According to St. Thomas Aquinas · 2020. 3. 30. · Thomas Aquinas on the Immortality of the Soul Although Aquinas does think that plants and non-human animals have souls too, he

The Human Soul, According to St. Thomas Aquinas

Remember Sammy the Squirrel?

Well, Sammy’s soul doesn’t really go anywhere in particular. It is just gone.

Think about it, where does the round shape of the clay ball go when the ball is squashed? Where does the green color of a tree go when it burns into ash?

Remember, his soul is a FORM. And forms need matter to exist…

In the same way, squirrel substantial forms cannot exist without something that IS a squirrel.

But where does Sammy’s soul go?

?

Green colors and round shapes cannot exist without something that is green or round.

One day, Sammy dies…

But… WHAT ABOUT HUMAN BEINGS?

Here is our friend Suzie.

We know that, according to hylomorphism, Suzie’s corpse is not Suzie. In fact, it isn’t even Suzie’s body.

But where does Suzie’s soul go after she dies?

Does it just cease to exist, like Sammy the Squirrel’s soul

does?

Hello there Suzie!

But where does Suzie’s soul go after she dies?

The easy answer would be “yes, Suzie’s soul is just gone

when she dies, just like Sammy the Squirrel’s soul is.”

But this is not Aristotle’s answer. Consider the

following passages from Aristotle’s “On the Soul”:

…the soul is inseparable from its body… Yet some [souls] may be separable because they are not the actualities of any body at all.

Thus, that in the soul which is called mind (by mind I mean that whereby the soul thinks and judges) is, before it thinks, not actually any real thing. For this reason it cannot reasonably be regarded as blended with the body: if it were, it would acquire some quality, e.g. warmth or cold, or even have an organ like the sensitive faculty: as it is, it has none…… Mind, in this sense of it,is separable, impassible, unmixed, since it is in its essential nature activity.

According to Aristotle, the human soul is special because of the “mind”. And so he suggests that the human soul may be capable of

continuing to exist after bodily death.

Thomas Aquinas on the Immortality of the Soul

Thomas Aquinas, like Aristotle, thinks that the human soul is different from all other souls because…

Of course, Aquinas had theological reasons for believing this, but he also thought there were

good philosophical arguments for it.

The key lies in a power that the human soul has: the intellectual power, that is, the

power of abstract thinking.

2 + 2 = 4

It is incorruptible, that is, it cannot be destroyed, even if the body is destroyed.


Although Aquinas does think that plants and non-human animals have souls too, he thinks that each of them has a different kind of soul.

Plants have a vegetative soul.

The key lies in a power that the human soul has: the intellectual power, that is, the

power of abstract thinking.

2 + 2 = 4

The vegetative soul gives to matter the powers of nutrition and growth.

These are the only powers that a plant needs.





Non-human animals (or what Aquinas calls “brutes”) have a sensitive soul.

The sensitive soul gives to matter all the powers of the vegetative soul (i.e.

nutrition and growth) plus the sensitive powers of sensation and self-motion.





Non-human animals (or what Aquinas calls “brutes”) have a sensitive soul.

The sensitive soul gives to matter all the powers of the vegetative soul (i.e. nutrition and growth) plus the sensitive powers of sensation and self-motion.

Human beings have an intellectual soul (sometimes called an “intellective” or “rational” soul).

This special soul makes us a special kind of animal: a rational animal.


Human beings have an intellectual soul (sometimes called an “intellective” or “rational” soul).

Just as the squirrel has the vegetative powers that plants have PLUS the sensitive powers (sensation

and self-movement)…

So a human has all the powers of both the tree and the squirrel (vegetative and sensitive powers)

PLUS a special power: the intellectual power — the power of abstract thinking.


The Intellectual power is a special power that only animals with intellectual souls have.

And it is because of this special power that Aquinas thinks the human soul is incorruptible,

that is, it cannot be destroyed, even when the body is destroyed at death.

But what is the intellectual power? And how does it make the soul incorruptible?

Let’s take a look at Aquinas’s argument for the incorruptibility of the soul.


Imagine that Suzie has never seen a snake.

One day, she sees a snake for the first time.

When suzie sees the snake, without even thinking about it, she immediately recognizes it as a particular kind of animal and gains the concept ‘snake.’


But what is this concept of ‘snake’ that Suzie has?

Well, although we have pictured it as a little black-and-white snake, in reality, it is not a picture but an idea. It is the idea of snakes in general, not

a picture of some particular snake.

The concept of ‘snake’ is a “universal” concept. A universal concept does not

represent any particular thing. It represents a kind of thing, in this case, the

kind: ‘snake’.

(Of course, Suzie will also have a picture in her memory of the particular snake she saw. But that is not the same as the concept of a snake.)

Thomas Aquinas on the Immortality of the SoulNow of course, since Suzie has only seen one snake so far, her concept of

‘snake’ is very imperfect.

For instance, since the snake she saw is a common garter snake, she doesn’t know that some snakes can be poisonous, and that some snakes

are constrictors.

But as she sees more snakes, her universal concept of ‘snake’ will become more and more refined.


So Suzie has in her mind this universal idea of ‘snake’. Remember, it is not the idea of any particular snake, but of snakes in general. It is not the idea

of any one thing in the world that Suzie has perceived with her senses. Rather, it is an idea that she has abstracted from the world she perceives.

