View source for Thomas Cajetan

{{Short description|15th/16th-century Italian philosopher and priest}}
{{For|the saint|Saint Cajetan}}
{{Infobox philosopher
| name              =  Thomas de Vio Cajetan
| image             =  Cajetan and Luther.jpg
| image_size        = 270px
| caption           = [[Martin Luther]] in front of Cardinal Cajetan by [[Ferdinand Pauwels]]
| birth_date        = {{birth date|1469|02|20|df=y}}
| death_date        = {{death date and age|1534|08|09|1469|02|20|df=y}}
| school_tradition  = [[Thomism]]
| era               = [[Medieval philosophy]]
| module           = {{Infobox Christian leader
| child            = yes
| type = cardinal
| title = [[Bishop of Gaeta]]
| church           = [[Catholic Church]]
| ordination       = 1491<ref>{{cite web | url=https://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/bishop/bvio.html | title=Tommaso (Jacopo) Cardinal de Vio &#91;Catholic-Hierarchy&#93; }}</ref>
| consecration     = 1 May 1518
| cardinal = 1 July 1517
| other_post = [[Cardinal-Priest]] of [[San Sisto Vecchio|San Sisto]]
| consecrated_by = [[Niccolò Fieschi]]
| term = 1519–1534
| created_cardinal_by = [[Pope Leo X]]
}}
| region            = {{tree list}}
* [[Western philosophy]]
** [[Italian philosophy]]{{tree list/end}}
| notable_works     ={{Cite book|title=Summula Caietani|url=https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=13688745}}
| alma_mater        = [[University of Padua]]
| influences        =  {{hlist|[[Thomas Aquinas|St. Thomas Aquinas]]|[[Averroes]]|[[Jerome|Saint Jerome]]<ref>Volz, J. (1908). [http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03145c.htm Tommaso de Vio Gaetani Cajetan]. In The [[Catholic Encyclopedia]]. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Retrieved September 21, 2019 from New Advent: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03145c.htm</ref>|[[Duns Scotus]]|[[Aristotle]]|[[Augustine of Hippo|Saint Augustine]]|[[Pico della Mirandola]]}}
| influenced        =[[Étienne Gilson]], [[Ralph McInerny]], [[Thomas More|More]], [[John Fisher|Fisher]], [[Mary I]], [[Catherine De Medici]], [[Louis XIV]], [[Edmund Burke|Burke]], [[Joseph De Maistre|Maistre]], [[Henri de Lubac]], [[Murray Rothbard]], [[Chris Ferrara]],
| main_interests    = {{hlist|[[Metaphysics]]|[[Christian theology|Theology]]|[[Analogy#Catholicism|Analogy]]}}
|birth_place=[[Gaeta]], [[Kingdom of Naples]]|death_place=[[Rome]], [[Papal States]]|honorific_prefix=[[His Eminence]]|honorific_suffix=[[Dominican Order|OP]]
}}
'''Thomas Cajetan''' {{post-nominals|post-noms=[[Dominican Order|OP]]}} ({{IPAc-en|ˈ|k|æ|d|ʒ|ə|t|ən}} {{respell|KAJ|ə|tən}}; 20 February 1469{{snd}}9 August 1534), also known as '''Gaetanus''', commonly '''Tommaso de Vio '''or '''Thomas de Vio''',<ref>{{Citation|last=Hill|first=Benjamin|title=Thomas of Vio (Cajetan)|date=2011|url=https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9729-4_494|encyclopedia=Encyclopedia of Medieval Philosophy|pages=1295–1300|editor-last=Lagerlund|editor-first=Henrik|publisher=Springer Netherlands|language=en|doi=10.1007/978-1-4020-9729-4_494|isbn=978-1-4020-9729-4|access-date=2020-01-22|url-access=subscription}}</ref> was an [[Italians|Italian]] philosopher, theologian,  the [[Master of the Order of Preachers]] 1508 to 1518, and [[cardinal (Catholicism)|cardinal]] from 1517 until his death.  He was a leading theologian of his day who is now best known as the spokesman for [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] opposition to the teachings of [[Martin Luther]] and the [[Protestant Reformation]] while he was the Pope's [[Papal legate|legate]] in [[Augsburg]], and among Catholics for his extensive commentary on the ''[[Summa Theologica]]'' of [[Thomas Aquinas]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03145c.htm |title=CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Tommaso de Vio Gaetani Cajetan |publisher=Newadvent.org |date=1908-11-01 |access-date=2014-06-07}}</ref>

