Kantianism and Thomistic Personalism on the Human Person: Self-Legislator or Self-Determiner?

• Authors: Knasas John F. X.
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

Inspired by a discussion about whether John Paul II grounded human dignity in a Kantian way, viz., emphasizing the person as an end unto itself, the author considers: (1) the relations between Kant and Aquinas on the topic of the philosophical basis of human dignity, and (2) John Paul II’s remarks on Kant’s ethics. He concludes that: (1) both Kant and Aquinas ground human dignity upon human freedom, but both understand the human freedom differently; (2) for Kant, human freedom is self-legislating and so exercised without rational direction; (3) the Thomistic notion of freedom is compatible with rational direction which consists, e.g., in the human understood as an intellector of being or as a willer of the good, though neither seem to be exploited by Wojtyla.

Keywords

EN

person; dignity; self-legislator; self-determiner; intellector of being; willer of the good; ethics; freedom; rationality; reason; will; Immanuel Kant; Thomas Aquinas; John Paul II; Karol Wojtyla

• Publisher: International Étienne Gilson Society
• Journal: Studia Gilsoniana
• Year: 2018
• Volume: 7
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 437-451

Dates

published

2018-09

Contributors

author

Knasas John F. X.

• University of St. Thomas, Houston, TX, USA

References

• Aquinas, Thomas. Questiones Disputatae de Veritate: Question I, translated by Robert W. Mulligan, S.J. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1952; Questions XXI, translated by Robert W. Schmidt, S.J. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1954. Accessible at: https://dhspriory.org/thomas/QDdeVer.htm. Accessed on Feb. 25, 2018.
• Aquinas, Thomas. Summa Contra Gentiles, translated by Vernon J. Bourke. Notre Dame, IN: Notre Dame Press, 1975.
• Aquinas, Thomas. Summa Theologiae. Second and Revised Edition, 1920. Literally translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province. Online Edition Copyright © 2017 by Kevin Knight, accessible at: http://www.newadvent.org/sum ma/. Accessed on Feb. 25, 2018.
• Kant, Immanuel. Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, translated by Mary Gregor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
• Knasas, John F. X. Being and Some Twentieth-Century Thomists. New York: Fordham University Press, 2003.
• Knasas, John F. X. “Kant and Aquinas on the Grounds of Moral Necessity.” In Atti del Congresso Internazionale su «L’Umanesimo Cristiano nel III Millennio. La Prospettiva di Tommaso d’Aquino», Vol. II , 748–53. Vatican City 2005.
• Wojtyla, Karol. “The Problem of the Will in the Analysis of the Ethical Act.” In Person and Community: Selected Essays, translated by Theresa Sandok, O.S.M., 3–22. New York: Peter Lang, 1993.
• Wojtyla, Karol. “The Problem of the Separation of Experience from the Act in Ethics.” In Person and Community: Selected Essays, translated by Theresa Sandok, O.S.M., 23–44. New York: Peter Lang, 1993.
• Wojtyla, Karol. “In Search of the Basis of Perfectionism in Ethics.” In Person and Community: Selected Essays, translated by Theresa Sandok, O.S.M., 45–56. New York: Peter Lang, 1993.

Notes

EN

SELECTED PAPERS OF THE SOCIETY FOR THOMISTIC PERSONALISM Guest Editor of the Issue: R. Mary Hayden Lemmons

Identifiers

ISSN

2577–0314

ISSN

2300–0066

DOI

10.26385/SG.070321