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Thomas Aquinas ( ; ; – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican Order friar and Catholic priest, the foremost Scholasticism thinker, as well as one of the most influential philosophers and theologians in the Western tradition. A Doctor of the Church, he was from the county of Aquino in the Kingdom of Sicily.
Thomas was a proponent of natural theology and the father of a school of thought (encompassing both theology and philosophy) known as Thomism. He argued that God is the source of the light of natural reason and the light of faith. He embraced several ideas put forward by Aristotle and attempted to synthesize Aristotelianism with the principles of Christianity. He has been described as "the most influential thinker of the medieval period"Wippel, John F. (1995) 2nd ed., "Aquinas, Saint Thomas", The Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, Cambridge University Press. p. 36. and "the greatest of the medieval philosopher-theologians".Broadie, Alexander (1999). "Aquinas, St Thomas", The Oxford Companion to Philosophy, Oxford University Press, p. 43. Thomas Aquinas's philosophy influenced modern virtue ethics, aesthetics, and cognitive theory. He has been criticized, notably by Bertrand Russell, for seeking to justify conclusions already dictated by faith rather than follow reason independently.
Thomas's best-known works are the unfinished Summa Theologica, or Summa Theologiae (1265–1274), the Disputed Questions on Truth (1256–1259) and the Summa contra Gentiles (1259–1265). His commentaries on Bible and on Aristotle also form an important part of his body of work. He is also notable for his hymns, which form a part of the Church's liturgy.
As a Doctor of the Church, Thomas is considered one of the Catholic Church's greatest theologians and philosophers. He is known in Catholic theology as the Doctor Angelicus ("Angelic Doctor", with the title "doctor" meaning "teacher"), and the Doctor Communis ("Universal Doctor"). In 1999 Pope John Paul II added a new title to these traditional ones: Doctor Humanitatis ("Doctor of Humanity/Humaneness").
At the age of five, Thomas began his early education at Monte Cassino. After the military conflict between Frederick II and Pope Gregory IX spilt into the abbey in early 1239, Landulf and Theodora had Thomas enrolled at the studium generale (university) established by Frederick in Naples. There, his teacher in arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music was Petrus de Ibernia. According to his biographer Guglielmo Tocco,Tocco's biography mention Master Peter of Ireland and Master Martin, who has been subsequently identified with Martin of Dacia. Cf. Martin of Dacia was his teacher of grammar and logic. It was at this university that Thomas was presumably introduced to Aristotle, Averroes and Maimonides, all of whom would influence his theological philosophy. Peter of Ireland was teaching the recently translated works of Aristotle as commented on by the Spanish-Arabic philosopher Averroes. During his study at Naples, Thomas also came under the influence of John of St. Julian, a Dominican preacher in Naples, who was part of the active effort by the Dominican Order to recruit devout followers.
At the age of nineteen, Thomas resolved to join the Dominican Order. His change of heart, however, did not please his family.Collison, Diane, and Kathryn Plant. Fifty Major Philosophers. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge, 2006. In an attempt to prevent Theodora's interference in Thomas's choice, the Dominicans arranged to move Thomas to Rome, and from Rome, to Paris. However, while on his journey to Rome, per Theodora's instructions, his brothers seized him as he was drinking from a spring and took him back to his parents at the castle of Monte San Giovanni Campano.
Thomas was held prisoner for almost one year in the family castles at Monte San Giovanni and Roccasecca in an attempt to prevent him from assuming the Dominican habit and to push him into renouncing his new aspiration. Political concerns prevented the Pope from ordering Thomas's release, which had the effect of extending Thomas's detention. Thomas passed this time of trial tutoring his sisters and communicating with members of the Dominican Order.
Family members became desperate to dissuade Thomas, who remained determined to join the Dominicans. At one point, two of his brothers resorted to hiring a prostitute to seduce him, presumably because sexual temptation might dissuade him from a life of celibacy. According to the official records for his canonization, Thomas drove her away wielding a burning log—with which he inscribed a cross onto the wall—and fell into a mystical ecstasy; two angels appeared to him as he slept and said, "Behold, we gird thee by the command of God with the girdle of chastity, which henceforth will never be imperilled. What human strength can not obtain, is now bestowed upon thee as a celestial gift." From then onwards, Thomas was given the grace of perfect chastity by Christ, a girdle he wore till the end of his life. The girdle was given to the ancient monastery of Vercelli in Piedmont, and is now at Chieri, near Turin.
By 1244, seeing that all her attempts to dissuade Thomas had failed, Theodora sought to save the family's dignity, arranging for Thomas to escape at night through his window. In her mind, a secret escape from detention was less damaging than an open surrender to the Dominicans. Thomas was sent first to Naples and then to Rome to meet Johannes von Wildeshausen, the Master General of the Dominican Order.
Thomas taught in Cologne as an apprentice professor, instructing students on the books of the Old Testament and writing Expositio super Isaiam ad litteram ( Literal Commentary on Isaiah), Postilla super Ieremiam ( Commentary on Jeremiah), and Postilla super Threnos ( Commentary on Lamentations). In 1252, he returned to Paris to study for a master's degree in theology. He lectured on the Bible as an apprentice professor, and upon becoming a baccalaureus Sententiarum (bachelor of the Sentences) he devoted his final three years of study to commenting on Peter Lombard's Sentences. In the first of his four theological syntheses, Thomas composed a massive commentary on the Sentences entitled Scriptum super libros Sententiarium ( Commentary on the Sentences). In addition to his master's writings, he wrote De ente et essentia ( On Being and Essence) for his fellow Dominicans in Paris.