He is not to be confused with his contemporary [[Saint Cajetan]], the founder of the [[Theatines]].

==Life==
He was born in [[Gaeta]], then part of the [[Kingdom of Naples]], as '''Jacopo Vio'''. The name Tommaso was taken as his religious as a friar, while the surname Cajetan derives from his native city.  At the age of fifteen, he entered the [[Dominican order]] and devoted himself to the study of the [[Thomism|philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas]], becoming before the age of thirty a doctor of [[theology]] at [[university of Padua|Padua]], and subsequently professor of [[metaphysics]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}<ref>{{Britannica|id=88628|title=Cajetan}}</ref> A public disputation at [[Ferrara]] (1494) with [[Pico della Mirandola]] made his reputation as a [[theology|theologian]].

He became general procurator in 1507 and [[Master of the Order of Preachers|general]] of the Dominicans a year later in 1508.

In 1511 a group of  dissident cardinals called the [[Conciliabulum of Pisa]] (1511–1512) against [[Pope Julius II]], who had ignored the electoral capitulations he had accepted before being elected. Cajetan displayed vigorous support for the papacy in a series of publications. These  were condemned by the [[Collège de Sorbonne|Sorbonne]] and publicly burnt by order of [[Louis XII of France|King Louis XII]].

At the [[Fifth Lateran Council]] (1512–17) which Pope [[Julius II]] set up in opposition to that of Pisa, De Vio played the leading role. During the second session of the council, in which he gave the opening oration, he obtained the approval of a decree recognizing the superiority of papal authority to that of councils.

Cajetan composed in defence of his position the ''Tractatus de Comparatione auctoritatis Papæ et conciliorum ad invicem''. [[Jacques Almain]] answered this work, and Cajetan replied in his ''Apologia''. Cajetan refused to accept Almain's argument that the Church's polity had to be similar to a lay regime, complete with limits on the ruler.<ref>Thomas M. Izbicki, "Cajetan's Attack on Parallels Between Church and State," ''Cristianesimo nella storia'' 29 (1999): 81-89.</ref>

For his support of [[papal]] rights, Cajetan was made [[Bishop of Gaeta]], and in 1517 would be made a [[Cardinal (Catholicism)|cardinal]] and [[archbishop of Palermo]] by [[Pope Leo X|Pope Leo&nbsp;X]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

In 1517, [[Leo X]] made him [[cardinal (Catholicism)|cardinal presbyter]] of [[San Sisto Vecchio|San Sisto]] in [[Rome]] for his services. In the following year, he became [[Diocese of Palermo|Archbishop of Palermo]]. He resigned Palermo in 1519 to become [[Bishop of Gaeta]], as granted him by the [[Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor|Emperor Charles V]] for whose election De Vio had laboured zealously. 
[[File:Luther-vor-Cajetan.jpg|thumb|The meeting of Cajetan and [[Martin Luther]]]]

In 1518, Cajetan was sent as legate to the [[Diet of Augsburg]] and at the behest of the [[Frederick III, Elector of Saxony]] was entrusted with examining the teachings of [[Martin Luther]].  According to [[Hilaire Belloc]], "[Luther] had not been treated roughly by his opponents, the roughness had been on his side. But things had gone against him, and he had been made to look foolish; he had been cross-examined into denying, for instance, the authority of a General Council — which authority was the trump card to play against the Papacy."<ref>{{cite book
  | last = Belloc
  | first = Hilaire
  | author-link = Hilaire Belloc
  | title = How the Reformation Happened
  | publisher = [[TAN Books & Publishers|TAN]]
  | year = 1992
  | isbn = 0-89555-465-8
}}</ref>

