Document Type : Research Paper
Authors
1 Professor of Philosophy, University of Tabriz
2 Associate professor of Philosophy, University of Tabriz
3 PhD student of philosophy, University of Tabriz
Abstract
Beauty is a metaphysical concept in Thomas. Such an attitude about beauty necessarily will relate it to the other philosophical concepts. It can be said that the understanding of beauty – which separated from Good- is impossible in the Hellenistic and middle ages thoughts- which are a kind of metaphysical one - because Beauty and Good are often enumerated as the objective properties of Beings in these thoughts. Thomas as other predecessors accepts the same idea about Beauty too and connects it with the Being. So we can enumerate beauty as one of the Transcendentals; one of which necessarily connect with Goodness; because the Transcendentals not only have connected with the Being but also with each other. Beauty, in Aquinas' philosophy, is an objective property and at the same time has connected with apprehension and with the soul too. Because of this, the appetitive power of the soul will owe the beauty by the mediation of the intelligence.
Highlights
Beauty and its Relation to Goodness in Thomas Aquinas’s Philosophical System
Morteza Shajari1, Hasan Fathi2, Zahra Gozali3
- 1. Professor of Philosophy, University of Tabriz. E-mail: mortezashajari@gmail.com
- 2. Professor of Philosophy, University of Tabriz. E-mail: hfathi42@yahoo.com
- 3. PhD. Candidate of Philosophy, University of Tabriz (correspondent author) E-mail: zhr.gozali@gmail.com
Abstract
Beauty is a metaphysical concept in Thomas. Such an attitude about beauty necessarily will relate it to the other philosophical concepts. It can be said that the understanding of beauty – which separated from Good- is impossible in the Hellenistic and middle ages thoughts- which are a kind of metaphysical one - because Beauty and Good are often enumerated as the objective properties of Beings in these thoughts. Thomas as other predecessors accepts the same idea about Beauty too and connects it with the Being. So we can enumerate beauty as one of the Transcendentals; one of which necessarily connect with Goodness; because the Transcendentals not only have connected with the Being but also with each other. Beauty, in Aquinas' philosophy, is an objective property and at the same time has connected with apprehension and with the soul too. Because of this, the appetitive power of the soul will owe the beauty by the mediation of the intelligence.
Keywords: Beauty, Goodness, transcendentals, Aquinas.
Introduction
Goodness, unlike beauty, has attracted the attention of many philosophers. Thomas is one of them who were familiar with Dionysius' thoughts especially with Divine Names. Beauty, because of this familiarity, appears for him as a philosophical subject. So he correlated it with Goodness. Taking such an attitude about beauty necessarily will relate this concept with the other philosophical concepts. It can be said that the understanding of beauty – which separated from Goodness- is something almost impossible in the Hellenistic and Middle Ages thoughts; because Beauty and Goodness are often enumerated as the objective properties of Beings. The determination of their relationship will be possible when we determine the relationship between them in the base of the general properties of the Being. Undoubtedly goodness is one of the Transcendentals. But this is not right about beauty. So we must determine that is a beauty one of this property or not. Thomas as the same as the other predecessors accepts the same idea about Beauty and connects it with the Being. In fact beauty, in his thought, is the property of being as being. So we can enumerate it as one of the Transcendentals; on of that which necessarily connect with Goodness; because the Transcendentals not only have connected with the Being but also with each other.
Beauty
There is a difference between nature and the concept of something and this is true about beauty.
The definition of Beauty
Thomas gives us two definitions of beauty. Beauty in these definitions is a thing that gives pleasure only in being seen or in being apprehended. These definitions say nothing about the nature of the beauty but only say about which impacts that seeing or apprehending of beauty make in us. So the definitions of Thomas about beauty are a type of a posterior one i.e., the definition by its effect, that is, by pleasure.
The Nature of Beauty
Thomas enumerates three objective conditions for beauty: harmony, integrity, and clarity; and calls the last one i.e. the clarity as the nature of beauty. Clarity is belonging to the Form in his thought. It is an ontological basis that participates in existence. According to him, Clarity of a thing implies to the knowability of that thing too. So we must enumerate it as the nature of beauty.
Transcendentality of Beauty
In this article have been clarified some reasons in favor of transcendentality of beauty. And these reasons are: beauty is the cause of the existence of all things; beauty is based on Form and the clarity and splendor of the beautiful. Beauty and goodness have the same reality. But they conceptually are different, because all the transcendentals add something to being conceptually. So beauty had a distinctive concept for itself. Beauty adds to goodness the relation with cognitive power. So it can be said that beauty adds its distinctive concept to being, i.e. clarity and it's relation to cognitive power.
Conceptually difference between beauty and goodness
All the transcendentals add conceptually something to the Being. This is true about Beauty. It, in Aquinas' philosophy, is an objective property and at the same time has connected with apprehension and with the soul too. So we must say that beauty is a relative transcendental. In other word, beauty needs to a relationship between the beautiful and the cognitive soul. Such a relationship will correlate beauty with the other power of the soul i.e. with the appetitive power. Because of such connection, the appetitive power of the soul will owes beauty by the mediation of the intelligence and so attains a type of real unity with beauty and consequently attains self-perfection and self -final actuality. So the relation between beauty and the soul is the relation of will perfecting by the intellect. So beauty adds to being such a relationship. The intellect attains a type of unity with the beautiful thing and then the will moves toward that beautiful thing and consequently attains a real unity between intellect and beauty and the soul rests in that unity.
Posteriority of Goodness over Beauty
Then beauty adds to goodness the relation which it adds to the cognitive power. In fact beauty in hierarchy of the transcendentals is the last one and because of that, it is the last one in hierarchy of the concept of goodness and the other posterior transcendentals. So in hierarchy of transcendentals, we cannot assume the other one after the beauty that its concept is more perfect than beauty concept. So the perfection of beauty is superior to the perfection of goodness. Its perfection is in the way that we can consider it as latest transcendental.
References
- Aquinas, Thomas (1947) Summa Theologica, trans. Fathers of English Dominican Province, in: http://dhspriory.org/thomas/summa/index.html.
- Aquinas, Thomas (2007) Expositio Super Dionysium De Divinis Nominibus, trans. Ananda. K. Coomaraswamy, in: Figures of Speech or Figures of Thought? World Wisdom, Bloomington, Indiana.
- Aquinas, Thomas (2018) Sententia, in Opera Omnia, by Enrique Alarcon, in: http://www.corpusthomisticum.org/iopera.html.
- Aquinas, Thomas (1955-57) Summa Contra Gentiles, New York: Hanover House, in: https://dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles.html.
- Aquinas, Thomas (2017) Questiones Disputatae de Veritate, in: http://dhspriory.org/thomas/QDdeVer.htm.
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