THOMAS AQUINAS

• LIFE: 1225-1274

INTRODUCTION• A Christian theologian• Wrote a synthesis of

Christian ideas and Aristotelian

• Produced a new grounding for Christian faith, redefinition of Christian political thought:– Allowing for independent

authority of secular government.

Introduction

• (1)He incorporated Aristotle’s telos, commitment to human reasons, views on forms of government.

Human Nature and Society

• (2)He depict people as rational and social, and as political society as natural– Not as a remedy for and a

consequence of humanity’s fallen nature

• Man’s rational and social capacity, not human sin or his practical inability to live alone, necessitates a political government

• “Man is by nature, however, a social and political animal, living amid a multitude of his kind; more so, indeed, than is the case with all other animals, which natural necessity itself makes clear…For men, however, none of these were provided by nature, but instead of all of these, reason was given to him….It is therefore, natural for man that he live in the companionship of his kind.”

– Thomas Aquinas

Human nature and society• (3) One principle that

ought to rule the government is reason.

• But to achieve justice and to serve people, a ruler is also required to follow God’s natural law

• State is no longer a product of human sin;– It has both important and

positive purposes of securing both Christian and secular goals.

Human nature and society

• (4)Politics is important to individual and collective moral growth and well-being.

Types of law• Law defines the

connections among the individual, the polity, and God.

• He combine Aristotle’s reason and telos, Cicero’s natural law, Christian notion of God to construct a theory of law that guides human affairs:

Types of law

• (1) Eternal Law– The unchanging reason

of God– The God’s plan for the

universe, affecting everything

Types of law

• (2) Divine law:– Applies to religion and

church issues– Apprehended through

revelation

Types of law• (3) Natural Law– This is the eternal law

that is etch upon the human mind

– Found only in human kind

– It determines one’s telos– It help one seek his or

her essential human purposes

– It is the “rule and measures” of our actions

• Two types of natural law:– (a)speculative reasons:

apply to sphere like mathematics

– (b)practical reason: contains rules to guide human actions through general principles of justice, to seek good, to preserve the self

Types of law• (3) Natural Law:

– Two ways of operations:• Particular actions:

– It serves as guide for personal behaviour

– To know what is right or correct on a particular situation

• Human law:– It must emulate natural

law– Seeking to promote

justice and the will of God

– To helps individual when their own reasons fails, to guide community to serve justice

Types of law• (4)Human Law:

• How to be true law?– Must follow natural law;

cannot depart from it– Must help to fulfill one’s

telos, functions as rational creature or vision of God.

– It obligates through conscience so long it emulates natural law; if not, it is not binding.

– It is ordinance of reason, promulgated for the common good, by who has the care for the community

– if it depart from the law of nature it is no longer a law but a perversion of law.

Types of law

• (4) Human law• Thus if unjust law is not a

law, it means also unjust ruler is not a ruler also

• Thus human law has a telos, a goal in furthering an end.

• It is a religious telos; and the purpose of the state and duty of the magistrate is to further that end.

Kingship, Tyranny and the Family

• Political authority / Ruler– must obey God and

natural law.– There is a set of external

restrictions on rulers– Must act based on the

precepts of justice and reason.

• “ Human government is derived from the divine government and should imitate it.”

Kingship, Tyranny and the Family• Aquinas also review the merit of

one, few, many rulers:– Based on Christian teaching he

supported the Kingship– Divine government is also ruled by

One entity– Rule of one for a community

• “ Accordingly, the best form of government is in a political community or kingdom where one is given the power to preside over all according to his virtue while under him are others having governing powers according to their virtue, and yet a government of this is shared by all, both because all are eligible to govern, being party kingdom since there is one at the head of all, party aristocracy insofar as a number of persons are set in authority, partly democracy, i.e, government by the people, insofar as the rulers can be chosen from the people…”

Kingship, Tyranny and the Family

• Political authority: the reasons:– (1)To invest secular

governments with some direct divine authority, not indirect authority through the church• They have some

independent justification, not from the church

– (2)the government is necessary because of human sociability, not because of the sin

– (3)One entrusted to rule must do so for the common good, not to serve personal desires or interest.

Kingship, Tyranny and the Family• Political authority:

– God may act to address tyranny.

– Even mild tyranny should not be tolerated.

– However, public action may be necessary to address excessive tyranny, including killing the tyrant if God does not act; the use of internal and external check ti ensure the authority stays in line

• Political authority;– Family and polity:

• The parallel between family, father and ruler

• “Therefore , he who rules a complete community, that is,a city or a province, is justly termed king; he who rules a household is called father of the family, but not king. A father has certain likeness to aking, because of which kings are sometimes called the fathers of the people.”

Kingship, Tyranny and the Family• The individual good, the

good of the family, and the good of the political community and the kingdom are different ends.– Need different rules or

types of prudence– The different opens a

distinct space for secular rulers and secular goals, independent of the church.

Church-State Relations and Tolerance• Separation between the two:

– Not a complete separation.– Church still holds authority

over the king– The king is still subordinate to

the church– Church still has limit in state

affairs

• “ The spiritual and the secular power alike derive from divine power, and that, as a result, secular power is subject to spiritual power insofar as God so disposes,i.e, in those things pertaining to the salvation of souls. In such matters, one should obey the spiritual rather than the secular power. But in those things which pertain to civic welfare, one should obey the secular rather than the spiritual power; “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.”

Church-State Relations and Tolerance

• The statement retains the traditional Christianity assumption that secular governments are subordinate to the church

• It also offer independent, divine justification for political rule.

• A secular ruler must be a Christian and serve Christian purposes, but the state is not a mere extension of the church.

• The synthesis produced concerns for tolerance:– Christians are obligated to

obey secular powers.– Non-christian should not be

forced to obey.– Nonbelievers cannot rule

over the faithful– Rulers must be Christian and

Christlike in their behaviour.

Church-State Relations and Tolerance

• The tolerance;– Christians heretics need

not be tolerated, except the Jews deserve tolerance, though they cannot rule over Christians.

Conclusion• The Muslims philosophers

like Al-Farabi, Averroes and Avicenna provided Christians with an example of how it was possible to reconcile God and religion with Aristotle by making God the first and final cause within an Aristotelian-Christian metaphysics.

• Thomas Aquinas’s contribution was the reorientation of Christianity into a more rational-based theology