63. The Soul is Not a Body but Its Form

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

The Materialist Position of Ancient Philosophers #

• Ancient thinkers posited the soul as a body, typically air-like or ghost-like
• Root cause: inability to transcend imagination; what cannot be imagined seems not to exist
• Core assumption: whatever is must be somewhere; only bodies occupy place
• Imagination grasps only the continuous (length, width, depth)
• Example: Empedocles thought all things are composed of earth, air, fire, water, love, and hate

Thomas’s Solution: Soul as Act and Form #

• Negative conclusion: The soul is not a body
• Positive conclusion: The soul is the act (actus) or form of a living body
• The soul is the first principle of life—not merely a principle (like the heart or eye)
• Distinction: the heart can be a principle of life but not the first principle
• Living and non-living bodies are composed of the same matter; they differ through form

Key Arguments #

Three Objections from Ancient Philosophy #

Objection 1: The Motion Argument

• Premise: A body moves another body only by being moved itself
• Premise: The soul moves the body
• Conclusion: Therefore, the soul must be a body
• Ancient reasoning: Everything is a body; only bodies move bodies

Objection 2: The Knowledge Argument (Empedocles)

• Premise: The thing known must be in the knower
• Premise: The soul knows bodily things
• Conclusion: Therefore, the soul must contain bodily things and be a body
• Empedocles: “By earth we know earth, by water water, by air air, by fire fire, by love love, by hate hate”

Objection 3: The Contact Argument

• Premise: Contact occurs only between bodies
• Premise: The soul makes contact with the body (moves it)
• Conclusion: Therefore, the soul is a body

Thomas’s Responses #

To Objection 1 (Motion)

• Not every mover must itself be moved (contrary to ancient assumption)
• Aristotle demonstrated there must be an unmoved mover
• The soul is a “moved mover” (mover per accidens): moved when the body moves, but not moved per se
• Example of train engine: pulls cars but is not pulled itself; all pulled cars form one grand pulled mover
• If all movers were moved movers, nothing would move

To Objection 2 (Knowledge)

• False assumption: the knower must actually contain what is known
• Truth: the likeness of the known must be in the knower in ability (potentia), not in act
• Example: color is not actually in the eye’s pupil but in ability only; tongue is not actually sweet but able to receive sweetness
• Ancient philosophers confused act and potentiality
• The soul receives bodily natures immaterially without being composed of them

To Objection 3 (Contact)

• Two kinds of contact exist: bodily surface contact and contact through power/action
• An immaterial thing can act upon a body through the second kind of contact
• Example: reaching out and touching someone’s body vs. saying something that “touches” their heart

Important Definitions #

Matter and Form #

• Matter (materia): Potentiality; able to receive form
• Form (forma): Actuality; what makes matter actually be something
• Relationship: Form is to matter as act is to potentiality
• Living differs from non-living not in matter but in form (the soul)

The Soul (ψυχή/anima) #

• The first principle (primum principium) of life in living bodies
• Not the same as a principle of life (e.g., the heart)
• Definition by operation: what causes life’s manifestations (motion, knowledge)
• Distinction: Greeks asked “What is the soul?” not “Do I have a soul?”

Substantial Form vs. Accident #

• Soul is presented here as analogous to form (though more precisely substantial form)
• Accidental form example: shape of a wooden chair; not the chair because it’s wooden but because of its form
• Same matter (wooden substance) differs through form (arrangement)

Examples & Illustrations #

The Wooden Chair #

• A wooden chair is not a chair because it is wooden (wooden tables exist)
• It is a chair because of its form (shape/arrangement)
• The form (shape) is to the wood (matter) as act is to potentiality
• Application: living body differs from non-living body in form (soul), not matter

The Letters C-A-T / A-C-T #

• Same three letters arranged differently = different words
• The order/arrangement (form) is what makes them actually this word or that word
• The letters (matter) have the ability to be arranged this way or that way
• Living and non-living bodies are similarly composed of the same matter but differ in arrangement (form/soul)

The Train Engine and Wagons #

• Engine pulls but is not pulled
• Each wagon pulls the one behind but is pulled by the one ahead (moved movers)
• If every part were a moved mover, there would be nothing to start the motion
• Therefore: not every mover can be moved; there must be an unmoved mover
• Application to soul: soul can move body without itself being moved per se

The Eye and the Tongue #

• Eye receives color in ability only, not actually colored
• Tongue can taste sweet without being actually sweet
• If tongue were actually sweet, it could not taste bitter
• Similarly: intellect must not have any determined bodily nature to know all bodies

Sleep as Death-Like State #

• Poets (Shakespeare, Homer) use “sleep, thou ape of death”
• In sleep: sensing ceases, local motion ceases, but digestion continues
• Death is opposite of life; sleep resembles death through absence of sensing and local motion
• Shows that life manifests primarily through two operations: motion and knowing

The Handkerchief Mouse #

• Anecdote: Mysterious great-aunt wrapped handkerchief to look like mouse
• Appeared alive due to apparent self-motion
• Illustrates that life appears through self-motion

The Mysterious Woman (Solzhenitsyn Biography) #

• Reference to Pierce’s biography of Solzhenitsyn
• Solzhenitsyn noted modern defect: constant distraction from one thing to another
• Contrast: ancient approach required sustained, contemplative attention

Notable Quotes #

“To be contained, that is to say in some place, right, is really a property of bodies.”

“We don’t think about anything without imagining. And we don’t imagine without the continuous, and that’s what a body is, something that’s length and width and depth.”

“Not every mover is itself moved; there must be an unmoved mover.”

“The soul is moved per accidens because it is in something that is moved, but not moved per se.”

“The thing known must be in the knower in ability, not in act.”

“If the soul were composed of all these things, then the soul would be a body. But if it’s not composed of these things, it’s only able to receive them.”

“The Greeks had no question that they had a soul. The question was: what is it?”

“When we hear the word soul, we probably think of something spiritual. But when the Greeks asked what is the soul, they were thinking of the first principle of life in living bodies.”

“Those letters that end the word cat or act, they’re able to be the word cat, they’re able to be the word act, right? But they’re actually one or another through this or that order.”

“Logic disposes for theology because in logic you have to learn to transcend your imagination.”

Questions Addressed #

Why did ancient philosophers think the soul must be a body?

• They could not transcend imagination (which grasps only continuous things)
• They assumed whatever exists must be somewhere
• They observed the soul moves the body and reasoned only bodies move bodies
• They did not distinguish between act and potentiality

How can an immaterial soul move a material body if contact only occurs between bodies?

• There are two kinds of contact: bodily surface contact and contact through power/action
• An immaterial thing acts on a body through the second type
• The soul acts on the interior of the body immediately, not through surface contact

What is the relationship between life and the soul if life manifests through operations?

• Life is manifest through two operations: motion (local motion) and knowing
• The soul is the first principle causing these operations
• Not every cause of life is the soul (heart, eye are causes but not the first cause)
• Sleep demonstrates this: sensing and motion cease, but digestion continues; thus knowing and motion are most manifestly life

Why is Empedocles’s theory wrong despite seeming plausible?

• He thought the thing known must be materially in the knower
• He failed to distinguish between receiving a likeness in ability vs. in act
• The soul can know bodies without containing bodily matter by receiving them immaterially

What is the difference between the soul being “a principle of life” and “the first principle of life”?

• Heart, eye, and other organs are principles of life
• But they are not the first principle
• The soul alone is the first, most fundamental principle
• This distinction is crucial for the definition of soul