In early 1256, Thomas was appointed regent master in theology at Paris and one of his first works upon assuming this office was Contra impugnantes Dei cultum et religionem ( Against Those Who Assail the Worship of God and Religion), a defense of the , which had come under attack by William of Saint-Amour. During his tenure from 1256 to 1259, Thomas wrote numerous works, including: Quaestiones Disputatae de Veritate ( Disputed Questions on Truth), a collection of twenty-nine disputed questions on aspects of faith and the human condition prepared for the public university debates he presided over during Lent and Advent; Quaestiones quodlibetales ( Quodlibetal Questions), a collection of his responses to questions Quodlibeta posed to him by the academic audience; and both Expositio super librum Boethii De trinitate ( Commentary on Boethius's De trinitate) and Expositio super librum Boethii De hebdomadibus ( Commentary on Boethius's De hebdomadibus), commentaries on the works of 6th-century Roman philosopher Boethius. By the end of his regency, Thomas was working on one of his most famous works, Summa contra Gentiles.
From 1252 to 1257, Thomas lived and worked with saint Bonaventure of Bagnoregio, of whom he became a fraternal friend. Both of them were teaching theology at the University of Paris. They disagreed about the role of faith and theology in relation to natural reason.According to Bonaventure, theology begins where philosophy ends in mystery and can go no further. According to Thomas, faith and theology grow together in a faith-reason hermeneutic circle in which philosophy uses all the other sciences to place itself at the service of theology. Bonaventure jokingly accused Thomas of having contaminated the pure wine of faith with the water of reason, and Thomas replied that even in the miracle of the Wedding at Cana the water was transformed into wine. Cf. Thomas d'Aquin, in Encyclopædia Universalis, vol. XVI, 1981, . LCCN at The Library of Congress at Washington, n. 68-59350.
During this period, Thomas wrote the De ente et essentia and the Scriptum super sententias, his first summa. Together with saint Bonaventure, he was also personal advisor to Saint Louis IX of France. According to Angelus Walz, O.P., it was during this period that Thomas met the future Pope Clement IV, who was also an advisor to the king and French, like Pope Urban IV.Angelus Walz, S. Thomas d'Aquin (edited by Paul Novarina), Paris 1932, p. 135. As quoted in
In February 1265 the newly elected Pope Clement IV summoned Thomas to Rome to serve as papal theologian. This same year, he was ordered by the Dominican Chapter of Anagni to teach at the studium conventuale at the Roman convent of Santa Sabina, founded in 1222. The studium at Santa Sabina now became an experiment for the Dominicans, the Order's first studium provinciale, an intermediate school between the studium conventuale and the studium generale. Prior to this time, the Roman Province had offered no specialized education of any sort, no arts, no philosophy; only simple convent schools, with their basic courses in theology for resident friars, were functioning in Tuscany and the meridionale during the first several decades of the order's life. The new studium provinciale at Santa Sabina was to be a more advanced school for the province. Tolomeo da Lucca, an associate and early biographer of Thomas, tells us that at the Santa Sabina studium Thomas taught the full range of philosophical subjects, both moral and natural.
While at the Santa Sabina studium provinciale, Thomas began his most famous work, the Summa Theologica, which he conceived specifically suited to beginner students: "Because a doctor of Catholic truth ought not only to teach the proficient, but to him pertains also to instruct beginners. As the Apostle says in 1 Corinthians 3:1–2, as to infants in Christ, I gave you milk to drink, not meat, our proposed intention in this work is to convey those things that pertain to the Christian religion in a way that is fitting to the instruction of beginners." Summa theologiae, I, 1, prooemium: "Quia Catholicae veritatis doctor non-solum provectos debet instruere, sed ad eum pertinet etiam incipientes erudire, secundum illud apostoli I ad Corinth. III, tanquam parvulis in Christo, lac vobis potum dedi, non-escam; propositum nostrae intentionis in hoc opere est, ea quae ad Christianam religionem pertinent, eo modo tradere, secundum quod congruit ad eruditionem incipientium." While there he also wrote a variety of other works like his unfinished Compendium Theologiae and Responsio ad fr. Ioannem Vercellensem de articulis 108 sumptis ex opere Petri de Tarentasia ( Reply to Brother John of Vercelli Regarding 108 Articles Drawn from the Work of Peter of Tarentaise).
In his position as head of the studium, Thomas conducted a series of important disputations on the power of God, which he compiled into his De potentia. Nicholas Brunacci was among Thomas's students at the Santa Sabina studium provinciale and later at the Paris studium generale. In November 1268, he was with Thomas and his associate and secretary Reginald of Piperno as they left Viterbo on their way to Paris to begin the academic year. Another student of Thomas's at the Santa Sabina studium provinciale was Beatification Tommasello da Perugia.
Thomas remained at the studium at Santa Sabina from 1265 until he was called back to Paris in 1268 for a second teaching regency. With his departure for Paris in 1268 and the passage of time, the pedagogical activities of the studium provinciale at Santa Sabina were divided between two campuses. A new convent of the Order at the Church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva began in 1255 as a community for women converts but grew rapidly in size and importance after being given over to the Dominicans friars in 1275. In 1288 the theology component of the provincial curriculum for the education of the friars was relocated from the Santa Sabina studium provinciale to the studium conventuale at Santa Maria sopra Minerva, which was redesignated as a studium particularis theologiae. This studium was transformed in the 16th century into the College of Saint Thomas (). In the 20th century, the college was relocated to the convent of Saints Dominic and Sixtus and was transformed into the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, (aka the Angelicum).
Disputes with some important Franciscans conspired to make his second regency much more difficult and troubled than the first. A year before Thomas re-assumed the regency at the 1266–67 Paris disputations, Franciscan master William of Baglione accused Thomas of encouraging Averroists, most likely counting him as one of the "blind leaders of the blind". Eleonore Stump says, "It has also been persuasively argued that Thomas Aquinas's De aeternitate mundi was directed in particular against his Franciscan colleague in theology, John Pecham."
