Laws are important in the sense that it prescribes the proper action or decision geared to what is acceptable and beneficial to the majority. It is likewise a means through which behavior is regulated through punishment and certain actions are rewarded. Natural law is a highest form of law because it is grounded on universality, its provisions seek to preserve life, protect human rights and uphold the truth. More importantly, as per the philosophies of St. Aquinas and King, natural law is just.
What makes natural law questionable is when some human laws claim that they are based on natural law. Inspired by natural law, human laws are quite interpretative and its interpretation is heavily depended on the cultural context and socio-economic dimension through which the human law was anchored on. Along these lines, the premises of natural law are reconfigured in a different way. This is the fallibility of human…...
mlaReferences
Ebenstein, W. (2000) Great Political Thinkers: Plato to the present. United States: Thomas Wadsworth
Donnelly, J. (1980) "Natural Law and Rights on Aquinas Political Thought" Western Political Quarterly. Volume 33 Number 4 December 1980. Utah: University of Utah
" To that, Aquinas responded that the perfect beatitude, in Bradley's paraphrase, "...through grace, has a sort of beginning in this life," and while on earth humans need friends to achieve the material and spiritual input that keeps them seeking happiness, "In heaven," Bradley paraphrases, "the society of friends is not an essential or necessary condition for enjoying the vision of God, ho as the perfect good, in and of Himself, fulfills all desires."
orks Cited
Aquinas, Thomas. "How the Moral Virtues are Distinguished From One Another." In Introduction to St. Thomas Aquinas, ed. Anton C. Pegis, 583-585. New York: The Modern
Library, 1948.
Bradley, Denis J.M. 2000. John Finnis on Aquinas 'The Philosopher.' The Haythrop Journal
41(1) (January) 1-24.
Curran, Charles E. 2003. A Vatican II view could allow for gay, lesbian, unions: but latest
Development hearkens back to Aquinas' view of relationship between law and morality.
National Catholic Reporter 39(38) (September): 19.
De ulf, Maurice. 1959. The…...
mlaWorks Cited
Aquinas, Thomas. "How the Moral Virtues are Distinguished From One Another." In Introduction to St. Thomas Aquinas, ed. Anton C. Pegis, 583-585. New York: The Modern
Library, 1948.
Bradley, Denis J.M. 2000. John Finnis on Aquinas 'The Philosopher.' The Haythrop Journal
41(1) (January) 1-24.
Therefore the Old Law should have been given to all nations, and not to one people only. (Aquinas: 811)
Aquinas responds in these words:
Although the salvation, which was to come through Christ, was prepared for all nations, yet it was necessary that Christ should be born of one people, which, for this reason, was privileged above other peoples, according to om. ix. 4: To whom, namely, the Jews, belongeth the adoption as of children of God... And the testament, and the giving of the Law;... whose are the fathers, and of whom is Christ according to the flesh. (Aquinas: 813)
But while on the one hand, Aquinas tried to be sympathetic and tolerant, on the other, he created an undesirable duality when he refused to resist some stereotypical images of Jews as usurers and murderers of Christ. When he had the opportunity to dispel some old beliefs and add a new…...
mlaReferences
Aquinas, Thomas. Basic Writings of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Volume: 2. Anton C. Pegis (Ed.) Hackett Publishing. Indianapolis, in. 1997.
John Y.B. Hood, Aquinas and the Jews (U. Of Pennsylvania, 1995)
Edward a. Synan, review of Kenneth R. Stow, Alienated Minority. The Jews of Medieval Latin Europe in the Catholic Historical Review, Vol. 80, No. 1 (January 1994)
Aquinas and His "Five ays," an Expression of Assumed Faith
The Five ays of the existence of God, penned by the famed Thomas Aquinas are reported to be some of the most practical and real philosophical arguments of the existence of God. Though they are with much merit the reality of each both ends and begins with simple faith. Once again the reader or philosopher is left to interpret the logic of Aquinas statements all ending with an assumption of faith, faith therefore becoming the very structure and skeleton of his proofs.
Though the works are of coarse well thought they were created in a time when the propriety to question the ultimate truths was unheard of. The faith of Aquinas and of the whole era in which he wrote is assumed through the dialogue of his proofs, in many ways nullifying each individual proof as just another representation of faith. This…...
mlaWorks Cited
Hibbs, Thomas S. "AQUINAS, VIRTUE AND RECENT EPISTEMOLOGY." The Review of Metaphysics 52.3 (1999): 573. Questia. 30 Nov. 2003 http://www.questia.com/ .
