Philosophy in Early Medieval Europe: Peter Damian and Anselm of Canterbury

Scholastic Philosophy of Anselm of Canterbury

Anselm of Canterbury (c. 1033—1109) is a pivotal figure in medieval philosophy, and his scholarly career unfolded through a series of notable events. An Italian by birth, Anselm became a monk and later the abbot of a monastery in Normandy, a region governed by Duke William the Conqueror. Following this, William's son, King William II of England, appointed Anselm as Archbishop of Canterbury.

To highlight Anselm’s “intellectual biography,” we first note his profound knowledge of ancient logical traditions, including the works of Aristotle, Porphyry, and Boethius, as well as his teaching of the "liberal arts" such as grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic. His literary output includes significant works relevant to the history of philosophy, specifically the "Monologion" and the "Proslogion."

The titles of these works reflect their literary form rather than their content. The "Monologion" is a discourse with oneself, while the "Proslogion" is a discourse with another. Anselm also refers to these works with alternative titles: the former as "A Model of Reflection on the Meaning of Faith" and the latter as "A Word to the Attentive." Understanding the content of these works will elucidate Anselm’s religious and philosophical views.

In examining scholastic philosophy, we will focus on the philosophical-methodological meaning of the term "scholasticism," excluding its cultural-historical and didactic aspects. This approach aligns with the interpretation of scholasticism by the German theologian and historian of medieval philosophy, Martin Grabmann. Thus, the primary goal is to reveal what rationalism means in medieval Western religious-philosophical thought through Anselm's example.

It is important to differentiate between Anselm’s religious-philosophical and theological aspects. The religious-philosophical aspect pertains to discussions about God as the foundation of being and various questions about God's relationship with the world, nature, humanity, society, and culture. In contrast, reflections on the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, and the devil are relevant only insofar as they exhibit philosophical content, problems, and methodology. This perspective is of interest to the historian of philosophy and contributes to the history of scholastic philosophy.

Anselm’s first approach in his scholastic (rationalist) philosophy involves an abstract-theoretical, logical description of God using the logical-ontological categories of Aristotle’s philosophy. More importantly, it involves deriving (deducing) the concept of God through the development of these categories, moving from one concept to another. Each category is not merely introduced but deduced and justified. This is exemplified in Anselm’s "Monologion."

The starting category of the "Monologion" is the highest nature, introduced as the cause of the existence of good things (since there are goods, there must be a cause) (p. 39). Its attributes are described as the essence (essentia), or substance, or nature - the best, greatest, and highest in relation to all that exists (p. 42^3). Here, nature is not a physical reality, as Anselm clarifies: “By nature, I mean the same as essence” (p. 43). The highest essence exists through itself and could not arise through itself or through another, thus being eternally existent (p. 45). It exists through itself and from itself, similar to how light shines and is the shining (p. 47). The highest essence is the most existent (summe).

Anselm lists many other properties of the highest essence: it must necessarily be living, wise, omnipotent, true, righteous, blissful, and eternal (p. 59). Anselm’s understanding of the relationship between the highest essence and its attributes differs from the usual correlation between God and His attributes. He writes that everything said about it does not show what it is, but rather what it is (p. 60). In other words, the attributes of the highest essence point not to its qualities but to its substance. Thus, all attributes merge into one goodness, making it simple rather than complex (p. 61).

The highest nature exists always, everywhere, and only in the present; it does not admit internal distinctions of place and time such as "here," "there," "now," "then"; it is immune to any changes (p. 66, 69, 72, 76). Anselm concludes that the highest essence exists everywhere and always, and simultaneously nowhere and never, that is, in every place and time and in no place (p. 73).

From the general and abstract highest essence, Anselm moves to its specific expression in the form of the Spirit, a spiritual substance. This is the second category of the "Monologion." It is introduced as follows: nothing is more worthy of essence than spirit or body, and among them, spirit is worthier than body; therefore, essence is spirit and not body (p. 77). The characteristics of the Spirit are described similarly to those previously attributed to the highest nature. Anselm states that the Spirit exists in a particularly wondrous manner; it exists simply, perfectly, and absolutely, while everything else exists only slightly and barely (p. 78).

The Spirit itself is further specified as the Word (p. 80, 88). “The Word of the highest Spirit” is the third category of the "Monologion." Through establishing the relations between the Spirit and the Word, Anselm further specifies both categories, adding new meanings to them.

The Word is a likeness of the Spirit, as a child is a likeness of a parent; thus, Anselm considers it most fitting to conceive the existence of the Spirit through birth (p. 90). Hence, the Spirit becomes the Father, and the Word becomes the Son (p. 91). The Spirit is appropriately called the Father and not the mother because the primary cause of offspring is always in the father, and the Word is the Son, not the daughter, because only the Son is always more like the Father (p. 92).

Since the Son is similar to the Father and possesses all His attributes, He is characterized as the understanding of understanding, the truth of truth, the memory of memory, that is, the memory that remembers the Father; the wisdom of wisdom, that is, the wisdom that understands the Father (p. 96, 98).

