Samuel Norman

In De ente et essentia, Thomas Aquinas states unambiguously that the essence of a composite substance is comprised of both form and matter. Some Thomistic interpreters conclude from this that the death of the human body entails the loss of matter from the essence, so that the subsisting soul possesses an essence fundamentally different from that of a living human being. This article demonstrates that such a reading is mistaken. By reconstructing Aquinas’ threefold distinction of matter and his account of essence, it shows that while prime and designated matter are lost at death, common matter continues to pertain to the soul’s essence. Consequently, even after its separation from the body, the soul retains an act of existence in and through a human essence and so constitutes the continued existence of a human being in a real ontological sense, even if such an existence is partial and imperfect in virtue of being subject to privation. Thus, Aquinas’ account of matter and essence is incompatible with certain corruptionist accounts of essence and establishes a firm metaphysical foundation for survivalism.