Martin, C.F.J. Thomas Aquinas: God and Explanations. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press, 1997.
O'Callaghan, John. "CONCEPTS, BEINGS AND THINGS IN CONTEMPORARY
Or Aquinas will rely on the evidence of Augustine, himself a convert to the Church, and who also had a keen interest in the teachings of Plato and Aristotle. Therefore, it is unfair to assert that Aquinas is only attempting to prove the existence of God after the fact of his conviction -- for Aquinas' conviction is based upon the proofs he gives -- that which is found in nature.
In fact, Aquinas' faith relies upon the use of reason. Such is the essence of Aquinas' doctrine. Reason is what leads him to believe in God, and reason is the tool by which he means to get those who study his doctrine to believe. How such a method could be applied in modern life is not difficult to see.
The modern world is compelled to view faith and reason as two separate entities -- not as things that go together. e…...
mlaWorks Cited
Kreeft, Peter, ed. A summa of the Summa: the essential philosophical passages of St.
Thomas Aquinas. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1990. Print.
It is feasible, perhaps, that someone could hold the principle that he should always act rationally but also believe that this rationality should act towards maximizing their individual base pleasures. Clearly, this could be carried out at the expense of other rational beings. This would violate Kant's universal laws of morality because it would reject the elevated nature of humanity in general. At the same time, if this person were willing to accept the notion that everyone else should behave as he does, his actions would be difficult to categorize by Kant's methods.
Kant's morality is a bit more complex than Aquinas' and objections to the latter's conception of ethics are slightly more straightforward. Basically, Aquinas' position that "knowledge is virtue" is difficult to back in light of instances in which knowledge of the rightness of an action are known but still not followed. It is perceivable that an individual…...
mlaWorks Cited
Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1988.
Kant, Immanuel. "What is Enlightenment?" Philosophy. 1784. Retrieved from eserver.org/philosophy/kant/what-is-enlightenment.txt.
Kretzmann, Norman and Eleonore Stump. Aquinas. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 2003.
McDermott, Timothy. St. Thomas Aquinas: Summa Theologiae. Allen: Christian Classics, 1989.
The nobility worked together with the urban citizens in order to limit the powers of the royalty. The Crown, on the other hand, joined the municipal/city governments to weaken the forces of the feudal (Minlan, 2007).
The principles of the feudal society also maintained that the King depends on himself for a living but if the King is in need of what can be called as some sort of non-feudal revenue, he makes an agreement with the taxpayers (ibid).
There were certain upheavals during Aquinas time. Peasant resistance was common in France. Unity was not achieved among the lordships which is why attempts towards the subordination of these peasants failed. This resulted to the non-existence of free labor. ent on customary tenancy was also paid in money terms which added to further decline of real feudal revenue (Das, 2005).
The lords, as I have mentioned earlier, were also not united to the…...
mlaReferences
Das, D. (2005). Agrarian Class Structure and Development: Book Review. Retrieved from on October 3, 2009.http://journal.ciiss.net/index.php/ciiss/article/view/15/15
Minlan, H. (2007). Misunderstanding of Feudalism, as seen from the Difference between the Chinese and Western Concepts of Feudalism. Retrieved from on October 3, 2009.http://www.nd.edu/~pmoody/Text%20Pages%20%20Peter%20Moody%20Webpage/Feudalism.htm
Mt. Holyoke College (n.d.). Mercantilism. Retrieved from on October 3, 2009.http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/mercantilism.htm
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2009). Saint Thomas Aquinas. Retrieved from / on October 3, 2009.http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aquinas
If we were to consider it a philosophical argument, then we would understand that Anselm is trying to convince us of the validity of his thesis. If we were to look at it as a personal declaration of faith, then we are likely to detect no persuasion effort whatsoever. In fact, Anselm is far from convincing non-believers of the necessity to believe. His argumentation is not directed at having people believe in god. The manner in which he establishes the relation between faith and understanding is a clear sign in this direction. One can understand what Anselm is saying and be convinced of it only if he is a believer. At this point, it is safe to say that the importance of faith is fundamental. Under these circumstances, it becomes difficult to accept the view according to which the Proslogion is a philosophical argument. Were it such, its goal…...
Plato, Thomas Aquinas and Jeremy Bentham have exerted great influence over our ideas of justice and have spawned various schools of thought. This paper compares views on justice by looking at their writings on the ideal state and what constitutes moral behavior.
