Scholastic Tradition Research Articles

Православная «мистика» в отечественной духовно-академической философии ХІХ века

The article is devoted to the analysis of such a spiritual phenomenon in the history of Russian philosophy as its spiritual-academic branch, represented in the ХІХ century by the scientific and pedagogical activity of philosophy professors of four academies of the Russian Empire: St. Petersburg, Moscow, Kiev and Kazan. On the example of the Kiev and Moscow Academies, the unique features of this philosophy, manifested in the desire of their most prominent representatives P. Avsenev and F. Golubinskiy to combine elements of Orthodox “mysticism” with elements of European rationalist philosophy, have been considered. In the work of these representatives of spiritual and academic philosophy, mystical and scholastic traditions are combined. Both philosophers were distinguished by an extremely increased interest in mystical literature, in the sphere of everything irrational, in the phenomena of somnambulism, sleepwalking, and clairvoyance. They retained the glory of strange and mysterious thinkers. By virtue of the last argument, the author has turned to their work and tried to compare some features of their philosophical views.

El debate en torno a la mímesis en la República de Platón y en la Poética de Aristóteles

En el presente artículo se busca analizar la concepción de mímesis tanto en la filosofía platónica, especialmente a partir de La Republica, como a lo largo de la Poética de Aristóteles. Considerando esto, se busca confrontar ambos planteos para rescatar ciertos aspectos de cada uno y proponer una visión propia que retoma la concepción de arte y belleza de la tradición escolástica, especialmente la lectura que realiza el filósofo Jacques Maritain que supone una especie de síntesis a la concepción de los autores de la antigua Grecia.

The Debate on Probable Opinions in the Scholastic Tradition, written by Rudolf Schuessler

The Debate on Probable Opinions in the Scholastic Tradition, written by Rudolf Schuessler

Схоластика на Руси

Статья посвящена вопросу о характере взаимоотношения и специфике взаимопроникновения западноевропейской и русской интеллектуальных культур и традиций. Особая роль отведена рецепции на Руси (в России) схоластического наследия: стиля мышления, научного, политического и ре­лигиозного мировосприятия. Специальное внимание сосредоточено на фи­гурах Раймунда Луллия и Фомы Кемпийского. Подчеркивается также и то, что для русского читателя в равной степени были приемлемы и сугу­бо рационалистический, и всецело духовный аспекты западной схоласти­ки. Интерес представляли обсуждаемые в ней проблемы как мистической жизни, так и философского осмысления истории. Кроме того, обращается внимание и на то, что схоластическая традиция оказала влияние на разви­тие русской литературы (Н.В. Гоголь, А.К. Толстой, М.А. Булгаков), а так­же на формирование русской философской лексики.

«Народ» в политической мысли европейского модерна: Гоббс, Спиноза, Пуфендорф

The author considers the evolution of the concept “people” in the political philosophy of Thomas Hobbes, Samuel Pufendorf and Benedict Spinoza. The political thought of Europe in the 17th century demonstrates a conscious turn from the medieval scholastic tradition of thinking about people and power. Politics begins to be thought of as a complex of human ac­tions aimed at achieving certain human goals. This, in turn, leads to the rationalisation of politics and, as a consequence, to the rejection of one of the most powerful mystical and theo­logical abstractions of the late Middle Ages — the concept “people” as a kind of mystical body. Protestant science makes a clear choice in favour of interpreting the concept as an “arti­ficial person”. The author emphasizes that the introduction of the concept “natural state” led to changes in the ontological status of people in political theory. The concept “people” becomes “a flickering subject” that appears during the transition from a natural state to a civil one and disappears when the transition goes in the opposite direction. In a civil state, people become an active subject when they perform the function of the legislator. In other cases, people as a political subject transform into a certain multitude, consisting of separate individuals.

