HUMA1010 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Komnenos, Pope Urban Ii, Western Roman Empire
28 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
Biography
•Anselm (1033-1109)
Born in Aosta, Burgundy, France
•
Entered the Benedictine monastic order at Bec,
and eventually elected abbot there in 1078
•
In 1093, enthroned Archbishop of Canterbury,
England
•
Historical Context
• The Great Schism (1054 CE)
• Eastern Byzantine Christendom = preserving tradition
Constantine (r. 324-337) at Constantinople
•
Theodosius I (r. 379-395) makes
Christianity official religion of the empire
•
Rome sacked in 410
•
Justinian the Great (e. 527-565)
•
•Weakened after crusades (1096-1291)
1095, 1147, 1189, 1202
•
Roman Pope Urban II responds in 1095 to
Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus (1081–1118)
•
• Western Roman Christendom
• Holy Roman Empire
• Confederate of city states in Europe
Charlemagne (924, by Pope Leo III)
•
Henry III (1046-1056)
•
Henry IV (1084-1106)
•
William the Conquerer (1066-1086)
•
William II (Rufus) (1087-1100)
•
Henry I (1100-1135)
•
• Scholasticism
• Monasticism = western traditions
St. Benedict of Nursa (480-546CE)
•
Pope Gregory the Great (540-604CE)
•
Key Sources
Primary Sources
Monologion
•
Proslogion (Addition)
•
Cur Deus Homo (Why God Became Man)
•
De Veritate (On Truth)
•
De Libertate Arbitrii (On Free Will)
•
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/anselm
Secondary Sources
•
The Cambridge Companion to Anselm
•
Medieval Philosophy of Religion, Chapter 6, Further Reading
•
Faith and Knowledge
On Philosophical Proofs:
• Anselm does seem to think it is possible to prove:
Existence of God
•
Divine attributes
•
Triunity of God
•
Reconciliation through God’s Self-Offering
•
• Aquinas’s distinction:
Aristotelian knowledge through sense-experience
•
Preambles of faith (facts about God, existence and
perfection proved by reason)
•
Mysteries of faith (facts about God, such as triunity,
that must be believed on the basis of revelation)
•
• Faith seeking understanding
The premises of Anselm’s arguments are not always self-evident.
•
Proofs begin with faith (proslogion begins in prayer)
•
Humility at the limits of understanding and
obedience to the tradition
•
Reasons of faith can be explained to patient
doubters
•
• Faith’s philosophical diversity:
Credo, as in trusting belief, a kind of relationally (credit, credibility)
•
Faith at the point at which reason runs out, or in opposition to reason (revealed faith)
•
Faith as in holding to be true in light of new evidence • Probability and Bayes’
(1701-1761) theorem:
• P(H|E)=P(E|H)*P(H) 9%= 99%*.001
•
P(E) https://youtu.be/R13BD8qKeTg
.001*.99+.999*.01
Things to be revealed
Anselm blurs these three things
I believe in order to understand
Ontological Argument
Anselm argument has haunted western philosophy.
•
This is not to say that it has always been well understood.
•
If starting with faith in God, the argument provides some
description of the limits of knowledge.
•
If starting with skepticism, the argument is unlikely to
operate as much more than a thought experiment.
•
‘That than which nothing greater can be conceived’:
Claims that God does not exist, do not adequately take
into account that the existence of God is beyond human
understanding.
•
What exists in reality is greater than what exists in the
mind’s understanding alone.
•
If something exists in the mind only, we can consider it
greater to exist in reality.
•
Therefore, God exists in reality outside the understanding.
•
Gaunilo’s “Reply on Behalf of the Fool”:
He didn’t object to the argument as such, he just
thought there was something wrong with it.
•
Lost Island counter-example:
•
• An island so marvellous no greater island can be conceived
Please read the citation from Gaunilo’s reply in the
reading for today, pg. 76-77.
•
How does Gaunilo’s example of the island undermine Anselm’s argument?
•
Why isn’t existence a perfection in Gaunilo’s view?
•
That than which nothing greater can be conceived:
• Reply to Gaunilo:
Yes, existence is not a perfection
•
Thinking a highest being in the mind is itself difficult
•
If it exists, it is a necessary being, not contingent.
•
A being that cannot fail to exist is greater than a being
that can fail to exist
A being with no beginning or end to its existence is
greater than a being that passes out of being.
○
If we imagine a unicorn and paint it into existence, that is
no indication that the unicorn, however perfect, exists as “that than which nothing
greater can be conceived.”
