Further Defense of Aquinas’s Motion Proof
/Daniel Shields briefly responds to the review by John Brungardt of his book, Nature and Nature’s God.
Read MoreThis section is devoted to essays on Thomistic philosophy, theology, scholarship, and topics related thereto.
Daniel Shields briefly responds to the review by John Brungardt of his book, Nature and Nature’s God.
Read MoreFor too long has Aquinas’s motion proof languished in the gaol of a contemporary Thomistic metaphysics unwilling to fully countenance the debt which Aquinas’s metaphysics owes to Aristotelian natural philosophy and unable to recapture the ground taken by materialist, naturalist, or positivist accounts of the cosmos. Shields’s book represents a real jail-break and counterattack.
Read MoreThe martyr can let himself be conquered by physical death; the doctor must hold fast to true knowledge so that he is not conquered by intellectual death. And if he does not have such knowledge, he should not become a doctor in the first place. For the theologian, not fortitude, but the truth, will set him free.
Read MoreGiven St. Joseph's pre-eminent nature in the Church and among the angels and saints, second only to the Mother of God, God would bestow the honor of accompanying Him to Heaven as He did for His Blessed Mother.
Read MoreHylomorphic dualism manages to keep the best insights from both hylomorphism—its unified account of the human being—and dualism—the immateriality of the intellect—, building a cohesive account of human beings that avoids the problems that arise for other forms of dualism.
Read MoreRANDALL B. SMITH
Randall B. Smith (Professor of Theology, University of St. Thomas, Houston) replies to Michèle Mulchahey’s Review in The Thomist 83.3 (2019) of Smith’s book, Reading the Sermons of Thomas Aquinas: A Beginner’s Guide (Emmaus Academic, 2016).
Read MoreCHRISTOPHER J. THOMPSON
In a small section of his famous work, the Summa Theologiae, St. Thomas Aquinas provides us with a basic tutorial on human flourishing. This well-known “treatise on human happiness” forms the skeletal outlines of the dominant desire at the core of every human heart: the inescapable need for happiness, fulfillment, bliss.
Read MoreEDMUND WALDSTEIN, O.Cist.
The Greek historian Herodotus recounts that Solon, the lawgiver of Athens, travelled through the world and saw many things. On travelling through Asia Minor, he visited the fabulously wealthy king Croesus of Lydia. Croesus had his servants show off his many treasures to Solon. Then Croesus asked Solon who the happiest man…
Read MoreJOÃO PINHEIRO DA SILVA
After all, it is a common place in the history of philosophy that Aquinas was, following Aristotle, a realist in various philosophical domains. At the same time, Aquinas helped consolidate “intentio” in the philosophical grammar. We can then pose the question: does Aquinas use of “intentio” lead him down a representationalist path?
Read MoreURBAN HANNON
Our Lord played a great many different roles at the Last Supper. Inasmuch as he was celebrating a Passover seder, he was just another observant Jew—whereas foretelling his betrayal, he played the prophet, and offering sacrifice, the high priest. He was a parting friend to his apostles…
Read MoreIn this paper, Dr. Glen Coughlin of Thomas Aquinas College discusses the views of Charles De Koninck about the necessity of proving the existence of immaterial beings before beginning metaphysics.
Read MoreAfter presenting the “first and more manifest way” of proving the existence of God by reason alone (without the aid of God revealing himself in Sacred Scriptures), in Summa Theologiae Ia, 2, 3, Saint Thomas Aquinas continues this project by turning in the “Second Way” to what he somewhat enigmatically calls “the nature of the efficient cause.” The greatest obstacle to understanding his Second Way, though, is determining precisely what Aquinas means by “the nature of the efficient cause” and “an order of efficient causes,” and how the Second Way is distinct from the First and Third Ways. This essay attempts to do so.
Read MoreBy JOHN BRUNGARDT, Ph.D.
In the following review-essay, I explore in some detail Knasas’s argumentation and some of its consequences. First, I will look at some of the background to the issues regarding the contemporary Thomistic schools of thought so as to set forth what is at stake in the debate (§1).
By WILLIAM MATTHEW DIEM, S.T.D.
Although David Bentley Hart admits we can reject God, he insists that “we cannot do so with perfect knowledge and perfect freedom.” Although it’s true that no sane person is able to choose eternal misery as such, that is not relevant to the question: one need not choose misery to merit misery.
Read MoreBy JONATHAN CULBREATH
As opposed to the originalist conception of law, St. Thomas teaches that law is an ordinance of reason for the common good promulgated by him who has power over the community, derived from the natural law itself, for the purpose of making men virtuous.
Read MoreBy JOHN BRUNGARDT, Ph.D.
A consideration of the philosophical notion of motion and how this aids Thomistic theology.
Read MoreJOHN O’NEILL, PhD Cand.
Thomas has already identified four relations in God and defined a divine person as a subsisting relation. Why, then, are the four real relations not four persons? Or why are there not only three real relations that subsist?
Read MoreBRETT T. FEGER
Aquinas’ analysis of the physical disposition of man’s posture provides a groundwork from which a meaningful conversation can be had with evolutionary materialists who reduce man to a mere animal.
Read MoreJOSHUA MADDEN, PhD
Put briefly, we can say along with Thomas Aquinas that “between husband and wife, it seems, there exists the greatest of friendship.”
Read MoreJOHN G. BRUNGARDT, PhD
Against some important philosophical mistakes which occur by the conflation of what is per accidens with what is per se.
Read MoreUnder the direction of the Sacra Doctrina Project