The distinction of the Father and the Son from the Spirit shows that they are in the common Spirit, and Anselm says that the name "Spirit" signifies the substance of the Father and the Son, and together they constitute one highest essence. Thus, Anselm returns to the initial category and simultaneously advances, as the highest essence now, in the form of the Spirit, Father, and Son, becomes the unified Trinity (p. 103, 108, 120). In this respect, Anselm’s categories move not in a circle but in a genuine dialectical spiral, that is, they develop.

The emergence of the Trinity allows Anselm to introduce the concept of God and thereby complete his system of reasoning in the "Monologion." As he writes, concerning this highest unified Trinity, one can say: one essence and three persons, or three substances, and the name God is correctly attributed to this highest essence alone (p. 121).

To conclude, let us briefly outline Anselm’s reasoning. In our life, there are goods; thus, there must be their cause—the highest essence. This essence is the highest Spirit, which begets the Word-Son and becomes the Father, resulting in the Trinity-God.

It seems that Anselm’s "Monologion" exemplifies scholastic deductive constructions, which later found continuation in the works of Thomas Aquinas and even Benedict Spinoza.

The concept of God introduced in the "Monologion" is further developed in the "Proslogion." Since the description of God in the "Proslogion" is similar to what was previously said about the highest essence, we will only mention a few of His attributes. God has no parts ("You are unity itself"); He exists outside all space and time. God is life itself; He is omnipotent and just, and so forth (p. 131, 137, 140).

The second aspect of Anselm’s scholastic (rationalist) philosophy lies in the purely logical nature of his arguments, with minimal reference to the authority of Scripture, that is, faith, while maintaining a priori knowledge. In response to the suggestion of validating the "Monologion" through references to Scripture and Church Fathers, Anselm describes his method: “...so that nothing is accepted as proven on the basis of Scriptural authority, but everything asserted in the conclusion of separate studies should strictly follow from reasoning and be evidently true” (p. 33).

Thus, Anselm employs no theological arguments or empirical data from natural science as proof, except for a few analogies drawn from human experience. His primary methodological approach remains logical (rational) conviction, appealing to human reason. This is clearly reflected in the famous title of the "Proslogion"—“Faith Seeking Understanding” ("Fides quaerens intellectum")—and Anselm’s own words about this work: “From the perspective of one who aims to stimulate his mind to contemplate God and seeks to understand what he believes, I have written this small treatise” (p. 123). In his dialogues, Anselm’s student frequently speaks of the transition of faith into knowledge: “You have made me, believing, know what I, not knowing, believed” (p. 254). Another remark from the student regarding a thesis posed by the teacher: “I believe, but I wish to understand” (p. 202).

Despite his focus on rational conviction and knowledge, Anselm places faith above all else (as noted earlier). A well-known quote illustrates this point: “I, Lord, do not seek to penetrate Your height, for I do not equate my understanding with it; but I wish to understand Your truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand in order to believe, but I believe in order to understand” (p. 128).

Anselm’s commitment to rational conviction can be illustrated by the main techniques of his arguments. In using deductive proof, he employs both empirical and theoretical premises. For example, in the "Monologion," we find an empirical basis for proving the existence of the highest essence: “If there are so many goods that we perceive with our senses (experimur) and discern with our rational part (ratione mentis), should we not believe that there is one thing through which all goods are goods?” (p. 39). Another argument from Anselm is: “Whoever observes the nature of things feels that not all are endowed with equal dignity: by nature, a horse is better than a tree, and a man is superior to a horse. Rational sense (ratio) convinces us that some nature is so exalted above all others that it has no higher nature” (p. 43).

In the "Proslogion," Anselm presents his famous argument for the existence of God, which is based on a self-evident (according to Anselm) theoretical premise that constitutes the proof itself. Anselm states: “I began to search for a single argument that would need nothing other than itself for its justification and would be sufficient to prove that God exists” (p. 123).

This premise-argument (proof) is as follows: “You [God] are that than which nothing greater can be conceived” (p. 128). The logic of this argument appears to be: if it is inconceivable that anything greater than God exists, then He, therefore, exists as the greatest being. It can also be said that Anselm treats this premise as an axiom accepted on faith without proof, as evidenced by his words: “Thus, ’that than which nothing greater can be conceived’ is necessarily what should be believed about the Divine substance” (p. 165).

However, Anselm thoroughly comments on—rather than proves—the thesis, suggesting that even the fool who denies God’s existence is convinced that at least in his mind, there is that than which nothing greater can be conceived. Yet Anselm insists that what is greater than which nothing can be conceived exists both in the mind and in reality: “For if it exists at least in the mind, it can be conceived to exist in reality, which is greater. Thus, undoubtedly, that than which nothing greater can be conceived exists (existit) both in the mind and in reality” (p. 128-129).

Anselm of Canterbury's proof of the existence of God, presented in his "Proslogion," was later termed the ontological argument, as it starts from the thesis of God's existence and has been subjected to numerous critiques.

Continuing the discussion on Anselm’s argumentation, it is noteworthy that he frequently employs reductio ad absurdum. For instance, the highest essence is present in everything, through everything, and all things are from and in it. Where it is not, there is nothing. Hence, it is everywhere. Anselm's scholastic method also includes a meticulous and pedantic examination of all nuances of a given issue.

