of the University Sermons. Pailin, David A., The Way to Faith, 206–8Google Scholar, dates this manuscript as 1848. William Fey also dates this document as 1848 (Faith and Doubt, 49).
7 Newman, , “Paper on the Certainty of Faith,” 1.Google Scholar
8 Ibid., 1, 7.
9 Ibid., 1.
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid., 1, 3.
12 Ibid., 3.
13 Ibid.
14 Ibid., 5.
15 Ibid.
16 Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 38–39.Google Scholar
17 Newman, , “Paper on the Certainty of Faith,” 1.Google Scholar
18 Ibid., 3.
19 Ibid.
20 Ibid.
21 Ibid.
22 Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 38-41, 48–49.Google Scholar
23 Ibid., 49.
24 Newman, , “Paper on the Certainty of Faith,” 5.Google Scholar
25 Newman, , Letters and Diaries, xv, 464–67.Google Scholar
26 Ibid., 465.
27 Ibid. Newman says that if he had not maintained this he would have fallen into a condemned proposition and he quotes as evidence for this a Thesis of Innocent XI from Denzinger, , Enchiridion Symbolorum, 30th ed., 1169.Google Scholar
28 Ibid., 467.
29 Ibid., 466. Here Newman uses the term “revelatio” to refer to the formal object of faith. In his later works the term “revelatio” designates the fact of revelation.
30 Ibid. Newman states that what is made evident in the process of faith is that the revelation and the revealed doctrines are credible. But, in themselves, both the revelation and the revealed doctrines remain obscure and inevident.
31 Ibid., 466-67.
32 See above, n. 7.
33 Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 53–54.Google Scholar
34 Ibid., 53.
35 Newman, , Theological Papers, 36.Google Scholar While some steps of the process are described as natural only and some are described as being both natural and supernatural, it is clear that, for Newman, the whole process of faith is rational, that is, according to the process of human reason. Nothing in the process violates the canons of informal reason.
36 Ibid., 37.
37 Ibid., 36.
38 Ibid., 37.
39 Ibid.
40 Ibid., 36. Newman states, “A body of proof exists for the credibilitas of Revelation which makes that credibilitas evidens…. This body of proof is the formal cause of the conclusion, or the shape in which the conclusion comes to us. It consists of all the facts and truths of the case, each in its right place as the prudentia sees and arranges them, conspiring to the conclusion of the credibilitas of Revelation.” Fey supports this interpretation when he writes, “The judgment of credibility is an objective (certain) assent resulting from an informal reflection on experience, not a formal demonstration from premises” (Faith and Doubt, 174).
41 Newman, , Theological Papers, 37.Google Scholar
42 Ibid., 38.
43 Ibid. At this point Newman adds a parenthetical remark which seems to raise questions about the nature of the assent on human faith which on the previous page was described as not excluding fear. “(But question—is not all doubt and fear excluded in our faith of the laws of nature?)”
44 Ibid., 37.
45 Ibid.
46 Ibid., 37-38.
47 Ibid., 37.
48 Ibid., 38.
49 Ibid., 37.
50 See above, nn. 7, 14.
51 Newman, , Theological Papers, 37.Google Scholar
52 Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 179.Google Scholar
53 Newman, , Theological Papers, 38.Google Scholar Although Newman adds, “it is difficult to understand this—for the imperium voluntatis goes before, and excludes doubt and fear.”
54 Newman first mentions this distinction in his 1830 university sermon entitled, “The Influence of Natural and Revealed Religion Respectively” (Newman, John Henry, Fifteen Sermons Preached before the University of Oxford [London: Longmans, Green, 1906], 16–36Google Scholar). Newman developed this distinction as a result of his discovery of the doctrine of the “Dispensation of Paganism” through his reading of Justin Martyr around 1828.
55 William Fey supports this interpretation. He writes, “The will, aided by grace, might command the intellect to believe (the second case) but the object of this human faith remains the credibility of the revelation; while divine faith in the intellect (the third case) has as its object revelation and the revealed content—that is, it follows the logic of testimony” [Faith and Doubt, 175).
56 Ibid., 53.
57 Ibid., 54-55.
58 Newman, , Theological Papers, 120–39.Google Scholar This document consists of a series of brief papers written by Newman between 1865-69 as he was preparing to write the Grammar of Assent.
59 Ibid., 132-33. These private revelations come through what Newman calls the private channels of revealed truth. He mentions three channels of private revelation (Visio, Scriptura, Traditio divina), and adds a possible fourth, the necessary conclusion from a defined premise. Although obligatory on the mind possessing them, the truths of Divine Faith cannot be imposed upon others, and Catholics who do not accept them are not considered to be outside the Church.
60 Ibid., 132.
61 Ibid., 139. Newman does not use the term human faith, but it is clear from the context that this is what he means. This is the same judgment that he referred to as human faith in his earlier works. Also, here Newman does not specify whether he is speaking about Divine Faith or Catholic Divine Faith.
62 Ibid., 133-34.
63 Dessain, Charles Stephen, John Henry Newman (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1971), 151–53.Google Scholar
64 Ker, Ian T., John Henry Newman: A Biography (Oxford: Clarendon: 1988), 649.Google Scholar
65 In the Grammar of Assent Newman carries on a dialogue with John Locke precisely on this point. It is Newman's disagreement with Locke on this point which is the basis for Newman's insistence that assent is unconditional (Newman, John Henry, An Essay in Aid of a Grammar of Assent [London: Longmans, Green, 1906], 159–87Google Scholar).
66 Harper, G. H., Cardinal Newman and William Froude, F.R.S.: A Correspondence (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1933), 9.Google Scholar
67 Ibid., 127-28.
68 Ker, , Newman, 638–42.Google Scholar
69 Dessain, , John Henry Newman, 148.Google Scholar Dessain quotes Caswall's note without giving the original reference.
70 Newman, , Grammar of Assent, 99.Google Scholar
71 Ibid., 100.
72 Ibid., 384. It is clear from what Newman says that he is here speaking of justifying Catholic Divine Faith and not some type of human faith. The Christianity he is attempting to justify is a “Revelatio revelata,” which is accepted as true “because it comes from Him [God] who neither can deceive nor be deceived” (387).
73 Ibid., 389f.
74 Pailin, , The Way to Faith, 266, n. 22.Google Scholar
75 Ferreira, , Doubt and Religious Commitment, 131, 135.Google Scholar
76 Newman, , Grammar of Assent, 100.Google Scholar
77 Ferreira, , Doubt and Religious Commitment, 15, 131, 135.Google Scholar
78 See above, n. 25.
79 Ker, , Newman, 329.Google Scholar
80 Fey, , Faith and Doubt, 41–43.Google Scholar
81 Ferreira, , Doubt and Religious Commitment, 137.Google Scholar
82 Ibid., 136.
83 Ibid., 135-36.