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Summa Theologiae · Suppl., q. 32, a. 7

Whether those who are deformed in those parts should be anointed?

Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, Supplement, question 32, On Whom Should This Sacrament Be Conferred and on What Part of the Body?, article 7. About 1 min.

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From the Supplement, compiled after Aquinas’s death from his Commentary on the Sentences and transcribed here from the 1917 to 1922 printings. About the Supplement.

Text: Summa Theologiae, Supplement to the Third Part (Supplementum Tertiae Partis), transcribed from Internet Archive scans, translated by the Fathers of the English Dominican Province. The Supplement, compiled after Aquinas’s death from his earlier Commentary on the Sentences, in the same English Dominican translation as the Gutenberg Parts. Transcribed by Bibliotheca Catholica from the OCR of four Internet Archive scans of the pre-1931 printings (Questions 1 to 33 from the 1917 Washbourne and Benziger volume, 34 to 68 from the 1922 volume, 69 to 86 from the 1921 volume, and 87 to 99 from the 1922 Benziger volume), with OCR errors corrected and doubtful passages marked, not rewritten. 99 questions and 446 articles. The two appendices printed after Question 99 are not included. Sources, SHA-256 of each OCR file, and the method are in the source record. Rights: Public domain (US)

The Supplement is not a Project Gutenberg text. It is Bibliotheca Catholica’s transcription of public-domain scans at the Internet Archive; obvious OCR errors were corrected, and passages marked “OCR uncertain” could not be confidently corrected, so check them against the linked scan page.

Objection 1: It seems that those who are deformed should not be anointed in those parts. For just as this sacrament demands a certain disposition on the part of the recipient, viz. that he should be sick, so it demands that he should be anointed in a certain part of the body. Now he that is not sick cannot be anointed. Therefore neither can he be anointed who lacks the part to be anointed.

Obj. 2: Further, A man born blind does not sin by his sight. Yet in the anointing of the eyes mention is made of sins by sight. Therefore this anointing ought not to be applied to one born blind, and in like manner as regards the other senses.

On the contrary, Bodily deformity is not an impediment to any other sacrament. Therefore it should not be an impediment to this one. Now each of the anointings is essential to the sacrament. Therefore all should be applied to those who are deformed.

I answer that, Even those who are deformed should be anointed, and that as near as possible to the part which ought to have been anointed. For though they have not the members, nevertheless, they have, at least radically, the powers of the soul, corresponding to those members, and they may commit inwardly the sins that pertain to those members, though they cannot outwardly.

This suffices for the Replies to the Objections.

Also online, linked only: the same translation at New Advent and the Latin text at Corpus Thomisticum. Neither is copied here.

Source: Thomas Aquinas. Summa Theologica, Supplement to the Third Part. Internet Archive scans: Third Part, Fourth Number (QQ. LXXXIV to Suppl. XXXIII), 1917, Third Part (Supplement), QQ. XXXIV to LXVIII, 1922, Third Part (Supplement), QQ. LXIX to LXXXVI, 1921, and Third Part (Supplement), QQ. LXXXVII to XCIX and Appendices, 1922; two curled pages of the 1921 volume are read from another scan of the same printing. Public domain in the USA. Printed in 1917, 1921, and 1922, before 1931. Outside the U.S., check local copyright rules. Transcription, OCR file checksums, and method: source record.