WHO AM I?

(THE HUMAN
PERSON AS A
MORAL BEING)

A.BASIC ANTHROPOLOGY
MAN IS A PERSON
MAN IS A SUBSTANTIAL
UNITY
MAN IS A SOCIAL BEING
MAN POSSESSES DIGNITY
AND RIGHTS

A. BASIC ANTHROPOLOGY
MAJOR THEMES
1. MAN IS A PERSON

A CONCRETE INDIVIDUAL SUBSTANCE

ENDOWED WITH REASON

2. MAN IS A SUBSTANTIAL UNITY

A UNION OF BODY AND SOUL, AN
EMBODIED-SPIRIT

MAN POSSESSES A COMPLETE SPECIFIC/UNIQUE NATURE

MAN IS NOT MERELY AN INDIVIDUAL SUBSTANCE WITH A

UNIQUE EXISTENCE

FREEDOM
TO SELFGOVERN
IN THE
WORLD

RATIONAL
NATURE /
INTELLIGENCE
TO
UNDERSTAND
THE WORLD

ACCORDING TO SAINT THOMAS AQUINAS

THE HUMAN PERSON IS THE MOST PERFECT IN THE WHOLE NATURE

WITH REASON TO UNDERSTAND THE WORLD

AND WILL TO DIRECT HIMSELF TO TRUE GOOD

3. MAN IS A SOCIAL BEING

Man is a relational being. He is open to himself and to others

Hence, man is inter-subjectivity, a community
LOVE

Social Nature of Man

Founded on nature
Life a life of comfort and security
Capacity of speech
There is no need for means of
communication if man is meant by
nature to be alone.

Social nature to
social obligation
General not an individual command
Now, is it wrong to live in solitude?
It is not wrong for a hermit to live alone if, in
his estimation, he can achieve his individual
aims in a better way by adopting the
solitary life.
Marriage is a general demand but not
everyone is not oblige to marry.

Social contract

When man enters into a society, he

contracts his freedom because he
has to live with other free beings.
Jean Jacques Rousseau

What are mans social obligations as

social being?
POLITICS
- man needs society, and if he does
not because he is sufficient unto
himself, that man is either a beast or
a god.

Extreme notions of man as a

social being:
SOCIALISM / COMMUNISM
- mortal enemy of capitalism
- issue of private property
Socialists propose to abolish capitalism
and private property because they
claim these are the sources of social
evils.

Communism
Is a complicated doctrine which includes
a complex of atheism, evolutionism,
historical materialism; it has a
methodology on its own according to
which the future ideal state can be
attained through revolution, dictatorship
suppression of freedom, etc.
New Order of Society: blind obedience
to the Party

Right to Private Property

Nature intends men to have private
property to a certain extent for his
needs and for those of his family.
But, abuse can be perpetrated.
Therefore, the needs of Ethics, so
that men are made aware of their
social obligation to other men.

Reminders of Ethics:
Principle of Stewardship
Universal Destination of Goods
Common Good
It stands to reason that if they derive protection
from society, they must be ready to contribute to
that society.
Submit to authority and to the legitimate laws of
society

4. MAN POSSESSES DIGNITY AND RIGHTS

THE HUMAN PERSON POSSESSES DIGNITY THAT HAS NO PRICE BUT VALUE
IMMANUEL KANT

TO BE A HUMAN BEING IS TO BE A FELLOW HUMAN BEING

MARTIN BUBER

I EXIST IN THE MEASURE THAT I EXIST FOR OTHERS

FOR AFTER ALL, TO BE IS TO LOVE
E. MOUNIER

THE FACE OF THE OTHER TELLS ME THAT IT IS IMPOSSIBLE

TO KILL THE PERSON WITH THAT FACE
E. LEVINAS

B. CHRISTIAN ANTHROPOLOGY
MAN IS A CREATURE
MAN IS THE IMAGE OF GOD
MAN IS FALLEN BUT REDEEMED

1. MAN IS A CREATURE

TO BELIEVE IN GOD AS CREATOR

IS TO LOOK UPON COSMIC EVOLUTION AS GODS CONTINUING ACTION
THIS VISION SHOULD MAKE MAN RESPONSIBLE, LOVING, AND CARING

TO AFFIRM GOD AS CREATOR

IS TO HIGHLIGHT MANS RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD

ALL HUMAN ACTIVITIES ARE SEEN AS EXPRESSIONS

OF THE CREATIVE AND PERSONAL ACTION OF GOD

2. MAN IS THE IMAGE OF GOD

Mans likeness to God is not only in his reason but also in his
responsible conduct.
He has the capacity to respond freely to the call of God.

BECAUSE OF THIS REALITY OF MAN

CARE MUST BE TAKEN THAT THERE BE NO MANIPULATION
THAT MAKES MAN LESS HUMAN
THAT VIOLATES THE DIGNITY OF HIS PERSONALITY
MADE TO THE IMAGE OF GOD.

3. MAN IS FALLEN AND REDEEMED

FROM THE DAWN OF HISTORY, MAN ABUSED HIS FREEDOM

SET HIMSELF AGAINST GOD AND
SOUGHT TO FIND FULFILLMENT APART FROM GOD

AS A CONSEQUENCE, MAN BECAME AWARE OF HIS LIMITATIONS

AND HIS ABILITY TO BECOME WHAT HE OUGHT AND DESIRES TO BECOME

MANS REASON HAS BEEN CLOUDED AND HIS WILL WEAKENED BY SIN
AND THUS THE IMAGE OF GOD HAS BEEN DISTORTED

THROUGH THE INCARNATION GOD HAS ENTERED HUMAN HISTORY

AND RESTORED THE IMAGE OF GOD IN MAN.