The Christological Character of the Beatific Vision: Hans Boersma’s Seeing God

The Christological Character of the Beatific Vision: Hans Boersma’s Seeing God1 Michael Root WE LIVE TODAY in a universe vastly larger than that imagined by our ancient and medieval forebears in its spatial and temporal reach, but oddly shrunken in its metaphysical complexity. Not only have angels and incorruptible heavenly bodies disappeared from the functional ontology of Western society, but also more mundane realities have often ceased to play more than an ornamental role in secular thought: essences, transcendental truths, ends (whether natural or supernatural). For many, what you see is what you get, and all you will ever get. Such views inevitably creep into Christian attitudes. Our horizon narrows; our faith too often focuses on our present life. That the nature and purpose of our present life might be determined by an end, a goal or telos, beyond the limits of this life becomes a thought that crosses the mind now and then, but too often fails to take root. The faith becomes constrained within Charles Taylor’s “immanent frame.”2 Heaven, resurrection, eternal union with God and the saints are not denied, but they fade from significance. [End Page 127] Hans Boersma will have none of this in Seeing God. The loss of a sense of a telos inherent within things is a fundamental impoverishment of modern thought (20–22). The Christian life, in particular, is determined by the end set before us; our “identity lies in the future; we are what we become” (20). Boersma is not afraid to name that end; it is “seeing God,” the beatific vision. On the first page of the book, he asks why we should believe that “seeing God is the purpose of our life” (1), and he then lays out an argument affirming that belief. This affirmation must be applauded, even if some aspects of his conclusions are problematic.3 I The structure of the book is straightforward. An extended Introduction and opening chapter lay out why the beatific vision is important, tendencies in modern culture and theology that have undercut the significance of the beatific vision, and the background metaphysical commitments that Boersma believes are needed for a vigorous reassertion of the vision’s centrality. The bulk of the book is a consideration of, as the subtitle promises, “the beatific vision in Christian tradition,” beginning with Plotinus and running chronologically as far as recent Dutch Reformed theologians, with major attention given along the way to Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Gregory Palamas, Dante, John Calvin, and Jonathan Edwards. The chapter on Edwards and the concluding chapter of the book lay out Boersma’s own proposal for understanding the vision. The historical survey is selective rather than comprehensive. The most significant chapters focus on figures and texts apparently chosen and interpreted with an eye toward Boersma’s larger argument about the nature of the vision. Some gaps in coverage are inevitable. The third of the book’s four parts is entitled “Beatific Vision in Protestant Theology,” but the figures [End Page 128] discussed are all Reformed; Lutherans and other non-Reformed Protestants make no appearance. More significantly, the Western Scholastic tradition of debate and teaching on the beatific vision, conflicted between 1235 and 1335 and then largely unified on doctrinal questions with variation on theological details, is represented only by Thomas Aquinas. The other medieval and Catholic figures considered (Bonaventure, Dante, Nicholas of Cusa, John of the Cross) are each treated only in relation to devotional or poetic texts. The theological consideration of such texts is certainly praiseworthy, but neglect of the explicit theological discussion of the topic is not. This tilt away from the Scholastic discussion distorts Boersma’s presentation. The views of individual authors are misrepresented4 and Aquinas’s significance for the Western tradition is both underestimated (his view on basic questions is not so much his alone, but the consensus of Catholic theology, embodied in doctrine)5 and overestimated (his [End Page 129] detailed views are not the only option available in line with the basic commitments he shares with other Scholastics). Boersma’s historical discussions lay bare what he thinks are significant problems in the way the vision is often discussed...

Translation as Commentary in the Sanskrit-Old Javanese Didactic and Religious Literature from Java and Bali

This article discusses the dynamics of translation and exegesis documented in the body of Sanskrit-Old Javanese Śaiva and Buddhist technical literature of the tutur/tattva genre, composed in Java and Bali in the period from c. the ninth to the sixteenth century. The texts belonging to this genre, mainly preserved on palm-leaf manuscripts from Bali, are concerned with the reconfiguration of Indic metaphysics, philosophy, and soteriology along localized lines. Here we focus on the texts that are built in the form of Sanskrit verses provided with Old Javanese prose exegesis – each unit forming a »translation dyad«. The Old Javanese prose parts document cases of linguistic and cultural »localization« that could be regarded as broadly corresponding to the Western categories of translation, paraphrase, and commentary, but which often do not fit neatly into any one category. Having introduced the »<i>vyākhyā-style</i>« form of commentary through examples drawn from the early inscriptional and didactic literature in Old Javanese, we present key instances of »cultural translations« as attested in texts composed at different times and in different geographical and religio-cultural milieus, and describe their formal features. Our aim is to document how local agents (re-)interpreted, fractured, and restated the messages conveyed by the Sanskrit verses in the light of their contingent contexts, agendas, and prevalent exegetical practices. Our hypothesis is that local milieus of textual production underwent a progressive »drift« from the Indic-derived scholastic traditions that inspired – and entered into a conversation with – the earliest sources, composed in Central Java in the early medieval period, and progressively shifted towards a more embedded mode of production in East Java and Bali from the eleventh to the sixteenth century and beyond.

