OUR GREEK HERITAGE | Aristotle Following Aristotle, Aquinas identifies the highest good of man as happiness and the means by which happiness is attained he identifies, in chorus with Aristotle, as virtue. However, whereas Aristotle believed that man could achieve “perfect happiness” in this life, Aquinas declares that “man’s ultimate happiness will consist in that knowledge of God which he possesses after this life.” David Withun explains that for Aquinas, eternal law is the law of God which can be known only through the revelation of God. Natural law, on the other hand, can be discerned through reason. This is why Aquinas was able to borrow so heavily from Aristotle. Christianity did not contradict but instead completed this knowledge through revelation. For Aquinas there is a transcendent and eternal order of reality by which societies and individuals can be measured and judged and to the dictates of which they should seek to conform. In the end, both Aristotle and Aquinas all make the same mistake of identifying the eternal order with the particular cultural or religious norms they assume as true.
Posted on: Sun, 07 Jul 2013 06:10:22 +0000
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