ON ACCOUNT OF HIS GREAT LOVE, HE BECAME WHAT WE ARE

THAT HE MIGHT MAKE US WHAT HE IS
ST IRINAEUS

THE CHRISTIAN RESPONSE TO GODS CALL

MUST INVOLVE ENTRUSTING ONESELF COMPLETELY TO THE LORD OF THE
FUTURE

EACH MORAL CHOICE IS A STEP OF FAITH INTO THE FUTURE

WHICH PREPARES FOR THE NEXT STEP INTO THE UNKNOWN DESTINY
WHICH GOD HAS PREPARED FOR THOSE WHO LOVE HIM

Main Ideas:
St.Thomas understands man as a whole
Man is substantially united body and soul
Man is the point of convergence between
corporeal and spiritual substances
Man is one substance body and soul
He is insistent that man is a substantial
unity of body and soul
Manis composed of spiritual and
corporeal substance

 Man is an embodied soul, not a soul using a

body as Plato asserted
Man is substantially body and soul
Only the soul is a substance, while the body
is actual
He asserts that any existing body is perfect
or any existing body is actual
all things which are diversified by
the diverse participation of being, are
more or less perfect

 No body can exist apart from matter

Any body should be necessarily be
material
This means that any body is actual
because it exists as such completely
as it is
The mere existence of a body makes a
body complete, perfect and actual

 Per se, the human body is perfect

It has head, hands, feet, and all else
that a human body must have
But it must be united to something
else that will enable it to perform
its intrinsic function as a human
body
The human body must be united with
something else which we call soul

 The human body has the

potentiality to be animated by the
soul

When animation happens, the

two become one
When a human body is animated by the
soul specifically during conception,
the soul includes the body in its
definition and in its act

 The soul substantiates the body

which is actual then becomes
one with the body in act
It is through animation that the
soul substantiates the actual
body
The two become one substance

On the soul
The soul, the animator of the
human body, is a substance.
It is a substance because it exists by
itself; it is incorporeal and spiritual.
Soul is a substance because it acts, it
wills, it thinks, it knows, etc.
The souls possession of will and
intellect is a priori and intrinsic in it.
The soul is unified with the body for
its lower activity, i.e. sensation.

 Sensation can only be realized in the

context of a body.
The soul in this context is limited that it
needs the correlative function of a
material element called body.
Hence, the intellectual soul is
understood by St. Thomas as the form
of the body because the soul is the
principle of life of the body, the principle
of nourishment and the principle of
movement.
Body and soul are substantially united.

 Although the body and soul are

substantially united, each retains its
own substantial identity because the
soul is not the body in the same
manner that the body is not the soul.
Soul is united to the body not only
because of perception, but also,
because it is the form of the body.
By form, St. Thomas explains, is
meant that the soul is the bodys
principle of activity.

 A body, categorically speaking, can act

only through the soul, because the
latter is the principle of life of the
former.
The soul in man is not only an
embodied substance in itself-because it
is immaterial or spiritual-but it is also, at
the same time, the form of the body.
Thus, the parts of a human body like
head, feet, ears, nose, eyes, skin,
tongue, and the rest, can only act
according through the soul.

 Through this, the souls animation

by the body (during conception)
becomes evident.
In this animation, the two are one in
a form of substantial unity in man.
However, it must be made lucid that
a body is not necessary to the
intellectual operation consideration
as such but because of the sensitive
power, which requires an organ of
equitable temperament, which
actually refers to the body.

What does St. Thomas mean

by substance?
Substance is that whose essence
necessitates its own existence.
In simple terms, a substance essentially
exists by itself.
But why did St. Thomas call the soul in
man substance?
When the soul animates the body, does
it make the body also a substance?

 Accordingly, the soul and the body

become substance only in terms of
participation.
St. Thomas asserts that everything
that is in any way it is, is from God.
For him, God is the only substance;
God is the only self-subsisting Being.
But this does not imply that the
human body and the human soul are
not substances.

 These are substances only by

participation.
The human body becomes a substance,
only when it is animated by the soul.
This animation is actually intrinsic in
the human body, for as long as there is
a human body there is also a soul
(except in death which is only a
temporary separation of body and soul
because in the Last Judgment the two
will be united again); like the body, the
soul is also a substance.

 Each of them becomes a substance by

virtue of their participation with God,
the only substance.
The human body and the human soul
are one substance in man and they are
unified together as an embodied soul.
However, matter is subject to
corruption.
So, a human body is subject to
corruption by necessity of its matter.
On the other hand, because the soul is
immaterial it is free from corruption.

 This logically makes the soul immortal.

Because it is immortal, its higher
powers such as intellect and will must
remain in the soul after the destruction
of the body.
And the substantial unity of the body
and soul, according to St. Thomas,
ceases at the cessation of breath.

To sum up
Man is substantially body and soul.
The soul is united with the human
body because it is the substantial
form of the human body.
Further, it is the principle of life of
the body.
But the soul, however, requires the
body as the material medium for its
operation particularly perception.

 Nevertheless, it has operative

functions (higher powers) which do
not need a material medium; they are
mans intellect and will.
Thus, at death, the souls intellection
and will remain in the soul as it is
immortal, simple, and incorruptible.
Body and soul before death are
essentially united because the two
exist in a correlative manner
specifically in the context of
perception.