Metaphor and the Truth

Abstract

There are not too many texts concerning metaphor in the works of Saint Thomas Aquinas. However, one of them seems to be very interesting, since it helps to solve the dilemma not only from the linguistic point of view (as it is practised nowadays), but from the viewpoint of metaphysics. Thomas says that the main reason why a metaphor appears is either a kind of defect in the truth or, on the contrary, a kind of excess (STh, I-II, 101, ad 2). In the first case, we need to use a metaphor if we want to express the meaning of a concrete material being as something really individual, in the second case, it is God which, perfectly intelligibile in se, cannot be known and properly communicated quoad nos. Metaphor so understood without eliminating the truth, plays an important role in our interiorization of reality and communication.