Maurice Blondel: Transforming Catholic Tradition

by Robert C. Koerpel

During the past few decades there has been renewed interest in the twentieth-century French Catholic philosopher Maurice Blondel (1861–1949) and his influence on modern and contemporary theology, but little scholarship has been published in the English-speaking world. In Maurice Blondel: Transforming Catholic Tradition, Robert Koerpel examines Blondel’s work, the historical and theological development of the idea of tradition in modern Catholicism, tradition’s relation to reason and revelation, and Blondel's influence on Catholicism's understanding of tradition. The book presents aspects of Blondel's thought that deserve to be more widely known and contributes to important debates in current theology on modern French Catholic thought and the emerging conversations surrounding them. Koerpel looks to the cultural context from which Blondel’s thought emerges by situating it within the broader conceptual, historical, and theological developments of modernity. He examines the problem of reason and revelation in modern Catholicism, the role and nature of tradition, and the relationships between theology and history, truth and change, nature and grace, and scripture and the development of doctrine.

This book provides readers with an appreciation of Blondel’s conceptually creative answer to how tradition represents the Word of God in human history and why it is one of his most important contributions to modern and contemporary theology. They will discover how his contribution restores the animated vitality between the institutional and liturgical dimensions of tradition essential to the living, dynamic nature of Catholicism.

278 pages, Hardcover

Published November 30, 2018

Reviews

[Rory Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

Blondel was a significant French philosopher in the first half of the twentieth century. His ‘philosophy of action’ was a precursor of existentialism, and his wider views also drove a significant new emphasis in the concepts of Revelation and Grace, within Catholic theology.

This book focuses upon Blondel’s views about Tradition. Essentially he rejected both of the main alternative models at the time. On the one hand Extrinsicism was arguing for a conceptual propositional model of revelation. It claimed that all truths were delivered in propositions which were defined and then learned as dogma. The other model was Historicism, which influenced by nineteenth century historical studies was prioritising secular archaeology over dogma, and thereby making archaeologists the gate-keepers of what counted as dogma.

Blondel thought that both approaches were mistaken, because both approaches had an excessively narrow view of what counted as engaging with information. Blondel argued that action does not follow knowledge, but rather knowledge follows action. People acquire truth in their lives, and then they struggle to express it in words. Truth is the conformity of minds to lives (not a conformity of minds to reality).

This is an interesting set of ideas, but there is a crucial ambiguity in what Blondel is saying. If he is saying that people’s beliefs and commitments should be determined from the consistency of both their words and actions, then he is making a trivial point. If he is arguing that people have knowledge in their actions, before they have knowledge in their words, then it sounds like he is affirming a potentially contradictory claim that people have knowledge before they have knowledge.

I was hoping that the author would pursue this issue of the meaning of what Blondel is committed to, but it was not pressed. That is especially disappointing as contemporary critics such as Garrigou lagrange made precisely this accusation that Blondel’s position is ultimately contradictory. If that is so, then that is a serious problem in Blondel’s views, so it is surprising that there was little by way of assessment of that issue.

The book seemed to be most confident dealing with the historical (rather than the philosophical) issues surrounding Blondel’s views. This was informative, but at times it felt like there was more background material than was really needed. Chapters 2 and 3, for example, felt as if they could have been simplified into a single chapter.

In some of the other chapters, there were also details that were not clearly relevant to the focus of the book. In the final chapter for example, there was an excursus on the meaning and adequacy of Vatican II’s 1965 claims about inspiration. Again, that was interesting information, but it was not clear how it aided the reader’s understanding of Blondel’s views.

Even though the historical side of the issues seemed to be particularly well represented in the book, there were some questionable historical claims made. For example, the author said that Pope Pius IX’s supporting of political liberalism ended in 1854 when he proclaimed the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception (p74). Historians usually cite that his policies changed from 1848 when his minister Pelligrino Rossi was murdered. As well as illustrating a questionable thesis, that point is also another example of information which is of questionable relevance to understanding Blondel’s philosophy.

Overall, the book contained some interesting information, but I was disappointed that its focus seemed a little too historical, and that it did not press Blondel enough on the (philosophical) coherence of his views about the nature of Tradition.

[Bryan Bergman · Rating 4 out of 5]

With this volume, Robert C. Koerpel continues the ongoing work of introducing Maurice Blondel to the English-speaking world. It is a welcome addition, as this French philosopher has exerted a great, though often unnoticed, influence upon the whole development of Catholic theology in the twentieth century and, as Koerpel argues, offers unique resources for confronting the contemporary epistemological and metaphysical challenges to Christian faith. More than providing a systematic overview of Blondel’s life and thought, as Olivia Blanchette has done, Koerpel applies Blondelian insights specifically to the question of tradition. The main argument is that Blondel’s notion of tradition offers a way toward overcoming modernity’s “problem of representation.” The book, therefore, serves as a general introduction to Blondel as well as a contribution to current debates on the nature of tradition.

What Koerpel calls the problem of representation, a term he borrows from Gary Lease, is the modern difficulty of relating thought to being, epistemology to ontology, and subject to object. Unlike medieval and ancient authors, who largely assumed a direct link between reality and our representations of reality, modern thinkers have struggled to relate the two. The struggle has theological implications. If our representations in general are dubious, then how can we represent the divine? According to Blondel, our representations (in dogma) are linked to reality (God) through action. Truth, in this sense, is something that we do. And this is precisely the meaning of tradition.

Koerpel situates Blondel’s notion of tradition in relation to other accounts of tradition that fail to solve the problem of representation. The neo-Thomistic conception, which Blondel calls “extrinsicism,” and the historical-critical conception of Alfred Loisy, called “historicism,” are both seen as inadequate. The former understands the truth of tradition to reside in the teaching authority of the Magisterium. By the work of the Holy Spirit in the church, tradition constitutes a source of revelation alongside scripture. In this sense it is extrinsic to the believer. Dogma must thereby be accepted as something externally related to us. Historicism, on the other hand, tends to reduce the contents of faith to the results of historical-critical research. For Blondel, both views neglect the dynamics of human action involved in all acts of understanding. Our estimation of Christian history as well as dogma depends on our openness to the God in whom we live and move and have our being. And this in the context of the communal action of the church.

The book has many strong points. It situates Blondel in relation to philosophical and ecclesial developments that came both before and after his career. This serves to highlight the uniqueness of Blondel’s contribution. Koerpel goes on to make Blondel’s arguments even stronger by interacting with Yves Congar’s criticisms of Blondel and by employing Blondel to critique contemporary accounts of the relationship between historical criticism and theology, such as those suggested by the International Theological Commission. A weakness in Koerpel’s presentation is that it tends to get caught in historical details, making it easy for the reader to lose track of the argument. Concrete applications and examples, moreover, would have served well to make it more accessible to those without a strong philosophical background. Overall, this is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the relationship between faith and reason, in the nature of tradition, or in getting to know the work of a highly original philosopher as Blondel.