The present note has arisen in response to the review of the book Metaphysics of intelligibility and self-consciousness in Thomas Aquinas, written by David Torrijos Castrillejo, and published in issue 148 of this magazine.
The present text of St. Thomas is a brief response to a case of conscience about the purchase on credit, divided into four issues and addressed to him by a brother in the Dominican order, Santiago de Viterbo.
In this paper we try: (1) A synthesis of the problem of post-kantian liberty according to diferent interpretations of the transcendental subject. (Between absolute idealism, vitalism, and hermeneutic ontology). (2) And its thomistic “understanding” according to the synthesis of “duplex cognitio de anima” and the notion of “ens sumitur ab actu essendi”
The Decree on the Reform of Ecclesiastical Studies of Philosophy, lends a special importance to the training of intellectual habits among students and candidates of the ecclesiastical faculties. This paper focuses on the need of a valid metaphysics to make it possible to understand the origin of the intellectual act. It describes the nature of habits and it also considers the formation of intellectual virtue, as necessary as contents, for a suitable philosophical formation. At this point, it pays attention to the relationship between the formation of habits and free will, by virtue of which habits may increase or decrease. Finally, it reflects on the virtue of studiositas which should have a moral and supernatural goal
The moral agent’s acts are the last expression of an internal temporary process rushed off a long time ago. The Thomist explanation for the knowledge of the singular as from the affect-cognitive structures of the moral agent is full of keen appreciations in order to give account for how two heterogeneous forms –the reality itself and the human intellectual ability– jell in the so-called moral act. The aim of this text is to highlight the structural framework that certifies the intersection reality-knowledge-operation in Saint Thomas’ proposal
This paper addresses the evaluation and critique of the so-called “ontological argument” in Scholasticism and in the philosophy of the modern period. There is offered a survey of texts of various Dominican Masters of theology who, prevalently in the University of Salamanca, have commented on the reply furnished by St Thomas Aquinas to the argument of id quo maius cogitari nequit, stated in a. 1 of q. 2 of the I Pars of the Summa.
We dedicate our attention also –but only in the particular case of Godoy– to the question (treated instead in a. 2 of q. 2) of the possibility or otherwise of demonstrating the existence of God with an a priori proof. In this way it will be possible to lay out the evidence that just as the two problems are distinct, to which Aquinas dedicates two different articles in q. 2 of the I Pars of the Summa Theologiae, so too there effectively result diverse debates which will have their origin in the Scholasticism of the modern period
The theme of Jesus Christ’s Me and of his self-consciousness is one of the most difficult and exciting topics of the whole Christology. After having been laid out in the theological debates of the xx century, it caused a strong controversy among theologians, who suggested diverse solutions, some of which repeated old mistakes in the understanding of the mystery of Christ, the only Son of God the Father, who became man for our salvation. The Carmelite theologian Bartomeu M. Xiberta intervened in this controversy with an unusual clarity. First, in order to defend in a decisive way the dogmatic foundations required by the right understanding of Christ’s being mystery, he destroyed some theological and philosophical perspective mistakes that impeded a clear approach to Christ’s being; and then, also in order to offer a solution to the mystery of his Self-consciousness that would be consistent with the biblical and traditional teachings of the Church, whose chief representatives he would recognize in Saint Cyril and Saint Thomas. The purpose of this paper is to present this christological contribution of Fr. Xiberta and to show how this teaching is still currently relevant
Cornelio Fabro’s research helps us to rediscover the significance of truth of the human knowledge in the light of St Thomas Aquinas’ realism –as adhesion and fidelity to the reality– in a critical comparison with modern and contemporary philosophy. It is possible especially in virtue of St. Thomas’ speculative genius.
This article presents Fabro´s research on Aristotle´s and Thomas Aquinas´ most relevant thesis, which allow to assert the possibility of a genuine knowledge of reality and to overcome cartesian separation of perception and thought
The Thomistic doctrine of sensation is characterized, among other things, by the frequent recourse to the distinction between two types of immutation: a spiritual and a natural one. In developing this distinction converge perennially valids philosophical principles and outmoded aspects of classical Physics. The same seems to occur in a strange text, where is attributed to the corruptible bodies, by virtue of their dependence on the heavenly bodies, the ability to achieve an effect that transcends the possibilities due to them as corruptible bodies: to diffuse their form in a way of spiritualis intentio. By attempting to interpretate and to give a definitive assessment of this doctrine, several Thomists have expressed discordant positions
According to Aquinas prudence is an extremely necessary virtue for human life. Due to its subject, it is one of the intellectual virtues and makes its possessor good in a moral sense. Aquinas also includes it among cardinal virtues and thoroughly considers supernatural infused prudence. Furthermore, prudence requires a right appetite, the perception of the singular, a higher wisdom, is different from moral science, synderesis, and from the act of conscience. The overall consideration of these matters allows to state that -clearly unlike relativist and essentialist approaches-, as far as Aquinas is concerned, prudence reaches its full extent precisely in the ascertainment of its limits