In 1519, Cajetan helped in drawing up the bill of excommunication against Luther.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Having proved to be an able diplomat and administrator, Cajetan was employed in several other negotiations and transactions. In conjunction with Cardinal Giulio de'&nbsp;Medici in the [[Papal conclave, 1521–22|conclave of 1521–1522]], he secured the election of Adrian Boeyens, then [[Bishop of Tortosa]], as [[Pope Adrian VI]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} He retained influence under [[Pope Clement VII]], suffered a short term of imprisonment after the storming of Rome by the [[Charles III, Duke of Bourbon|Constable of Bourbon]] and by [[Georg von Frundsberg|Frundsberg]] (1527), retired to his diocese for a few years, and, returning to Rome in 1530, assumed his old position of influence with Pope Clement, on whose behalf he drafted the decision rejecting the petition made by [[Henry VIII of England]] for the annulment of his marriage to  [[Catharine of Aragon]].{{Citation needed|date=December 2020}} Appointed by Clement VII to the commission  of cardinals assigned to report on the "Nuremberg Recess", De Vio, in opposition to the majority,  recommended certain concessions to the Lutherans, notably the marriage of the clergy as in the [[Eastern Orthodox Church|Greek Church]] and communion in both kinds according to the decision of the [[Council of Florence|Council of Basel]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Cajetan died on August 9th in [[Rome]] in 1534.

==Views==
[[File:De Vio - Opuscula omnia, 1596 - 4592647 BEIC3 V00110 F0009.tif|thumb|''Opuscula omnia'', 1596]]

=== Religion and Philosophy ===
As a philosopher and logician, Cajetan defended the idea of [[analogy]].<ref>Joshua P. Hochschild, ''The semantics of analogy: rereading Cajetan's De nominum analogia'' (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2010).</ref>

Though as a theologian Cajetan was a scholastic of the older [[Thomism|Thomist]] type, his general position was that of the moderate reformers of the school to which [[Reginald Pole]], later [[archbishop of Canterbury]], also belonged; i.e.,&nbsp; he desired to retain the best elements of the humanist revival in harmony with [[Catholic]] orthodoxy illumined by a revived appreciation of the Augustinian doctrine of justification.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} In the field of [[Thomism|Thomistic]] philosophy, he showed striking independence of judgment, expressing liberal views on marriage and divorce, denying the existence of a material [[Hell]] and advocating the celebration of public prayers in the vernacular.{{Citation needed|date=December 2020}}

Some Dominicans regarded his views as too independent of those of Saint Thomas. The [[Collège de Sorbonne|Sorbonne]] in [[Paris]] found some of these views heterodox, and in the 1570 edition of his celebrated commentary on [[Thomas Aquinas|Aquinas]]' ''Summa'', the objectionable passages were expunged.{{Citation needed|date=December 2020}} In this spirit, he wrote commentaries upon portions of [[Aristotle]] and upon the ''Summa'' of [[Thomas Aquinas|Aquinas]], and towards the end of his life made a careful translation of the [[Old Testament|Old]] and [[New Testament|New]] Testaments, excepting [[Song of Solomon|Solomon's Song]], the [[Prophet]]s and the [[Book of Revelation|Revelation of St John]].{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} Cajetan also wrote opinions on subjects of practical importance, such as the disposition of plundered goods whose ownership could not be determined.<ref>Thomas M. Izbicki, "Cajetan on the Acquisition of Stolen Goods in the Old and New Worlds," ''Rivista di Storia del Cristianesimo'' 4 (2007): 499-509.</ref>

