Catholic "life" doctrine in relation to Aquinas and Aristotle

[Scott_Dickerson]

I am not a Catholic.

From various accounts I gather that the RCC holds that human life begins at the moment of conception; thus abortion is murder.

I also have gathered that the Church follows, in many if not most ways, the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas, who in turn adapted the ancient teachings of Aristotle to the Church’s use.

Now we get to the meat of the question. Didn’t Aristotle teach that specifically human life was the “form” (we might say “an emergent property”) of the matter of the body, as of its completion AS a functioning human body?

As I understood it, the body first has a “vegetative soul,” to which is subsequently superadded an “animal soul,” with the “human soul” overlaid last of all.

This seems to endorse the very view the RCC rejects–that the product of conception does not have human life from the start, but only at some point fairly close to birth–“viability” constituting a plausible, if imperfect, signifier of the attainment of that point.

Per my interpretation of Aristotle, it is the functionally complete human body (completion including the nervous system) that is a true human being.

Comments? Clarification? Please, no discussion of the morality of abortion per se–just this specific question about the basis of Catholic doctrine.

[Tusculan]

Since we’re in GD, do you mind if I provisionally relate something I remember, but can’t immediately provide a reference for?

IIRC Aquinas and/or Catholic doctrine used to hold that the foetus wasn’t human from the moment of conception, but only could be considered human after a couple of months. Somewhere along the road, however, Catholic doctrine was tightened.

A bit of Googling got me this review, which seems to support my memory. It is a review of A Brief, Liberal Catholic Defense of Abortion by Daniel A. Dombrowski and Robert Deltete (University of Illinois Press, 2000, 158 pp.). Apparently Pius IX in 1869 made the difference.

[Tusculan]

Furthermore this review of Robert Pasnau, *Thomas Aquinas on Human Nature: A Philosophical Study of Summa Theologiae 1a 75-89 *, Cambridge University Press, 2002, points to the Summa, questions 75 and 76 for the basis of the view of Aquinas on the soul. The summary is interesting. If you want to read the Summa yourself, here is an on-line text.

[Beagle]

Ignoring the whole question of philosophy for a moment, traditionally there has been a period in the pregnancy known as “the quickening” that was significant in determining the status a fetus was given. I believe this dates back close to a thousand years, if not longer.

[Beagle]

This is interesting.

For early modern men and women and their medical practitioners, the experience and understanding of pregnancy was primarily uncertain. This uncertainty extended to the whole process of pregnancy-from the moment of conception to delivery, the detection and bearing of a 'true fruit was doubtful. This 'uncertainty was heightened by the fact that both body and language could conceal the truth. The woman herself was frequently uncertain and could be mistaken in her interpretation of the condition of her belly. This ambiguity is expressed in the vague and faltering language used to describe such experiences. Women’s bodies were believed to conceal the truth more readily than their male counterparts. Equally a woman’s physical narrative was more likely to be distrusted. Tensions surrounding the appropriate nature of women’s 'knowledge of such hidden 'secrets also affected the ways in which women and their practitioners described the 'truths` of the belly. This article traces the ambiguities faced by women and their midwives/accoucheurs through three areas of pregnancy: quickening, false conceptions, and the threat of miscarriage. The much-neglected source of medical texts and observations is drawn upon, alongside letters and diaries and judicial material.

Here is an anti-abortion take on the quickening.

Linking Roe to quickening analysis.

[Scott_Dickerson]

Thanks for the cites, folk.

Not that I can comprehend Aquinas in a quick read, but I would like to note the following quotes.

“…The embryo has first of all a soul which is merely sensitive, and when this is removed, it is supplanted by a more perfect soul, which is both sensitive and intellectual…”

“…it must be said that the soul is in the embryo; the nutritive soul from the beginning, then the sensitive, lastly the intellectual soul.”

Have I pulled these quotes too far out of context? Is the RCC doctrine of when the life of the human person begins not based upon Aquinas? Am I wrong in supposing that it is the “intellectual soul” that defines whether a living thing is a human person; and thus that a living thing is not a human person until that point (later than the beginning) when the intellectual soul is present?

Or is it perhaps the RCC view that science has shown that the intellectual soul does after all become present in the matter of the body “at the beginning”?

Or is murder defined, not as the killing of an actual human being, but of that which has the potential to become a human being?

Help! (Not like I’m asking for a lot!..)

[Tusculan]

Even though I’ve been raised RC, I’m not qualified to inform you on RCC doctrine so I can’t help you there. But the books mentioned in the links I provided say that RCC doctrine concerning the beginning of human life is not based on Aquinas.

Aquinas, OTOH can be read as pure philosophy. As you can see from the links I provided, Aquinas never directly dealt with abortion. If you want, you can, however, try to deduce his position from other bits. See for example:
Summa, Second Part of the Second Part, Q 64, Article 8, Objection 2 (which is an argument that Aquinas discusses, but isn’t his position):

Further, it is written (Ex. 21:22): “If . . . one strike a woman with child, and she miscarry indeed . . . if her death ensue thereupon, he shall render life for life.” Yet this may happen without any intention of causing her death. Therefore one is guilty of murder through killing someone by chance.

and Reply to Objection 2 (which is Aquinas’ position)

He that strikes a woman with child does something unlawful: wherefore if there results the death either of the woman or of the animated fetus, he will not be excused from homicide, especially seeing that death is the natural result of such a blow.

