Thomistic Hylomorphism vs. Evolutionism
A careful analysis can reveal the omnipresence of evolutionism, simultaneously with the metaphysical relativism repeatedly denounced by Joseph Ratzinger. From the outset I must clarify that “evolutionism” does not refer only to the supposed dynamics of species in the animal or plant world. Often it is also applied to human society. For example, when you hear a modern architect claiming that modern civilization is superior to any other because it discovered plastic, you are dealing with a sample of historical “evolutionism.” Or when a computer scientist points to today’s computers as representing a true peak of civilization, and to A.I. as the crown of technological progress, again we are dealing with “evolutionism.” Of course, not in the biological sense. In fact, Marxist-Leninist ideology systematically applied the principle of evolution to the whole of society. The destructions that resulted from this are well documented, just like the disasters caused by the achievements of science—for example, weapons of mass destruction or contraceptive means.
In any field we look at, we discover the presence, in one form or another, of an “evolutionist” vision. Some members of the community of specialists in the history of ancient philosophy will tell us that the transition from the mytho-poetical thinking of archaic Greece to the rational thinking of classical Greece represents an “evolution.” Or that the “disenchantment of the world” and the throwing of religions into the garbage bin of history represent a pinnacle of “progress.” The very idea of “progress,” in fact, implies a certain theoretical form of evolutionism. The hidden premise is the following: what was simpler, more primitive, more backward—in a word “inferior”—is followed by what is more sophisticated, more elaborate, more refined—in a word “superior.” The cell came before the monkey, the monkey before man.
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Darwin and his disciples did not honor any animal kingdom by saying that a particular species descended from humans. I have always wondered: if the similarity between monkeys and humans inspires them, why do they not say that monkeys descend from humans? As we know, evolutionists are always content to dishonor humans by telling them that they descend from monkeys. I am convinced that some will criticize my statement by pointing out that they do not care about honor. I will not contradict them. The fact remains that Darwin never claimed that the inferior comes from the superior, only vice versa. Why? Because, in their opinion, everything evolves. And now, when digital prophets announce to us that A.I. no longer even needs humans, who can oppose the triumphant march of historical evolution?
That there are serious reasons to oppose such a doctrine is known to all who still consider the Holy Scripture of the Judeo-Christian tradition to be truly inspired by God and free from any error (according to the dogma of biblical inerrancy). In turn, the Holy Fathers and Doctors of the Church made the greatest effort imaginable to interpret the biblical texts in order to help us understand our situation. For example, they do not hesitate to show that once the original sin committed by Adam and Eve in Eden occurred, everything began to devolve. Initially, their bodies were immortal thanks to those preternatural qualities generated by the presence of original sanctifying grace. After original sin, because of the corruption that infected them, they became corruptible, mortal, subject to diseases and the vicissitudes of this transient life. The world itself is no longer incorruptible but, on the contrary, evanescent, subject to destruction and death. Everything therefore speaks of what Mircea Eliade called the “fall into history.” That is, the involution from a superior state that we can no longer even conceive, to a deplorable state which Saint Gregory of Nyssa described as a “death in life.” Once the exile from Paradise occurred, things did not cease to degrade.
The Tower of Babel and the confusion of languages is another biblical episode that shows the degeneration of man. First of all, man abandons monotheistic religion, becoming idolatrous and recklessly desiring to reach Heaven by his own powers. Likewise, instead of caring for the things of the soul, he often turns into a monster thirsting for power. Murders (Cain vs. Abel), acts of vandalism and theft—some on a massive scale—the inevitable wars, all show us that evil is dominant in the universal history of humanity. Although some wise men understood the situation very well and tried to combat it, they were never listened to or followed. If they were not killed, like Socrates, they were fortunate to live in exile or anonymity.
Plato shows us in the dialogue Phaedrus that writing undermines memory, condemning us to forgetfulness. It was truly superior to know the Iliad and the Odyssey by heart or, like Saint Augustine and other Holy Fathers, the Psalms of King David. But who would follow them in the age of digital means of information storage? The giant in the dream of King Nebuchadnezzar II, whose meaning the prophet Daniel will reveal, also indicates an involutive sense of history: the four empires are made of materials of decreasing value—from gold to iron and clay. So there is no “evolution” or “progress.” Alongside the biblical reasons for which the evolutionary doctrine has always been rejected by true Catholic theologians, there are also those derived from Thomistic metaphysics and its hylomorphic doctrine.
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This doctrine tells us that everything that exists in the physical world has its roots in principles (i.e., “forms” or “substances”) from the metaphysical world. Both cosmos and all living creatures (man included) are therefore a synthesis of the visible, material, sensible world and the invisible, spiritual, intelligible world. In the case of man, his immortal soul represents, in the same terms, the “form” of his mortal body—the “matter.”
Following the thought of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the Church adopted this conception of the soul as the “substantial form” of the body (“matter”). I emphasize that this is official doctrine of the Catholic Church, as Dr. Edward Feser has already stated in some of his articles. To demonstrate this, one may consult the Catechism:
The unity of soul and body is so profound that one has to consider the soul to be the ‘form’ of the body: i.e., it is because of its spiritual soul that the body made of ‘matter’ becomes a living, human body; spirit and matter, in man, are not two natures united, but rather their union forms a single nature (art. 365).
For all major Catholic thinkers after the Angelic Doctor, the mentioned hylomorphism excludes any evolutionary hypothesis. Why is it so? Because the “substantial forms” at the foundation of all creatures and objects in our physical world are intelligible entities created directly by God. These entities—also called “essences,” “substances,” or “ideas” of beings and things—cannot undergo an “evolution.” Nor can man manipulate or transform them in any way. A “substantial form” cannot change into another form. Only God can do this, as seen in the Church’s teaching on the Holy Eucharist, which affirms that at the moment the priest pronounces the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ from the night of the Last Supper, the “forms” of bread and wine are replaced by God Himself with the “substances” of His Body and Blood. The only change we can talk about in the case of forms is the transition from potency to act. But, in order not to complicate things unnecessarily, I will not go into details.
Obviously, the rejection of evolutionism presupposes the existence of a certain philosophical framework that allows, as far as possible at our current (post-lapsarian) level of knowledge, an explanation of the existence of beings and things in our world. If, however, this framework is rejected, then man and the world are explained in strictly material terms, in which invisible particles—such as atoms—are the “bricks” from which everything is made. I may surprise some readers by saying that, from the perspective of classical Aristotelian-Thomistic metaphysics, the transformation of forms (i.e., “transformism”) or what some call their “fluidity” is just as unacceptable as the modern atomic model. In fact, hylomorphism was rejected precisely in order to make possible the universal spread of the atomic model. But this is a story too long to be told here and now.
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Just as in his famous 1988 lecture in New York titled “Biblical Interpretation in Crisis,” Cardinal Ratzinger shows that false philosophies have generated incorrect interpretations of Holy Scripture, the abandonment of the explanatory model of hylomorphism has led to theories that compromise the authentic understanding of man and of his origins.
A major task of the few Catholic philosophers who have the courage to publicly express uncomfortable truths is to propose complete explanations grounded in this doctrine. They must also show why the love of wisdom is more necessary than ever. Or, in the case of challenges coming from those who believe that A.I. = human intelligence, they must correctly describe both the human intellect and its capacity for knowledge. These are not simple tasks. Yet only in this way can the major challenges of the present moment be confronted.