○
•
Thomas Aquinas’s (1225-1274) Objections:
• Not everyone uses the term God in the same way
• Yes, unless we understand Anselm’s “that than which nothing greater can be
conceived,” as the name for God.
• The statement does not evince an actually existing
entity outside the mind
The issue here (unlike Gaunilo) is that the statement
evinces a kind of thing that is beyond all human understanding, and in that sense is not
ontologically significant to human beings.
•
Yes, but Anselm’s name for God could be maintained in a minimalistic way, i.e. we don’t
have to have complete knowledge of a thing if its concept is coherent
•
Immanuel Kant’s (1724-1804) Objections:
Existence is not a predicate
•
To say God exists does not add anything to God
•
Existence is an attribute only meaningful in the
apprehensible world (phenomenologically)
•
Responses to Kant’s Objections:
Adding existence can contribute meaning, e.g. Socrates
exists and not just as Plato’s fiction.
•
Kant assumes ontological univocity. The response is to note
that Anselm’s argument evinces a kind of being the cannot fail to be, and in this sense
the object of faith is utterly different to being in the world (Barth).
•
The argument might better be understood as a post- ontological argument (Jean-Luc
Marion).
•
The name for God
Week 7: Anselm
Wednesday, 12 April 2017
9:04 am
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
Biography
•Anselm (1033-1109)
Born in Aosta, Burgundy, France
•
Entered the Benedictine monastic order at Bec,
and eventually elected abbot there in 1078
•
In 1093, enthroned Archbishop of Canterbury,
England
•
Historical Context
• The Great Schism (1054 CE)
• Eastern Byzantine Christendom = preserving tradition
Constantine (r. 324-337) at Constantinople
•
Theodosius I (r. 379-395) makes
Christianity official religion of the empire
•
Rome sacked in 410
•
Justinian the Great (e. 527-565)
•
•Weakened after crusades (1096-1291)
1095, 1147, 1189, 1202
•
Roman Pope Urban II responds in 1095 to
Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus (1081–1118)
•
• Western Roman Christendom
• Holy Roman Empire
• Confederate of city states in Europe
Charlemagne (924, by Pope Leo III)
•
Henry III (1046-1056)
•
Henry IV (1084-1106)
•
William the Conquerer (1066-1086)
•
William II (Rufus) (1087-1100)
•
Henry I (1100-1135)
•
• Scholasticism
• Monasticism = western traditions
St. Benedict of Nursa (480-546CE)
•
Pope Gregory the Great (540-604CE)
•
Key Sources
Primary Sources
Monologion
•
Proslogion (Addition)
•
Cur Deus Homo (Why God Became Man)
•
De Veritate (On Truth)
•
De Libertate Arbitrii (On Free Will)
•
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/anselm
Secondary Sources
•
The Cambridge Companion to Anselm
•
Medieval Philosophy of Religion, Chapter 6, Further Reading
•
Faith and Knowledge
On Philosophical Proofs:
• Anselm does seem to think it is possible to prove:
Existence of God
•
Divine attributes
•
Triunity of God
•
Reconciliation through God’s Self-Offering
•
• Aquinas’s distinction:
Aristotelian knowledge through sense-experience
•
Preambles of faith (facts about God, existence and
perfection proved by reason)
•
Mysteries of faith (facts about God, such as triunity,
that must be believed on the basis of revelation)
•
• Faith seeking understanding
The premises of Anselm’s arguments are not always self-evident.
•
Proofs begin with faith (proslogion begins in prayer)
•
Humility at the limits of understanding and
obedience to the tradition
•
Reasons of faith can be explained to patient
doubters
•
• Faith’s philosophical diversity:
Credo, as in trusting belief, a kind of relationally (credit, credibility)
•
Faith at the point at which reason runs out, or in opposition to reason (revealed faith)
•
Faith as in holding to be true in light of new evidence • Probability and Bayes’
(1701-1761) theorem:
• P(H|E)=P(E|H)*P(H) 9%= 99%*.001
•
P(E) https://youtu.be/R13BD8qKeTg
.001*.99+.999*.01
Things to be revealed
Anselm blurs these three things
I believe in order to understand
Ontological Argument
Anselm argument has haunted western philosophy.
•
This is not to say that it has always been well understood.
•
If starting with faith in God, the argument provides some
description of the limits of knowledge.
•
If starting with skepticism, the argument is unlikely to
operate as much more than a thought experiment.
•
‘That than which nothing greater can be conceived’:
Claims that God does not exist, do not adequately take
into account that the existence of God is beyond human
understanding.