Thomas was deeply disturbed by the spread of Averroism and was angered when he discovered Siger of Brabant teaching Averroistic interpretations of Aristotle to Parisian students. On 10 December 1270, the Bishop of Paris, Étienne Tempier, issued an edict condemning thirteen Aristotelian and Averroistic propositions as heretical and excommunicating anyone who continued to support them.McInerney, Against the Averroists, p. 10. Many in the ecclesiastical community, the so-called Augustinians, were fearful that this introduction of Aristotelianism and the more extreme Averroism might somehow contaminate the purity of the Christian faith. In what appears to be an attempt to counteract the growing fear of Aristotelian thought, Thomas conducted a series of disputations between 1270 and 1272: De virtutibus in communi ( On Virtues in General), De virtutibus cardinalibus ( On Cardinal Virtues), and De spe ( On Hope).
Thomas has been traditionally ascribed with the ability to levitate and as having had various mystical experiences. For example, G. K. Chesterton wrote that "His experiences included well-attested cases of levitation in ecstasy; and the Blessed Virgin appeared to him, comforting him with the welcome news that he would never be a Bishop." It is traditionally held that on one occasion, in 1273, at the Dominican convent of Naples in the chapel of Saint Nicholas, after matins, Thomas lingered and was seen by the sacristan Domenic of Caserta to be levitating in prayer with tears before an icon of the crucified Christ. Christ said to Thomas, "You have written well of me, Thomas. What reward would you have for your labor?" Thomas responded, "Nothing but you, Lord."
On 6 December 1273, another mystical experience took place. While Thomas was celebrating mass, he experienced an unusually long ecstasy. Because of what he saw, he abandoned his routine and refused to dictate to his socius Reginald of Piperno. When Reginald begged him to get back to work, Thomas replied: "Reginald, I cannot, because all that I have written seems like straw to me" ( mihi videtur ut palea).William Leon McBride (1997). 081532491X, Taylor and Francis. 081532491X As a result, the Summa Theologica would remain uncompleted. What exactly triggered Thomas's change in behaviour is believed by some to have been some kind of supernatural experience of God. After taking to his bed, however, he did recover some strength.
In 1274 Pope Gregory X summoned Thomas to attend the Second Council of Lyon. The council was to open 1 May 1274, and it was Gregory's attempt to try to heal the East-West Schism of 1054, which had divided the Catholic Church in the West from the Eastern Orthodox Church. At the meeting, Thomas's work for Pope Urban IV concerning the Greeks, Contra errores graecorum, was to be presented. However, on his way to the council, riding on a donkey along the Appian Way, he struck his head on the branch of a fallen tree and became seriously ill again. He was then quickly escorted to Monte Cassino to convalesce. After resting for a while, he set out again but stopped at the Cistercian Fossanova Abbey after again falling ill. The monks nursed him for several days,Thomas Aquinas, Reader, p. 12. and as he received his last rites he prayed: "I have written and taught much about this very holy Body, and about the other sacraments in the faith of Christ, and about the Holy Roman Church, to whose correction I expose and submit everything I have written." He died on 7 March 1274 while giving commentary on the Song of Songs.
When the devil's advocate at his canonization process objected that there were no , one of the cardinals answered, "Tot miraculis, quot articulis"—"there are as many miracles (in his life) as articles (in his Summa Theologica)". Fifty years after Thomas's death, on 18 July 1323, Pope John XXII, seated in Avignon, pronounced Thomas a saint.
A monastery at Naples, Italy, near Naples Cathedral, shows a cell in which he supposedly lived. His remains were translated from Fossanova to the Church of the Jacobins in Toulouse, France, on 28 January 1369. Between 1789 and 1974 they were held in the Basilica of Saint-Sernin. In 1974 they were returned to the Church of the Jacobins, where they have remained ever since.
When he was canonized, his feast day was inserted in the General Roman Calendar for celebration on 7 March, the day of his death. Since this date commonly falls within Lent, the 1969 revision of the calendar moved his memorial to 28 January, the date of the translation of his relics to Church of the Jacobins, Toulouse. Calendarium Romanum Libreria Editrice Vaticana 1969, p. 86 Liturgy of the Hours Volume III, Proper of Saints, 28 January.
Thomas Aquinas is honored with a feast day in some churches of the Anglican Communion with a Lesser Festival on 28 January.
The Catholic Church honours Thomas Aquinas as a saint and regards him as the model teacher for those studying for the priesthood. In modern times, under papal directives, the study of his works was long used as a core of the required program of study for those seeking ordination as priests or deacons, as well as for those in religious formation and for other students of the sacred disciplines (philosophy, Catholic theology, church history, liturgy, and canon law).Code of Canon Law, Can. 252, §3
In 1880 Thomas was declared the patron saint of all Catholic educational establishments. In 1879 Leo XIII instituted the Pontifical Academy of Saint Thomas Aquinas, putting into practice Aeterni Patris recommendations. Similarly, in Pascendi Dominici gregis, the 1907 encyclical by Pope Pius X, the Pope said, "...let Professors remember that they cannot set St. Thomas aside, especially in metaphysical questions, without grave detriment." On 1 September 1910 Pius X addressed the letter Sacrorum Antistitum to all bishops and teachers of religious orders, by which he decreed that the Scholastic philosophy of Thomas was to be 'established as the foundation of sacred studies' for young clerics. Pius X's 1914 decree Postquam sanctissimus gave further Vatican endorsement to 24 specific neo-scholastic theses of "Official Catholic Philosophy" understood to be rooted in Thomism.
In response to neo-scholasticism, Catholic scholars who were more sympathetic to modernity gained influence during the early 20th century in the nouvelle théologie movement (meaning "new theology"). It was closely associated with a movement of ressourcement, meaning "back to sources", echoing the phrase " ad fontes" used by Renaissance humanists. Although nouvelle théologie disagreed with neo-scholasticism about modernity, arguing that theology could learn much from modern philosophy and science, their interest in also studying "old" sources meant that they found common ground in their appreciation of scholastics like Thomas Aquinas. The Second Vatican Council generally adopted the stance of the theologians of nouvelle théologie, but the importance of Thomas was a point of agreement. The council's decree Optatam Totius (on the formation of priests, at No. 15), proposed an authentic interpretation of the popes' teaching on Thomism, requiring that the theological formation of priests be accomplished with Thomas Aquinas as teacher.
