Rethinking Scholastic Communities in Latin Europe: Competition and Theological Method in the Twelfth Century

Abstract

This paper explores the role of competition between masters and their communities in shaping the dynamism of theological debate in twelfth-century Europe. Whereas scholastic debate in the thirteenth century was heavily influenced by the structures and curriculum of the University of Paris, this was not the case in the twelfth century. While there were celebrated confrontations between individual monks and schoolmen (such as St Anselm against Roscelin of Compiegne, and Bernard of Clairvaux against Peter Abelard), it is inadequate to interpret these episodes in terms of simple opposition between monastic and scholastic theological traditions. Rather, we see the evolution of a range of educational communities, of monks, of regular canons, and of secular clergy, each with their own interpretation of Christian teaching, and with their own attitudes to the use of reason and the learning of classical antiquity. After 1150, there was an increasing tendency to professionalization in the teaching of theology, epitomized by the growing influence of Peter Lombard’s Sentences, but there was no consensus about the extent to which it should also engage in philosophical reflection. There was also competition between the cathedral school at Notre-Dame and the canons of Saint-Victor, who preferred to emphasize the role of experience in the spiritual life. The case of Richard of Saint-Victor’s writing on the Trinity shows how he sought to combine an experiential dimension to religious insight, with presentation of Christian teaching in terms of reason, rather like St Anselm, rather than through debating patristic authority, as followed by disciples of Peter Lombard. The label of scholasticism should not conceal the enduring diversity of approaches adopted by different communities.