•
What exists in reality is greater than what exists in the
mind’s understanding alone.
•
If something exists in the mind only, we can consider it
greater to exist in reality.
•
Therefore, God exists in reality outside the understanding.
•
Gaunilo’s “Reply on Behalf of the Fool”:
He didn’t object to the argument as such, he just
thought there was something wrong with it.
•
Lost Island counter-example:
•
• An island so marvellous no greater island can be conceived
Please read the citation from Gaunilo’s reply in the
reading for today, pg. 76-77.
•
How does Gaunilo’s example of the island undermine Anselm’s argument?
•
Why isn’t existence a perfection in Gaunilo’s view?
•
That than which nothing greater can be conceived:
• Reply to Gaunilo:
Yes, existence is not a perfection
•
Thinking a highest being in the mind is itself difficult
•
If it exists, it is a necessary being, not contingent.
•
A being that cannot fail to exist is greater than a being
that can fail to exist
A being with no beginning or end to its existence is
greater than a being that passes out of being.
○
If we imagine a unicorn and paint it into existence, that is
no indication that the unicorn, however perfect, exists as “that than which nothing
greater can be conceived.”
○
•
Thomas Aquinas’s (1225-1274) Objections:
• Not everyone uses the term God in the same way
• Yes, unless we understand Anselm’s “that than which nothing greater can be
conceived,” as the name for God.
• The statement does not evince an actually existing
entity outside the mind
The issue here (unlike Gaunilo) is that the statement
evinces a kind of thing that is beyond all human understanding, and in that sense is not
ontologically significant to human beings.
•
Yes, but Anselm’s name for God could be maintained in a minimalistic way, i.e. we don’t
have to have complete knowledge of a thing if its concept is coherent
•
Immanuel Kant’s (1724-1804) Objections:
Existence is not a predicate
•
To say God exists does not add anything to God
•
Existence is an attribute only meaningful in the
apprehensible world (phenomenologically)
•
Responses to Kant’s Objections:
Adding existence can contribute meaning, e.g. Socrates
exists and not just as Plato’s fiction.
•
Kant assumes ontological univocity. The response is to note
that Anselm’s argument evinces a kind of being the cannot fail to be, and in this sense
the object of faith is utterly different to being in the world (Barth).
•
The argument might better be understood as a post- ontological argument (Jean-Luc
Marion).
•
The name for God
Week 7: Anselm
Wednesday, 12 April 2017
9:04 am
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
Biography
•Anselm (1033-1109)
Born in Aosta, Burgundy, France •
Entered the Benedictine monastic order at Bec,
and eventually elected abbot there in 1078
•
In 1093, enthroned Archbishop of Canterbury,
England
•
Historical Context
• The Great Schism (1054 CE)
• Eastern Byzantine Christendom = preserving tradition
Constantine (r. 324-337) at Constantinople
•
Theodosius I (r. 379-395) makes
Christianity official religion of the empire
•
Rome sacked in 410
•
Justinian the Great (e. 527-565)
•
•Weakened after crusades (1096-1291)
1095, 1147, 1189, 1202 •
Roman Pope Urban II responds in 1095 to
Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus (1081–1118)
•
• Western Roman Christendom
• Holy Roman Empire
• Confederate of city states in Europe
Charlemagne (924, by Pope Leo III)
•
Henry III (1046-1056)
•
Henry IV (1084-1106)
•
William the Conquerer (1066-1086)
•
William II (Rufus) (1087-1100)
•
Henry I (1100-1135)
•
• Scholasticism
• Monasticism = western traditions
St. Benedict of Nursa (480-546CE)
•
Pope Gregory the Great (540-604CE)
•
Key Sources
Primary Sources
Monologion
•
Proslogion (Addition)
•
Cur Deus Homo (Why God Became Man)
•
De Veritate (On Truth)
•
De Libertate Arbitrii (On Free Will)
•
http://www.ccel.org/ccel/anselm
Secondary Sources
•
The Cambridge Companion to Anselm
•
Medieval Philosophy of Religion, Chapter 6, Further Reading
•
Faith and Knowledge
On Philosophical Proofs:
• Anselm does seem to think it is possible to prove:
Existence of God
•
Divine attributes
•
Triunity of God
•
Reconciliation through God’s Self-Offering
•
• Aquinas’s distinction:
Aristotelian knowledge through sense-experience
•
Preambles of faith (facts about God, existence and
perfection proved by reason)
•
Mysteries of faith (facts about God, such as triunity,
that must be believed on the basis of revelation)
•
• Faith seeking understanding
The premises of Anselm’s arguments are not always self-evident.
