Thomism

Introduction
Aquinas’s thought
The 14th and 15th centuries
Thomism in the 16th century
Decline and revival through the mid-20th century
Thomism following the Second Vatican Council

References & Edit History Related Topics

Images

St. Thomas Aquinas Enthroned Between the Doctors of the Old and New Testaments, with Personifications of the Virtues, Sciences, and Liberal Arts, fresco by Andrea da Firenze, c. 1365; in the Spanish Chapel of the Church of Santa Maria Novella, Florence.

Pope Leo XIII seated in formal papal robes and cape, wearing a cross necklace, facing forward, in a black and white portrait from 1878.

At a Glance

Thomism summary

Related Questions

How did Aquinas’s understanding of God differ from Aristotle’s prime mover?
How did Cardinal Cajetan contribute to the interpretation of Thomism during the Renaissance?
How did Francisco de Vitoria and other Salamanca scholars use the Summa theologiae?
How did German idealism differ from Thomism’s view of nature and human beings?
How did Islamic commentators such as Avicenna and Averroës influence the background of Thomism?
How did Jacques Maritain use Thomistic ideas to discuss democracy and community?
How did St. Thomas Aquinas combine Christian theology with Aristotle’s philosophy?
How did Thomas Aquinas defend human freedom while teaching that God governs creation?
How did Thomas Aquinas describe the relationship between the human soul and the body?
How did Thomas Aquinas distinguish God from created beings through essence and existence?
How did Thomas Aquinas distinguish faith from knowledge and opinion?
How did Thomas Aquinas distinguish philosophy from theology?
How did Thomas Aquinas explain the role of natural laws in God’s creation?
How did Thomas Aquinas try to unite reason and faith in the Summa theologiae?
How did Thomas Aquinas use Aristotle’s ideas while preserving Christian doctrine?
How did Thomism influence Christian ideas about moral excellence and happiness?
How did post-Vatican II thinkers apply Thomistic ideas to medical ethics, spirituality, and human rights?
How did some 20th-century thinkers connect Thomism with idealism, phenomenology, and existentialism?
How did the Dominican order help preserve and promote Thomas Aquinas’s teachings after his death?
How did the Second Vatican Council change the position of Thomism in Roman Catholic thought?
How did the question-and-answer format shape Thomas Aquinas’s teaching method?
How does Aquinas’s Fifth Way use purpose in nature to argue for an intelligent guide?
How does Aquinas’s Fourth Way use degrees of perfection in its argument for God?
How does Aquinas’s Third Way argue from contingency to a necessary being?
What did Pope Leo XIII ask Catholics to do in the encyclical Aeterni Patris?
What did Thomas Aquinas mean by esse, or the act of existing?
What religious truths did Thomas Aquinas believe human reason could demonstrate?
What starting points did Thomas Aquinas say philosophers and theologians use in their work?
Which Christian beliefs did Thomas Aquinas believe depended on divine revelation rather than reason alone?
Which Jesuit writers helped begin the 19th-century Thomistic revival?
Which ideas from Aristotle had the strongest influence on Thomism?
Who was St. Thomas Aquinas, and why did his ideas become influential in Roman Catholic theology?
Why are the first three of Aquinas’s Five Ways considered cosmological arguments?
Why did Catholic thinkers revive Thomism in the mid-1800s?
Why did Pope Leo XIII describe Thomas Aquinas as a defender of the Catholic faith?
Why did Thomas Aquinas believe faith and reason could not truly contradict each other?
Why did Thomas Aquinas believe theology should take precedence over philosophy?
Why did Thomas Aquinas describe faith as an act of the intellect guided by the will?
Why did Thomas Aquinas identify the highest human happiness with the vision of God?
Why did some medieval theologians oppose Thomas Aquinas’s use of Aristotelian philosophy?
What is ethics?
How is ethics different from morality?
Why does ethics matter?
Is ethics a social science?
What are some general characteristics of postmodernism?
What do postmodernists believe?
How is postmodernism related to relativism?
Where did Marxism come from?
Why is Marxism important?
How is Marxism different from other forms of socialism?

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Thomism

theology

Written by

Thomas F. O'Meara

Thoma O'Meara, O.P. Professor of Theology, Notre Dame University. Author of Thomas Aquinas Theologian and others.

Thomas F. O'Meara

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Britannica Editors

Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....

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History

Thomism, the theology and philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas (1224/25–1274) and its various interpretations, usages, and invocations by individuals, religious orders, and schools. Thomism’s rich history may be divided into four main periods: the first two centuries after his death (the 14th and 15th centuries), the 16th century, the period from about 1850 to the Second Vatican Council (1962–65), and the period from the Second Vatican Council to the present. Aquinas achieved an original synthesis...

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