Scholastics

The Thirteenth Century

In the thirteenth century, the Middle Ages reached the pinnacle of their development. The synthesis that had been gradually forming since the fall of Rome achieved its fullest expression. The fourteenth century brought with it the disintegration of institutions and philosophies, while the fifteenth century heralded the emergence of those institutions and philosophies that we still regard as new. The great figures of the thirteenth century were truly monumental: Innocent III, St. Francis, Frederick II, and Thomas Aquinas stand as supreme representatives of the ideals they embodied, each in their own way. This century also bequeathed significant achievements less definitively tied to these great names: the Gothic cathedrals of France, the romantic literature of the cycles concerning Charlemagne, Arthur, and the Nibelungs, and the nascent constitutional governance embodied in the Magna Carta and the House of Commons. The question that most directly engages our interest is the history of scholastic philosophy, particularly the system of Aquinas; however, I shall defer this discussion until the next chapter to first provide an overview of the events that had the most profound impact on shaping the spiritual atmosphere of the age.

The central figure at the beginning of the century is Pope Innocent III (1198—1216), a shrewd politician of boundless energy and an unyielding advocate of the most extreme claims of the papacy, yet devoid of Christian humility. Upon his elevation, he chose as his sermon text: “Behold, I have set you this day over nations and kingdoms, to root out and to pull down, and to destroy and to throw down, to build and to plant.” Innocent considered himself “the king of kings, the lord of lords, a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.” To impose such a self-image on others, Innocent seized every favorable circumstance. In Sicily, which had been conquered by Emperor Henry VI (who died in 1197) and married to Constance, the heir of the Norman kings, the new king was Frederick, who was merely three years old at Innocent's ascent to the papacy. The kingdom was in turmoil, and Constance required the pope’s assistance. She appointed him guardian of the infant Frederick and secured Innocent’s recognition of her son’s rights in Sicily in exchange for acknowledgment of papal supremacy. Similar recognitions were granted by Portugal and Aragon. In England, King John, after fierce resistance, was compelled to cede his kingdom to Innocent and reclaim it as a papal fief.

Only the Venetians had, to some extent, bested Innocent during the Fourth Crusade. The crusading army was to embark on ships in Venice, but difficulties arose in securing a sufficient number of vessels. Only the Venetians had enough ships, yet they insisted (for purely commercial reasons) that it would be far better to conquer not Jerusalem but Constantinople, as this would serve as a useful intermediate step, particularly since the Eastern Empire had never shown much goodwill toward the crusaders. It was deemed necessary to concede to Venice; Constantinople was captured, and a Latin emperor was installed. Initially, Innocent was vexed; however, he later reasoned that this presented an opportunity to reunite the Eastern and Western churches. (This hope ultimately proved futile.) Aside from this instance, I know of no one who ever managed, even to a degree, to prevail over Innocent. By his order, a great crusade was launched against the Albigensians, resulting in the root eradication of heresy, happiness, prosperity, and culture in Southern France. Innocent deposed Raymond, Count of Toulouse, who showed no enthusiasm for the crusade, and secured a significant portion of the Albigensian territory for the leader of the crusaders, Simon de Montfort, father of the parliament's creator. Innocent clashed with Emperor Otto and called upon the Germans to depose their ruler. They complied, and at Innocent’s suggestion, they elected Frederick II as emperor in Otto's stead, who had now reached adulthood. However, for the support rendered to Frederick, Innocent demanded a terrifying price in the form of promises that Frederick, however, resolved to break at the first opportunity.

Innocent III was the first great pope to possess no trace of holiness. The reform of the church allowed hierarchs to feel secure regarding its moral prestige, leading them to believe they no longer needed to concern themselves with a holy way of life. The quest for power, beginning with Innocent III, increasingly subordinated the politics of the papacy and even provoked opposition from certain religious individuals during his pontificate. To enhance the power of the curia, Innocent III undertook the codification of canon law; Walter von der Vogelweide termed this code “the most vile book ever produced by hell.” And although the most astonishing victories of the papacy still lay ahead, even at this moment one could foresee the nature of its subsequent decline.

