Thursday, September 03, 2009

Q118 A3: Whether human souls were created together at the beginning of the world?

No. Souls were not created before bodies, but are created at the same time as they are infused into them, because if it were accidental to the soul to be united to the body, it would follow that man who results from this union is a being by accident; or that the soul is a man, which is false, as proved above (Q75 A4).

Animae non sunt creatae ante corpora, sed simul creantur cum corporibus infunduntur, quia si accidentaliter conveniret animae corpori uniri, sequeretur quod homo, qui ex ista unione constituitur, esset ens per accidens; vel quod anima esset homo, quod falsum est, ut supra ostensum est.

Moreover, that the human soul is not of the same nature as the angels, is proved from the different mode of understanding, as shown above (Q55 A2; Q85 A1), for man understands through receiving from the senses, and turning to phantasms, as stated above (Q84 A6; Q84 A7; Q85 A1). For this reason the soul needs to be united to the body, which is necessary to it for the operation of the sensitive part, whereas this cannot be said of an angel.

Quod etiam anima humana non sit eiusdem naturae cum Angelis, ipse diversus modus intelligendi ostendit, ut supra ostensum est, homo enim intelligit a sensibus accipiendo, et convertendo se ad phantasmata, ut supra ostensum est.