Contemporary Christian theology is plagued by terminological difficulties in its conceptualizing of God and the world. While broad access to historical material has provided fertile grounds for retrieval, it also possesses the attendant danger of the obscuration of theological concepts based on the misapplication of technical terms. This has occurred with the use of words such as “substance”, “person”, and “will.” If clarity is a significant goal of the theological endeavor, then attempts to give specificity and nuance to common words used in Christianity is foundationally significant. One area where such a need is particularly acute is in relation to those terms that attempt to describe non-cognitive activities of the soul.
This paper will proceed in two parts, with the first section providing the historical foundations for the use of the words “passions”, “affections”, and “emotions”. Central to this discussion will be an analysis of usage by significant theologians, including Augustine, Aquinas, Scotus, Luther, and Calvin, with particular emphasis on how they related these terms to one another. The second section will show some of the confusion that occurs due to the lack of clarity regarding passions, affections, and emotions and how they differ from one another. Specifically, it will be argued that attempts to use past theologians to address contemporary psychological questions concerning emotions have frequently been undermined by a misunderstanding of what emotions are and how they are distinct from passions and affections.