Of the [[Protestant Reformation|Reformation]] he remained a steadfast opponent, composing several works directed against [[Martin Luther]],<ref>''Cajetan Responds A Reader in Reformation Controversy'', ed. Jared Wicks (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1978).</ref> and taking an important part in shaping the policy of the papal delegates in Germany. Learned though he was in the [[scholastic theology|scholastics]], he recognized that to fight the reformers he would need a deeper knowledge of the Scriptures than he possessed. To this study he devoted himself with characteristic zeal, wrote commentaries on the greater part of the Old and the New Testament, and in the exposition of his text, which he treated critically, allowed himself considerable latitude in departing from literal and traditional interpretations.

Cajetan was a man of austere [[piety]] and fervent zeal. And from the standpoint of the Dominican idea of the supreme necessity of maintaining ecclesiastical discipline, he defended the rights of the papacy and proclaimed that the pope should be "the mirror of God on earth."{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

===Views on papal authority===
Against the Council of Pisa's advocacy of [[conciliarism]], which placed the authority of a general council above the pope's authority, Cajetan responded that a general council could only judge a pope if the pope had become a heretic. In the case of a wicked but non-heretical pope, Cajetan insisted that resistance is sufficient to reduce abuses, while deposition is inadmissible as a council convened without a pope would be "headless" (using the scriptural analogy of the relationship between sheep and their shepherd). In the case of heresy, however, Cajetan wrote that an exceptional general council could be convened to grant the reigning pope a fair hearing, and if he was judged to be in heresy, the council could act to sever the bond between the man holding the papacy and the office itself.<ref name=co/><ref name=wi/> However, he denied that this action constituted the council acting over the pope, which he regarded as theologically impossible. Rather, he considered that such an action merely indicated that the council could undo the election of that particular man to the office of the pope (since the election was also performed by human beings).<ref name=co>{{cite book |last1=Michael O'Connor |title=Cajetan's Biblical Commentaries Motive and Method |date=2017 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=9789004325098 |pages=26–27}}</ref><ref name=wi>{{cite book |last1=Tommaso de Vio Cajetan |last2=Jared Wicks |title=Cajetan Responds A Reader in Reformation Controversy |date=2011 |publisher=Wipf & Stock Publishers |isbn=9781610975698 |page=10}}</ref> Cajetan, building on similar discussions from [[John of Paris]] and [[Augustinus Triumphus]] regarding the removal of heretical popes, interpreted Titus 3:10 as saying that a heretical pope should be deposed after two admonitions.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Karen Bollermann, Thomas M. Izbicki, and Cary J. Nederman |title=RELIGION, POWER, AND RESISTANCE FROM THE ELEVENTH TO THE SIXTEENTH CENTURIES PLAYING THE HERESY CARD |date=2014 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |isbn=9781349492213 |page=163}}</ref>

=== Economic thoughts ===

In light of the contemporary economic development, Cajetan cogitated a lot about the morality of trade. More conservative than the future [[School of Salamanca]], his reflections were nonetheless quite modern with utilisation of practical consideration outside of pure theorical thinking and some relevant ideas, like the formulation of the [[liquidity preference]].{{sfn|Decock|2020|p=237-238}}

However his views on [[usury]] were still conservative, as showed by his condemnation of [[mount of piety|mounts of piety]] (that he tried unsuccessfully to ban during the [[Fifth Council of the Lateran]]),{{sfn|Decock|2020|p=236}} his disapproval of [[usury]] or his prohibition of ''[[contractum trinius]]''.{{sfn|Decock|2020|p=238}}

==Modern assessment==
===On Aquinas===
In the mid-twentieth century, Cajetan's thought came to be assessed negatively by certain Catholic commentators who, in reacting against [[neo-Thomist]] thought, portrayed Cajetan as the first person to make mistaken interpretations of the thought of [[Thomas Aquinas]].

