Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
  1. Home
  2. Browse subjects
  3. Philosophy
  4. Medieval philosophy
  5. Content listing

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

1480 results in Medieval philosophy

Page 49 of 74

Aquinas and the Nicomachean Ethics
  • Edited by Tobias Hoffmann, Jörn Müller, Matthias Perkams
  • Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    25 July 2013
  • Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is the text which had the single greatest influence on Aquinas's ethical writings, and the historical and philosophical value of Aquinas's appropriation of this text provokes lively debate. In this volume of new essays, thirteen distinguished scholars explore how Aquinas receives, expands on and transforms Aristotle's insights about the attainability of happiness, the scope of moral virtue, the foundation of morality and the nature of pleasure. They examine Aquinas's commentary on the Ethics and his theological writings, above all the Summa theologiae. Their essays show Aquinas to be a highly perceptive interpreter, but one who also brings certain presuppositions to the Ethics and alters key Aristotelian notions for his own purposes. The result is a rich and nuanced picture of Aquinas's relation to Aristotle that will be of interest to readers in moral philosophy, Aquinas studies, the history of theology and the history of philosophy.

  • Chapter Thirteen - Pleasure, a supervenient end

  • Edited by Tobias Hoffmann, Catholic University of America, Washington DC, Jörn Müller, Matthias Perkams, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität, Jena, Germany
  • Book:
    Aquinas and the <I>Nicomachean Ethics</I>
    Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    25 July 2013, pp 220-238

  • Summary

    Without doubt happiness is the central concept on which ancient moral philosophy was found. Christian authors' approach to philosophy is very much shaped by their understanding of happiness. The author first sketches out the basic characteristics of Aristotelian happiness. Afterwards, he briefly examines Albert the Great's commentaries on the EN. Aquinas's interpretation of Aristotelian happiness in his own commentary, the Sententia Libri Ethicorum(SLE), can be understood at least partly as a critical reaction to the highly influential reading of his teacher. The author outlines Aquinas's understanding of happiness, starting from his commentary and proceeding to the theological works. This enable to finally evaluate the way in which Aquinas's theological background shaped his reading of Aristotelian eudaimonia. Aristotle generally sticks to the idea that virtuous activity is the essential and constitutive part of happiness.

  • Chapter Four - Duplex beatitudo

  • Edited by Tobias Hoffmann, Catholic University of America, Washington DC, Jörn Müller, Matthias Perkams, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität, Jena, Germany
  • Book:
    Aquinas and the <I>Nicomachean Ethics</I>
    Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    25 July 2013, pp 52-71

  • Summary

    Without doubt happiness is the central concept on which ancient moral philosophy was found. Christian authors' approach to philosophy is very much shaped by their understanding of happiness. The author first sketches out the basic characteristics of Aristotelian happiness. Afterwards, he briefly examines Albert the Great's commentaries on the EN. Aquinas's interpretation of Aristotelian happiness in his own commentary, the Sententia Libri Ethicorum(SLE), can be understood at least partly as a critical reaction to the highly influential reading of his teacher. The author outlines Aquinas's understanding of happiness, starting from his commentary and proceeding to the theological works. This enable to finally evaluate the way in which Aquinas's theological background shaped his reading of Aristotelian eudaimonia. Aristotle generally sticks to the idea that virtuous activity is the essential and constitutive part of happiness.

  • Chapter Five - Aquinas on choice, will, and voluntary action

  • Edited by Tobias Hoffmann, Catholic University of America, Washington DC, Jörn Müller, Matthias Perkams, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität, Jena, Germany
  • Book:
    Aquinas and the <I>Nicomachean Ethics</I>
    Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    25 July 2013, pp 72-90

  • Summary

    Aquinas's interpretation of EN 3.1-5 reveals from the outset a special interest in "choice". He states explicitly that Aristotle's definition of virtue as a "habit issuing in choices" requires a special treatment. The other main concepts discussed in 3.1-5, "the voluntary" and "the will" are in Aquinas's view connected with choice. Since choice is an interior act of the will, it is free in the sense of not being necessitated by any factor outside human reason, and cannot be impeded from taking place. It is thus the act about whose freedom there can never be any doubt. Aquinas's concept of will is not confined to simply positing a "rational appetite". By integrating an Augustinian concept of interior freedom and Aristotelian philosophy of nature, Aquinas is able not only to affirm that the will is open to alternative courses of action but to interpret this as a natural phenomenon.

  • Chapter Nine - Aquinas on Aristotelian justice

  • Edited by Tobias Hoffmann, Catholic University of America, Washington DC, Jörn Müller, Matthias Perkams, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität, Jena, Germany
  • Book:
    Aquinas and the <I>Nicomachean Ethics</I>
    Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    25 July 2013, pp 146-164

  • Summary

    The author discusses Aquinas's treatment of Aristotle and investigates the treatment of Aristotelian justice in his commentary on Book 5 of the Nicomachean Ethics and the way he incorporates this treatment into his systematic writings. This is an interesting test case because in his commentary Aquinas undoubtedly misinterprets at least two of Aristotle's key contentions in ways that make Aristotle look more Thomistic. Aquinas includes in his interpretation material that is foreign to Aristotle. Aquinas uses his partly erroneous and expanded interpretation as the basis for his own treatment of justice in the Summa theologiae. So, if there is a case to be made that Aquinas is un-Aristotelian, anti-Aristotelian, or subverter of Aristotelianism, we might expect to find it in his treatment of Aristotle on justice. Aristotle's ethics provides Aquinas with what appears to be the best system natural reason has produced.

  • Chapter Fourteen - Aristotle, Aquinas, Anscombe, and the new virtue ethics

  • Edited by Tobias Hoffmann, Catholic University of America, Washington DC, Jörn Müller, Matthias Perkams, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität, Jena, Germany
  • Book:
    Aquinas and the <I>Nicomachean Ethics</I>
    Published online:
    05 August 2013
    Print publication:
    25 July 2013, pp 239-257

  • Summary

    Aquinas's interpretation of EN 3.1-5 reveals from the outset a special interest in "choice". He states explicitly that Aristotle's definition of virtue as a "habit issuing in choices" requires a special treatment. The other main concepts discussed in 3.1-5, "the voluntary" and "the will" are in Aquinas's view connected with choice. Since choice is an interior act of the will, it is free in the sense of not being necessitated by any factor outside human reason, and cannot be impeded from taking place. It is thus the act about whose freedom there can never be any doubt. Aquinas's concept of will is not confined to simply positing a "rational appetite". By integrating an Augustinian concept of interior freedom and Aristotelian philosophy of nature, Aquinas is able not only to affirm that the will is open to alternative courses of action but to interpret this as a natural phenomenon.

Page 49 of 74