--- title: "Summa Theologica, Second Half" author: "Thomas Aquinas" translator: "Fathers of the English Dominican Province" languages: [en] shelf: "Medieval" section: 913 of 935 url: https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/913/ cite: "Thomas Aquinas, tr. Fathers of the English Dominican Province, Summa Theologica, Second Half, section 913. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/913/" --- # Summa Theologica, Second Half *Thomas Aquinas, tr. Fathers of the English Dominican Province* Courage and temperance, the states of life, then Christ, the sacraments and the last things. ## 913. Supp. · Q. 96, Art. 9: Whether an aureole is due to the angels? Source: https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/913/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/thomas-aquinas-summa-theologica-second-half/913/#p-N [¶0] Whether an aureole is due to the angels? [¶1] Objection 1: It would seem that an aureole is due to the angels. For Jerome (Serm. de Assump. [*Ep. ad Paul. et Eustoch. ix]) speaking of virginity says: "To live without the flesh while living in the flesh is to live as an angel rather than as a man": and a gloss on 1 Cor. 7:26, "For the present necessity," says that "virginity is the portion of the angels." Since then an aureole corresponds to virginity, it would seem due to the angels. [¶2] Objection 2: Further, incorruption of the spirit is more excellent than incorruption of the flesh. Now there is incorruption of spirit in the angels, since they never sinned. Therefore an aureole is due to them rather than to men incorrupt in the flesh and who have sinned at some time. [¶3] Objection 3: Further, an aureole is due to teaching. Now angels teach us by cleansing, enlightening, and perfecting [*Cf. FP, Q 111, A 1] us, as Dionysius says (Hier. Eccles. vi). Therefore at least the aureole of doctors is due to them. [¶4] On the contrary, It is written (2 Tim. 2:5): "He . . . shall not be [Vulg.: 'is not'] crowned, except he strive lawfully." But there is no conflict in the angels. Therefore an aureole is not due to them. [¶5] Further, an aureole is not due to an act that is not performed through the body: wherefore it is not due to lovers of virginity, martyrdom or teaching, if they do not practice them outwardly. But angels are incorporeal spirits. Therefore they have no aureole. [¶6] I answer that, An aureole is not due to the angels. The reason of this is that an aureole, properly speaking, corresponds to some perfection of surpassing merit. Now those things which make for perfect merit in man are connatural to angels, or belong to their state in general, or to their essential reward. Wherefore the angels have not an aureole in the same sense as an aureole is due to men. [¶7] Reply to Objection 1: Virginity is said to be an angelic life, in so far as virgins imitate by grace what angels have by nature. For it is not owing to a virtue that angels abstain altogether from pleasures of the flesh, since they are incapable of such pleasures. [¶8] Reply to Objection 2: Perpetual incorruption of the spirit in the angels merits their essential reward: because it is necessary for their salvation, since in them recovery is impossible after they have fallen [*Cf. FP, Q 64, A 2]. [¶9] Reply to Objection 3: The acts whereby the angels teach us belong to their glory and their common state: wherefore they do not merit an aureole thereby. ### Supp. · Q. 96, Art. 10: Whether an aureole is also due to the body? [¶11] Whether an aureole is also due to the body? [¶12] Objection 1: It would seem that an aureole is also due to the body. For the essential reward is greater than the accidental. But the dowries which belong to the essential reward are not only in the soul but also in the body. Therefore there is also an aureole which pertains to the accidental reward. [¶13] Objection 2: Further, punishment in soul and body corresponds to sin committed through the body. Therefore a reward both in soul and in body is due to merit gained through the body. But the aureole is merited through works of the body. Therefore an aureole is also due to the body. [¶14] Objection 3: Further, a certain fulness of virtue will shine forth in the bodies of martyrs, and will be seen in their bodily scars: wherefore Augustine says (De Civ. Dei xxii): "We feel an undescribable love for the blessed martyrs so as to desire to see in that kingdom the scars of the wounds in their bodies, which they bore for Christ's name. Perchance indeed we shall see them, for this will not make them less comely, but more glorious. A certain beauty will shine in them, a beauty, though in the body, yet not of the body but of virtue." Therefore it would seem that the martyr's aureole is also in his body; and in like manner the aureoles of others. [¶15] On the contrary, The souls now in heaven have aureoles; and yet they have no body. Therefore the proper subject of an aureole is the soul and not the body. [¶16] Further, all merit is from the soul. Therefore the whole reward should be in the soul. [¶17] I answer that, Properly speaking the aureole is in the mind: since it is joy in the works to which an aureole is due. But even as from the joy in the essential reward, which is the aurea, there results a certain comeliness in the body, which is the glory of the body, so from the joy in the aureole there results a certain bodily comeliness: so that the aureole is chiefly in the mind, but by a kind of overflow it shines forth in the body. [¶18] This suffices for the Replies to the Objections. It must be observed, however, that the beauty of the scars which will appear in the bodies of the martyrs cannot be called an aureole, since some of the martyrs will have an aureole in which such scars will not appear, for instance those who were put to death by drowning, starvation, or the squalor of prison.