Frederick II, who was Innocent III's ward, traveled to Germany in 1212 and was elected emperor in place of Otto with the pope’s assistance. Innocent did not live to witness the formidable adversary he had nurtured in Frederick. Frederick is one of the most remarkable rulers known to history; he spent his childhood and youth under difficult and unfavorable conditions. His father, Henry VI (son of Barbarossa), had defeated the Sicilian Normans and married Constance, the heir to the throne. He stationed a German garrison that incited the hatred of the Sicilians; however, in 1197, when Frederick was only three years old, his father died. Constance then opposed the Germans and sought to govern without them, with the pope's aid. The Germans harbored resentment, and Otto attempted to conquer Sicily; this led to his conflict with the pope. Palermo, where Frederick spent his childhood, had other causes for unrest. Muslims were inciting rebellions; the Pisans and Genoese fought one another and everyone else for control of the island; influential factions in Sicily continually shifted allegiances depending on which side offered a higher price for treachery. Yet, culturally, Sicily enjoyed immense advantages. Here, Muslim, Byzantine, Italian, and German civilizations clashed and intermingled like nowhere else. Greek and Arabic languages remained vibrant in Sicily. Frederick learned to speak six languages fluently and displayed wit in all of them. He was well-versed in Arabic philosophy and maintained friendly relations with Muslims, much to the horror of pious Christians. Frederick was a Hohenstaufen and could pass for a German in Germany, but in terms of culture and sensibility, he was an Italian infused with Byzantine and Arab elements. His contemporaries observed his endeavors with astonishment that gradually turned to dread; they referred to him as “the wonder of the world and the marvelous creator of a new order.” Even during his lifetime, Frederick became a legendary figure. He was attributed authorship of the book “On the Three Impostors,” which supposedly critiqued Moses, Christ, and Muhammad. This book, which never truly existed, was successively attributed to many church adversaries, the last of whom was Spinoza.

During Frederick’s rivalry with Emperor Otto, the terms “Guelph” and “Ghibelline” began to be used. They are distortions of the family names of the two rivals, “Welf” and “Waibling.” (Incidentally, Otto’s nephew is an ancestor of the reigning British royal family.) Innocent III died in 1216. Otto, having suffered defeat at Frederick’s hands, died in 1218. The new pope, Honorius III, initially maintained good relations with Frederick, but soon disagreements arose between them. First, Frederick refused to embark on a crusade; furthermore, he encountered troubles with the Lombard cities, which in 1226 formed a peace and defensive alliance for a duration of twenty-five years. The Lombard cities harbored animosity towards the Germans; one of their poets composed passionate verses directed against them: “Do not love the Germans; away, away from these mad dogs.” These lines seemingly expressed the sentiments of all Lombardy. Frederick sought to remain in Italy to deal with the cities, but in 1227, Honorius III died and was succeeded by Gregory IX, an ardent ascetic who cherished St. Francis, who returned this affection. (Two years after St. Francis’s death, Gregory canonized him.) Gregory prioritized the crusade, and for refusing to participate, he excommunicated Frederick. Frederick, married to the daughter and heiress of the king of Jerusalem, was not against embarking on a crusade, provided his affairs allowed; he referred to himself as the king of Jerusalem. In 1228, still excommunicated, Frederick indeed set out for the East; this infuriated Gregory even more than Frederick’s previous refusal, for how could a man under papal anathema lead a crusader army? Upon arriving in Palestine, Frederick established friendly relations with the Muslims, justifying to them that Jerusalem was dear to Christians, although its strategic significance was negligible, and succeeded in persuading them to peacefully cede Jerusalem to him. This further enraged the pope: one should fight the infidels, not negotiate with them. Nevertheless, Frederick was duly crowned in Jerusalem, and no one could dispute that he had achieved complete success. In 1230, peace was restored between the pope and the emperor.

