Fortitude

One of the great Thomist scholars was Josef Pieper (1904-1997), and one of his greatest books is The Four Cardinal Virtues.

In it he writes about the foundational interiority that governs exteriority, and in this excerpt writes about the apparent contradiction between Christ’s teaching of turn the other cheek with his behavior of not turning the other cheek when struck by the servant when he was before the high priest. (John 18:23)

“Thomas Aquinas, in his commentary on St/ John’s Gospel, has pointed to the apparent contradiction between this scene…and the injunction of the Sermon on the Mount: “I say unto you, resist not evil, if one strike you on the right cheek, offer him the other” (Matt 5:39). A passivistic exegesis is quite unable to solve this “contradiction.” Thomas explains (in agreement with Augustine): “Holy Scripture must be understood in the light of what Christ and the saints have actually practiced. Christ did not offer His other cheek, nor Paul either. Thus to interpret the injunction of the Sermon on the Mount literally is to misunderstand it. This injunction signifies rather the readiness of the soul to bear, if it be necessary, such things and worse, without bitterness against the attacker. This readiness our Lord showed, when He gave up His body to be crucified. That response of the Lord was useful, therefore, for our instruction.” (p. 132)