This seems to say that the animated fetus is considered on a par with a born human being.

Note that Question 64, article 7 discusses self-defense, and one of the justifications for (some situations of) abortion was that the mother would otherwise die in childbirth.

I’m not well-read into the concept of ‘soul’ with Aquinas either, so I can’t help you more than give a plausible interpretation of the texts themselves. The First Part, Q 75 makes clear that the soul is the principle of living things (animals and humans). But Second Part of the Second Part, Q 64, Article 1 makes clear that animals may be killed. However, that is only for the purpose for which they were designed.

There is no sin in using a thing for the purpose for which it is. Now the order of things is such that the imperfect are for the perfect, even as in the process of generation nature proceeds from imperfection to perfection. Hence it is that just as in the generation of a man there is first a living thing, then an animal, and lastly a man, so too things, like the plants, which merely have life, are all alike for animals, and all animals are for man. Wherefore it is not unlawful if man use plants for the good of animals, and animals for the good of man, as the Philosopher states (Polit. i, 3).

Note his statement that “in the generation of man there is first a living thing, then an animal, and lastly a man”. These few passages indicate that Aquinas did not believe that the soul (or possibly the intellectual soul) was the criterion on which to distinguish between being a human person or not. But the texts seem to be open to multiple interpretations.

I have to leave it at that, lest I’m writing a complete scholarly article on Aquinas’ concept of the soul. If you are really interested, I must recommend you to do some research in the library of a nearby university. Or order the books mentioned earlier. For starters you can try The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas (1993), a collection of articles on various aspects of Aquinas by leading experts in the field. It also has an extensive bibliograpy. Browsing on-line also led to Problem of the Rational Soul in the Thirteenth Century by Richard C. Dales (1995). I’m not sure that it will cover what you’re interested in, though.

[Scott_Dickerson]

Thanks for the quotes and recommendations.

It’s easy to fall into the trap of believing that: (a) the intellectual soul “just is” the defining human soul; (b) it is the indwelling presence of the defining human soul that “just is” the human person; © murder “just is” the killing of a human person as such (as opposed to the killing of a living human body). These points of view may be reasonable for a 21st-century American non-Catholic; that does not mean they have much to do with RCC doctrine.

Anyone else out there who’d care to give me the skinny? (Is it definitely NOT the case that “(human) life begins at conception” comes from St. T? What is the signif of those quotes I found?)

[culov]

Going to a Catholic High School, I am unfortunately forced to listen to their crap. Directly from a Catholic Ethics book:

“The Catholic Church bases its pro-life position on the conviction that a new human being with an immortal soul, created and loved by God, comes into existence at the moment of conception. Human life is sacred from the beginning. As such, the fertalized, living ovum at any stage in its development has all the rights endowed on human beings, the most basic being the right to life. (See the Cathechism of the Catholic Church, #2270.)”

Now CCC, 2270 says:

2270. "Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception.
      From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.[Cf. CDF, Donum vitae I, 1.]
      Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.[Jer 1:5 ; cf. Job 10:8-12 ; Ps 22:10-11 .]
      My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.[Ps 139:15 .] "

I hope this somehow helps you.

[Scott_Dickerson]

CULOV:

Thanks. O’ course, now I’m more confused than ever.

"…Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.[Jer 1:5 ; cf. Job 10:8-12 ; Ps 22:10-11 .] …My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately wrought in the depths of the earth.[Ps 139:15 .] "

So–the Israelites believed in some sort of pre-existence (ie, before conception in the womb) of the soul/person; a doctrine abandoned by the RCC?

When, and under what circumstances, did the RCC adopt the specific doctrine that the human life of the individual person (if that’s the way to put it) began with the uniting of egg and sperm to form a growing organism?

I know what you’re thinking out there, devout Catholics. You’re thinking I’m just getting ready to flame and mock on the subject of abortion. I hereby pledge not to do that. I’m just unsure how it came to be that this specific doctrine became a part of the Church’s teaching. I had thought it was a direct teaching of St. Thomas, but it seems I was wrong.

Anyone?

[Tusculan]

The review I first linked to speciically points to Pope Pius X, who, apparently without any precedent, excommunicated in 1869 everyone involved with abortions. So there is your answer, isn’t it?

Googling on Pius X and abortion will soon show that this appears to be amply documented. Specific references can be found to the papal bull “Apostolicae sedis”. See this site in German.

[Tusculan]

If you want to see at the source itself, you should consult the site of the Holy See.

Here’s the reference to abortion in the Catechism nrs. 2270-2275, with footnotes. Here is the Declaration on Abortion.

Furthermore you see an explanation at something called the Catholic Encyclopedia (lemma Abortion) (TR it says the CC has not modified its standpoint in 1869, only made clear what it was)