In the ensuing years, as this world sustained itself, the emperor dedicated his efforts to the affairs of the Kingdom of Sicily. With the assistance of his chief minister, Pietro della Vigna, he promulgated a new code of laws based on Roman law, reflecting a high level of civilization within Frederick's southern dominions; this code was promptly translated into Greek for the benefit of that portion of the population that spoke the language. A pivotal role was played by the university established by Frederick in Naples. He minted gold coins known as "augustals," marking the first gold currency in the West for many centuries. Frederick facilitated trade conditions and abolished all internal tariffs. He even summoned elected representatives from cities to sit in his council, which, however, held only advisory powers.

The end of this period of peaceful relations came in 1237 when Frederick re-entered into conflict with the Lombard League; the pope aligned himself with the cities and once again excommunicated the emperor. From that moment until Frederick’s death in 1250, war became a relentless reality, escalating into a brutal and treacherous conflict on both sides. Fortune oscillated violently, swinging from one side to the other, and the outcome of the struggle remained uncertain at the time of the emperor's demise. However, those who sought to succeed Frederick were stripped of his strength and gradually succumbed to defeat, leaving Italy fragmented and the pope triumphant.

The deaths of popes brought little change to the course of the conflict; each new pope continued, with little modification, the policies of his predecessor. Gregory IX died in 1241; in 1243, Innocent IV was elected pope, a fierce adversary of Frederick. Louis IX, despite his impeccable orthodoxy, endeavored to temper the fury of Gregory IX and Innocent IV, but to no avail. Innocent IV, in particular, was intolerant, rejecting all offers of negotiation from the emperor and displaying a complete disregard for means to combat him. He declared Frederick deposed from the throne, proclaimed a crusade against him, and excommunicated all who supported him. Monks rallied against Frederick, Muslims incited rebellions, and conspiracies even emerged among his prominent nominal supporters. All of this only intensified Frederick’s wrath; conspirators faced brutal punishments, and prisoners had their right eyes gouged out and right hands severed.

At one moment in this titanic struggle, Frederick contemplated founding a new religion, wherein he would serve as the Messiah, and his minister, Pietro della Vigna, would assume the role of St. Peter. He did not venture so far as to publicize his project, but shared it in a letter addressed to della Vigna. Suddenly, however, Frederick became convinced—whether rightly or wrongly—that Pietro was plotting against him; he blinded him and displayed him in a cage for public scorn. Yet, Pietro escaped further suffering by taking his own life.

Despite all his talents, Frederick could not achieve victory, for the anti-papal forces of his time were imbued with piety and democratic ideals, while his aim resembled a restoration of the pagan Roman Empire. Culturally, Frederick was an enlightened man, yet politically he held reactionary positions. His court bore an Eastern character: he maintained a harem with eunuchs. Yet it was in this court that Italian poetry was born; Frederick himself had some merit as a poet. In the course of his struggle against the papacy, he published polemical writings on the dangers of ecclesiastical absolutism, which would have been enthusiastically received in the sixteenth century but went unacknowledged in his own time. The heretics, whom Frederick ought to have seen as allies, appeared to him merely as rebels, and in a bid to please the pope, he persecuted them. Were it not for the emperor, the free cities might have become adversaries of the pope; yet as long as Frederick demanded their submission, they welcomed the pope as their ally. Ultimately, despite Frederick’s freedom from the superstitions of his age and his cultural superiority over contemporary rulers, his position compelled him to become the enemy of all politically free-spirited forces. Frederick's defeat was inevitable, but among all historical figures who suffered loss, he remains one of the most intriguing.

The heretics opposed by Innocent III and persecuted by all rulers (including Frederick) merit examination both in their own right and because they unveil the sentiments of the populace, which would otherwise have left scant trace in the literature of the time.

