ST Thomas Aquinas Virtue of Ethics

St Thomas Aquinas virtue of ethics
St. Thomas Aquinas/ The Angelic Doctor
-He was called the angelic doctor because of his angelic purity, his writings about angels, and his
angelic wisdom.
God can be proven in 5 ways
1. Observing movement in the world as proof of God.

2. Identifying the cause and effect and identifying god as the cause of everything.
3. Impairment nature of beings proves the existence of God, who originates only from
within self.
4. Noticing varying levels of human perfection proves that a supreme perfect being must
exist.
5. Knowing that natural beings cant bare intelligence without God granting it to them.
What influenced his virtue of ethics
-St. Thomas Aquinas was greatly influenced by Aristotle’s works when it was translated into
latin and greek where most Christians appreciated his works. His ethical theory was greatly
inspired by Aristotle’s work and that is the Nichomachean ethics. And the main point of the
Aristotle’s ethics is how to achieve happiness, and as same goes for St Thomas Aquinas. Even
though he was greatly influenced by his works, he focused more on the divinity.
Works where he mentioned or is connected to Aristotle
The five ways, the point of this work is to prove God’s existence. For example, the first way
which Aristotle reasoned out in one of his works that there was a first mover, thus St Thomas
Aquinas understood this that the first mover is God, he connected it to Christianity. (p.s. search
kayo inyo ha, akin 2. >:<<<<<< labyu ol mwah)
Order of Law
1. Natural Law- Man acts in accordance with achieving his goals / controls man’s sense of
right and wrong.
2. Human law- this is the man made law that human beings made to maintain peace and
order. It can be changed it is not permanent it can be changed depending on some
circumstances.
3. Divine law- is any law that, according to religious belief, comes directly from the will of
God, in contrast to man-made law. An eteral law it cannot be destroyed or removed.
4. Eternal law- is comprised of those laws that govern the nature of an eternal universe. It is
the moral law; the law of nature. It is the law which God in the creation of man infused
into him for his direction and preservation.
Qualities of Law
1. Law must be just

2. Law must be honest
3. Law must be useful to some degree
4. Law must be possible for fluffiness
5. Law must be permanent
(law must be for everybody, precept- which is kind of order to a group of people; law is for
everyone. )
-Negative laws are forbidden such as killing and etc.

Outcomes if one will abide the law
1. Moral violation- you have sinned

2. Penal violation- held the culprit liable (a mistake but not sinned)
3. Mixed- combination of two violation
His natural law and ethics
According to Aquinas, in human nature there is a tendency for us to follow what is good and bad.
The natural law we can comprehend that doing virtues acts or doing good must be promoted,
while the vices or doing bad deeds must be avoided. He believes that we inclined or act to
survive, to reproduce offspring and guide them, and lastly to know the truth about God.
Feature of human behaviors/actions
He believes that human beings are divided into three, and that is people who are good, bad, and
people who are neutral. He said that in order for an action to be moral, it must be good and not
bad on people.
His virtue of ethics (base on andeng’s understanding only. For more information and shit
visit these sites: https://ourhappyschool.com/philosophy/thomas-aquinas-ethics-analysis,
https://www3.nd.edu/~undpress/excerpts/P01296-ex.pdf, and
https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/thomas-aquinas-ethics-anti-capitalism/)
In ethics, he took inspiration from the greek philosopher aristotle. He believes that in order for
one person to be genuinely happy, it is not all about the materials we receive or attain, pleasure,
honor, and etc. It is all doing things or activities with virtue. A person must focus on themselves
on practicing the moral values in life in order for them to get used to it and they will be able to
do virtuous acts willingly.
His ethical theory involves principles on how to act and virtues. The purpose on these two traits
is to lead them to live in a fulfilling life. If Aristotle believes that human being are directed to
eudaimonia, Aquinas believes in beatitudo or felicitas which means communication with God
and it can only be achieved in afterlife.
St. Augustine believes that true happiness can be attained/achieved in life, St. Aquinas believes
that in this life we cannot achieve the pure happiness that we all want, but, we can all attain true
happiness once we are blessed with God.
St. Aquinas believes/agrees on Aristotle’s ethical theory and that is deciding what right action
should be done depending on what circumstances they are in, but they must be still connected in
virtuous acts. He defines virtue as good habits, the acquired habits are that the will plays the
major role because despite the obstacles that one person will encounter, they will still act
according to their will. While the infused habits are the habits that were not acquired, these are
the habits that God bestowed to people.

ST Thomas Aquinas Virtue of Ethics

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

ST Thomas Aquinas Virtue of Ethics

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

ST Thomas Aquinas Virtue of Ethics

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

St Thomas Aquinas virtue of ethics

St. Thomas Aquinas/ The Angelic Doctor

God can be proven in 5 ways

1. Observing movement in the world as proof of God.

What influenced his virtue of ethics

Works where he mentioned or is connected to Aristotle

1. Law must be just

-Negative laws are forbidden such as killing and etc.

1. Moral violation- you have sinned

His natural law and ethics

Feature of human behaviors/actions

You might also like