Although the "Monologion" and the "Proslogion" are directly concerned with God, the exploration of this central category of religious philosophy also includes ontological and epistemological questions, Christian cosmogony, and reflections on the knowledge of God, which are examined as abstractly as God Himself.

In Anselm's ontology, we encounter a collection of rather standard propositions of religious philosophy. The totality of things exists through something else, specifically a non-material principle, God. Nothing arises otherwise, Anselm writes, except through the highest essence. It is the “creator” who produced such a wealth of things, beautifully arranged, from nothing, through itself and not through another.

Anselm explains the creation of everything from nothing and the concept of “nothing” using everyday analogies, leading to an understanding of “nothing” as “what did not exist before; a state that did not exist up to a certain point.” For instance, creation from nothing is akin to someone becoming rich from being poor or another gaining health from illness—conditions they did not previously possess. A particularly vivid example is when someone is elevated from a state of humiliation, we say: “He has created him from nothing.” Previously treated as nothing, the person is now esteemed as something.

Yet, although creation arises from nothing, there is an underlying basis for creation—models of things in the mind of the highest nature. Anselm makes an important assertion regarding this: “It is clear that all things, before they came into being, were in the mind of the highest nature as a model, form, likeness, or rule of the thing to be created.” He characterizes the form of things in the mind before their creation as “the utterance of things in the mind itself, like a master who, when preparing to create a work, conceptualizes it in his mind.”

However, Anselm also points out a significant difference between the imagination of the highest substance and that of the master: the internal utterances of the creative substance are not acquired from external sources; the master, on the other hand, cannot conceive of something unless he knows it from other things.

Anselm further details this general position by describing the creative activity of the Spirit, the bearer of the Word. It is continuously stated that the highest Spirit is the creator of things and the beginning; it speaks itself and thus speaks all that is created; by its Word, creation is spoken into existence.

From the notion of the existence of models in the mind of the creative substance, Anselm draws a crucial ontological conclusion: “If it is evident that the created was nothing before it came into being... it was nonetheless not nothing in relation to the mind of the creator.” In other words, material things are nothing until they come into existence, but as their ideal models, they are not nothing, as they exist in the mind of the creator.

The created existence of the highest essence or Spirit is described by Anselm not in great detail, mainly in relation to the characteristics of this highest nature. For instance, the totality of things consists of matter: earth, water, air, fire, that is, inanimate substance. But since the highest nature not only exists but also lives, senses, and reasons, the created things are more akin to those that live, perceive, and are rational, rather than those that do not sense and are impervious to rational meaning. Anselm repeatedly emphasizes that higher existence and greater degrees of essence and dignity pertain to created nature that is closer to and more similar to the highest essence. Thus, a living substance exists more than an inanimate one; a sensing one more than a non-sensing one; a rational one more than an irrational one. Accordingly, living natures are superior to inanimate ones, sensing to non-sensing, and rational to irrational.

In the "Monologion," Anselm offers brief remarks on the knowledge of God, reflecting the traditional Christian agnostic approach. He summarizes the examination of the highest essence: “The mystery of such an exalted thing exceeds any degree of human intellectual sophistication.” Similarly, regarding the Spirit, he states: “How the Spirit speaks or how it knows creation, human knowledge cannot comprehend.” Understanding the “wondrous” and “inexpressible multiplicity” of the highest unity of the Spirit and the Word is also placed beyond logic. According to Aristotelian logic, it is impossible for the same thing to be both begetter and begotten, yet Christian doctrine stipulates that both the begetter and the begotten must constitute the same thing.

Thus, according to Anselm (and tradition), God cannot be directly and immediately known or expressed. This can only be done indirectly, through something else, like speaking in riddles or seeing a reflection in a mirror. Names for the highest nature, such as “wisdom” and “essence,” merely hint at it through some resemblance: “These [words],” Anselm writes, “form something entirely different in my mind than what my mind seeks to approach through this weak signification.”

Despite the difficulties Anselm identifies in knowing God, there is a possibility to know the creative essence to a significant degree through the closest creature—rational consciousness, which he calls its mirror and image. “Knowledge approaches the highest essence most closely through rational consciousness,” Anselm notes. The presence of rational consciousness, which successfully ascends to the knowledge of the creative essence, allows Anselm to offer a moderately optimistic conclusion: “Thus, this nature is so ineffable that it cannot be expressed as it is through words, and yet, under the guidance of reason, we can indirectly, through something else and somewhat conjecturally, affirm something about it.”

In the "Proslogion," Anselm says much the same about the knowledge of God but with what seems to be a greater presence of mystical epistemology in the spirit of the Areopagite and Eriugena. Here, Anselm speaks of the inaccessible light in which God dwells and which cannot be penetrated to see Him directly: “God is not seen by those who seek Him. The soul has seen both truth and light, but not You as You are.”

In conclusion, the "Monologion," Anselm's perhaps principal work, presents abstractly and categorically the ontology, anthropology, and epistemology of Christian philosophy in the West.