Law in the Context of Medieval Scholasticism

Abstract

Abstract Beginning in the late eleventh century and continuing through the thirteenth century, scholars of civil and canon law began to work out systematic accounts of the foundations, legitimacy, and scope of positive law, drawing on ancient legal and theological sources and interpreting these in innovative ways. These efforts gave rise to a systematic jurisprudence, developed through ongoing interactions among Scholastic legal scholars and the practicing lawyers and rulers whom they trained and advised. There were of course many debates among legal scholars, but the main lines of this jurisprudence were commonly accepted among civil and canonical jurists alike. While the distinction between legal theory and political theory was not sharply drawn until near the end of this period, it is also apparent that even in its earliest stages, legal theory was focused on questions of authority and legitimacy. This chapter offers an overview of the development and the main lines of Scholastic jurisprudence, focusing on the work of civil and canon jurists, while also commenting on Thomas Aquinas’s influential theory of law.