The total transcendence of the infinite in Thomas Aquinas: A systematic resolution of the problem of the finite and the infinite in modern philosophy

In my dissertation, I ask how we may think the infinite rationally, a question that has been posed in modern philosophy of religion. I demonstrate how Aquinas was able to resolve the problem of the finite and the infinite without relegating the infinite to a irrational beyond, which is what thinkers like Kant have done, with their limiting of speculative metaphysics in order to make room for 'faith'. Neither, however, does Aquinas pretend that human beings can achieve comprehensive knowledge of the infinite, and thereby deny the absolute transcendence of the infinite to the human intellect; this comprehension is what Hegel claims to have done in his System of Science, the first part of which, the Logic, is described as the 'exposition of God as he is in his eternal essence before the creation of nature and finite spirit.' My thesis is intended to show that Aquinas' metaphysics of the act of being, far from encroaching upon the mystery of the infinite, in fact is the only way to adequately express its very transcendence. Therefore, I argue for the continued importance of an attention in philosophy of religion to a metaphysics that thinks critically about being, rather than pretending to bracket or transcend it in symbolic language or praxis, if we hope to be able to think the infinite as truly transcendent.