The Nature of the

Human Person
 Learning Objectives

● describe the nature of the human person;

● identify the importance of a person's ability
and capacity; and
● describe a person's unique qualities that
make him/her a productive social being.
 Table of Contents

01 04
The Human Person Philosophical Views

02 05
Classical Greek Views
Characteristics

03 06
Sociological Views
Biblical Views
The Human Person

• Estafiol (2007) defines the human

person as having physical, spiritual,
emotional, and intellectual
attributes.
• St. Thomas Aquinas describes the
human person as having physical
and spiritual substance because
he/she has a soul and is created by
a Superior Being with a divine
purpose.
• Dictionaries define the human
person as a "self-conscious animal."
 Characteristics of a Human Person

Rational being Born free Unique

Social being Sexual by nature

 Biblical Views

• The human person has

superiority and dignity inherited
from the Supreme Being.
• According to the book of
Genesis, chapter 1, verses 26
to 27, God created man and
woman in His own image and
likeness and made them masters
of the fish of the sea, the birds,
the heaven, the earth, the wild
beasts, and all the reptiles that
crawl upon the earth.
 Philosophical Views

• Protagoras, a human person is the

measure of all things that exist and
of all things that do not exist.
• Plato claimed that the perfect
human being does not exist in this
world because what is in this world
is just an imperfect copy of
humanity's original self in the realm
of ideas.
• Parmenides posited that a person
has knowledge of something that
exists, for a person who does not
exist is nothing.
Different philosophical views of the human
person

Conservatism Liberalism
not entirely positive and more egalitarian view
definitely non-egalitarian of human nature

Socialism Fascism
readily engages in cooperative
what matters most is
social activities when given the
the country itself
opportunity
Classical Greek Views

"a rational animal.”

An animal's vegetative
sensory and rational
element is integrated
within his/her being; thus
he/she is a material
(body) and spiritual (soul)
being.
Sociological Views

Salcedo (2004)
states that people
look at this social
world or at the
various ways that
human beings
behave in a social
way.
 “
❑ Human persons are social animals.
❑ The human person's social behavior is learned, not
instinctive.
❑ To understand the human person's social behavior,
we have to focus our attention on the groups to
which people belong.
❑ Sociology is a discipline that looks into the totality
of relationships in an individual's life.
San Juan (2007) proposes
some common ideas about the
human person.
 Hierarchy of Needs
The guiding principle in realizing a person's competence
and ability is the exploration of his/her totality in the field of
humanistic psychology

Figure 1 Maslow's hierarchy of needs

Thank You! ☺

CREDITS: This presentation template was

created by Slidesgo, including icons by
Flaticon, infographics & images by Freepik
and illustrations by Stories