The esse-essentia distinction in the Summa Contra Gentiles, II 52-54

Milidrag, Predrag (2015) The esse-essentia distinction in the Summa Contra Gentiles, II 52-54. Filozofija i društvo, 26 (2). pp. 414-435. ISSN 0353-5738 eISSN 2334-8577

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Abstract

The article analyzes Aquinas’s arguments for real distinction between essence and being (esse) as presented in the chapters 52-54 of the second book of the Summa contra gentiles, in the wider context of his metapyhsics. First, the paper analyzes the determinations of God on the basis of real distinction (Ipsum esse subsistens, creator, infinite perfection), and after that it analyzes the role of the act and potency, priority of act, separation of the act from the form in Aquinas’s understanding of esse, as well as the concept of existential participation; in doing so, the difference among those concepts in Plato and Aristotle and in Aquinas is accentuated. At the end, the paper analyzes the role of two kinds of causality, efficient and formal in real distinction.

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