[[Fergus Kerr]] wrote a 2002 book, ''After Aquinas'', attacking Cajetan on this.  Among others, he cited [[Étienne Gilson]], who was responding to arguments that 'philosophy' and 'Christianity' were incompatible disciplines, there existed in Hellenistic Judaism, patristic thought and the medieval period a way of thinking, animated by the ancient Greek quest for the cause of being, which could rightly be called 'Christian philosophy'. In Gilson's account, it was in Cajetan's thought that this link was first broken, since Cajetan, influenced by [[Scotism]], reduced [[Thomas Aquinas]]'s metaphysics of the existential act of being to an ontology of substance. Cajetan and his successors therefore, in Gilson's account, represented Thomas as focused on the forms and essences of beings only, and not on the existence of all things as participation in the pure actuality which is God. Accordingly, for Gilson, 'philosophy' and 'Christianity' are only incompatible if Christian thought is understood in its tradition post-Cajetan—a tradition which is worse than the older, more distinguished tradition of Christian thought.<ref>Kerr, Fergus.  ''After Aquinas'' (2002), pp. 80-83.</ref> [[Henri de Lubac]] wrote in ''[[Surnaturel]]'' (1946), an account of Aquinas’ views on the natural and the supernatural, that Cajetan's interpretation of Aquinas, while influential, was incorrect.  De Lubac argued that Cajetan treated Aquinas as an Aristotelian, working with a definition of nature from Aristotle's ''Physics'', which effectively turned human nature into a reality essentially closed in on itself, with its own intrinsic powers, desires and goals. De Lubac did not think Aquinas was an Aristotelian, and that subsequent Catholic thought produced mistaken readings of Thomas Aquinas's account of the relationship between nature and grace.<ref>Kerr, Fergus.  ''After Aquinas'' (2002), p. 136.</ref>

In 2006, [[Ralph McInerny]] and other scholars challenged the negative assessment of Cajetan's work made by De Lubac and Gilson. McInerny writes that the criticisms of Cajetan are not in fact supported by evidence from his works, and furthermore that it is not Cajetan but Gilson whose interpretation of Aquinas is a departure from the latter's beliefs.<ref>McInerny, Ralph, "Preambula Fidei; Thomas Aquinas and the God of the Philosophers"</ref> <!-- Others such as [[John Milbank]], professor at the university of Nottingham, have assessed Aquinas' texts differently and defended De Lubac and Gilson's arguments as having established that Cajetan's thought deviates from that of Aquinas.-->

===Other===
[[Bruce Metzger]] wrote that Cajetan's biblical commentaries were surprisingly "modern", anticipating [[Biblical criticism|biblical textual criticism]]. Notably, Cajetan revived earlier Christian doubts as to the apostolic authorship of the Epistles of James, Jude, 2 John, and 3 John, as well as opposing Pauline [[authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Metzger |first=Bruce |author-link=Bruce Metzger |date=1987 |title=The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance |url= |location=Oxford |publisher=Clarendon Press |page=240 |isbn=0-19-826954-4}}</ref>

==Works==
[[File:De Vio, Tommaso – Summula Caietani, 1530 – BEIC 13688745.jpg|thumb|''Summula Caietani'', 1530]]

*''Opera omnia'' (5 vols., 1639)
*''Opuscula omnia'' (1530)
* {{Cite book |title=Summula Caietani |publisher=Claude Chevallon |location=Paris |year=1530 |language=la |url=https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=13688745}}
*''Commentary on Saint Thomas' Summa theologiae'' (1540)
*''De divina institutione Pontificatus Romani Pontificis'' (1521)
*''In Porphyrii Isagogen'' (1934)
*''De comparatione auctoritatis papae'' and ''Apologia'' (1936)
*''De Anima'' (1938)
*''Scripta philosophica'' (6 vols., edited by P. Zammit, M.-H. Laurent and J. Coquelle, 1934–39)

