关于Thomas Aquinas的译名问题

Thomas Aquinas（1224—1274）是13世纪意大利著名神学家和哲学家，700多年来其思想在西方产生深远影响，为此有人把他列入“世界十大思想家”。然而，国内出版物中Thomas Aquinas的译名五花八门：     

Swinburne on Aquinas’ View of Faith

Philosophia - In recent decades, Richard Swinburne has offered an influential view of the relationship between faith and reason. In doing so, he focused to a considerable extent on Aquinas’s...     

Conscience: Aquinas — With a hint of aristotle

The paper presents Aquinas’s account of conscience, and argues that key elements of this account are key elements too of Aristotle’s moral theory. The paper’s purpose is to encourage debate over conscience as not only a Stoic/Christian concept but one with deeper— and more widespread—roots in western ethical tradition.     

Aquinas’s Transformation of the Virtue of Courage

Courage is an important moral virtue for both Aristotle and Aquinas. For Aristotle, courage is a virtue that belongs to warriors who are ready for a noble death on the battlefield. As a Christian theologian as well as an Aristotelian expert, Aquinas aims to give this Aristotelian moral virtue a fully theological expression. This paper analyzes the differences between Aquinas’s conception of courage and Aristotle’s, as well as explores Aquinas’s transformation of Aristotelian courage through a three part process. Firstly, based on Aristotle’s paradigm of courageous warriors in battle, Aquinas extends the scope of “battle” from the military sense to a broader one. By doing so, Aquinas expands the range of application of courage. Secondly, Aquinas explicitly defines endurance as the chief act of courage based on the reason that endurance is more difficult than aggression, thereby shifting our attention from the attack aspect of courage to the endurance aspect. Finally, Aquinas defines the principal act of perfect courage as martyrdom thereby pointing to Christ, who was the perfect martyr, as the paradigm of a courageous person. The result of this transformation is a successful theological virtue of courage.     

A Joint Declaration?: Justification as Theosis in Aquinas and Luther

In the wake of the Lutheran-Catholic Joint Declaration on Justification, this essay attempts to explore ecumenical convergences in the writings of Thomas Aquinas and Martin Luther on the question of justification. Specifically, this essay takes the recent Finnish uncovering of the theme of theosis in Luther's work and probes Aquinas' Summa Theologiae for similar themes of ontological participation of the human in the divine. I first display Aquinas' doctrine of God and show how human participation in the Trinitarian life is written into the structure of his account of God. I then show how Aquinas' understanding of participation informs his analysis of the virtues. Finally, I present some of the Finns' findings on Luther and examine covergences with Aquinas. Overall, I suggest that language of participation can help overcome the overdrawn contrast between Aquinas' account of the virtues and the forensic interpretation of Luther.     

The theological virtues. Aquinas did,but did Kant?

Recent studies in virtue ethics devote little attention to the theological virtues. After a short introduction into the history of the theological virtues a comparative investigation of realist and constructivist ethics is carried out. Using Thomas Aquinas as point of reference the author discusses possible Kantian vindication of the theological virtues through Onora O'Neills constructivist ethics. In conclusion the authors holds that there are surprising convergences concerning Kant's notion of hope and that of Aquinas in regard to the function of the theological virtues.     

Could Aquinas Reject Semantic Realism? Reply to De Anna

While accepting that metaphysical realism is incompatible with semantic anti-realism, De Anna has argued in The Philosophical Quarterly , 50 (2000), pp. 82–7, that Aquinas'metaphysical realism is compatible with the negation of semantic realism. In reply, I show that De Anna's case for this claim has two serious shortcomings: first, it fails to recognize the cognitive issues arising from the distinction between adequate and inadequate effects; secondly, it incorrectly assumes that the analogical use of language can extend one's recognitional capacities.     

Who is God in the Old Testament? Retrieving Aquinas after Rahner's Answer

Karl Rahner adamantly argued that the God of the Old Testament is the unoriginate Person of the Father. This forms the bedrock of his trinitarian theology, often credited as renewing Christian appreciation for the Trinity. However, his position that the Old Testament God must be identified as the Father contradicts much of the Christian tradition, including strands of Greek theology whose emphasis on the Father he claimed to restore to the West. This article retrieves the theology of Thomas Aquinas after Rahner in order to correct the imbalance of Rahner's position with greater nuance in appreciating the mystery of God in the Old Testament.     

Does Empathy Have Any Place in Aquinas’s Account of Justice?

