THE NATURE OF THE INTELLECTIVE SOUL IN THOMAS AQUINAS

Abstract

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this article is to characterize the human soul as an intellectual potency united to the body as its form, by means of its faculties, in the psychology and epistemology of Thomas Aquinas. The search for knowledge, whether it be philosophical or theological knowledge, originated in the senses, in the beings, is assimilated, compared and unified by the intellective potencies (passive, agent intellect, memory, intelligence, speculative intellect and practical awareness). In Aquinas, following the peripatetic tradition, there is the primacy of understanding over the will. Thus, we will develop this work in three parts. First, on the intellectual substance as body form; then, on the nature of the intellective soul, and finally, on the incorruptibility of the intellectual soul. KEY WORDS: Intellective soul. Form. Body. Incorruptibility.