Plato (427-327 BC) is one of the most famous philosophers of antiquity. In The epublic, Plato wrote of his concept of individual justice as an offshoot of what he sees as a tripartite soul. Plato believed that the human soul is divided into three elements. First, there are the bodily appetites, expressed through bodily needs such as hunger and thirst. Second are the spiritual elements, expressed through emotions like love, anger and compassion. Above all, the third element that separates people from animals and makes them unique is the human ability to use language and reason (Annas 1981).
An imbalance among these elements leads to conflict, sickness and misery. Individual…...
mlaReferences
Annas, Julia (1981). An Introduction to Plato's Republic. London: Oxford University Press.
Atkinson, Charles M. (1976). Jeremy Bentham: His Life and Work. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing.
Gilson, Etienne. (1994). The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas. Translated by I.T. Shook Notre Dame, Ind: University of Notre Dame.
Saint Thomas Aquinas was a thirteenth century Dominican monk: Soccio notes that "Dominicans were dedicated to education and to preaching to common people" (Soccio 219). It is this learned quality which permeates Aquinas' approach to building a Christian system of philosophy: Aquinas is usually considered part of a larger medieval intellectual movement known as Scholasticism. Scholasticism represented an attempt on the part of Christian thinkers of the middle ages to justify Christian doctrine so that it was in line with Aristotelian natural philosophy (the medieval equivalent of what we know as "science"). But in the greater sense, Scholasticism was a philosophy that hinged upon the "logical and linguistic analysis of texts and on arguments producing a systematic statement and defense of Christian beliefs," as Soccio puts it (Soccio 222). In other words, there was a strong interest in not only the legalistic codification of Christian doctrine, but also the philosophical…...
mlaWorks Cited
Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica. Online at: http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1002.htm
Soccio, Archetypes of Wisdom (8th edition).
Wikipedia.org, "Jakob Schegk."
Wikipedia.org, "G.E.M. Anscombe."
Thomas Aquinas is the most important figure of his age. Many people have heard of Thomas Aquinas, but fewer know why he is the most important figure of the 1200s and beyond.
Thomas Aquinas was a Dominican monk, a writer, and a philosopher. He created much of the modern Catholic Church doctrine and regulations, and was made a saint in 1323. Thomas combined the best of theologian and philosopher, and his life indicates that religion can be successfully based on both. He learned much from an extensive study of Aristotle and his writings, and he went on to write about Aristotle frequently and in great detail. He used Aristotle's order of determination to demonstrate Christian thinking and philosophy, and interpreted Aristotle's writings to fit his own individual theologies. He understood how to blend theology with philosophy, and come up with another from of theology that helped explain God and his…...
mlaReferences
Saint Thomas Aquinas.
Thomas Aquinas created his worldview through a combination of theology and philosophy. He believed that an individual must be ordered toward the right attributes on a daily basis. Attributes such as charity, peace and holiness are all apart of philosophy he called, "Virtue Ethics." He believed that good scriptural theology presupposes good philosophical analysis and analysis. Thomas primarily used philosophy as a medium to discern what we can naturally know about human being and God. As an Aristotelian and an Empiricist, his works were heavily influenced by these streams of thought. Aquinas believed in both supernatural revelation and natural revelation. With natural revelation, Aquinas believed the truths are available to individuals based solely through their human nature and correct reasoning's. With supernatural revelation, he believed that humans could learn the truth only through reading the scripture. The theological virtues of faith, hope and charity and Aquinas believed, were supernatural and…...
mlaSources:
1) Comenius, Johann Amos. 1673. The Gate of Languages Unlocked, or, A Seed-Plot of All Arts and Tongues: Containing a Ready Way to Learn the Latine and English Tongue. London: Printed by T.R. and N.T. for the Company of Stationers.
2) Spinka, Mathew. 1967. John Amos Comenius: That Incomparable Moravian. New York: Russell and Russell.
Thomas Aquinas Argument on the Existence of God
Thomas Aquinas had an argument of the existence of God. Providing this argument in a logical way to parishioners in a homily or during an RCIA would be challenging but possible. Thomas has based his argument on five major elements that form the premises of the argument conclusion. The audience needs to be alerted on each of the premises leading to the decision made. There is motion in the world. This motion exists in terms of potential motion, which made to be a real motion by action. Action leads to the motion. There is no stagnation in the universe, which is a sign of things moving. God must be the mover, as no one understands it. The existence of God can be perceived from the efficiency perspective (Thomas & Regan, 2012).
Nothing can exist before the creator. God must be an initial mover who…...
