St.

Augustine of Hippo and

St. Thomas Aquinas
Cruz//Milan//Agdan//Patani//Villar

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SAINT AUGUSTINE
OF HIPPO
 Saint Augustine of Hippo

BACKGROUND
Saint Augustine of Hippo (13 November 354 – 28 August 430
AD) was a Roman African, early Christian
theologian and philosopher from Numidia whose writings
influenced the development of the Western Church and Western
philosophy, and indirectly all of Western Christianity.
A fourth century philosopher whose groundbreaking philosophy
infused Christian doctrine with Neoplatonism.
His numerous written works, the most important of which
are Confessions (c. 400) and The City of God (c. 413–426), shaped
the practice of biblical exegesis and helped lay the foundation for
much of medieval and modern Christian thought.

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 Saint Augustine of Hippo

BACKGROUND
He is the first Western philosopher to promote what has come to
be called "the argument by analogy" against solipsism: there are
bodies external to mine that behave as I behave and that appear
to be nourished as mine is nourished; so, by analogy, I am justified
in believing that these bodies have a similar mental life to mine.
Augustine adopts a subjective view of time and says that time is
nothing in reality but exists only in the human mind’s
apprehension of reality. He believes that time is not infinite
because God “created” it.

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 Renowed for
His books, "The Confessions" and "The City of God." After the authors
of the New Testament, he has probably been the most influential
Christian writer.

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 The Confessions

In the work, Augustine writes about how much he regrets having led a sinful
and immoral life. He discusses his regrets for following the Manichaean
religion and believing in astrology. He writes about Nebridius's role in helping
to persuade him that astrology was not only incorrect but evil, and
Saint Ambrose's role in his conversion to Christianity. The first nine books are
autobiographical and the last four are commentary and significantly more
philosophical. He shows intense sorrow for his sexual sins and writes on the
importance of sexual morality. The books were written as prayers to God,
thus the title, based on the Psalms of David; and it begins with "For Thou hast
made us for Thyself and our hearts are restless till they rest in Thee." The
work is thought to be divisible into books which symbolize various aspects of
the Trinity and trinitarian belief.

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 The City of God

Augustine wrote The City of God, arguing for the truth of Christianity over
competing religions and philosophies and that Christianity was not
responsible for the Sack of Rome, but instead was responsible for its success.
The book presents human history as a conflict between what Augustine calls
the Earthly City (often colloquially referred to as the City of Man, but never by
Augustine) and the City of God, a conflict that is destined to end in victory for
the latter. The City of God is marked by people who forego earthly pleasure to
dedicate themselves to the eternal truths of God, now revealed fully in the
Christian faith. The Earthly City, on the other hand, consists of people who
have immersed themselves in the cares and pleasures of the present, passing
world.

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SAINT THOMAS
AQUINAS
 Saint Thomas Aquinas

BACKGROUND
Thomas Aquinas (1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian
Dominican friar, Philosopher, Catholic priest, and Doctor of the
Church. He is an immensely influential philosopher, theologian,
and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism, within which he is also
known as the Doctor Angelicus and the Doctor Communis.
He was the foremost classical proponent of natural theology and
the father of Thomism; of which he argued that reason is found in
God.

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 Saint Thomas Aquinas

BACKGROUND
Aquinas had the nickname “the Dumb Ox”, which was due to
three reasons: (1) his size (for he was a fat man), (2) he was often
quite and deep in thought, and (3) because many of his classmates
had thought he was stupid at first due to the previous reasons.
However, Aquinas was far from a stupid man and his mentor Saint
Albert once prophetically told the other students, “You call him
the dumb ox, but in his teaching he will one day produce such a
bellowing that it will be heard throughout the world.”

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 Renowed for
His so-called five ways of attempting to demonstrate the existence
of God.

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 The First Way: Argument from Motion

1. Our senses prove that some things are in motion.

2. Things move when potential motion becomes actual motion.
3. Only an actual motion can convert a potential motion into an actual motion.
4. Nothing can be at once in both actuality and potentiality in the same respect
(i.e., if both actual and potential, it is actual in one respect and potential in
another).
5. Therefore nothing can move itself.
6. Therefore each thing in motion is moved by something else.
7. The sequence of motion cannot extend ad infinitum.
8. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other;
and this everyone understands to be God.

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 The Second Way: Argument from Efficient Causes

1. We perceive a series of efficient causes of things in the world.

2. Nothing exists prior to itself.
3. Therefore nothing [in the world of things we perceive] is the efficient cause of itself.
4. If a previous efficient cause does not exist, neither does the thing that results (the effect).
5. Therefore if the first thing in a series does not exist, nothing in the series exists.
6. If the series of efficient causes extends ad infinitum into the past, for then there would be
no things existing now.
7. That is plainly false (i.e., there are things existing now that came about through efficient
causes).
8. Therefore efficient causes do not extend ad infinitum into the past.
9. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the
name of God.
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 The Third Way: Argument from Possibility and Necessity (Reductio
argument)
1. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, that come into being and go out of
being i.e., contingent beings.
2. Assume that every being is a contingent being.
3. For each contingent being, there is a time it does not exist.
4. Therefore it is impossible for these always to exist.
5. Therefore there could have been a time when no things existed.
6. Therefore at that time there would have been nothing to bring the currently existing contingent
beings into existence.
7. Therefore, nothing would be in existence now.
8. We have reached an absurd result from assuming that every being is a contingent being.
9. Therefore not every being is a contingent being.
10. Therefore some being exists of its own necessity, and does not receive its existence from another
being, but rather causes them. This all men speak of as God.
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 The Fourth Way: Argument from Gradation of Being

1. There is a gradation to be found in things: some are better or worse than

others.
2. Predications of degree require reference to the “uttermost” case (e.g., a thing
is said to be hotter according as it more nearly resembles that which is
hottest).
3. The maximum in any genus is the cause of all in that genus.
4. Therefore there must also be something which is to all beings the cause of
their being, goodness, and every other perfection; and this we call God.

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 The Fifth Way: Argument from Design

1. We see that natural bodies work toward some goal, and do not do so by
chance.
2. Most natural things lack knowledge.
3. But as an arrow reaches its target because it is directed by an archer, what
lacks intelligence achieves goals by being directed by something intelligence.
4. Therefore some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are
directed to their end; and this being we call God.

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