Human Nature According to St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas

The core of Ancient Philosophy

is

“COSMOLOGY”

- the study of the universe that involves science, philosophy and

religion.

The core of Medieval Philosophy

is

“THEODICY”

-  branch of theology concerned with defending

 the attributes

of God against objections resulting from physical and moral evil.

Philosophers

• St. Augustine • Boethius

Philosophers

• John Scotus Erigena • St. Anselm

Philosophers

• Peter Abelard• John of Salisbury

Philosophers

• Hugh of St. Victor• Albert the Great

Philosophers

• Roger Bacon• St. Thomas Aquinas

Philosophers

• St. Bonaventure• Nicolas of Autrecourt

Philosophers

• John Duns Scotus • William of Ockham

• St. Augustine • St. Thomas Aquinas

Human Nature According To......

St. Augustine (354-430 A.D.)

• Plotinus, a major philosopher in the Ancient World.

• St. Augustine is the first great Christian philosopher and the man authority in the medieval period.

According to St. Augustine: “God is Absolute Spirit, Absolute Will,

Absolute Intelligence, Absolute Freedom, Absolute Good, Absolute Power, Absolute Holiness, cannot will evil, no beginning and no end (Eternal) and Transcendent. “

Augustine asserts that:“God is creator”.“God created the world out of love and man is part of this creation”.“God created man in a mortal body and in an immortal soul and gave man free will.”“Evil comes into the world not because it is part of God’s creation, but because man’s free will.”

Evil is the mere absence of good.

• Man’s redemption is a must for Augustine.

“Through evil, man is lost from God; man sins. But man can only be saved by God, not by man himself. It is God alone who can redeem man. Man cannot be saved; his salvation depends on the grace and mercy of God.”

To Augustine:Salvation happens only through conversion

symbolized by one’s submission to the Church and her sacraments. Thus, in effect, Augustine is saying that without the Church, there is no salvation.

Man is created by God in His image.

God being Absolute Freedom, gives man free will.

Man for Augustine,

“is not a body only nor a soul.... Only when body and soul are in union can we speak of man”.

St. Thomas Aquinas (1224-1274)

Monumental Work

Like his predecessors, particularly Aristotle and Augustine, St. Thomas understands man as a whole.

St. Thomas asserts: “Man “is one substance body and soul”“The soul is a substance, while the body is actual. “

He says: “...all things which are diversified by the diverse

participation of being, are more or less perfect”. “No “body”, however, can exist apart from matter.

Therefore, any “body” should necessarily be material.”

The human body is perfect. It has head, hands,

feet, and all else that a human body must have.

• St. Thomas:–When animation happens, the two

become one. As animation occurs, life instantly comes to the fore.

– Human life here is understood by Aquinas in his doctrine called PARTICIPATION.

To him, through participation, God allows human life to partake in the celebration of existence.

-To Aquinas, can happen in a docrine he calls annihilation.

It is God alone, for Aquinas, who has the exclusive authority to annihilate life.

The soul, the animator of the human body, is a substance.

It is substance because:• It exist by itself.• It is incorporeal and spiritual.• It acts, it wills, it thinks, it knows etc.

St. Thomas asserts that:“Everything that is in any way it is, is from God. For him, God is the only substance; God is the only self-subsisting Being.”

*Matter is subject to corruption.

*Human body “is subject to corruption by necessity of its matter”.

• Soul is immaterial (free from corruption)

According to St. Thomas:“Soul must remain after the destruction of the body.”

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