Saint thomas aquinas a model
of sensuous
beautyIn
the middle ages, Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225 - 1274), one
of the greatest
of the medieval Christian
theologians, commented on what he thought were
the elements
of Beauty. What was an
offhanded comment in his monumental Summa
Theologica has become for many lovers
of beauty, a model
of evaluation and appreciation based on three concepts: wholeness, balance, and radiance. If a work
of art contains all
the three elements,
then
the observer may be reasonably assured that
the work is beautiful. Should one
of these three components be found deficient
then
the work will be deficient; and though it may gain acceptance as a work
of art, it will never be considered beautiful. But before I propose my own opinions about
beauty, let me do a bit
of history:
The ancient Greeks’ word for
beauty was kalos, a word that owned o
ther connotations such as “what is proper,”
of “what is good;” and as a result
the Greeks didn’t leave us a clear cut model
of beauty. And incidentally, though Plato’s
theory
of forms leads to an absolute
beauty, which is transcendental, I am interested in
beauty that is
of this
world.
In the summer of 1952 while playing “Cowboys and Indians” with her older brothers, Alice Walker at the age of eight years old, was blinded in her right eye by an errant BB gun pellet shot by one of her brothers. Alice became so self-conscious of the large white scar tissue left in her right eye, that she no longer held her head up because she felt ugly and ashamed of herself.
Do you judge beauty, how you see it? Or do you look deep and consider the concept behind the painting? Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. What you consider to be a stunning piece of art could be nothing to someone else and vice versa. Beauty is a relative term that is hard to explain in words unlike the other concepts that you may study in other courses.
In Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, both racism and beauty are portrayed in a number of ways. This book illustrates many of the racial concerns which were immense issues in the 1970’s when the book was written, however not as much of issues in today’s current society.