Originalidad de la metafísica cusana: la negación en cuanto principio primero

Our paper will be developed in three moments. First, we will present the originality of Nicholas de Cusa’s thought (1401-1464) expressed in his formula “about learned ignorance”, that is to say, on the knowledge of not knowing as it is the irreplaceable resource to express the absolute perfection of the beginning of everything: God. In a second moment we will show how this originality differs from the scholastic tradition elaborated by both Albertus Magnus and Thomas of Aquinas, appealing to the metaphysics of being proposed by Aristotle.Thirdly, we will present passages from Cusanus‘s later works, in which the principle of negation is reelaborated and thematically deepened. Our aspiration is that this path through Cusanus´s texts provides us with a complete image of the deep originality of Cusanus´s thought.

The Origin of a New Kind of Science From the Life Sciences

Science in the modern era began with a process of synthesis; the natural sciences in particular emerged through a coalescence of several cultural traditions. Scientific knowledge arose in a series of several separate events as mathematics, philology, physics and biology emerged independently. Scientific ideas about natural life developed via a synthesis of three types of knowledge. (1) There was the tradition of herbalism as a type of knowledge of nature, and this approach remained close to the Aristotelian tradition of describing nature with a bookish method centered on descriptive practice. (2) The scholastic tradition clarified existing concepts and formed new ones. Its role was crucial in supplying nascent science with its set of cognitive tools. (3) The alchemical tradition provided experimental knowledge of nature as applied to human life. It was particularly important in building the skills needed to connect theoretical systems with reality. This synthesis in natural philosophy was the basis of Linnaean reforms. However, theoretical morphology was cen¬tral to Linnaeus’ thinking and, its features were responsible for the success of his system. Theoretical morphology offered ways to decide how a natural phenomenon should be reduced and divided into parts in order to serve as an object of scientific cognition. Essential theoretical precepts for this morphology were formulated by Andrea Cesalpino in De plantis libri XVI (1583). Hence, the origin of the natural sciences as a study of living nature should properly be traced to the 16th century. This strand in the development of the new scientific approach in Europe through studying living things should also be connected with earlier (medieval) efforts of the Dominican Order (promoting purer versions of Aristotelianism), while another strand which led to the appearance of physics and other more mathematically expressed branches of the natural sciences belongs to the Franciscan orders (more influenced by Neoplatonism). Science emerged then as profound and experimentally verifiable theoretical knowledge based on ideation through the construction of the objects of experimental research.

The Tibetan Institutionalisation of Disputation: Understanding a Medieval Monastic Practice

Within Europe, there developed what has been described as a »medieval culture of disputation«.1 This description seems equally apt with regard to certain societies in Asia that had strong Buddhist scholarly traditions. A formalised practice of disputation is one of the many correspondences that exists, for instance, between the scholarly cultures of medieval Europe and Tibet. In Europe, various intellectual and social movements contributed to the eventual decline of scholasticism, the system to which disputation was central. But in Tibet, disputation still holds pride of place in a style of learning that is essentially medieval in origin. The existence of this »living tradition« and the availability of plentiful sources hailing from the medieval scholastic tradition may well be seen as major assets when it comes to understanding the earlier Tibetan practice. But confusion about sources, domains, and claims of continuity appear to have discouraged efforts in this direction. The current article is the first to consider Tibetan monastic disputation in historical terms. Through the clarification of boundaries, the identification of relevant historical sources, and by means of comparison with contemporary practice, it takes the first steps to understanding the evolution of disputation, specifically within institutional contexts.

A Case of Geluk Growth: The Career of Scholar and Yogin Shar Kalden Gyatso (1607–1677) and His Role in Propagating the Geluk School in Rebgong, Amdo

This paper explores the life of Shar Kalden Gyatso with a focus on his contributions to the seventeenth-century development of Geluk influence in the northeastern Tibetan region of Amdo. Not only did he adopt the role of a monastic leader in founding and bolstering scholastic traditions in his home region in Amdo, but he was also an accomplished practitioner. In addition to his role as the founder of scholastic and retreat institutions in Rebgong, his close relationship with local rulers in Amdo and his non-sectarian stance toward other religious traditions fueled his charisma and increased his base of followers. Therefore, the main goal of this paper is to explore all these themes as they illustrate the career of Shar Kalden Gyatso as a central figure in the religious history of Amdo in general and the development of Geluk influence in Rebgong in particular. Meanwhile, I provide an appropriate assessment of the sectarian conversion of Rongwo Monastery, also considering the importance of Shar Kalden Gyatso’s role in institutional foundations, his network of patronage, and his religious ecumenical thought to particularly characterize his outstanding career.

