The 13th Century and the Soul as a Philosophical and Theological Concept

This work aims to contribute to analysing the influence of philosophy and theology in the 13th century and how the concept of the Soul was based during this period, especially in Thomas Aquinas, interfacing with Platonic and Aristotelian thought. The concept of the Soul has been grounded in the classics of philosophy, unsettling even the great thinkers in the history of philosophy. Plato, in his dialogue entitled Fédon, poses the problem of the immortality of the soul. Aristotle thought that the soul was present within animate beings, in other words, man, animals and plants, that which possessed the principle of movement, interconnected with the things we live, feel and think about, having a very strong union with the conservation of life. The question is to understand why the Soul is totally linked to the body for Thomist ideas? The soul thus becomes the substantial form of the body, which is substance, having the competence to subsist, not needing the body to be. The body of living beings is a great source of speculation for scholars, who tend to explain behaviours that are often not revealed by science or religion.