The substantial unit of soul and the body in Thomas of Aquinas

Abstract

Between the Spiritualistic tendency, which characterizes itself for seeing man as rational soul, and the body as its cage; and, on the other hand, the Materialistic tendency of viewing man as a body, the Thomistic Anthropology conceives man as compound of body and soul, matter and spirit. Thomas of Aquinas, within an ontological analysis of the sensible real, establishes from the ontological unity between body and soul, the possibility for one to observe the external movement of the body as evidence of its deep structure, where sensations, memories, feelings, desires and thoughts are wrought and reflected the latter’s way of acting. The intelligible being is involved in the sensitive existence.