On 20 November 1974, Paul VI wrote the apostolic letter Lumen ecclesiae, inviting the Dominicans to return to the source and rediscover the true doctrine of Thomas.With 70 quotations, prevalently in the field of Catholic liturgy, Thomas is one of the most frequently cited authors of the 1997 Catechism of the Catholic Church. General Catholic appreciation for Thomas has remained strong in the 20th century, as seen in the praise offered by Pope John Paul II in the 1998 encyclical Fides et ratio, (at No. 43).Pope John Paul II also recalled Aquinas during his speech at the Pontifical Athenaeum 'Angelicum' (1979), his address at the International Congress of the Thomas Aquinas Society (1986), as well as in a letter to the General of the Dominicans (2001). and similarly in Pope Benedict XV's 1921 encyclical Fausto Appetente Die.Benedict XV, Encyclical Fausto appetente die. . 29 June 1921, AAS 13 (1921), p. 332; Pius XI, Encyclical Studiorum Ducem, §11, 29 June 1923, AAS 15 (1923), cf. AAS 17 (1925), p. 574; Paul VI, 7 March 1964, AAS 56 (1964), p. 302 (Bouscaren, vol. VI, pp. 786–788).
The cognitive neuroscientist Walter Freeman has proposed that Thomism is the philosophical system explaining cognition that is most compatible with neurodynamics.
Henry Adams's Mont Saint Michel and Chartres ends with a culminating chapter on Thomas, in which Adams calls Thomas an "artist" and constructs an extensive analogy between the design of Thomas's "Church Intellectual" and that of the gothic cathedrals of that period. Erwin Panofsky later would echo these views in Gothic Architecture and Scholasticism (1951).
Thomas's aesthetic theories, especially the concept of claritas, deeply influenced the literary practice of modernist writer James Joyce, who used to extol Thomas as being second only to Aristotle among Western philosophers. Joyce refers to Thomas's doctrines in Elementa philosophiae ad mentem D. Thomae Aquinatis doctoris angelici (1898) of Girolamo Maria Mancini, professor of theology at the Collegium Divi Thomae de Urbe. For example, Mancini's Elementa is referred to in Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.
The influence of Thomas's aesthetics can also be found in the works of the Italian semiotics Umberto Eco, who wrote an essay on aesthetic ideas in Thomas (published in 1956 and republished in 1988 in a revised edition).
He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. He is not engaged in an inquiry, the result of which it is impossible to know in advance. Before he begins to philosophize, he already knows the truth; it is declared in the Catholic faith. If he can find apparently rational arguments for some parts of the faith, so much the better; if he cannot, he need only fall back on revelation. The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading. I cannot, therefore, feel that he deserves to be put on a level with the best philosophers either of Greece or of modern times.. A History of Western Philosophy, Ch. 34, "St. Thomas Aquinas", Allen & Unwin, London, England; Simon & Schuster, New York 1946, pp. 484–.
This criticism is illustrated with the following example: according to Russell, Thomas advocates the indissolubility of marriage "on the ground that the father is useful in the education of the children, (a) because he is more rational than the mother, (b) because, being stronger, he is better able to inflict physical punishment.". Even though modern approaches to education do not support these views, "No follower of Saint Thomas would, on that account, cease to believe in lifelong monogamy, because the real grounds of belief are not those which are alleged".
In particular, Thomas pleads that he possesses knowledge of the "essence" of God and that this knowledge is not only beyond human reason but is knowledge to which human reason must be "adapted".
As quoted in (, also freely available on Academia.edu) ( ivi: pp. 1-2 of the PDF file)
Aquinas is often depicted in a Dominican habit with a cincture that refers to his prayers to God for being kept in perpetual virginity.In the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin, for example, there is a panel depicting Saint Thomas: the artist, from the school of Bernardo Daddi, imagines and depicts angels girding the hips of the saint, absorbed in prayer, while they communicate to him that his prayer to the Lord for the perpetuae virginitatis cingulum had been accepted. Cfr. C.M.J.Vanstenkiste - M.C. Celletti, Tommaso d'Aquino, in Bibliotheca Sanctorum XII, Roma 1969, coll. 544-566, specialmente 563-566; P. Amargier, Tommaso d'Aquino, in A. Vauchez (ed.), Storia dei santi e della santità cristiana Ch. VI. L'epoca del rinnovamento evangelico 1054-1274, Milano 1991, pp. 245-260. The chalice refers to his doctrine of Eucharistic transubstantiation.
Thomas blended Greek philosophy and Christian doctrine by suggesting that rational thinking and the study of nature, like revelation, were valid ways to understand truths pertaining to God. According to Thomas, God reveals himself through nature, so to study nature is to study God. The ultimate goals of theology, in Thomas's mind, are to use reason to grasp the truth about God and to experience salvation through that truth. The central thought is "gratia non tollit naturam, sed perficit" ('divine grace does not destroy nature, but perfects it').
Though one may deduce the existence of God and his Attributes (Unity, Truth, Goodness, Power, Knowledge) through reason, certain specifics may be known only through the special revelation of God through Jesus Christ. The major theological components of Christianity, such as the Trinity, the Incarnation, and charity are revealed in the teachings of the church and the and may not otherwise be deduced. However, Thomas also makes a distinction between "demonstrations" of sacred doctrines and the "persuasiveness" of those doctrines. The former is akin to something like "certainty", whereas the latter is more probabilistic in nature.
