PERSON. - It indicates the dignity of subsistent spiritual nature: « Persona significat id quod est perfectissimum in tota natura, scilicet subsistens in rationali natura » (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ, q. 29, a. 3). In Greek, as Boethius recalls, it was the "mask" that actors wore on their faces (πρόσωπον) in representing scenic characters; the Latin term p. « dicta est a personando, quia concavitate ipsa maior necesse est ut volvatur sonus » (Boethius, De duabus naturis, ch. 3: PL 64, 1344). The definition of Boethius himself is traditional in Latin theology: « P. est rationalis naturae individua substantia » (PL 64, 1343). Less well known is the other one recalled by St. Thomas (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ, q. 29, a. 3 ad 2): « P. est hypostasis proprietate distincta ad dignitatem pertinente », which is by Alan of Lille ([v.]; cf. Theologicae regulae, § 32: PL 210, 637). Since hypostasis (v.) is complete individual nature, the p. is rational hypostasis: « Ideo omne individuum rationalis naturae dicitur persona » (Sum. Theol., 1ᵃ, q. 29, a. 3 ad 2). In a rigorous sense, therefore, from the metaphysical point of view, p. adds to hypostasis only the qualification of honor of rational nature and not a new constitutive ontological principle (cf. ibid., ad 1). The concept of p., therefore, in its metaphysical content coincides with that of hypostasis or subsistence (hoc aliquid, 1682 71; Aristotle, Met., VII, 13, 1038 b 24) and is distinguished from "nature" (v.), whether universal or individual, inasmuch as this in creatures is indeed the fundamental constitutive element of beings, but is not yet subsistent in itself: in order to subsist, singular nature needs accidents and the act of being.
Therefore the human nature in Christ is indeed singular but is not a p. insofar as it is precisely assumed and subsists in the divine p. of the Word; instead, in the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity (v.) the one and identical nature subsists in three divine Persons who are distinguished by the opposition of relations. The heresies and controversies over the dogmas of the Trinity and the Incarnation originated from the uncertain determination of the meaning and of the respective relations among "nature," "substance," "hypostasis" and p., also because the Greek terms do not always have an adequate correspondence in the Latin language, according to the wise admonition of St. Thomas (cf. Contra errores Graecorum, Proemium).
Only with Christianity, which attributes to man freedom (v.), that is, the faculty of choosing his ultimate end (v.) and therefore full responsibility for his actions, does the concept of p. attain its ultimate requirement of the "dominion" that the spirit has over bodies (Sum. Theol., 1°, q. 39, a. 1). Man in the Greek world is subject to the laws of "fate" (εὐμικέτης) and of "necessity" (ἀνάγνη) which even the gods themselves cannot change: the "providence" (πρόνοια) to which the last Greek philosophy (Stoics, Neoplatonists) has recourse does not break the circle of necessity (v.) but only carries out the plan of each one's destiny (cf. W. Chase Greene, Moira, Fate, Good and Evil in Greek thought, Cambridge 1944, pp. 313, 378).
Some among the Neo-Scholastics have claimed to introduce a radical opposition and distinction between individual (v.) and p., inasmuch as the individual concerns the material aspect of the single person with his animal and egoistic instincts, while the p. expresses the higher life in the relationship that the individual has toward God and society (Maritain, Garrigou-Lagrange, Gillet, Delos). Nevertheless, on the metaphysical plane the unity of the entity must remain firm, along with the principle (characteristic of Thomism) that the same spiritual soul, as substantial form of the body, is the source in man of every act and perfection, not only in the intellectual sphere but also in the sensitive and biological one (Q. de anima, a. 11, c.). It is from the functional point of view only, not from the strictly ontological one, that the human soul transcends the body (Q. de spirit. creat., a. 2 ad 2), and in this sense St. Thomas defends, against every form of Platonism (v.), that the perfection of man requires the body, and therefore corporeal individuality has a constitutive and positive value (loc. cit., a. 2, ad 5).