Recent developments in cognitive science have prompted philosophers to speculate about the importance of empathy, the ability to directly apprehend and take on the mental and emotional states of others, in understanding and being motivated by moral norms—particularly moral norms concerning other humans. In this paper, I investigate whether some kind of empathy is involved in Thomas Aquinas’s account of the virtue of justice, which he describes as essentially other-directed. I claim that a kind of empathy is involved in Aquinas’s notion of friendship and that this notion of friendship is related to justice as a virtue as its goal. Having the virtue of justice is geared towards establishing true friendship, at least in part. In so doing, it is directed towards establishing a sufficient groundwork for genuine empathy. Instances of genuine empathy, then, are approximations of this goal of the work of justice, even if they occur outside the context of a true friendship. Given this, I describe possible roles Aquinas might afford empathy and empathetic emotions in the context of cultivating the virtue of justice, including roles in motivation and knowledge.     

Was Thomas Aquinas a Sociobiologist? Thomistic Natural Law,Rational Goods,and Sociobiology

Abstract. Traditional Darwinian theory presents two difficulties for Thomistic natural‐law morality: relativism and essentialism. The sociobiology of E. O. Wilson seems to refute the idea of evolutionary relativism. Larry Arnhart has argued that Wilson's views on sociobiology can provide a scientific framework for Thomistic natural‐law theory. However, in his attempt to reconcile Aquinas's views with Wilson's sociobiology, Arnhart fails to address a critical feature of Aquinas's ethics: the role of rational goods in natural law. Arnhart limits Aquinas's understanding of rationality to the Humean notion of economic rationality–that “reason is and ought to be the slave of the passions.” On Aquinas's view, rationality discovers goods that transcend the merely biological, viz., the pursuit of truth, virtue, and God. I believe that Aquinas's natural‐law morality is consistent with some accounts of sociobiology but not the more ontologically reductionist versions like the one presented by Wilson and defended by Arnhart. Moreover, Aquinas's normative account of rationality is successful in refuting the challenges of evolutionary relativism as well as the reductionism found in most sociobiological approaches to ethics.     

Is God His Essence? The Logical Structure of Aquinas’ Proofs for this Claim

In this article I consider whether Aquinas’ arguments for the claim that God is His essence are conclusive, and what was his purpose of upholding this thesis. I show his proofs from Summa Theologiae and Summa Contra Gentiles to be problematic and argue that the defense of Aquinas’ views on that matter suggested by certain remarks of P. T. Geach is flawed.     

Rewriting Aquinas’ animal ethics: the primacy of reason in the determination of moral status

Arguing in support of Aristotle, Aquinas conceptualised the cognitive functioning of the human as exceeding that of other animals. In its base form, the Thomistic position asserts that the intellective functioning of the human animal is superior to the instinctual operation of the non-human animal. For Aquinas, it is the intellect that determines the enactment of the human will. Thus, if a non-human animal is devoid of intellect, no willing of any action is possible. Consequently, an action of a non-human animal which is humanly perceived as immoral, is in fact morally agnostic because the animal lacks the reasoning capacity to judge the potential action's moral status. Given that Aquinas’ argument centres on the role of reason in determinations of moral status, we seek to determine the status theoria of the Thomistic moral theory in light of contemporary studies into animal cognition. The assertion is made that this particular aspect of Aquinas’ moral theory requires rewriting because reason is evident in animal cognition to a greater extent than Aquinas would have been able to appreciate given his contextual limitations. This presence of reason, we argue, ascribes moral status to some non-human animals, analogous to their human counterparts. However, we will also contend that rather than dismissing Aquinas’ reason-founded ethics, value could be found in retaining a rewritten Thomistic theoretical construction which extends Aquinas’ ethic to include animals apart from the human that are bearers of the faculty of reason.     

‘A Mark of Perfection:’ Receiving and Perfection in Aquinas’s Trinitarian Theology

In the last three decades, some Thomists have argued that receiving is a pure perfection, others that it is a transcendental, and others that it is neither. All agree, however, that Aquinas himself holds that it is neither a pure perfection nor a transcendental. I argue here that, while Aquinas does not number receiving among the pure perfections or the transcendentals, he comes closer to doing so than has been acknowledged, and – at least in one respect – he even associates reception more radically with perfection than do any of the more recent champions of receptivity.     

