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Is it possible to be a phenomenological Thomist? An investigation of the notions of esse and esse commune
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2024
Abstract
This article tests whether it is possible to be a ‘phenomenological-Thomist’ through the provision of the first stages of a loosely speaking Heideggerian phenomenological interpretation of the meaning of being an entity as it is disclosed in experience. In the process, the article will unpack and reinterpret the concepts of esse and esse commune in the thought of Thomas Aquinas.
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- Copyright © 2012 The Author. New Blackfriars
References
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19 This view of principles and causes as the ends of a process of abstraction is common in the Aristotelian-Thomist view of being and universals and in particular within what gets called ‘moderate realism’.
20 Heidegger's view of principle as ground or as grounding, I would suggest, is analogous to Kant's view of principles in the Critique of Pure Reason, in particular the expositions of space and time as the a priori forms of intuition. See: Heidegger, Phenomenological Interpretation of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason and Heidegger, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics. It is important to note that for Heidegger, unlike Kant, first principles are not simply intrinsic to the a priori structure of human intuition and reason.
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30 It will be presupposed in this article that we can take ens to signify the formal concept of the being of entities.
31 Thomas Aquinas, I Sent., VIII, 1, 1. Translated by James Anderson, An Introduction to the Metaphysics of St. Thomas Aquinas, p.20.
32 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book II: Creation, Chapter 54.
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34 Thomas Aquinas, ‘De ente et essentia’, in Selected Writings, pp.41, 43. This interpretation is supported by Thomas’ claim that the human soul, although close to the material, is in part individuated by its esse and not merely our material composition. “ … although its individuation depends on the body as upon the occasion for its beginning … it is not necessary that its individuation be lost when the body is taken away because that existence, since it is absolute, always remains individuated once the soul acquires it …”.
35 Scott MacDonald, ‘The Esse/Essentia Argument in Aquinas’ De ente et essentia’, p. 158.
36 W. Norris Clarke, The One and the Many: A contemporary Thomist metaphysics, p.32.
37 Thomas Aquinas, ‘On Being and Essence’, in Thomas Aquinas: Selected Writings, pp.41–43. See also: Lehrberger, James, ‘The Anthropology of Aquinas’ “De Ente Et Essentia”’, The Review of Metaphysics, vol.51, 4 (1998), p.837Google Scholar.
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39 Thomas Aquinas, I Sentences, d.19, p.5 as paraphrased by John Wippel, Metaphysical Themes in Thomas Aquinas, Vol.II, p.67.
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42 Ibid., pp.114–116.
43 Gregory LaNave, ‘God, Creation, and the possibility of philosophical wisdom’, Theological Studies, 2008, 69.
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46 Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles, Book One: God, 26, 5.
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48 John Wippel, The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas, p.116.
49 We could easily find the same kind of community through dependent interactions in the way that rivers are formed through the interactions of water and mountains, or beaches through the interaction of waves and sandstone, mountains through the interaction of tectonic plates, the activities of life and the individual act of the earth, the earth, sun, and other planets that constitute the solar system, etc … It is, however, often more difficult in inanimate entities to determine individual act because inanimate objects have acts but less obvious expressive activities.