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Thomas Aquinas on the Political Analogy and the Passions of Christ Cover

Thomas Aquinas on the Political Analogy and the Passions of Christ

By: Antônio Lemos  
Open Access
|Dec 2025

Abstract

In this paper I will address the question whether Aquinas’ political analogy can be properly applied to Christ as having political or despotic rule over his passions. I will argue that a close reading of various texts of Aquinas, especially the more mature Compendium of Theology, leads to the conclusion that Jesus’ reason exercised a despotic rule over his passions, not a political rule. His propassions were totally under the control of his reason and could not resist it; they did not retain “something of their own”, which is the ability to resist reason. The case of Mary’s passions in the writings of Aquinas make this point even more clear.

Language: English
Page range: 146 - 161
Submitted on: Mar 20, 2025
Accepted on: Sep 29, 2025
Published on: Dec 8, 2025
Published by: Thomas Institute of Utrecht
In partnership with: Paradigm Publishing Services
Publication frequency: 1 issue per year

© 2025 Antônio Lemos, published by Thomas Institute of Utrecht
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.