Saint Thomas Aquinas

Born 1225/1227, Roccasecca, near Aquino, Terra di Lavoro, Kingdom of Sicily

Died March 7, 1274, Fossanova, near Terracina, Latium, Papal States
Canonized July 18, 1323
Feast day January 28, formerly March 7
Father Count Landulf of an old high-born south Italian family
Mother Countess Theodora of Theate of noble Norman descent
Monte Cassino early education, at the age of 5
Sinibald abbot of Monte Cassino, Count Landulfs brother
Military career pursued by the rest of the family's sons
Abbacy a normal career path for a younger son of southern Italian nobility.
After nine years forced to return to his family when the emperor expelled the monks because they were too
obedient to the pope
Enrolled at the studium generale recently established by Frederick in Naples (University of Naples) where he
encountered the scientific and philosophical works of Aristotle, Averroes and Maimonides
Thomas came under the influence of John of St. Julian, a Dominican preacher in Naples, who was part of the
active effort by the Dominican order to recruit devout followers
Here his teacher in arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music was Petrus de Ibernia
At age nineteen, Thomas resolved to join the Dominican Order.
Dominicans a new religious order founded 30 years earlier, which departed from the traditional
paternalistic form of government for monks to the more democratic form of the mendicant friars and from the
monastic life of prayer and manual labour to a more active life of preaching and teaching
Thomas's change of heart did not please his family, who had expected him to become a Benedictine monk
apparently wanting him to become an influential and financially secure abbot or archbishop rather than take a
friar's vow of poverty
In an attempt to prevent Theodora's interference in Thomas's choice, the Dominicans arranged for Thomas to
be removed to Rome, and from Rome, sent to Paris
On his way to Rome, his brothers, per Theodora's instructions, seized him as he was drinking from a spring and
took him back to his parents at the castle of Monte San Giovanni Campano where he was held for two years in
the family homes at Monte San Giovanni and Roccasecca in an attempt to prevent him from assuming the
Dominican habit and to push him into renouncing his new aspiration
Family members became desperate to dissuade Thomas, who remained determined to join the Dominicans. At
one point, two of his brothers hired a prostitute to seduce him, but he drove her away, wielding a burning
stick.
Thomas held out stubbornly against his family despite a year of captivity, by 1244, seeing that all of her
attempts to dissuade Thomas had failed, Theodora sought to save the family's dignity, arranging for Thomas to
escape at night through his window. In her mind, a secret escape from detention was less damaging than an
open surrender to the Dominicans. Thomas was sent first to Naples and then to Rome to meetJohannes von
Wildeshausen, the Master General of the Dominican Order
In the autumn of 1245 went to Paris to the convent of Saint-Jacques, the great university centre of the
Dominicans; there he studied under Albertus Magnus, a tremendous scholar with a wide range of intellectual
interests
During the summer of 1248, Aquinas left Paris with Albertus, who was to assume direction of the new faculty
established by the Dominicans at the convent in Cologne Pope Innocent IV's offer to appoint him abbot of
Monte Cassino as a Dominican
Albertus then appointed the reluctant Thomas magister studentium
He remained there until 1252, when he returned to Paris to prepare for the degree of master of theology.
After taking his bachelors degree, he received the licentia docendi (license to teach) at the beginning of
1256 and shortly afterward finished the training necessary for the title and privileges of master
In the year 1256 he began teaching theology in one of the two Dominican schools incorporated in the
University of Paris.
In 1259 Thomas was appointed theological adviser and lecturer to the papal Curia, then the centre of Western
humanism
He returned to Italy, where he spent two years at Anagni at the end of the reign of Alexander IV and four
years at Orvieto with Urban IV
From 1265 to 1267 he taught at the convent of Santa Sabina in Rome and then, at the request of Clement IV,
went to the papal Curia in Viterbo
In November 1268, he was sent to Paris, where he became involved in a sharp doctrinal polemic that had just
been triggered off.
At Easter time in 1272, Thomas returned to Italy to establish a Dominican house of studies at the University of
Naples. This move was undoubtedly made in answer to a request made by King Charles of Anjou, who was
anxious to revive the university. After participating in a general chapter, or meeting, of the Dominicans held in
Florence during Pentecost week and having settled some family affairs, Thomas resumed his university
teaching at Naples in October and continued it until the end of the following year.
In January 1274 Thomas Aquinas was personally summoned by Gregory X to the second Council of Lyons,
which was an attempt to repair the schism between the Latin and Greek churches. On his way he was stricken
by illness; he stopped at the Cistercian abbey of Fossanova, where he died on March 7
The writings of Thomas may be classified as: (1) exegetical, homiletical, and liturgical; (2) dogmatic, apologetic,
and ethical; and (3) philosophical. Among the genuine works of the first class were: Commentaries on Job
(1261-65); on Psalms, according to some a reportatum, or report of speeches furnished by his companion
Raynaldus; on Isaiah; the Catena aurea, which is a running commentary on the four Gospels, constructed on
numerous citations from the Fathers; probably a Commentary on Canticles, and on Jeremiah; and wholly or
partly reportata, on John, on Matthew, and on the epistles of Paul; including, according to one authority,
Hebrews i.-x. Thomas prepared for Urban IV: Officium de corpore Christi (1264); and the following works may
be either genuine or reportata: Expositio angelicce salutationis; Tractatus de decem praeceptis; Orationis
dominico expositio; Sermones pro dominicis diebus et pro sanctorum solemnitatibus; Sermones de
angelis, and Sermones de quadragesima. Of his sermons only manipulated copies are extant. In the second
division were: In quatitor sententiarum libros, of his first Paris sojourn; Questiones disputatce, written at Paris
and Rome; Questiones quodlibetales duodecini; Summa catholicce fidei contra gentiles (1261-C,4); andthe
Summa theologica. To the dogmatic works belong also certain commentaries, as follows: Expositio in librum
beati Dionysii de divinis nominibits; Expositiones primoe et secundce; In Boethii libros de hebdomadibus;
and Proeclare quoestiones super librum Boethii de trinitate. A large number ofopuscitla also belonged to this
group. Of philosophical writings there are cataloged thirteen commentaries on Aristotle, besides numerous
philosophical opuscula of which fourteen are classed as genuine.