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Thomas Aquinas: Selected Commentaries on the Old Testament
Thomas Aquinas’s Old Testament commentaries remain some of his most neglected writings due partly to the widely varying quality of both the commentaries themselves and their English translations, which often retain the terseness and opacity of the original Latin manuscripts. Nevertheless, Thomas’s corpus of Old Testament commentaries contains some of his finest biblical exegesis and theology. Within them, we find dimensions of his thought and literary personality that do not appear in any of his other writings.
This volume aims to promote appreciation for Thomas’s Old Testament exegesis by making his best commentaries more accessible. To this end, it offers a topically organized selection of the most theologically profound lectures from his premier Old Testament commentaries—those on the Psalms, Job, and Isaiah. Moreover, the translations used in this collection have undergone extensive editing and revision to enhance their accuracy, elegance, clarity, stylistic consistency, and overall readability. Lastly, hundreds of explanatory footnotes have been added to facilitate study, along with two indices and a bibliography.
Together with its companion volume, Thomas Selected Commentaries on the New Testament, this collection offers a curated introduction to Thomas’s biblical commentaries, suitable for newcomers, students, and scholars alike.
This volume aims to promote appreciation for Thomas’s Old Testament exegesis by making his best commentaries more accessible. To this end, it offers a topically organized selection of the most theologically profound lectures from his premier Old Testament commentaries—those on the Psalms, Job, and Isaiah. Moreover, the translations used in this collection have undergone extensive editing and revision to enhance their accuracy, elegance, clarity, stylistic consistency, and overall readability. Lastly, hundreds of explanatory footnotes have been added to facilitate study, along with two indices and a bibliography.
Together with its companion volume, Thomas Selected Commentaries on the New Testament, this collection offers a curated introduction to Thomas’s biblical commentaries, suitable for newcomers, students, and scholars alike.
328 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 16, 2024
About the author
Thomas Aquinas
2,823 books1,240 followersPhilosophy of Saint Thomas Aquinas, a Dominican friar and theologian of Italy and the most influential thinker of the medieval period, combined doctrine of Aristotle and elements of Neoplatonism, a system that Plotinus and his successors developed and based on that of Plato, within a context of Christian thought; his works include the
Summa contra gentiles
(1259-1264) and the
Summa theologiae
or theologica (1266-1273).
Saint Albertus Magnus taught Saint Thomas Aquinas.
People ably note this priest, sometimes styled of Aquin or Aquino, as a scholastic. The Roman Catholic tradition honors him as a "doctor of the Church."
Aquinas lived at a critical juncture of western culture when the arrival of the Aristotelian corpus in Latin translation reopened the question of the relation between faith and reason, calling into question the modus vivendi that obtained for centuries. This crisis flared just as people founded universities. Thomas after early studies at Montecassino moved to the University of Naples, where he met members of the new Dominican order. At Naples too, Thomas first extended contact with the new learning. He joined the Dominican order and then went north to study with Albertus Magnus, author of a paraphrase of the Aristotelian corpus. Thomas completed his studies at the University of Paris, formed out the monastic schools on the left bank and the cathedral school at Notre Dame. In two stints as a regent master, Thomas defended the mendicant orders and of greater historical importance countered both the interpretations of Averroës of Aristotle and the Franciscan tendency to reject Greek philosophy. The result, a new modus vivendi between faith and philosophy, survived until the rise of the new physics. The Catholic Church over the centuries regularly and consistently reaffirmed the central importance of work of Thomas for understanding its teachings concerning the Christian revelation, and his close textual commentaries on Aristotle represent a cultural resource, now receiving increased recognition.
Saint Albertus Magnus taught Saint Thomas Aquinas.
People ably note this priest, sometimes styled of Aquin or Aquino, as a scholastic. The Roman Catholic tradition honors him as a "doctor of the Church."
Aquinas lived at a critical juncture of western culture when the arrival of the Aristotelian corpus in Latin translation reopened the question of the relation between faith and reason, calling into question the modus vivendi that obtained for centuries. This crisis flared just as people founded universities. Thomas after early studies at Montecassino moved to the University of Naples, where he met members of the new Dominican order. At Naples too, Thomas first extended contact with the new learning. He joined the Dominican order and then went north to study with Albertus Magnus, author of a paraphrase of the Aristotelian corpus. Thomas completed his studies at the University of Paris, formed out the monastic schools on the left bank and the cathedral school at Notre Dame. In two stints as a regent master, Thomas defended the mendicant orders and of greater historical importance countered both the interpretations of Averroës of Aristotle and the Franciscan tendency to reject Greek philosophy. The result, a new modus vivendi between faith and philosophy, survived until the rise of the new physics. The Catholic Church over the centuries regularly and consistently reaffirmed the central importance of work of Thomas for understanding its teachings concerning the Christian revelation, and his close textual commentaries on Aristotle represent a cultural resource, now receiving increased recognition.
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October 12, 2026
Soooo peak. St Thomas is the Angelic Doctor of the Church for a reason.
Content derives only from excerpts of Job, Psalms, and Isaiah, but covers nearly everything there is to cover about the faith. List includes but is not limited to:
Christology, the divine nature and human nature of Christ, Mariology, the Church, the body of the Church with Christ as its head, angelogy, demonology, sin, virtue, soteriology, Aristotlean metaphysics, the Eucharist, Confession, prophecy (fulfillment), the Incarnation, the Passion, the Resurrection, the general resurrection, death, free will, divine providence, Old Testament -> New Testament fulfillment, etc…
So glad I covered this with annotations instead of reading passively because I wouldn’t have engaged with the gold that is in every sentence and paragraph if I read passively.
St Thomas discusses the expansive ideas in the most concise terms, that are incredibly understandable despite being written within a 13th century framework.
So much content was covered in only 170 pages.
Will be referring to this in the future.
Onto the St Thomas’ New Testament 400 page burger of a commentary next.
Content derives only from excerpts of Job, Psalms, and Isaiah, but covers nearly everything there is to cover about the faith. List includes but is not limited to:
Christology, the divine nature and human nature of Christ, Mariology, the Church, the body of the Church with Christ as its head, angelogy, demonology, sin, virtue, soteriology, Aristotlean metaphysics, the Eucharist, Confession, prophecy (fulfillment), the Incarnation, the Passion, the Resurrection, the general resurrection, death, free will, divine providence, Old Testament -> New Testament fulfillment, etc…
So glad I covered this with annotations instead of reading passively because I wouldn’t have engaged with the gold that is in every sentence and paragraph if I read passively.
St Thomas discusses the expansive ideas in the most concise terms, that are incredibly understandable despite being written within a 13th century framework.
So much content was covered in only 170 pages.
Will be referring to this in the future.
Onto the St Thomas’ New Testament 400 page burger of a commentary next.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review