Though it may be surprising to learn, Thomas Aquinas writes about the ritual practices of
the Old Testament Torah as sacraments. This nomenclature was typical in the Middle Ages,
when medieval theologians spoke about the sacraments of the Old Law.
How does Aquinas treat this topic and how does he
think that the sacraments of the Old Law relate to the sacraments of the New Law?
The notion of a sacrament comes from the Latin word 'Sacramentum':
which means an external sign that calls to mind a sacred thing. Both the fathers of the Church and
medieval Latin doctors sought to understand how the signs of worship instituted in the
Mosaic Law and celebrated in the covenant of the ancient Jewish people were indicative of a real
relationship with God and of holy things. How did these signs call to mind the covenant with God?
They also sought to understand how the ceremonial precepts of the Mosaic Law related to the
sacraments of the New Testament and in what way the latter sacraments may be said to be superior.
After all, Catholic Christians traditionally believe that the
seven sacraments of the New Law convey Grace effectively and are
in some sense an improvement on the works of the Old Law. Furthermore,
St. Paul talks about the Old Law consisting in rituals that can convey death rather than life.
How should we understand all this if God himself instituted
the law of the Old Covenant and its rituals?
When he speaks of these things, Aquinas makes a set of distinctions that are
particularly helpful for understanding the relationship of the sacraments of the Old
Law and those of the New. He says that the rituals of the Old Law oriented people to
right worship God in accord with God's own designs by forms of worship instituted by
God himself through the medium of human mediators, the prophets such as Moses.
This means that the Mosaic Law can contain what we could call
human religious rituals that derive in part from the human imagination and in
fact partly from on ancient near middle eastern religious customs.
However it is also the case that in this process of formulating the ceremonies of the Law,
its human authors were truly inspired by God, to instruct and form a given historical
people in knowledge of the effective and true worship of the one God and Creator.
In short the sacraments of the Old Law are both divine and human,
and are meant to lead Israel to a true knowledge and worship of God. They are
derived from divine institution, and not mere human convention.
At the same time, Aquinas argues that the sacraments of the Old Law do not effectively
convey grace to their participants. This is not to say that people in the Old Covenant
lacked grace. Aquinas thinks they did receive grace and that only by grace can one be saved.
However, he thinks the grace that they received came in the form of the invisible life of faith,
hope, and charity and this life was expressed through the sacraments that
they practiced. These sacraments of the Old Law were not sources of grace,
but outward signs of grace. Without the inward life, the outward acts would be empty.
This is why St. Paul is surely correct when he notes that the works of the Law
without grace and faith can kill, but when they were observed in grace and faith,
by the saints of Israel, they were genuine signs of inner life with God. These sacraments
did not convey life of themselves, but they were the signs of life conveyed.
Aquinas has a more technical way of putting this. He notes that
the sacraments of the Old Law were not efficient, instrumental causes of grace,
but they were final causes or signs of grace inhabiting the person leading them
teleologically into a deeper life with God in the covenant of Israel.
In addition, Aquinas thinks these sacraments of the Old Law pointed towards the one saving
sacrifice of Christ. Because they did not convey grace of themselves, they were
indications of an inner life of grace, freely given by God already to the people of Israel,
and the covenant of election was itself a pure gift given to Abraham and his descendants.
At the same time this gift was given in view of the unique Redeemer, Jesus Christ,
who is the Son of God incarnate and who by his life, death and resurrection has
merited salvation for the whole human race, and conveyed grace of divine life to the world.
So the Old Testament sacrifices are rituals of faith conducted with hope
that the God of Israel would redeem the world. In this way, they pointed
forward implicitly toward the coming of a mediator, and that mediator is Christ.
The Old Testament rituals find their end or purpose in him and they are typological
symbols of the true sacrifice that is to come. Christ is the true paschal lamb,
the true peace offering, the sin offering and so forth.
This idea helps us understand why Aquinas thinks the New Testament
sacraments are different from those of the Old Covenant. The New Testament sacraments,
of which there are seven, are instituted by Christ himself during his early life or
at the time of his resurrection through the apostolic college.
These sacraments are signs and instruments of grace. They not
only symbolize the redemption of Christ that has already taken place in the past,
but they also apply and communicate the grace that he has merited once and for all,
to the wider human community, when they receive these sacraments.
So like the Old Testament sacraments,
those of the New Testament symbolize Christ. They do so explicitly rather than implicitly.
In addition, however, they not only symbolize his grace,
but also actively communicate it. Or rather we can say that the now living Christ,
and the Holy Spirit constantly communicate grace in and through the sacraments of the New Law.
They communicate grace effectively because they come after Christ and participate in his agency.
In and through them he is constantly undertaking
the effective communication of his grace to the world.
In this sense, Aquinas argues, the Old Testament sacraments terminate
in Christ while the New Testament sacraments promulgate Christ and
his life to the world and they are meant to endure until the end of time.
For this reason, the New Testament sacraments are considered definitive,
historically speaking. They are not something that
can be undone or reconfigured, and they will endure until the end of the ages.
However, we understand their importance in part by always looking backwards in scripture and in
the liturgy at the typological symbols of them in the Old Testament. These symbols of
the Old Law are not merely dissolved, but actually find their fulfillment
in Christ in the New Testament and in his sacramental work in the life of the Church.
So the Church continues to recognize herself in the Old Covenant and her sacrifices
as indicated by symbols and signs.
The two covenants remain together a unified and single testimony to Christ forever.
In this sense, ancient Israel, and her spiritual and sacramental life,
remains forever an indication of the mystery of the life of the Church.
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