(en) Can we build bridges between what moral theology and modern philosophy mean by the term “person”? It is not certain. From the Greek theatre of Antiquity to Augustino-Thomistic theology, via Boethius, runs a path that can enlighten us. There is no relational dimension in Boethius ; Saint Thomas attempted to overcome that impasse by exploiting the verb subsistere. K. Barth and K. Rahner are both well-known for criticizing the application to God of the modern notion of “person”, which cannot be reduced to the self-aware subject. The contributions of Richard de Saint-Victor and Hegel, which must also be assessed, lead us in fine to accept W. Pannenberg’s recent attempt to define the person as a “presence of the Self in the moment of I”.
Riaudel, O. (2008). La dignité de la personne humaine. Revue d’éthique et de théologie morale, 2(249), 37-52. https://doi.org/10.3917/retm.249.0037 (Original work published 2008)