Hylemorficzna jedność radości: ujęcie Awicenny i św. Tomasza z Akwinu

The aim of the paper is to deal with the problem of emotion in the context of medieval discussion on mind-body problem. The paper focuses particularly on joy and pleasure (delectatio, gaudium) as an example of intersection of mental and corporeal emotional phenomena in Avicenna and Thomas Aquinas. Both Aquinas’s treatise of the passions of the soul in the Summa Theologiae and parallel works and Avicenna’s philosophical and medical works reflect the problem of the way in which the unity of the person, soul and body, is experienced and displayed in emotion. Firstly, it has to be said that although an ‘emotion’ (passio) can be considered as an unified state of mind, neither Thomas nor Avicenna considered ‘emotion’ in this way. Rather, they recognized ‘emotion’ as a set of components, of bodily involvement, intentionality, objectivity, behavioral suggestions, even a sense of ecstasy, etc. Both Avicenna and Aquinas consider joy as a conglomerate of corporeal and mental elements. Avicenna argues, that emotions of the soul, such as joy, pain, fear and anger, are also called the emotions of the spirit, since they are accompanied by cardiac and spiritual changes, as he says in De medicinis cordialibu. Analogically, Aquinas distinguishes in STH Prima Secundae formal and material aspect of emotion: the formal element is the movement of the appetitive power, while the bodily transmutation is the material element. Both of these are mutually proportionate (STH, I-II, q. 44, a. 1, co.:) So, a central issue of my paper is the question how they could think the various mental and physiological features of emotion of joy together. Although they both refer to Aristotle’s psychology, their answers seem to differ significantly. The difference is about the specific role of estimation in the plane of sensual and intellectual cognition. For Thomas estimation is definitely sensual cognitive power; however Avicenna argues that estimation takes part in the intellectual evaluation of the objects intended. Also, there is a different account of intellectual emotion. Whereas Thomas says that emotion is a result of cognition and inasmuch there are sensual and intellectual cognition, there are accordingly sensual and intellectual emotions (passions and affection), Avicenna introduces the power of estimation which is affective evaluation for both sensual and intellectual cognition. So, one could say that Thomas elaborates two theories of emotion (theory of affection is not compatible with the theory of passions), whereas Avicenna develops an unitary theory of emotion.