Saint Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas lived and died between 1225-74. He was an Italian philosopher and theologian. He was the Doctor of the Church, also acknowledged as the Angelic Doctor. He is the supreme stature of scholasticism, one of the most important saints of the Roman Catholic Church, as well as, originator of the system acknowledged by Pope Leo XIII to be the legitimate Catholic philosophy (1).
This article argues that Thomas Aquinas's political philosophy is un-egalitarian. Not only does Aquinas disappoints to give his support to an egalitarian outlook of political impartiality, but so as to explain his political philosophy properly one has got to ascribe to him an idea intensely undemocratic in its repercussions. This paper proposes, consequently, that by means of Aquinas's thought, as a rational foundation for democracy would need a considerable reconsideration of his own point-of-view.
The purpose of this paper is neither to call into question the…...
mlaBibliography
1). Allen Buchanan. Justice as Reciprocity vs. Subject-Centered Justice. Philosophy and Public Affairs 119 (1990) 227-52.
2). Aidan Nichols. Discovering Aquinas: An Introduction to His Life, Work, and Influence. (W.W. Norton & Company; 1987)
3). Brian Davies. The Thought of Thomas Aquinas. (Clarendon Press, 1993)
4). John Finnis. Natural Law and Natural Right. (New York: Oxford University, 1981)
The way in which this argument is employed differently in classical Islamic philosophy is actually quite interesting. e might compare Aquinas' argument here with Avicenna's use of Al-Farabi's concept of the "active intellect." Aquinas' prime mover argument is fundamentally Aristotelian, and thus Avicenna and al-Farabi were both familiar with the Aristotelean notion that God as Prime Mover could be logically deduced from the motion of planets and stars. For Avicenna, however, the notion of "active intellect" (borrowed from al-Farabi but here repurposed) is understood as the necessary manifestation of God in the world: the movements of things from potentiality to actuality is an intellectual movement (as well as a physical) and the form and shape that appears in matter is actually -- in Avicenna's philosophy -- an emanation from God's active intellect. As Leaman puts it, "this is not a matter of choice or God's grace but rather a necessary…...
mlaWorks Cited
Leaman, Oliver. An Introduction to Classical Islamic Philosophy. Second edition. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Print.
Thomas Aquinas was an Italian philosopher who was eventually canonized and made into a saint. Because of his sainthood, there are myths surrounding Thomas Aquinas that may be difficult to distinguish from the factual information surrounding his life. As a result, you may want to be wary when looking at religious sources of information about his life, if you are supposed to be focusing on fact-based biographical-type information. However, investing the mythology of his life would also be a worthwhile topic of pursuit, such as his proof of the existence of God.....
I. Introduction
A. Definition of the Human Condition
B. Importance of Studying the Human Condition
C. Thesis Statement: Exploring key aspects of the human condition and their significance in shaping human existence.
II. Historical Perspectives on the Human Condition
A. Ancient Philosophical Views (e.g., Aristotle, Plato)
B. Medieval and Renaissance Perspectives (e.g., Thomas Aquinas, Machiavelli)
C. Enlightenment Thinkers (e.g., Rousseau, Hobbes)
III. Psychological Dimensions of the Human Condition
A. Human Emotions and Behavior
B. Cognitive Processes and Perceptions
C. Impact of Social and Environmental Factors
IV. Existential and Philosophical Views
A. Existentialism: Meaning and Purpose
B. Absurdity and Anxiety in Human Existence
C.....
1. Analyze Thomas Aquinas' Five Ways to prove the existence of God and evaluate their effectiveness in addressing modern scientific and philosophical challenges.
2. Compare and contrast Thomas Aquinas' views on natural law and ethics with those of other prominent philosophers, such as Aristotle or Immanuel Kant.
3. Investigate how Thomas Aquinas' theology influenced the development of Western Christian thought and the relationship between faith and reason in his writings.
4. Examine Thomas Aquinas' concept of the soul and its relationship to the body, and explore how it differs from other philosophical and theological perspectives on the nature of the human person.
5. Discuss....
1. The Essence of Thomas Aquinas's Natural Law Theory: An Exploration of Its Foundations and Implications
Discuss the metaphysical and ethical principles that underpin Aquinas's natural law theory.
Analyze the concept of the eternal law and its relationship to the natural law.
Examine the role of human reason in discerning the precepts of natural law and their binding force.
2. The Harmony of Faith and Reason in Aquinas's Summa Theologica: A Critical Examination
Trace the development of Aquinas's understanding of the relationship between faith and reason.
Explore the arguments Aquinas presents for the compatibility of faith and reason.
Evaluate the strengths....
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