Faith, Hope, Love

Rating:
Summary: You Really Need Both Books
Review: I first came into contact with this work because it was a required text for my seminary class on ethics. Pieper was a first rate German philosopher and expert on the works of St. Thomas Aquinas.

If you study this book, Faith, Hope, Love (the three theological virtues), along with his other book, The Four Cardinal Virtues (fortitude, temperance, justice, prudence), you will have a wonderful primer on ethics from a classical perspective. I especially enjoyed his section on love. It is one of the best treatments of the subject I have read.

One word of warning is in order. Philosophy is not light reading. I know, it was one of my majors. Philosophy written in German and translated into English produces a book that is not for the timid. If you are willing to take on the challenge, more power to you. It is worth the effort, but you should know what you are getting into before you put down your money. This is a book for those who want to think and wrestle with ethics. It is not for everyone.

Rating:
Summary: These Three Things Abide
Review: This book is a compilation of three essays by the popular Thomist, the late Josef Pieper, on the theological virtues.

Though Pieper writes from a Christian perspective, he is doing philosophy not theology. (The theological virtues are so called not because they are for theologians only, but because they derive directly from God.)

The richness of these essays is their thoroughgoing personalism. Pieper defines all three virtues in terms of relationships. In faith, "the will of the believer is directed toward the person of the witness, toward the warrantor." "Hope says: it will turn out well....It will turn out well for us." And "to love means to rejoice in the happiness of another."

As always, Pieper writes clearly, logically, at times movingly. This book reminds us that while the source of these virtues is beyond human reason, the practical understanding and practice of them is not.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant, challenging, and wonderful
Review: This book really cannot be praised too highly. Pieper's discussion is more deep and insightful than any psychology text I've seen, and he's not even trying to do psychology.

He uses traditional and technical words (like "sloth"), but this is necessary to distinguish shades of moods, emotions, and actions. I used to think of "slothful" as synonymous with "laziness" -- but this book made me realize what a huge difference there was. You could work hard every day, but if deep inside you know you could do great things, and you simply don't bother to do them, then you are guilty of sloth. Many Christians (and non-Christians) that I know, including myself, will recognize this as a part of their lives.

And that's just from one paragraph of "Hope", the least powerful of these three essays!