The most interesting and indeed the most significant of these heretical sects were the Cathars, better known in southern France as the Albigensians. The origins of Cathar doctrines trace back to Asia, from whence they penetrated Europe via the Balkans; these doctrines gained considerable traction in northern Italy, and in southern France, they were embraced by a vast majority of the population, including the nobility, who welcomed the pretext to seize church lands. The widespread appeal of this heresy stemmed in part from disillusionment following the failure of the Crusades, but primarily from the moral outrage provoked by the wealth and licentious lifestyle of the clergy. During this time, sentiments akin to later Puritanism flourished in favor of personal sanctity, intertwined with a cult of poverty. The Church amassed vast wealth and largely succumbed to secularism: many priests led notoriously immoral lives. Monks from mendicant orders accused those of older orders and parish priests, claiming they profaned the confessional, using it to seduce believing parishioners; adversaries of the mendicant monks leveled the same accusations against them. There is no doubt that in many cases, these accusations were entirely just. The more the Church asserted its supremacy, justifying its claims with religious arguments, the more common folk were horrified by the contrast between the clergy's vows and their deeds. In the thirteenth century, the same motivations were at work that ultimately led to the Reformation. The primary difference lay in the fact that secular rulers were not prepared to align themselves with heretics, primarily because none of the philosophies extant at the time could reconcile heresy with the claims of kings to supremacy.

We lack the means to ascertain the exact beliefs of the Cathars, for we are entirely dependent on the testimonies of their adversaries. Moreover, churchmen, well-acquainted with the history of heresies, tended to affix a familiar label to all heretical movements and to attribute to existing sects the views of earlier groups, often based on some distant resemblance. Nevertheless, we possess considerable data, nearly beyond doubt. Apparently, the Cathars were dualists and, like the Gnostics, believed that the Old Testament Jehovah was a malevolent creator of the world, while the true God revealed himself only in the New Testament. They regarded matter essentially as the embodiment of an evil principle and denied the resurrection of the bodies of the righteous. The wicked, however, would be punished by reincarnation into animal bodies. Consequently, the Cathars adhered to vegetarianism, abstaining even from eggs, cheese, and milk. They did, however, consume fish, believing that fish are born asexually. Any carnal connection instilled revulsion in the Cathars; some even claimed that marriage was even more abominable than fornication, for it signified a constant and pleasurable bond between a man and a woman. Conversely, the Cathars saw nothing reprehensible in suicide. They accepted the New Testament more literally than the Orthodox: they refrained from oaths and offered their other cheek. Persecutors testified to the example of a man accused of heresy who, in his defense, claimed that he had eaten meat, lied, cursed, and was a good Catholic.

The stricter prescriptions of the sect were to be followed only by a select few especially holy individuals, referred to as the "perfect"; the rest were permitted to eat meat and even to enter into marriage.

It is intriguing to trace the lineage of these doctrines. The crusaders brought them to Italy and France from a Bulgarian sect known as the Bogomils; in 1167, when the Cathars convened at a council near Toulouse, Bulgarian delegates were present at its sessions. In turn, the Bogomil sect arose from the amalgamation of Manichaeans and Paulicians. The Paulicians were an Armenian sect that rejected infant baptism, purgatory, the veneration of saints, and the dogma of the Trinity; they gradually spread into Thrace and then into Bulgaria. The Paulicians were followers of Marcion (circa 150 CE), who believed he was adhering to Saint Paul by rejecting Jewish elements in Christianity and displayed a certain kinship with the Gnostics, though he did not align himself with their movement.