•
Proofs begin with faith (proslogion begins in prayer)
•
Humility at the limits of understanding and
obedience to the tradition
•
Reasons of faith can be explained to patient
doubters
•
• Faith’s philosophical diversity:
Credo, as in trusting belief, a kind of relationally (credit, credibility)
•
Faith at the point at which reason runs out, or in opposition to reason (revealed faith)
•
Faith as in holding to be true in light of new evidence • Probability and Bayes’
(1701-1761) theorem:
• P(H|E)=P(E|H)*P(H) 9%= 99%*.001
•
P(E) https://youtu.be/R13BD8qKeTg
.001*.99+.999*.01
Things to be revealed
Anselm blurs these three things
I believe in order to understand
Ontological Argument
Anselm argument has haunted western philosophy.
•
This is not to say that it has always been well understood.
•
If starting with faith in God, the argument provides some
description of the limits of knowledge.
•
If starting with skepticism, the argument is unlikely to
operate as much more than a thought experiment.
•
‘That than which nothing greater can be conceived’:
Claims that God does not exist, do not adequately take
into account that the existence of God is beyond human
understanding.
•
What exists in reality is greater than what exists in the
mind’s understanding alone.
•
If something exists in the mind only, we can consider it
greater to exist in reality.
•
Therefore, God exists in reality outside the understanding.
•
Gaunilo’s “Reply on Behalf of the Fool”:
He didn’t object to the argument as such, he just
thought there was something wrong with it.
•
Lost Island counter-example:
•
• An island so marvellous no greater island can be conceived
Please read the citation from Gaunilo’s reply in the
reading for today, pg. 76-77.
•
How does Gaunilo’s example of the island undermine Anselm’s argument?
•
Why isn’t existence a perfection in Gaunilo’s view?
•
That than which nothing greater can be conceived:
• Reply to Gaunilo:
Yes, existence is not a perfection
•
Thinking a highest being in the mind is itself difficult
•
If it exists, it is a necessary being, not contingent.
•
A being that cannot fail to exist is greater than a being
that can fail to exist
A being with no beginning or end to its existence is
greater than a being that passes out of being.
○
If we imagine a unicorn and paint it into existence, that is
no indication that the unicorn, however perfect, exists as “that than which nothing
greater can be conceived.”
○
•
Thomas Aquinas’s (1225-1274) Objections:
• Not everyone uses the term God in the same way
• Yes, unless we understand Anselm’s “that than which nothing greater can be
conceived,” as the name for God.
• The statement does not evince an actually existing
entity outside the mind
The issue here (unlike Gaunilo) is that the statement
evinces a kind of thing that is beyond all human understanding, and in that sense is not
ontologically significant to human beings.
•
Yes, but Anselm’s name for God could be maintained in a minimalistic way, i.e. we don’t
have to have complete knowledge of a thing if its concept is coherent
•
Immanuel Kant’s (1724-1804) Objections:
Existence is not a predicate
•
To say God exists does not add anything to God
•
Existence is an attribute only meaningful in the
apprehensible world (phenomenologically)
•
Responses to Kant’s Objections:
Adding existence can contribute meaning, e.g. Socrates
exists and not just as Plato’s fiction.
•
Kant assumes ontological univocity. The response is to note
that Anselm’s argument evinces a kind of being the cannot fail to be, and in this sense
the object of faith is utterly different to being in the world (Barth).
•
The argument might better be understood as a post- ontological argument (Jean-Luc
Marion).
•
The name for God
Week 7: Anselm
Wednesday, 12 April 2017 9:04 am
Document Summary
Entered the benedictine monastic order at bec, and eventually elected abbot there in 1078. Historical context: the great schism (1054 ce, eastern byzantine christendom = preserving tradition. Justinian the great (e. 527-565: weakened after crusades (1096-1291) Roman pope urban ii responds in 1095 to. Byzantine emperor alexius i comnenus (1081 1118: western roman christendom, holy roman empire, confederate of city states in europe. Henry i (1100: scholasticism, monasticism = western traditions. Medieval philosophy of religion, chapter 6, further reading. On philosophical proofs: anselm does seem to think it is possible to prove: Preambles of faith (facts about god, existence and perfection proved by reason) Mysteries of faith (facts about god, such as triunity, that must be believed on the basis of revelation: faith seeking understanding. The premises of anselm"s arguments are not always self-evident. Proofs begin with faith (proslogion begins in prayer) Humility at the limits of understanding and obedience to the tradition.
