Thomas Aquinas

John Wippel, a Thomistic interpreter of the Gilsonian version of Existential Thomism states that the metaphysical thought of Thomas Aquinas has been a singular effort of the discovery of being as real or as existing which in turn makes it easier for us to understand being as being or ens commune. This task is processed through the intellect9s two operations, viz., its first operation, i.e., simple apprehension wherein we come to the knowledge of 8the essential nature of something9 or 8of what things are9 and its second operation called judgement. Further, it is only through a special kind of judgement known as separatio that we come to discover being as being or ens commune or being in general as Thomas Aquinas calls it.

We find a wonderful synthesis of Husserlian phenomenology and Thomism in the later thought of Edith Stein, inspired by her conversion to the Catholic faith. The resulting relational ontology presents being as opening up and unfolding into infinity. Stein9s thought is an integration, not a compromise, of phenomenological attentiveness to lived experience with the metaphysical realism of the Christian tradition, especially of Thomas Aquinas, ordered towards a fuller understanding of the human person as grounded in truth, open to transcendence, and ultimately fulfilled in God.