Spiritual Traditions and the Virtues: Living Between Heaven and Earth

This book develops a philosophical appreciation of the spiritual life. Specifically, it aims to show how a certain conception of spiritual good, one that is rooted in Thomas Aquinas’s account of infused moral virtue, can generate a distinctive vision of human life and the possibilities for spiritual fulfilment. Among other matters, the text examines the character of the goods to which spiritual traditions are directed; the structure of such traditions, including the connection between their practical and creedal commitments; the relationship between the various vocabularies that are used to describe, from the insider’s perspective, progress in the spiritual life; the significance of tradition as an epistemic category; and the question of what it takes for a spiritual tradition to be handed on from one person to another. So, while the discussion aims to make some contribution to the discipline that we standardly call the philosophy of religion, it has a rather different focus from some familiar ventures in the field, in so far as it starts from a consideration of the nature of spiritual goods and of traditions that seek to cultivate such goods. In his account of the virtues, Aquinas suggests how it is possible for our relations to the everyday world to be folded into our relations to the divine or sacred reality otherwise understood. In this sense, he is offering a vision of how it is possible to live between heaven and earth. This book considers how that vision may be extended across the central domains of human thought and experience, and how it can deepen and diversify our understanding of what it is for a human life to be lived well.