Patristics and Scholasticism

What Medieval Philosophy Investigates

The aim of medieval philosophy is the exploration of salvation. This objective encompasses two tasks: to elucidate the mode of existence of human beings and the mode of existence of creation. Human beings are revealed as creations destined for salvation, distinguishing them from other creations; since humanity is incomparable to anything else, its salvation can only be realized through the God-man, rather than through mere divine will or its own volition. Otherwise, salvation would not differ from God's providence over the world or from the self-preservation efforts of any living being or even any inanimate object.

However, if humanity is one of the creations, it is necessary to determine what creation itself entails. Creation is that which pertains to the being of creation, and the being of creation is distinct from the being of the Creator. The distinction here lies not in the relationship between cause and effect, as one might assume, but in the very mode of existence: God "is" being, while humanity "has" being.

Thomas Aquinas refers to existence as "that which possesses existence," "stably existing." Here, any existing entity, no matter how stable or endowed with constant properties, is ultimately contingent due to its imperfection—these same properties could potentially manifest in another existence. Thus, God is the one who inherently possesses the perfection of all existence, realized each time as the pure act of being, and consequently cannot lose His existence or transfer even the slightest fragment to another. Therefore, God creates the world as something other in relation to Himself: just as a carpenter making a stool has no part of the stool within him. The only special case is humanity; since it possesses freedom, including the freedom to attain the perfection of existence, not merely the perfection of fulfillment, it is capable of divinization and becoming a god.

The medieval definition of truth is: "Truth is the correspondence between the thing and the mind." The mind can contemplate the thing not merely as a given but as that which can be grasped in its independent existence. The mind can examine how "intelligent" the thing is, how much it can be an object of intellectual comprehension. Herein lies the truth of the thing, its capacity to reveal itself to the mind as such, rather than as an illusion or mere conjecture about the thing. For instance, we may mistake a tree for a person from afar. But if we further contemplate how we would engage with this object, we conclude that we cannot communicate with it; thus, the truth of its being lies, in part, in its refusal to engage with us. Similar to the ancient sophistry of Protagoras, in medieval philosophy, humanity is indeed the measure of all things, but not in Protagoras’s sense that humanity can self-determine what truly exists versus what is fictitious. Rather, in recognizing its created nature, independence, or freedom, humanity discerns these same properties in all things.

Medieval philosophy is divided into two major periods: patristics (pre-university philosophy, derived from the word "father," "father of the Church") and scholasticism (university philosophy, derived from the word "school"). Notably, scholasticism begins before the establishment of universities, within courtly and ecclesiastical schools: in the East, John of Damascus (c. 675—c. 753), and in the West, John Scottus Eriugena (i.e., born in Ireland, c. 810—877) can already be regarded as scholastics. These authors systematize theological knowledge, approaching it not as a source of inspiration, improvisation, and preaching but as an object of thoughtful and gradual interpretation, refinement, and concise and precise exposition. Yet, when not referring to the scholastics, of whom there were many across different schools, but rather to scholasticism, literally "the art of the school" or "the art of being a school," its institutionalization occurs in the West in the 13th century through the endeavors of Albert the Great (c. 1200—1280) and his student Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225—1274).

Scholasticism introduced new, previously non-existent rules for the production of knowledge. First and foremost, knowledge became rooted not in recollection, in the ability to quickly recall the necessary citation, but in sustained memory: in the classroom, all read and commented upon the entire work of Aristotle together. Exhaustive commentary, addressing all tangentially arising questions, replaced the former free discussion and the study of only those problems that presently posed challenges for the Church. The scholastic examines not only the questions posed by contemporaries but also those that can arise from the very logic of the text.

Furthermore, the methods of teaching evolved: truth is no longer the mind's ability to correspond to revelation or the actual state of affairs, but rather constant repetition, re-reading that which can only be acknowledged as true. Thus, the lecture as the main principle of scholastic learning implies that students follow the text being commented upon, and sometimes even the commentary itself; the lecturer's goal is to demonstrate that this commentary operates impeccably, meaning that truth possesses a universality that can be attained in any classroom.

The Greek word "scholē," from which our term "school" is derived, means "leisure, activity," as we say, "I have classes now." This leisure can be understood as the absence of tasks, which, according to Plato and Aristotle, prompts contemplation, the consideration of more general laws than those encountered in specific activities. Scholasticism is the practice of commenting on Aristotle, emerging in response to another, Arab practice of systematic commentary on Aristotle. For Arab scholars, Aristotle served as the source of true formulations, and the goal of commentary was to "automatically" extract truth. However, for scholasticism, Aristotle could not replace Revelation; thus, commentary became a genre: students understood that such rhetorical strategies reach undeniable truth in the study of a particular realm of being. Therefore, the task of the scholastic is to discern the genre to which their speech pertains and thereby maintain a systematic acquisition of truth about different domains of reality.

In essence, the fundamental conflicts that accompany university philosophy up to the present day were already rooted in scholasticism, including the primary conflict of the 20th century between Anglo-American analytic philosophy and European continental philosophy. Scholasticism primarily trends toward nominalism, albeit with significant struggles and losses, specifically, the doctrine of the principle conditionality of our linguistic sign, which ultimately yields the analytic philosophy of the 20th century, asserting that all philosophical problems arise from the ambiguity of linguistic expressions. If one can systematically reproduce truth in university readings, this inertia of language and linguistic impressions can be overcome. Analytic philosophy stands in opposition to continental philosophy, which traces its lineage to the inherent diversity of programs within European universities. Continental philosophy considers it possible to draw on data from various sciences to construct philosophical arguments, positing that any subject can inspire philosophical insight, and that polemical passion should not be confined solely to language but must also encompass the critique of thought, the shortcomings of feeling, and reasoning. Thus, critical university thought, even in its disputes, inherits the original situation of scholasticism.