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Thomism. The school of philosophy and theology following the thought of Thomas Aquinas (1255-74). It developed in various phases and has experienced periods of support and neglect.

When Aquinas died he left no direct successor, but his system was adopted by various individuals, most notably by many of his confreres in the Dominican order and by his own original teacher, the eclectic Albertus Magnus. Nonetheless, there was still much opposition to his Aristotelianism on the part of church authorities, and in 1277 in Paris and Oxford several propositions derived from Thomas’s teachings were condemned. It was primarily due to Dominican efforts that the system of Aquinas was not only eventually rehabilitated, but that he himself was canonized in 1323.

From this time period on, Thomism became one of the several competing schools of medieval philosophy, e.g., Augustiniamism, the Franciscan followers of Duns Scotus, and the nominalist disciples of William of Occam. Thomism distinguished itself with its Aristotelian doctrines of the unity of the human person (composed of the soul as the form of the body), the analogy of being, the reality of forms within particular entities, and the real distinction between a being and its essence. At the same time, the followers of St. Thomas did not remain uniform, but particular commentators took on individual traits.

V. J. Bourke, Thomistic Bibliography: 1920-1940