FROM NATURAL LAW TO THE GOLDEN RULE: AQUINAS REVISITED

Abstract

These days, the Thomistic account of natural law is the object of renewed interest and criticisms. A number of objections are usually lodged against the idea of a human nature and a shared human good, in that it might seem that these ideas are unquestionably culturally related and that cultural boundaries cannot be crossed. At the same time, the concepts of ‘human nature’ and ‘natural law’ are often misunderstood to be related to human biology only. To overcome these issues, this paper aims to reinterpret the Thomistic doctrine of natural law as a form of the golden rule (‘Do not do unto others as you would not have them do unto you’; ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you’).