# Thomism — Tradition Thomism is the philosophical and theological system descended from [[Thomas Aquinas]] (1225–1274), who synthesized [[Aristotle]] with Christian doctrine. Where the [[Natural Law]] tradition isolates Aquinas's ethical-political doctrine, Thomism is the *whole system*: a metaphysics of being (God as *ipsum esse*), hylomorphism, the five ways of demonstrating God by reason, and the insistence that faith and reason are complementary. ## Why it matters on the right Thomism is the most fully-developed metaphysical alternative to liberal modernity available on the right. Its 20th-century revival — **neo-Thomism**, led by [[Jacques Maritain]] and [[Étienne Gilson]] — kept it intellectually live, and today it is the backbone of [[Integralism]] and the [[Catholic Post-Liberalism]] of figures like [[Patrick Deneen]]. Where secular conservatives reach for [[Natural Law]] as a rights-and-morality argument, integralists reach for the entire Thomist edifice as a rival picture of reality, politics, and the good. ## Relationship Thomism is the metaphysical parent of the [[Natural Law]] tradition and a primary tradition of the [[Philosophy of Religion]] branch (natural theology). See the [[Philosophy in Right-Wing Thought Hub]] MOC.