Thomas Aquinas and Antonio de Córdoba on self-defence: saving yourself as a private end

ABSTRACT

Revisionists about Aquinas’ teaching on private self-defence take the standard reading to hold that Aquinas applies a version of the Doctrine of Double Effect (DDE) according to which the intentional killing of a wrongful attacker by a private person is morally prohibited while the non-intentional but foreseeable killing of the attacker is permitted. Revisionists dispute this reading and argue that Aquinas permits the intentional killing of wrongful attackers. I argue that revisionists mischaracterize the standard reading of Aquinas. I consider one of its main proponents, Antonio de Córdoba (1485–1579). When Córdoba condemned the intentional killing of wrongful attackers by private persons, he was not applying DDE. Rather, he was arguing that when you decide to kill an attacker you treat the attacker as a resource for the private end of saving your life. Killing a member of your community is a form of irrevocable social exclusion. This decision ought to be left to the public authorities. The disagreement between the authors defending the standard view and their critics was not about DDE but rather about the moral limits that membership in a community sets on the pursuit of private ends, including the private end of staying alive.     

What is First? Metaphysics as Prima Philosophia and Ultima Scientia in the Works of Thomas Aquinas

The article analyzes the status of metaphysics in relation to other sciences, especially the sense and reasons behind its priority in the system of sciences, as conveyed in the works of Thomas Aquinas. The question of what comes first in the system of sciences has led to an exploration and justification of the criteria behind this priority. According to Thomas Aquinas, metaphysics is justly considered to be the first philosophy: on the one hand it is occupied with what comes first in the ontological order – the first causes of being, on the other hand, other sciences rely on it for their first principles. The article critically analyzes both substantiations of the idea of being first. The substantive criterion is questioned by the introduction of revealed theology into the system of sciences accepted by Aquinas; revealed theology is also occupied with what comes first, and does so with greater authority than metaphysics. The article focuses on the analysis of main doubts concerning metaphysics’ methodological criterion of priority: the idea that metaphysics, in relation to other sciences, is in a sense first and functions as a determinant, while also being last and determined by these very sciences. Metaphysics is first, as other sciences draw from it their first principles, and last, as it utilizes facts established by other sciences which come first in the process of knowledge acquisition. Hence the charge that Aquinas’ argumentation concerning metaphysics’ priority is circular in nature. The article analyzes various aspects of this difficulty and offers suggestions on how to overcome them.     

Aquinas’s Miracles and the Luciferous Defence: The Problem of the Evil/Miracle Ratio

Miracles and the problem of evil are two prominent areas of research within philosophy of religion. On occasion these areas converge, with God’s goodness being brought into question by the claim that either there is a lack of miracles, or there are immoral miracles. In this paper I shall highlight a second manner in which miracles and the problem of evil relate. Namely, I shall give reason as to why what is considered to be miraculous may be dependent upon a particular response to the problem of natural evil. To establish this claim, I shall focus upon Aquinas’s definition of a miracle and a particular free-will defence, the Luciferous defence.

Emotion in Augustine of Hippo and Thomas Aquinas: A Way Forward for the Im/passibility Debate?

Abstract:  Recent debates on divine passibility or impassibility are often defined in terms of, and presuppose, a modern understanding of emotion. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas offer a subtle alternative, enabling us to distinguish between rational and irrational, voluntary and involuntary, and virtuous and vicious psychological states. These accounts are explored, and the possibilities they uncover for finding ways through the various impasses in the theological contemporary debate are discussed.     

Saint Thomas Aquinas’ ontological epistemology as clarified realism: The relating of subject to object for ontological knowledge

The Kantian revolution limited the possibility of ontological knowledge, severing subject from thing as is evident in its legacy in both continental and analytic philosophy. Consequently, if a thing cannot be known as it is, the philosophical status of empirical science as a study about existing natural things should be called into question. It could be construed, for instance, that a scientific theory is a construction about something to which the subjective constructor can never have ontological access. But, when empirical scientists develop evidence-based proofs for their theories the assumption of realism usually stands: scientific theories constructed by scientists are actually purported to represent natural entities back to these constructing scientists. Given that there is a danger of philosophy becoming isolated from empirical science, we attempt to bridge the gap between philosophical discourse and science-in-praxis through a recapitulation of Aquinas’ ontological epistemology. Aquinas argued for a clarified realism in which the epistemic is construed as an intersection between the thinking subject and the object. Contrary to naïve realism, then, it will be explicated how Aquinas’ realism was a precursor of “critical realism”, as he discerned the complex interaction of thinking subject and the being of the object as both bearing on the production of knowledge.