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Published: Thomas Aquinas on the Good, Moral Life, and Happiness.
Rudi te Velde has written or rewritten a number of essays that deal with themes that are central to Aquinas’s practical philosophy of human virtue and happiness. He collected them in a book that came out with Peeters Publishers in November 2024.
They focus on the anthropological-theological presuppositions of his moral thought, such as good and evil, human freedom as rooted in the transcendental openness of the soul, practical reason and virtue, and, as recurring theme, the duality of nature and grace in accounting for human morality in the light of the Christian faith.Taken together, the essays present a nuanced and compelling picture of human agency, endowed with reason and free will, supported by God’s grace, and directed to final happiness through a life of virtue. The book argues for the subtle balance in Aquinas between the aspect of the moral ‘autonomy’ of reason on the one hand and the intimate presence of grace on the other, with its promise of a renewal of the virtuous life beyond the humanly possible.
This collection is number 22 in the Publication Series of the Thomas Instituut. Orders can be placed at Peeters Publishers here.