Among the other heresies that gained widespread traction, I shall examine only one—the heresy of the Waldensians. They were followers of Peter Waldo, an enthusiast who proclaimed a "crusade" in 1170 in the name of observing the law of Christ. He distributed all his possessions to the poor and founded a society called the "Poor of Lyons," whose members upheld the ideal of poverty and led a strictly virtuous life. In the early days, the Waldensians enjoyed papal support, but they vehemently condemned the immoral lifestyle of the clergy and were condemned by the Council of Verona in 1184. They then resolved that every righteous person had the right to preach and interpret the Holy Scriptures; they began to appoint their own priests, dispensing with the services of the Catholic clergy. The Waldensians spread in Lombardy and also in Bohemia, where they paved the way for the Hussites. During the punitive expedition against the Albigensians, which also affected the Waldensians, many fled to Piedmont; it was the persecution of the Piedmontese Waldensians during Milton’s time that inspired his sonnet "O Lord, avenge thy slain saints." The Waldensians have survived to this day in remote Alpine valleys and in the United States.

All these heresies alarmed the Church, prompting vigorous measures for their suppression. Innocent III believed that heretics deserved death for their treason against Christ. He called upon the French king to launch a crusade against the Albigensians, which he did in 1209. The crusade was marked by incredible atrocities; the slaughter that occurred after the capture of Carcassonne was particularly horrific. The duty of exposing heresy fell upon the bishops, but this proved too burdensome for those with other responsibilities, and in 1233 Gregory IX established the Inquisition, which was entrusted with this aspect of the bishops’ duties. After 1254, individuals accused by the Inquisition were prohibited from employing the services of lawyers. In cases of conviction, the property of the accused was confiscated—in France for the benefit of the crown. When the accused was found guilty, they were handed over to the secular authorities with a plea for mercy; but if the secular authorities refused to condemn the convicted to burning, they themselves were subject to the Inquisition's trial. The Inquisition was responsible for pursuing not only heresy in the conventional sense but also witchcraft and sorcery. In Spain, the activities of the Inquisition were primarily directed against secret Jews. The functions of the Inquisition were mainly carried out by Dominicans and Franciscans. The Inquisition never penetrated Scandinavia or England, but the English showed complete readiness to utilize its services against Joan of Arc. Overall, the Inquisition proved to be quite successful; at the very outset of its existence, it entirely eradicated the Albigensian heresy.

At the beginning of the thirteenth century, the Church faced a threat of insurrection that was hardly less ominous than that which erupted against it in the sixteenth century. The Church was largely saved from this uprising by the emergence of mendicant orders; St. Francis and St. Dominic achieved far more for orthodoxy than even the most vigorous popes.

St. Francis of Assisi (1181 or 1182—1226) was one of the most charming figures in history. He came from a wealthy family and in his youth was not averse to ordinary amusements. However, one day, as Francis rode past a leper, a sudden surge of compassion compelled him to dismount and kiss the unfortunate man. Shortly after this incident, he resolved to renounce all worldly goods and dedicate his life to preaching and good deeds. Francis's father, a respected businessman, was enraged but was powerless to deter his son from this path. Soon, St. Francis gathered a group of followers, all of whom pledged to observe complete poverty. Initially, the Church regarded the Franciscan movement with a measure of suspicion, as it bore too much resemblance to the movement of the "Poor of Lyons." The first missionaries sent by St. Francis to distant lands were deemed heretics because they adhered to the ideal of poverty in their lives, rather than limiting themselves to a vow of poverty, which no one took seriously. Yet Innocent III proved discerning enough to recognize the benefits that the Franciscan movement could bring, should it be kept within the bounds of orthodoxy, and in 1209 or 1210 he formally recognized the newly established order. Gregory IX, a personal friend of St. Francis, continued to patronize him while also imposing some rules that contradicted the saint's enthusiastic and anarchic inclinations. Francis sought to interpret the vow of poverty in the strictest sense imaginable; he objected to his followers utilizing any housing or churches. The Franciscans were to subsist solely on what they could collect through begging, without any accommodations other than what might be offered by chance hospitality. In 1219, St. Francis undertook a journey to the East and preached before the Sultan, who received him kindly but did not renounce Islam. Upon his return, Francis discovered that the Franciscans had built a monastery for themselves; he fell into deep sorrow, but the pope persuaded—or perhaps forced—him to acquiesce. After Francis's death, Gregory IX canonized him but softened the rule regarding poverty that Francis had established.