A herança de Leibniz na compreensão de lógica de Christian Wolff

The essay to understand the genealogic tree of the general logic, especially in the XVII and XVIII Century and, particularly, in the European Academy, leads us to a research on the comprehension of this discipline in Christian Wolff’s philosophy. That study, in its turn, shows us that Wolff’s influences are both the “Logic of Ideas” represented by the Messieurs of Port-Royal and John Locke, and the scholastic tradition represented, notably, by Leibniz. In this paper, we will retrace this double influence with the aim of accentuate the Leibnizian heritage in the comprehension of the general logic by Christian Wolff.

To Awaken Beyond the Image-Free (nirābhāsa): The Meaning and Means of the Exoteric Path of Mahāmudrā in the Tangut Keypoints-Notes Cluster

From the 11th through 13th centuries, the mass of yogic techniques informed by the Yoganiruttara cycle of Buddhist Tantra flowed over the Himalayan range and extended to the Hexi Corridor. The Tibetan, Tangut, and Chinese peoples who had been exposed to such a yogic and tantric culture actively drew on Indian Buddhist legacies as taxonomical and conceptual device to structure and make sense of these cutting-edge contemplative techniques. One such discursive device was the Mahāmudrā rubric considered as the pinnacle of a systematic presentation of both tantric and sūtric paths to ultimacy. In this article, I explore the sūtric path structure embedded within a 12th-century Tangut Mahāmudrā presentation—in the Keypoints of Mahāmudrā as the Ultimate along with its commentary—formulated under the Tibetan auspices. I analyze the relevance of the Keypoints exoteric expositions of Mahāmudrā to the Mahāyāna intellectual history through the lens of non-conceptual meditation scheme. In specific, I argue that the Tangut Mahāmudrā works under survey map out a “positive-mystical” paradigm of Buddhist soteriology shared across those Mahāyāna scholastic traditions inspired by the Buddha-nature doctrine to account for the tantric phenomenology.

Spinoza and the Logical Limits of Mental Representation

This paper examines Spinoza’s view on the consistency of mental representation. First, I argue that he departs from Scholastic tradition by arguing that all mental states—whether desires, intentions, beliefs, perceptions, entertainings, etc.—must be logically consistent. Second, I argue that his endorsement of this view is motivated by key Spinozistic doctrines, most importantly the doctrine that all acts of thought represent what could follow from God’s nature. Finally, I argue that Spinoza’s view that all mental representation is consistent pushes him to a linguistic account of contradiction.

Prawo czy forma? Francisa Bacona koncepcja prawidłowości w przyrodzie

The aim of this paper is to analyze the terms “law” (of nature) and “form” in two works of Francis Bacon: the Novum Organum and The Advancement of Learning. The term “form” belongs to the scholastic tradition, whereas the term “law” is crucial for modern scientific methodology. The analysis starts with general characteristics of both terms and then traces them in Bacon’s writings. Both terms turn out to be important for Bacon, but it is argued that to fully understand his approach, his nominalistic tendencies should be acknowledged as well.

THE RECOVERY OF FREEDOM OF SPEECH IN THE CULTURE OF HUMANISTS AND THE COMMUNICATIVE ORIGINS OF THE REFORMATION

Ideas and opinions about communication and intellectual exchange underwent significant changes during the transition from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. The rediscovery ofparrhesiaby the humanists of the Quattrocento is one of the least studied of these changes, and at the same time, paradoxically, one of the most fascinating. My main argument in these pages is that the recovery of Hellenistic “freedom of speech” was a process that took place from the thirteenth century through the first decade of the sixteenth century; thus it began well before the term παρρησία was common currency among humanists. This is the most important and counterituitive aspect of the present analysis of early modernparrhesia, because it means that the concept did not develop at the expense of classical and biblical tradition so much as at the expense of late-medieval scholastic speculation about the sins of the tongue and the legitimation of anger as an intellectual emotion. To illustrate this longue durée process, I have focused on three stages: (i) the creation, transformation, and assimilation by fourteenth-century humanism of the systems of sins of the tongue, and especially the sin ofcontentio; (ii) the synthesis carried out by Lorenzo Valla between the scholastic tradition, the communicative presumptions of early humanism, and the classical and New Testament ideas ofparrhesia; and (iii) the systematization and transformation of this synthesis in Raffaele Maffei'sCommentariorum rerum urbanorum libri XXXVIII. In closing, I propose a hypothesis. The theoretical framework behind Maffei's encyclopaedic approach is not only that he was attempting to synthesize the Quattrocento's heritage through the prism of classical sources; it was also that he was crystallizing the communicative “rules of the game” that all ofChristianitasimplicitly accepted at the beginning of the sixteenth century. Taking the three ways of manifesting the truth considered by Maffei and fleshing them out in the figures of Erasmus of Rotterdam, Celio Calcagnini, and Martin Luther just before the emergence of the Protestant Reformation could help to explain from a communicative perspective the success and pan-European impact of the Reformation.

