Jon W. Thompson

Much of the Christian philosophical and theological tradition has affirmed hylomorphism: a philosophical anthropology on which the person is understood as a fundamental unity of soul and body. This resonates not only with certain touchstone philosophical authors, such as Aristotle, but also with the theological doctrine of the resurrection of the flesh. On the other hand, certain significant authors in the Christian tradition (most notably Thomas Aquinas, a leading advocate of hylomorphism) insist elsewhere that the separate soul enjoys perfect beatitude or happiness in separation from all body. This raises a potential tension in Christian philosophical theology. The Christian doctrine of resurrection (as well as Aristotelian-Thomistic anthropology) would indicate that happiness cannot be enjoyed unless a complete human essence is instantiated; therefore, perfect beatitude of the complete human person must await re-embodiment. On the other hand, this claim is specifically rejected in Thomas Aquinas’s treatment of the beatitude of the soul between death and resurrection. I argue that a broadly hylomorphic philosophical anthropology ought to explicitly defer beatitude until the resumption of the flesh.