Reviewed by: Doubt in an Age of Faith: Uncertainty in the Long Twelfth Century John H. Arnold Doubt in an Age of Faith: Uncertainty in the Long Twelfth Century. By Sabina Flanagan. [Disputatio, Vol. 17.] (Turnhout: Brepols. 2008. Pp. xiv, 212. €60,00. ISBN 978-2-503-52748-2.) Hugh of St. Victor (1078–1141), in his De sacramentis, essayed a definition of faith: “Faith is a kind of certainty of the mind concerning things absent, established beyond opinion but short of knowledge.” A popular, received view of the Middle Ages would read this as an unwitting diagnosis of medieval credulity and its intellectual shortcomings—that lack of knowledge was always and immediately trumped by the received opinion of the Church. However, as Hugh went on to note—and as Sabina Flanagan further explores—doubt and disbelief, founded on lack of certain knowledge, was perfectly well recognized and experienced. Medieval people did sometimes doubt, often questioned, and occasionally were deeply skeptical. An “Age of Faith” is, as we have long known, an inadequate and misleading description of the period. Flanagan is the first author to tackle, in a monograph, the fact and implications of medieval doubt. Her focus is the long twelfth century and is situated very much in the world of the twelfth-century Renaissance: We meet a variety of familiar figures (John of Salisbury, Gerald of Wales, Peter the Venerable, Peter Abelard, Hildegard of Bingen) and some rather less well-known, but still highly learned, writers (Baldwin of Forde, Herbert of Bosham, [End Page 327] Otloh von St. Emmeram). Other medievalists have previously challenged the assumption that medieval people were unable to question or disbelieve, in the specific sense of experiencing religious doubt or skepticism. But Flanagan’s book in fact casts its net much wider than the particular realm of spiritual credulity; and in doing so, although some things are lost, much also is gained. For Flanagan, “doubt” and “uncertainty” are to be tackled as mental and linguistic operations. She is not interested in skepticism or unbelief in their social or cultural settings, but is pursuing, rather, a rigorous intellectual history of medieval cognitive abilities. As such, “uncertainty” here extends well beyond the realm of religion; although there is, as one would expect, some discussion about creedal belief and the like, the authorial net hauls in many other issues, such as the use (or rejection) of divination, how and why one might seek personal or political counsel, intellectual hesitation, and the ability to discern logical alternatives to a cognitive problem. There is a certain loss of focus here, notable particularly in the opening chapters, where example is piled upon example without (initially) any apparent analytical structure. At points, “doubt” becomes an almost boundless category, potentially encompassing any element of decision-making or hesitation. At these fringes, one is less than certain as to what Flanagan sees herself as addressing and revising; although medieval people have been thought credulous, it is not been generally held that they were incapable of thought itself. However, the latter half of the book gains clarity and momentum, as we are shown a variety of medieval writers—such as Hugh of St. Victor—directly addressing, or otherwise grappling with, issues of doubt and uncertainty. Via these examples, Flanagan engages critically with several modern debates, perhaps most importantly Gavin Langmuir’s arguments about the link between religious doubt and the growth of antisemitism in the period. Overall, Flanagan notes that although parts of twelfth-century thought bear specific premodern cognitive tendencies—she argues, for example, that Abelard’s Sic et non is considerably less radical and more imprisoned in its pregiven premises than is often assumed—there are various points of contact and similarity between the medieval “then” and the modern “now.” She ends with a defense of a suitable, humanistic balance between doubt and faith (religious and secular) in our current endeavors. Some uncertainty exists about Flanagan’s overall purpose. But she provides undoubtedly an interesting and thought-provoking work, and a very intriguing way into the varied contours of the twelfth-century Renaissance. [End Page 328] John H. Arnold Birkbeck, University of London Copyright © 2010 The Catholic University of America Press
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Sep 1, 2024
Matthew S C Olver 
Open Access