Edouard Hugon

Édouard Hugon (b. 25 August 1867 in Lafarre, France; d. 7 February 1929 in Rome), Roman Catholic Priest, French Dominican, Thomistic philosopher and theologian trusted and held in high esteem by the Holy See, was a famed professor at the Angelicum at the turn of the 20th Century, as well as a well-known author of philosophical and theological manuals within the school of traditional Scholastic Thomism.

Biography

Florentin-Louis Hugon was born on 25 August 1867 in Lafarre (Loire), France, a small mountain village in the Diocese of Puy-en-Velay. At eighteen years of age, having finished secondary school, he entered the Dominican Order in Rijckholt (nearby Maastricht, Holland), where the Studium of the Province of Lyons was taking refuge away from political persecutors. The following year he received the Dominican habit under the name Brother Édouard. He made his solemn profession on 13 January 1890 and was ordained priest on 24 September 1892. He immediately began his teaching career, which lasted until the end of his life. He successively taught in Rijckholt, at Rosary Hill (New York), in Poitiers, in Angers, again at Rijckholt, and finally at the Angelicum (Rome) from 1909 to 1929. He also worked as Consultant for the Sacred Congregation for the Oriental Church (now known as the Congregation for the Oriental Churches).

Works

Perhaps his most notable contribution as a writer is his involvement (next to Guido Mattiussi) with the ecclesiastical document known as The 24 Thomistic Theses, which was issued by the Sacred Congregation of Studies under the authority of Pope St. Pius X in 1914, and which is the official pronouncement of the Catholic Church on which philosophical positions constitute Thomism.

Among Hugon's personal works, some of the best-known are:

Les XXIV theses thomistes ("The 24 Thomistic Theses," a work which explains the ecclesiastical document).

Cursus philosophiae thomisticae, 4 vols. ("Thomistic Philosophy Course," based on the thought of St Thomas Aquinas as interpreted by John of St Thomas).

Tractatus dogmatici, 3 vols. ("Dogmatic Treatises," a course on theology organized as a commentary on Aquinas' Summa Theologiae).

Hors de l'Église, point de salut ("Outside of the Church there is No Salvation," his Thomistic solution to the theological problem of salvation and membership in the Catholic Church).

La causalite instrumentale dans l'ordre surnaturel ("Instrumental Causality in the Supernatural Order").

Bibliography

Angelo Walz, "Hugon (Edouard)" Dictionnaire de Spiritualité Vol. 7, Beauchesne: Paris, 1969; col. 858-859.

M-Fr. Cazes, OP "In memoriam. Le très réverend Père Hugon" Revue thomiste 6(1929), 97-99.

Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, "In Memoriam. Un théologien apôtre, le P. Maître Édouard Hugon, professeur de dogme à l'Angelico, a Rome," Pierre Tequi: Paris, 1929.

External links

• Friedrich Wilhelm Bautz (1990). Bautz, Friedrich Wilhelm. ed (in German). Hugon, Eduard (Édouard). Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). 2. Hamm. col. 1148. ISBN 3-88309-032-8. http://www.bautz.de/bbkl/h/hugon_ed.shtml. 

• Cursus philosophiae thomisticae, vol. 1: Logica, vol. 2: Philosophiae naturalis Ia-IIae: Cosmologia, and vol. 3: Philosophiae naturalis IIa-IIae: Biologia et psychologia.
• Presentation of Fuori della Chiesa non cè salvezza (Edizioni Amicizia Cristiana: Chietti, 2007), the Italian translation of Hors de l'Église, point de salut.
• "The 24 Thomistic Theses" (document of the Sacred Congregation of Studies, 1914).