As a saint, Francis had no equal; what renders him unique among saints is the immediacy of his joy, the boundless breadth of his love, and his poetic gift. He seemed to perform good deeds effortlessly, as though no human filth stood in his path. Every living creature evoked a sense of love in Francis—not only as a Christian and a man with a responsive heart but also as a poet. His hymn to the sun, composed shortly before his death, could almost have been written by the sun-worshipper Akhenaten; yet still, it is suffused with a Christian spirit, though not overtly so. Francis felt a duty towards the lepers for their sake and not for his own; unlike most Christian saints, he was more concerned with the happiness of others than with his own salvation. He never displayed a sense of superiority, even towards the most despised and wretched individuals. Thomas of Celano remarked of Francis that he was greater than a saint among saints; among sinners, he was also one of his own.

Had Satan existed, the future of the order founded by St. Francis would have given him great satisfaction. Francis’s immediate successor as head of the order, Brother Elias, wallowed in luxury and allowed the ideal of poverty to be forgotten entirely. In the years immediately following the founder's death, the Franciscans mostly occupied themselves as recruiting sergeants in the brutal and bloody wars of the Guelphs and Ghibellines. The Inquisition, established seven years after Francis's death, was in several countries primarily in the hands of the Franciscans. A small minority, known as the Spirituals, remained faithful to his teachings; many of them were burned by the Inquisition for heresy. These individuals claimed that Christ and the apostles owned no property; not even the clothing they wore belonged to them; this viewpoint was condemned as heretical by Pope John XXII in 1323. The practical outcome of St. Francis's life was the creation of yet another wealthy and corrupt order, the strengthening of the hierarchical power, and the facilitation of the persecution of all those distinguished by moral purity or freedom of thought. Considering the personality of St. Francis and the goals he set for himself, one cannot imagine a conclusion that could appear more cruelly ironic.

St. Dominic (1170—1221) is a figure significantly less compelling than St. Francis. He was a Castilian and, like Loyola, was possessed by a fanatical devotion to orthodoxy. He viewed his primary role as the suppression of heresy, accepting the ideal of poverty only as a means to achieve this end. Throughout the war against the Albigensians, Dominic was present with the punitive army, though it is said that he did not approve of some of its most extreme atrocities. The Order of Dominicans was founded in 1215 by Innocent III and quickly achieved success. The only human trait I know of in St. Dominic is a confession he made to Jordan of Saxony, wherein he admitted that he preferred to converse with young women rather than with old ones. In 1242, the order formally resolved that this remark be expunged from the biography written by Jordan of its founder.

The Dominicans engaged even more fervently in the activities of the Inquisition than the Franciscans. However, they rendered a useful service to humanity through their devotion to knowledge. This was far from the intentions of St. Dominic himself; he mandated that the brothers of his order "should not study secular sciences or liberal arts except by special dispensation from their vows." In 1259, this statutory prescription was revoked, and from that point onward, everything was done to facilitate a scholarly way of life for the Dominicans. Manual labor was entirely excluded from their duties, and the hours devoted to religious services were reduced to increase the time available for study.

The Dominicans dedicated themselves to reconciling Aristotle with Christ; Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas—both members of the Dominican order—fulfilled this task as successfully as possible. The authority of Thomas Aquinas so overshadowed all others that the achievements of subsequent Dominicans in the realm of philosophy proved rather modest. Despite Francis harboring an even greater antipathy towards knowledge than Dominic, the greatest names of the following period belonged to the Franciscans: Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, and William of Ockham—all were Franciscans. The contributions made by the mendicant orders to the development of philosophy will be the subject of the subsequent chapters.