In other words, Thomas thought Christian doctrines were "fitting" to reason (i.e. reasonable), even though they cannot be demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt. In fact, the Summa Theologica is filled with examples of Thomas arguing that we would expect certain Christian doctrines to be true, even though these expectations are not demonstrative (i.e. 'fitting' or reasonable). For example, Thomas argues that we would expect God to become incarnate, and we would expect a resurrected Christ to not stay on Earth.
The conclusion was that the meaning of "I Am Who I Am" is not an enigma to be answered, but a statement of the essence of God. This is the discovery of Thomas: the essence of God is not described by negative analogy, but the "essence of God is to exist". This is the basis of "existential theology" and leads to what Gilson calls the first and only existential philosophy. In Latin, this is called Haec Sublimis Veritas, "the sublime truth". The revealed essence of God is to exist, or in the words of Thomas, "I am the pure Act of Being". This has been described as the key to understanding Thomism. Thomism has been described (as a philosophical movement), as either the emptiest or the fullest of philosophies.
Like Aristotle, Thomas posited that life could form from non-living material or plant life:
Additionally, Thomas considered Empedocles's theory that various mutated species emerged at the dawn of Creation. Thomas reasoned that these species were generated through in animal sperm, and argued that they were not unintended by nature; rather, such species were simply not intended for perpetual existence. That discussion is found in his commentary on Aristotle's Physics:
Thomas believed that the existence of God can be demonstrated. Briefly in the Summa Theologiae and more extensively in the Summa contra Gentiles, he considered in great detail five arguments for the existence of God, widely known as the quinque viae (Five Ways).
Thomas was receptive to and influenced by Avicenna's Proof of the Truthful.Adamson, Peter (2013). "From the necessary existent to God". In Adamson, Peter (ed.). Interpreting Avicenna: Critical Essays. Cambridge University Press. . Concerning the nature of God, Thomas, like Avicenna felt the best approach, commonly called the via negativa, was to consider what God is not. This led him to propose five statements about the divine qualities:
This Trinity exists independently from the world. It transcends the created world, but the Trinity also decided to give grace to human beings. This takes place through the Incarnation of the Word in the person of Jesus Christ and through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit within those who have experienced salvation by God; according to Aidan Nichols.
Thomas argued against several specific contemporary and historical theologians who held differing views about Christ. In response to Photinus, Thomas stated that Jesus was truly divine and not simply a human being. Against Nestorius, who suggested that the Son of God was merely conjoined to the man Christ, Thomas argued that the fullness of God was an integral part of Christ's existence. However, countering Apollinaris of Laodicea's views, Thomas held that Christ had a truly human (rational) soul, as well. This produced a duality of nature in Christ. Thomas argued against Eutyches that this duality persisted after the Incarnation. Thomas stated that these two natures existed simultaneously yet distinguishably in one real human body, unlike the teachings of Mani and Valentinus.Thomas Aquinas, pp. 231–239.
With respect to Paul the Apostle's assertion that Christ, "though he was in the form of God... emptied himself" (Philippians 2:6–7) in becoming human, Thomas offered an articulation of divine kenosis that has informed much subsequent Catholic Christology. Following the Council of Nicaea, Augustine of Hippo, as well as the assertions of Scripture, Thomas held the doctrine of divine immutability.Augustine, Sermo VII, 7.For instance, Malachi 3:6 and James 1:17 Hence, in becoming human, there could be no change in the divine person of Christ. For Thomas, "the mystery of Incarnation was not completed through God being changed in any way from the state in which He had been from eternity, but through His having united Himself to the creature in a new way, or rather through having united it to Himself."ST III.1.1.
Similarly, Thomas explained that Christ "emptied Himself, not by putting off His divine nature, but by assuming a human nature." For Thomas, "the divine nature is sufficiently full, because every perfection of goodness is there. But human nature and the soul are not full, but capable of fulness, because it was made as a slate not written upon. Therefore, human nature is empty." Thus, when Paul indicates that Christ "emptied himself" this is to be understood in light of his assumption of a human nature.
In short, "Christ had a real body of the same nature of ours, a true rational soul, and, together with these, perfect Deity". Thus, there is both unity (in his one hypostasis) and composition (in his two natures, human and Divine) in Christ.Thomas Aquinas, pp. 241, 245–249. Emphasis is the author's.
Echoing Athanasius of Alexandria, he said that "The only begotten Son of God... assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods."
The goal of union with God has implications for the individual's life on earth. Thomas stated that an individual's Free Will must be ordered towards the right things, such as charity, peace, and Sacred. He saw this orientation as also the way to happiness. Indeed, Thomas ordered his treatment of the moral life around the idea of happiness. The relationship between will and goal is antecedent in nature "because rectitude of the will consists in being duly ordered to the last end that." Those who truly seek to understand and see God will necessarily love what God loves. Such love requires morality and bears fruit in everyday human choices.
With regard to heretics two points must be observed: one, on their own side; the other, on the side of the Church. On their own side there is the sin, whereby they deserve not only to be separated from the Church by excommunication, but also to be severed from the world by death. For it is a much graver matter to corrupt the faith that quickens the soul, than to forge money, which supports temporal life. Wherefore if forgers of money and other evil-doers are forthwith condemned to death by the secular authority, much more reason is there for heretics, as soon as they are convicted of heresy, to be not only excommunicated but even put to death.On the part of the Church, however, there is mercy, which looks to the conversion of the wanderer, wherefore she condemns not at once, but "after the first and second admonition", as the Apostle directs: after that, if he is yet stubborn, the Church no longer hoping for his conversion, looks to the salvation of others, by excommunicating him and separating him from the Church, and furthermore delivers him to the secular tribunal to be exterminated thereby from the world by death.
Heresy was a capital offence against the secular law of most European countries of the 13th century. Kings and emperors, even those at war with the papacy, listed heresy first among the crimes against the state. Kings claimed power from God according to the Christian faith. Often enough, especially in that age of papal claims to universal worldly power, the rulers' power was tangibly and visibly legitimated directly through coronation by the pope.