Aquinas would put it like this: Suzie has in her mind the substantial form of ‘snake’. She has “snakeness” in her mind.

But, Aquinas reasons, something that is purely material can only have snakeness

in it in one way: by being a snake! If Suzie’s mind were purely material, the

only way it could receive this “snakeness” would be by actually

becoming a snake!


And of course, Suzie has acquired many other universal concepts like this, through observation of the world.…

But despite the fact that Suzie has these forms in her mind, her mind does not become a snake, or a dog, or a cupcake, or triangular!

“snakeness"

“cupcake-ness”

“dogness”

“triangularity”

So, Aquinas concludes, this action of abstracting universal concepts from the world is an action that must act apart from matter (it acts “without a corporeal organ”).

It is an action that doesn’t depend on Suzie’s body.


And if Aquinas is right that Suzie’s soul can operate without her body, then it seems like it could exist without the body as well.

Note that this is a little bit like Descartes’s reasoning. However, it doesn’t rely on imagining existing without a body. Rather, the argument is that certain actions of the soul (e.g. abstraction) do not act through the body. Therefore,

the soul is not totally bound up with the body, as a squirrel’s soul is.

It can act and exist apart from her body!

So Suzie’s soul doesn’t depend on her body in the way a squirrel’s soul does.


However, without a body, Suzie’s soul will be deeply incomplete. It will be only a shadow of what Suzie once was.

Recall what Descartes thought the soul was: “A thinking thing.”What he meant by this was that the soul is a thing that only thinks.

But Aquinas believes that the soul does more than thinking. It is also the substantial form of a material body.

And her soul is what gives Suzie her various powers: her power of digestion, sensation,

self-motion, and growth.

Suzie’s soul is what gives Suzie all of her human physical traits including her shape, and size, her arms, legs, eyes, and mouth.


But Suzie’s soul won’t be able to DO any of the these things after death, because all of them require a body! This is why Aquinas says that a soul

without a body is in an “unnatural” state.

So without a body, Suzie’s soul will be only a shadow of what Suzie once was.

And her soul is what gives Suzie her various powers: her power of digestion, sensation, self-motion, and growth.

Suzie’s soul is what gives Suzie all of her human physical traits including her shape, and size, her arms, legs, eyes, and mouth.

The soul is, after all, a substantial form. And it will always be incomplete without matter: without

something for it to be the form OF.


Suzie’s soulSo Aquinas thinks that when Suzie dies, Suzie is gone. Only Suzie’s

soul remains.

Suzie is essentially an animal. And a soul by itself, is not an animal.

This is why Aquinas believes that Suzie is not identical to her soul.

So without a body, Suzie’s soul will be only a shadow of what Suzie once was.

Aquinas thinks that this view makes more sense AND is more

faithful to Christianity than Descartes’s view.


Suzie’s soul

- For Aquinas, you are a body, and not just any body, you are a living body with a rational soul. But for Descartes, you are only a soul.

Here are some of his reasons:

Aquinas thinks that this view makes more sense AND is more faithful to Christianity than Descartes’s view.

- Aquinas’s view helps us see that we are animals, but that we are also a specialkind of animal: a rational animal.

But for Descartes, we are immaterial souls, not animals.


Suzie’s soul




- Aquinas’s view helps us see why we think death is a truly bad thing.But for Descartes (and Socrates) death just frees the soul (that is,

YOU) from the body

(After all, why do people cry at funerals if the person is in

“a better place”? It isn’t clear why a dualist should

cry at a funeral…)


Suzie’s soul




- Aquinas’s view helps us see why we think death is a truly bad thing.But for Descartes (and Socrates) death just frees the soul (that is, YOU) from the body

But Aquinas’s view also seems too sad!

When Suzie dies, Suzie is gone forever.

…or is she?


What if Suzie’s soul could, somehow, be joined to some physical matter again? Then Suzie will return!

Aquinas thinks this explains why the Christian belief in the resurrection of the body is so important.

Death is NOT a good thing, it is a bad thing. But God will use death to accomplish a much

greater thing: the resurrection of the whole person!

Suzie’s soul


If Socrates and Descartes are correct that your body is just a “prison” for your soul (a prison for the “real you”)

then why would God put you back into that prison!

But according to hylomorphism, you are an animal, a living body. So both a soul and a body are necessary for you to be you.

But if dualism is true then why would God resurrect our bodies?

Death is NOT a good thing, it is a bad thing. But God will use death to accomplish a much greater

thing: the resurrection of the whole person!

Is Aquinas’s argument for the

immortality of the soul a good one?

But note that even if Aquinas’s argument does not absolutely prove the

human soul’s immortality, it at least proves that such

immortality is possible.

So hylomorphism is at least compatible with

life after death.

Well, there is a good deal more to the

argument than I have presented here.


Next time, we’ll look at some arguments against hylomorphism.

We’ve seen that there are many reasons for thinking that hylomorphism true.

- It explains the unity of living things.- It explains how a physical substance can be the same substance through time.

- It allows me to say that I am animal.

- It explains how soul and body are truly united in one substance.

- It explains why a dead body falls apart, but a living body continues to live.

- It explains how a physical object could also be conscious.

- It allows for the human soul to exist after death.

- It takes the life of other animals (and plants) seriously: they have souls too.

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According to St. Thomas Aquinas · 2020. 3. 30. · Thomas Aquinas on the Immortality of the Soul Although Aquinas does think that plants and non-human animals have souls too, he