Intelligence is conditional and conditioning love. “Intellectual light full of love – love of the true good, full of joy…” is how Dante, one of the first Thomists, translated the Thomist concept of intelligence-goodness into poetry.

According to historical sources, Thomas was a Sunday monk. The thought and faith of St Thomas were, for centuries, the basis of the philosophical and theological studies of the seminarians and experienced a particular revival over time through the work of Leo XIII and Jacques Maritain.

And perhaps even more topical than the great Summae are the Theological-Pastoral and Spiritual Opuscles, which are constantly reprinted.

In 1244 Thomas became a Dominican monk, much to the chagrin of his family, who were looking forward to his becoming a Benedictine monk and abbot.

Thomas Aquinas considered the three points of his theory of the dogma of Christianity to be the following:

1. Reason is bound to criticize itself, correcting itself. When one of its conclusions contradicts dogma, without, however, using revelation or dogma as the supreme argument but only as a signal of error. The ideas for the decision of any philosophical rejection must belong to reason.

2. The philosopher is bound to understand and explain the word of God. This means that there is also a rational discourse about divinity alongside revealed theology. Natural theology does not compete with revealed theology, nor is it the whole of philosophy. It is a complement to revealed theology and a crowning achievement for philosophy.

3. The theology included in sacred doctrine differs in kind from that theology that is part of philosophy.

Thomas’s father had died, but the rest of the family was so upset that the Dominicans decided to send him to Paris for safety.

Did Aquinas believe in God?

The problem of a correct interpretation of Aristotelianism was cardinal: with the Arabic commentaries, Aristotelianism was theologically unacceptable; on the other hand, the brutal elimination of these commentaries and their theses was impossible, the famous condemnations proving not once ineffective. All that remained for Thomas was confronting the Averroists to achieve a balanced understanding of the texts and concepts.

According to his clear statements as a monk, Thomas firmly believed in God and His Word. 

According to this understanding, privations and negations are not beings. Thus, we have a firm basis for following the essence, that is, something that makes a being what it is.