Simple theft, forgery, fraud, and other such crimes were also capital offences; Thomas's point seems to be that the gravity of this offence, which touches not only the material goods but also the spiritual goods of others, is at least the same as forgery. Thomas's suggestion specifically demands that heretics be handed to a "secular tribunal" rather than magisterium authority. That Thomas specifically says that heretics "deserve... death" is related to his theology, according to which all sinners have no intrinsic right to life. For Jews, Thomas argues for toleration of both their persons and their religious rites.Novak, Michael (December 1995), "Aquinas and the Heretics" , First Things.
The question was again addressed by Thomas in Summa Theologica III Q. 68 Art. 10:
The issue was discussed in a papal bull by Pope Benedict XIV (1747) where both schools were addressed. The pope noted that the position of Aquinas had been more widely held among theologians and canon lawyers, than that of Duns Scotus.Denzinger, Henry, The Sources of Catholic Dogma, B. Herder Book Company, St. Louis, Missouri, 1955, p. 364.
A mention of witchcraft appears in the Summa Theologicae Note this Supplement was written or compiled by others after Thomas's death. and concludes that the church does not treat temporary or permanent impotence attributed to a spell any differently to that of natural causes, as far as an impediment to marriage.
Under the canon Episcopi, church doctrine held that witchcraft was not possible and any practitioners of sorcery were deluded and their acts an illusion. Thomas Aquinas was cited in a new doctrine that included the belief in witches. This was a departure from the teachings of his master Albertus Magnus whose doctrine was based in the Episcopi. Original essay (1890) available here [14] . "To what extent Dominican inquisitors such as Heinrich Kramer really found support in Thomas is irrelevant in this context, thus associating Thomas's name with the whole aspect of witchcraft and the persecution of witches."
The famous 15th-century witch-hunter's manual, the Malleus Maleficarum, also written by a member of the Dominican Order, begins by quoting Thomas Aquinas refuting the Episcopi and goes on to cite Thomas Aquinas over a hundred times. Promoters of the witch hunts that followed often quoted Thomas more than any other source. "Thomas Aquinas's statements remain essentially theoretical and lack any direct relation to the subsequent persecution of witches."
Human beings are material, but the human person can survive the death of the body through the continued existence of the soul, which persists. The human soul straddles the spiritual and material worlds, and is both a configured subsistent form as well as a configurer of matter into that of a living, bodily human. Because it is spiritual, the human soul does not depend on matter and may exist separately. Because the human being is a soul-matter composite, the body has a part in what it is to be human. Perfected human nature consists in the human dual nature, embodied and intellecting.
Resurrection appears to require dualism, which Thomas rejects. Yet Thomas believes the soul persists after the death and corruption of the body, and is capable of existence, separated from the body between the time of death and the resurrection of the flesh. Thomas believes in a different sort of dualism, one guided by Christian scripture. Thomas knows that human beings are essentially physical, but physicality has a spirit capable of returning to God after life. For Thomas, the rewards and punishment of the afterlife are not only spiritual. Because of this, resurrection is an important part of his philosophy on the soul. The human is fulfilled and complete in the body, so the hereafter must take place with souls enmattered in resurrected bodies. In addition to spiritual reward, humans can expect to enjoy material and physical blessings. Because Thomas's soul requires a body for its actions, during the afterlife, the soul will also be punished or rewarded in corporeal existence.
Thomas states clearly his stance on resurrection, and uses it to back up his philosophy of justice; that is, the promise of resurrection compensates Christians who suffered in this world through a heavenly union with the divine. He says, "If there is no resurrection of the dead, it follows that there is no good for human beings other than in this life." Resurrection provides the impetus for people on earth to give up pleasures in this life. Thomas believes the human who prepared for the afterlife both morally and intellectually will be rewarded more greatly; however, all reward is through the grace of God. Thomas insists beatitude will be conferred according to merit, and will render the person better able to conceive the divine.
Thomas accordingly believes punishment is directly related to earthly, living preparation and activity as well. Thomas's account of the soul focuses on epistemology and metaphysics, and because of this, he believes it gives a clear account of the immaterial nature of the soul. By accepting the essentiality of both body and soul, he allows for a Heaven and Hell described in scripture and church dogma.
Much of Thomas's work bears upon philosophical topics, and in this sense may be characterized as philosophical. His philosophical thought has exerted enormous influence on subsequent Christian theology, especially that of the Catholic Church, extending to Western philosophy in general.
This natural law precept prescribes doing and pursuing what reason knows is good while avoiding evil. Reason knows what is objectively good because good is naturally beneficial and evil is the contrary. To explain goods that are naturally self-evident, Thomas divides them into three categories: substantial goods of self-preservation desired by all; the goods common to both animals and humans, such as procreation and education of offspring; and goods characteristic of rational and intellectual beings, such as living in community and pursuing the truth about God.
To will such natural goods to oneself and to others is to love. Accordingly, Thomas states that the love precept obligating loving God and neighbour are "the first general principles of the natural law, and are self-evident to human reason, either through nature or through faith. Wherefore all the precepts of the decalogue are referred to these, as conclusions to general principles."
To so focus on lovingly willing good is to focus natural law on acting virtuously. In his Summa Theologiae, Thomas wrote:
Thomas emphasized that "Synderesis is said to be the law of our mind, because it is a habit containing the precepts of the natural law, which are the first principles of human actions."
According to Thomas,
Thomas defined the four cardinal virtues as prudence, temperance, justice, and courage. The cardinal virtues are natural and revealed in nature, and they are binding on everyone. There are, however, three theological virtues: faith, hope, and charity. Thomas also describes the virtues as imperfect (incomplete) and perfect (complete) virtues. A perfect virtue is any virtue with charity, charity completes a cardinal virtue. A non-Christian can display courage, but it would be courage with temperance. A Christian would display courage with charity. These are somewhat supernatural and are distinct from other virtues in their object, namely, God:
Thomas Aquinas wrote "Greed is a sin against God, just as all mortal sins, in as much as man condemns things eternal for the sake of temporal things."