The Internal Unity of Natural Kinds

It is often assumed that the essence of a natural kind is complex, being such as to include (or to wholly consist of) multiple fundamental properties. For instance, perhaps the essence of the kind “electron” includes both negative charge and a precise rest mass, where neither of these is derivable from the other, nor derivable from some other foundational property. This assumption raises the ‘unity problem’: how to explain what unifies or holds together these properties. One important answer is developed by David Oderberg. His model draws on insights from both analytic metaphysics and the Scholastic tradition. I provide a summary of his solution to the unity problem and point to a potential worry it faces. I conclude by adverting to an alternative solution that would still fit within Oderberg’s overall system.

Interpretation of signs in the conception of Ch.S. Pierce via predicabilia and categories of Aristotle

The article is devoted to the hypothesis explaining the order of signs' classes presented in the manuscripts and articles of Ch.S.Pierce via the diagram of relations of Aristotle's categories which was described in the first translation of Aristotle into Latin conducted after Boethius by Julius Pacius.The hypothesis allows explaining not only the order of categories in the Ch.S.Pierces diagram but also interpreting them via ten categories of Aristotle on the background of scholastic tradition of depicting relations.The conclusion is drawn that the theory of Ch.S.Pierce seems to be the development of Aristotle's doctrine of categories.The article can contribute to the history of philosophy.

Порівняльний аналіз вчень Теофана Прокоповича й Ґеорґія Кониського про душу

The article compares selected chapters devoted the problems of mind (anima) from two philosophical courses by Georgii Konyskyi, taught at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in 1747-1749 and 1749-1751 academic years. As Konyskyi taught his first course using verbatim Teofan Prokopovych’s philosophical course of 1706-08 academic years, the article compares the doctrines on mind by these two Mohylian authors. It also shows the evolution of Konyskyi’s views. There are common elements between the philosophy of mind of Prokopovych and Konyskyi: their interpretations of Aristotle’s definition of the soul; the scholastic concept of the man as an integral mind-body entity; the problem of the unity and multiplicity of forms. It is shown that Prokopovych and Konsyskyi understood the three-level structure of a human soul in the same way as Francisco Suarez and Rodrigo de Arriaga. However, there are some differences between these two Mohylian professors. They interpreted differently sensitive and intellectual cognition. Prokopovych upholds the scholastic doctrine of species. Konyskyi, in his second course, abandons this doctrine and defends the doctrine of impressiones. They are developed by the phantasmata – not received from objects. The impressions are modifications of animal spirits by direct or indirect impact of objects on senses of a human being or any other animated being. In the doctrine on intellectual powers, Prokopovych upholds the scholastic distinction between active and passive intellect. Konyskyirejects this common for scholastic tradition distinction and considers that passive intellect can do full-scale intellectual activity. The influence of Early Modern philosophy, especially Cartesianism, was the reason why Konyskyi changed his position.

Internacionalización de la educación y movilidad: reflexiones a partir del caso argentino

The internationalization of education is a topic of growing interest. It refers to various patterns of power relations, as well as the accumulation of advantages and changes linked to the mobilities in modernity and fundamentally the effects of globalization in contemporary societies. In this article we analyze, on the one hand, the evolution of this education phenomenon, taking into account the Argentine case, particularly in the city of Buenos Aires. The existing inequalities and the problems linked to social exclusion and to the (dis) advantages that have an impact on the inequitable access to education in this international framework are considered as an underlying element of academic mobility. Likewise, the imminent globalization that permeates the different spheres of social life also has its correlation with the increase in mobility and the diversification of travel, among which are trips for reasons of study, as will be shown below with precise data on arrivals of non-residents to Argentina. Finally, certain decision factors are listed when developing study trips by non-residents entering the country in general and the city of Buenos Aires in particular. Among them stand out: the gratuity, ta democratic university ethos, certain discourses on educational quality, and references and scholastic tradition