ABSTRACT
Thus it seems that, according to Aquinas, in the life of the world to come I have not only a body that is identical in kind to the body I have now, but a body that is numerically identical to the body I have now. Of course, this body will be transformed and will possess qualities or dispositions it currently lacks, such as incorruptibility and, if I am to be among the blessed, brightness (claritas), agility (agilitas), and subtlety (subtilitas).2 But it will nevertheless be the same body. Otherwise, Aquinas says, one could not speak of “resurrection” but ought rather to speak of “the assumption of a new body.”3 This view fits also with what Aquinas says about the definition of a human being. He defines human beings in part as
having a certain kind of matter, that is, bones and flesh considered generally, if not these bones and this flesh in particular. However, if there were a definition of a particular human being, for example of Socrates, then it would have to include his particular bones and flesh.4 According to Aquinas it belongs to the concept of a particular soul that it has an affinity to a particular body.5 “For this soul is adapted to this and not to that body.”6