Furthermore, in his Treatise on Law, Thomas distinguished four kinds of law: eternal, Natural law, human, and Divine law. Eternal law is the decree of God that governs all creation: "That Law which is the Supreme Reason cannot be understood to be otherwise than unchangeable and eternal." Natural law is the human "participation" in the eternal law and is discovered by reason. Natural law is based on "first principles":
Whether the natural law contains several precepts, or one only is explained by Thomas, "All the inclinations of any parts whatsoever of human nature, e.g., of the concupiscible and irascible parts, in so far as they are ruled by reason, belong to the natural law, and are reduced to one first precept, as stated above: so that the precepts of the natural law are many in themselves, but are based on one common foundation."
The desires to live and to procreate are counted by Thomas among those basic (natural) human values on which all human values are based. According to Thomas, all human tendencies are geared towards real human goods. In this case, the human nature in question is marriage, the total gift of oneself to another that ensures a family for children and a future for mankind. He defined the dual inclination of the action of love: "towards the good which a man wishes to someone (to himself or to another) and towards that to which he wishes some good".
Concerning Human Law, Thomas concludes,
Thomas also greatly influenced Catholic understandings of mortal sin and .
Thomas refers to animals as bruta, non-rational, and that the natural order has declared animals for man's use. Thomas denied that human beings have any duty of charity to animals because they are not persons. Otherwise, it would be unlawful to kill them for food. But humans should still be charitable to them, for "cruel habits might carry over into our treatment of human beings."
Thomas contributed to economic thought as an aspect of ethics and justice. He dealt with the concept of a just price, normally its market price or a regulated price sufficient to cover seller costs of production. He argued it was immoral for sellers to raise their prices simply because buyers were in pressing need of a product.
Thomas made a distinction between a good man and a good citizen, which was important to the development of libertarian theory. That indicates, in the eyes of the atheist libertarian writer George H. Smith, that the sphere of individual autonomy was one which the state could not interfere with.
Thomas thought that monarchy was the best form of government because a monarch does not have to form compromises with other persons. Thomas, however, held that monarchy in only a very specific sense was the best form of government—only when the king was virtuous is it the best form; otherwise if the monarch is vicious it is the worst kind (see De Regno I, Ch. 2). Moreover, according to Thomas, oligarchy degenerates more easily into tyranny than monarchy. To prevent a king from becoming a tyrant, his political powers must be curbed. Unless an agreement of all persons involved can be reached, a tyrant must be tolerated, as otherwise, the political situation could deteriorate into anarchy, which would be even worse than tyranny. In his political work De Regno, Thomas subordinated the political power of the king to the primacy of the divine and human law of God the creator. For example, he affirmed:
According to Thomas, monarchs are God's representatives in their territories, but the church, represented by the popes, is above the kings in matters of doctrine and ethics. As a consequence, worldly rulers are obliged to adapt their laws to the Catholic Church's doctrines and determinations.
Thomas said slavery was not the natural state of man.Weithman, Paul J. (1992). "Augustine and Aquinas on Original Sin and the Function of Political Authority" , p. 356. He also held that a slave is by nature equal to his master. He distinguished between 'natural slavery', which is for the benefit of both master and slave, and 'servile slavery', which removes all autonomy from the slave and is, according to Thomas, worse than death. Aquinas' doctrines of the Fair Price, of the right of tyrannicide and of the equality of all the baptized sons of God in the Communion of saints established a limit to the political power to prevent it from degenerating into tyranny. This system had a concern in the Protestant opposition to the Catholic Church and in "disinterested" replies to Thomism carried out by Immanuel Kant and Baruch Spinoza.
Thoughts on the afterlife and resurrection
A grasp of Thomas's psychology is essential for understanding his beliefs about the afterlife and resurrection. Thomas, following church doctrine, accepts that the soul continues to exist after the death of the body. Because he accepts that the soul is the form of the body, then he also must believe that the human being, like all material things, is form-matter composite. The substantial form (the human soul) configures prime matter (the physical body) and is the form by which a material composite belongs to that species it does; in the case of human beings, that species is a rational animal. So, a human being is a matter-form composite that is organized to be a rational animal. Matter cannot exist without being configured by form, but form can exist without matter—which allows for the separation of soul from body. Thomas says that the soul shares in the material and spiritual worlds, and so has some features of matter and other, immaterial, features (such as access to universals). The human soul is different from other material and spiritual things; it is created by God, but also comes into existence only in the material body.
Philosophy
Thomas Aquinas was a theologian and a Scholasticism philosopher. He never considered himself a philosopher, and criticized philosophers whom he saw as pagans, for always "falling short of the true and proper wisdom to be found in Christian revelation". With this in mind, Thomas did have respect for Aristotle, so much so that in the Summa, he often cites Aristotle simply as "the Philosopher", a designation frequently used at that time. However, Thomas "never compromised Christian doctrine by bringing it into line with current Aristotelianism; rather, he modified and corrected the latter whenever it clashed with Christian belief". (2025). 9781615302444, Britannica Educational Publishing. ISBN 9781615302444
Commentaries on Aristotle
Thomas Aquinas wrote several important commentaries on Aristotle's works, including On the Soul, On Interpretation, Posterior Analytics, Nicomachean Ethics, Physics and Metaphysics. His work is associated with William of Moerbeke's translations of Aristotle from Ancient Greek into Latin.