This ontological distinction and opposition of individual and p. instead gains the favor of transcendent idealism, especially Hegelian, according to which the "single individual" is the immediacy of appearance that must "vanish" or "sublate itself," through mediation, into the absolute personality of the Idea or universal Spirit: for Hegel the single individual is a "form of evil" (cf. Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts, § 139: ed. E. Gans, Berlin 1840, p. 179 ff.). The only p., subject of right, is the State. The reaction of existentialism (v.) has the precise intent of taking up again the notion of p. as spiritual individual, primary subject of freedom, against idealist nullification: for Kierkegaard (v.) in particular the "single individual" is "the Christian category par excellence, with which the cause of Christianity stands or falls" (cf. Diario, Italian trans., I, Brescia 1948, pp. 343, 392 ff.). The dialectic of the p., understood as communication of the "I-thou" relationship, is also present in the anti-Hegelian polemic of Feuerbach (cf. Grundsätze der Philosophie der Zukunft, 62: « Die wahre Dialektik ist kein Monolog... sie ist ein Dialog zwischen Ich und Du »; ed. Bohlin-Jodl, II, Stuttgart 1904, p. 319), but it was particularly developed in a phenomenological sense by Max Scheler (Natur und Wesen der Sympathie, 5th ed., Frankfurt am Main 1948, especially p. 252 ff.) and in a theological sense by M. Buber (Ich und Du, in Dialogisches Leben, Zurich 1947, p. 13 ff.). In the Christian social personalism (v.) of E. Mounier (v.) the p. is characterized by the transcendence it has over its "empirical conditions" and by the subjection that, as a creature, it owes to God as infinite reality that transcends it (E. Mounier, Liberté sous conditions, Paris 1946, p. 66 ff.).
In left-wing or neutral existentialism, on the other hand, the ontological dimension of the p. is bent to the generic orientation toward "being itself" (Sein selbst: Heidegger) or toward "all-embracing being" (Das Umgreifende: Jaspers) or is simply broken in the antithesis of the "subject" and the "other" (en soi and pour soi, autrui: Sartre): in this way existentialism renounces its most consistent metaphysical claim against idealism (cf. F. J. von Rintelen, Philosophie der Endlichkeit, Meinsheim-Glan 1951, p. 416).
From the notion of p. depend the sense and the structure of the problems of the spiritual life, of ethics and of politics, so that this notion is not so much a point of arrival of philosophical reflection as the criterion and necessary reference according to which every philosophy tests its validity.
BIBLI: L. Schütz, s. v., in Thomas Lexikon, 2° ed., Paderborn 1895, p. 202 sgg.; W. Stern, Person und Sache, 3 voll., Lippia 1906-24; A. Trendelenburg, Zur Geschichte des Wortes Person, in Kant-Studien, 13 (1908), p. 1 sgg.; A. Rupp, Begriff und Problem der Persönlichkeit, ibid., 16 (1911), p. 258 sgg.; R. Hirzel, Die Person, Begriff und Name derselben im Altertum, Monaco 1914; H. Rheinfelder, Das Wort Person, Geschichte seiner Bedeutungen, Halle 1928; R. Eisler, Wörter, d. philos. Begriffe, II, 4° ed., Berlino 1929, p. 393 sgg.; Fr. Altheim, Persons, in Archiv für Religionswissenschaft, Berlino 1929, p. 35 sgg.; N. Hartmann, Das Problem der geistigen Seine, Berlino e Lippia 1933, p. 141 sgg.; P. Descous e collaboratori, Autour de la personne humaine (Archives de philosophie, 15, 11), Parigi 1938; Th. Steinbüchel, Die philosophische Grundlegung der hath. Sittenlehre, Düsseldorf 1938, p. 337 sgg.; C. H. Ratschov, Die Einheit der Person, Halle 1938; Fr. Tillman, Die Idee der Nachfolge Christi, 3° ed., Düsseldorf 1949, p. 57 sgg.; N. Hartmann, Ethik, 3° ed., Berlino 1949, specialmente 227 sgg.; O. Derini, La persona, Su esencia, su vida y su mundo, La Plata 1950; L. Paryson, Esistenza e p., Torino 1950; L. Stefanini, Metafisica della p., Padova 1950, Cornelio Fabro