The Early History of Greed: The Sin of Avarice in Early Medieval Thought and Literature (review)

Abstract

The Early History of Greed The Sin of Avarice in Early Medieval Thought and Literature. By Richard Newhauser. [Cambridge Studies in Medieval Literature, 41.] (New York: Cambridge University Press. 2000. Pp. xiv, 246. $64.95.) Professor Newhauser begins his study by setting up two principles. First, concern with avaritia was not late medieval by-product of a burgeoning money economy, but reflected an ancient and long-lasting preoccupation, as much with the forcefulness of yearning as with the object of desire (p. xii). As author puts it later, the broad contours of avarice's were clearly products of late antique culture (p. 95). Second, the pressures of asceticism asserted a transformative power on definition of vice throughout early Middle Ages (p. xiii). The two principles do not prove easy to reconcile; and it is first, eventually, that comes to dominate argument. Reaching back to Herman, author chronicles a broadening of concern, a shift from philargyria to pleonexia, from a delight in money to an addiction to surfeit, a shift boosted considerably by Clement's enthusiasm for figurative, and by Origen's search for psychological roots of vice. From same early period, however, writers were aware of the social consequences of sin (p. 23). The results of that double focus are admirably unfolded. First, indignation at acquisitive did not always encourage radical social reform; it was more a matter of encouraging rich to help poor. Thus, seeds for a future justification of wealth were contained already in early condemnation of greed (p. 9). Motive began to count for more than possession-a compromise associated with distinction between precepts and counsels. We are invited to recognize development of a lay church, within which ascesis was tempered by pastoral demands and opportunities. Church leaders in fourth century, after impact of Constantine, were affected by new anxieties. Here,Ambrose is made a key figure, deeply disturbed by runaway destructiveness of wealth. (Neil McLynn's study of Ambrose, now more than six years old, is not, however, mentioned.) I would have contrasted him less with Basil; but Professor Newhauser documents in interesting ways Ambrose's alarm at economic disruption of Balkans under pressure from barbarians, and his concern that loyalty to property and inheritance was inhibiting conversion of elite. He and his Italian colleagues seem to have been less worried by their own impact on economic system-as author points out, it took a Jerome to uncover that contradiction-and I was surprised to find virtually no reference to Paulinus of Nola (and, perhaps more forgivably, none to Dennis Trout's 1999 biography). It is interesting that attack on avarice should have been tied up with so many other theoretical preoccupations. The chief of them may have been development of a history of avarice, which affected one's understanding of Fall, of prior situation in Paradise (not to mention Golden Age), and of changing impact of in all its guises throughout chronicled past. Augustine, of course, is given greatest prominence here, although author is astute in his assessment of Gregory of Nazianzus, and pays due attention to several earlier stages in process of historicizing vice. …