Epistemology
Thomas Aquinas believed "that for the knowledge of any truth whatsoever man needs divine help, that the intellect may be moved by God to its act." However, he believed that human beings have the natural capacity to know many things without special divine revelation, even though such revelation occurs from time to time, "especially in regard to such (truths) as pertain to faith." But this is the light that is given to man by God according to man's nature: Now every form bestowed on created things by God has power for a determined actuality, which it can bring about in proportion to its own proper endowment; and beyond which it is powerless, except by a superadded form, as water can only heat when heated by the fire. And thus the human understanding has a form, viz. intelligible light, which of itself is sufficient for knowing certain intelligible things, viz. those we can come to know through the senses.
Ethics
Thomas was aware that the Albigensians and the Waldensians challenged moral precepts concerning marriage and ownership of private property and that challenges could ultimately be resolved only by logical arguments based on self-evident norms. He accordingly argued, in the Summa Theologiae, that just as the first principle of demonstration is the self-evident principle of noncontradiction ("the same thing cannot be affirmed and denied at the same time"), the first principle of action is the self-evident Bonum precept ("good is to be done and pursued and evil avoided").
all acts of virtue are prescribed by the natural law: since each one's reason naturally dictates to him to act virtuously. But if we speak of virtuous acts, considered in themselves, i.e., in their proper species, thus not all virtuous acts are prescribed by the natural law: for many things are done virtuously, to which nature does not incline at first; but that, through the inquiry of reason, have been found by men to be conducive to well living.
Therefore, we must determine if we are speaking of virtuous acts as under the aspect of virtuous or as an act in its species.
that just as, in the speculative reason, from naturally known indemonstrable principles, we draw the conclusions of the various sciences, the knowledge of which is not imparted to us by nature, but acquired by the efforts of reason, so to it is from the precepts of the natural law, as from general and indemonstrable principles, that human reason needs to proceed to the more particular determination of certain matters. These particular determinations, devised by human reason, are called human laws, provided the other essential conditions of law be observed.
Human law is positive law: the natural law applied by governments to societies. Natural and human law is not adequate alone. The need for human behaviour to be directed made it necessary to have Divine law. Divine law is the specially revealed law in the scriptures.
Political order
Thomas's theory of political order became highly influential. He sees man as a social being who lives in a community and interacts with its other members. That leads, among other things, to the division of labour.
Death penalty
In Summa Contra Gentiles, Book 3, Chapter 146, which was written by Thomas prior to writing the Summa Theologica, Thomas allowed the judicial
.
However, in the same discussion:
In the Summa Theologiae Thomas states his position on the nature of the soul; defining it as "the first principle of life". The soul is not corporeal, or a body; it is the act of a body. Because the intellect is incorporeal, it does not use the bodily organs, as "the operation of anything follows the mode of its being".
According to Thomas, the soul is not matter, not even incorporeal or spiritual matter. If it were, it would not be able to understand universals, which are immaterial. A receiver receives things according to the receiver's own nature, so for the soul (receiver) to understand (receive) universals, it must have the same nature as universals. Yet, any substance that understands universals may not be a matter-form composite. So, humans have rational souls, which are abstract forms independent of the body. But a human being is one existing, single material substance that comes from body and soul: that is what Thomas means when he writes that "something one in nature can be formed from an intellectual substance and a body", and "a thing one in nature does not result from two permanent entities unless one has the character of substantial form and the other of matter."
Modern Western views concerning capitalism, unfair labor practice, living wage, price gouging, monopolies, fair trade practices, and predatory pricing, inter alia, are remnants of the inculcation of Aquinas' interpretation of natural moral law.Marcia Colish, Medieval Foundations of the Western Intellectual Tradition, 400–1400, Yale University Press, 1997, pp. 333–334.
In distributive justice something is given to a private individual, in so far as what belongs to the whole is due to the part, and in a quantity that is proportionate to the importance of the position of that part in respect of the whole. Consequently, in distributive justice a person receives all the more of the common goods, according as he holds a more prominent position in the community. This prominence in an aristocratic community is gauged according to virtue, in an oligarchy according to wealth, in a democracy according to liberty, and in various ways according to various forms of community. Hence in distributive justice the mean is observed, not according to equality between thing and thing, but according to proportion between things and persons: in such a way that even as one person surpasses another, so that which is given to one person surpasses that which is allotted to another.Thomas asserts that Christians have a duty to distribute with provision to the poorest of society.Gilson, Etienne, The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, University of Notre Dame Press, 1994.
"Social justice" is a term that arose in the 19th century in the writings of Luigi Taparelli, and it was his term for the reality Thomas Aquinas called "legal justice" or "general justice". Legal or social justice is the contribution of the individual to the common good. So for Thomas, distributive justice goes in the direction from the common good to the individual, and is a proportional distribution of common goods, to individuals based on their contribution to the community. Legal or general justice, or what came to be called social justice, goes in the other direction, from the individuals to the common good.
The first edition of Thomas's complete works, the so-called editio Piana (from Pius V, the Pope who commissioned it), was produced in 1570 at the studium of the Roman convent at Santa Maria sopra Minerva, the forerunner of the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum.
The critical edition of Thomas's works is the ongoing edition commissioned by Pope Leo XIII under the title Sancti Thomae Aquinatis Doctoris Angelica Opera Omnia, known as the Leonine Edition. Most of his major works have now been edited for the Leonine Edition. They include Thomas's commentaries on Aristotle's On Interpretation ( Peri hermeneias) and Posterior Analytics ( Posteriorum analyticorum), prepared by Thomas Maria Zigliara, in the first volume (1882), the Summa Theologiae in nine volumes from 1888 to 1906, and the Summa contra Gentiles in three volumes from 1918 to 1930.
Abbé Migne published an edition of the Summa Theologiae, in four volumes, as an appendix to his Patrologiae Cursus Completus (English editions: Joseph Rickaby 1872, J. M. Ashley 1888).
Electronic texts of mostly the Leonine Edition are maintained online by the Corpus Thomisticum by Enrique Alarcón, University of Navarra, and at Documenta Catholica Omnia.
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