Sakovska O. The notion of “corpus” in St. Thomas Aquinas’ philosophy.

The thesis paper is dedicated to the concept of “corpus” as it was reflected in the philosophical system of Aquinas. The work provides a sight into the frequency and contexts of the concept’s usage in Corpus Thomisticum in general, specifically in Aquinas’ natural philosophy, metaphysics, epistemology and psychology. The circumstances of this notion’s appearance in St. Thomas’ philosophy are demonstrated, as well as the ways Aquinas’ understanding of this notion has been changing during the different periods of philosopher’s work. The influence of this notion on the further philosophy development was analyzed, as well as the sources of philosophical inspiration (i.e. Aristotelian philosophy, Avicenna’s and Averroes’ approaches etc.), which led to the formation of the Aquinas’ position on the corpus, were disclosed. Through using hermeneutical and comparative historical methods, as well as the elements of conceptual history and statistics, it was demonstrated that during the different periods of work Aquinas’ used the “corpus” notion through the different perspectives (starting with explaining the concept through a substantial form in accordance with Avicenna’s position and resulting in its understanding via defining as a quantity species and a divisible continuum as a reflection of Aristotle’s position). It was also described the ways the notion of corpus has been explained by St. Thomas through the concepts of artificial things, which are not natural but still embody the diversity of substantial forms of the components it was made of. From this position, Aquinas’ understanding of the celestial matter and its influence on the terrestrial beings through the concept of agent was explained.