Thomas Aquinas' Question For The Essence Of Virtue And Its Contemporary Value

With the development of the current of the revival of virtue ethics,virtue theory of Thomas Aquinas as a great example of medieval virtue ethics has attracted more and more attention.The primary problem of virtue theory of Thomas Aquinas is the essence of virtue or what is virtue,which should be continued to discuss and explain by virtue ethics and the revival of virtue ethics.Question for the essence of virtue has philosophical and theological origin.Greek philosopher Socrates,Plato,Aristotle and Christian St.Paul and Augustine etc.discussed the essence of virtue from philosophical or theological angle respectively.Aquinas analyzes what is "virtue"in Summa Theologica intensively,and quotes,maintains the definition of virtue of Augustine,meanwhile he uses unique methodology of "The Four Causes".From four angle,namely,The final cause,The material cause,The formal cause and The efficient cause,he perfectly shows the essential connotation of virtue,which inherits,integrates and develops the Augustine's and Aristotle's tradition of virtue.Based on the background of the revival of virtue ethics currently,inspecting the Aquinas'question for the essence of virtue,we can find it has important implications for revival of virtue ethics,reconstruction of the concept of virtue;And it helps us clarity the relationship of virtue and remodel the frame of teleology,which are benefit for exploring the development road of virtue ethics;Aquinas integrates logos and belief and underlines that virtue shapes ego,which contains the value of humanistic thought.