could be asked whether religious recognition nevertheless prepares
the way for the secular notion of equality. To consider this issue, we
need to look at some texts in more detail.
4.5.6. Equality, Submission, OthernessIn looking at these texts, we can also consider the sense in which the
main question could be answered with yes. In the second and third
paradigms, we occasionally encounter texts containing views about
mutual and even equal respect as well as of individual esteem.
Thomas Aquinas is interesting in this respect. When he invokes the
phrase‘recognize him who recognizes you’,^86 he revives the old
Aristotelian sense ofanagnorisisas mutual facial recognition, adding
to it the aspect of normative recognition.
The issue of equality may be even more important in Thomas’s
discussion regarding the debt of honour to people in positions of
dignity. Reflecting the hierarchical constitution of feudal society,
Thomas considers that recognition (recognitio) of their excellence is
the due of such people.^87 Thomas mentions various reasons for this:
people with dignity have benefited their subjects, the law has set them
above others, and they seem to have some kind of excellence as
persons. These meanings stem from a premodern idea of honour
and the feudal hierarchy. However, Thomas also considers cases in
which such people should be honoured by others who are not their
subjects. Such cases manifest a moral debt of honesty, since, because
of justice, we owe a moral debt to all those from whom we have
received something that needs to be repaid.
The broader context of this remark concerns observance. In the
previous question, Thomas teaches that dignitaries are rulers with
legal powers. Such dignitaries tend also to be experts in knowledge
and virtue. Their expertise needs to be honoured, irrespective of
institutional hierarchies.^88 Thomas’s recognition of excellence^89
thus covers both institutional hierarchy and the excellence which
people display and distribute in their knowledge and moral conduct.
(^86) Thomas,Super Ev. Ioh. 20 lec. 3 (p. 465), cf. section 2.4.
(^87) SThII/2, q102 a2. (See section 2.4). (^88) SThII/2, 102 a1, esp. ad 2.
(^89) Cf.SThII/2, q102 a2 resp.
Recognition in Religion 249