==References==

===Footnotes===
{{Reflist}}

===Sources===
* "Aktenstücke uber das Verhalten der römischen Kurie zur Reformation, 1524‑1531," in ''Quellen und Forschungen'' (Kön. Press. ''Hist. Inst., Rome''), vol.&nbsp;iii. p.&nbsp;1‑20; TM&nbsp;Lindsay, ''History of the Reformation'', vol.&nbsp;i. (Edinburgh, 1906).
*{{EB1911|wstitle=Cajetan, Cardinal|volume=4|page=961}}
*{{CE1913|wstitle=Tommaso de Vio Gaetani Cajetan|volume=|page=}}
* ''Conciliarism and Papalism'', trans. J. H. Burns and Thomas M. Izbicki, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
* {{cite book|language=en|last1=Decock|first1=Wim|chapter=Thomas Cajetan (1469-1534)|title=Law and the Christian Tradition in Italy|editor1=O. Condorelli|editor2=R. Domingo|location=Londres|publisher=Routledge|date=2020|url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003014539-14/thomas-cajetan-1469%E2%80%931534-wim-decock|pages=230–244|doi=10.4324/9781003014539-14 |isbn=978-1-003-01453-9 }}

==External links==
{{commons category}}
*{{Cite book
| publisher = [[Lucantonio Giunta]], Francesco senese De Franceschi
| language = la| last = De Vio
| first = Tommaso
| title = Opuscula omnia
| date = 1596
| url = https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=4592647&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&search_terms=DTL8&pds_handle=
}}

*{{Cite book
| language = la| last = De Vio
| first = Tommaso
| title = Apologia de comparata auctoritate pape et ecclesie
| date = 1513
| url = https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=4591902&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&search_terms=DTL8pds_handle=
}}

*{{Cite book
| publisher = Johann Beplin
| language = la| last = De Vio
| first = Tommaso
| title = Oratio in secunda sessione Concilii Lateranensis
| date = 1512
| url = https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=4591527&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&search_terms=DTL8&pds_handle=
}}

*{{Cite book
| publisher = Marcello Silber
| language = la| last = De Vio
| first = Tommaso
| title = Auctoritas Pape et Concilii siue Ecclesie comparata
| date = 1511
| url = https://gutenberg.beic.it/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=4591665&custom_att_2=simple_viewer&search_terms=DTL8&pds_handle=
}}
*{{prdl|13}}

{{s-start}}
{{S-rel|ca}}
{{succession box
|title=[[Masters General of the Dominican Order|Master General of the Dominican Order]]
|before=[[Jean Clérée]]
|after=[[García de Loaysa]]
|years=1508–1518}}
{{succession box
|title=[[Cardinal-Priest]] of [[San Sisto Vecchio|San Sisto]]
|before=[[Achille Grassi]]
|after=[[Nikolaus von Schönberg]]
|years=1517–1534}}
{{succession box
|title=[[Archbishop of Palermo]]
|before=[[Francisco de Remolins]]
|after=[[Giovanni Carandolet]]
|years=1518–1519}}
{{succession box
|title=[[Bishop of Gaeta]]
|before=[[Fernando Herrera (bishop)]]
|after=[[Esteban Gabriel Merino]]
|years=1519–1534}}
{{succession box
|title=[[Cardinal-Priest]] of [[Santa Prassede]]
|before=[[Ippolito de' Medici]]
|after=[[Francesco Cornaro (1478–1543)|Francesco Cornaro (cardinal)]]
|years=1534}}
{{s-end}}

{{History of Catholic theology|state=collapsed}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Cajetan, Thomas}}
[[Category:1469 births]]
[[Category:1534 deaths]]
[[Category:16th-century Italian cardinals]]
[[Category:16th-century Italian male writers]]
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[[Category:16th-century Italian Roman Catholic theologians]]
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[[Category:Bishops of Gaeta]]
[[Category:Catholic philosophers]]
[[Category:Counter-Reformation]]
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[[Category:Italian male non-fiction writers]]
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