Abelard - Avicenna

Question 1

When did Peter Abelard live?

Answer 1

1079 - 1142

Question 2

What was Abelard’s relationship with his teachers?

Answer 2

He was very arrogant and enjoyed arguing with his teachers.

Question 3

What is the story of Abelard and his love, Heloise?

Answer 3

He fell in love with Heloise, who was the niece of a prominent church official at Notre Dame. Heloise got pregnant and Abelard tried to marry her in secret, but her uncle threatened bodily injury to Abelard, so he flees to a monastery and became a monk. That’s when he started publishing theology.

Question 4

What is the translation of the title of Abelard’s “Sic Et Non,” what is it, and when did he write it?

Answer 4

• “Yes And No”
• It was a collection of 150 statements of the Church Fathers, organized by topics and put together to exhibit potential/seeming disagreement.
• He wrote it in 1121-1122.

Question 5

What was the first C of Peter Abelard?

Answer 5

Contribution:
- Cathedral Schools of Paris became Universities of Paris.
- Helped create Theology as Scientia (Unified body of knowledge).
- Popularized Scholasticism.

Question 6

What was the second C of Peter Abelard?

Answer 6

Controversy:
- View of Christ’s Atonement (moral exemplar).
- View of moral action (All that matters is your intention).
- View of Trinity (Modalism - God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are the same/not different from each other).

Question 7

What was the third C of Peter Abelard?

Answer 7

Conceptionalist:
- Universals exist only in the mind.

Question 8

What were the 3 problems of the High Middle Ages?

Answer 8

1. What’s the relationship between faith and reason?
2. What’s the relationship between the will and the intellect?
3. What’s the relationship between universals and reality?

Question 9

What is a Universal?

Answer 9

Something shared/common by/to individual things.

Question 10

What must we assume if Universals are real?

Answer 10

Particularity becomes irrelevant: Denigration of the body.

Question 11

What is a Realist?

Answer 11

Realism:
- Immaterial: Is the Universal separable from the thing?
- Material: The Universal is inseparable from the thing.

Question 12

If Universals aren’t real, what consequences follow?

Answer 12

Skepticism.

Question 13

Who was Roscellin and when did he live?

Answer 13

1045-1120
He was the first Nominalist: Universals aren’t real, they’re just names.

Question 14

What is Extreme Realism?

Answer 14

Universals are real and they are separable from particular things (Plato).

Question 15

What was Plato’s Idea/Form?

Answer 15

The highest and most perfect realization.

Question 16

What’s Moderate Realism?

Answer 16

Universals are real but are inseparable from particular things.

Question 17

What is form (with a lowercase “f”)?

Answer 17

The shape of intelligible unity of a thing.

Question 18

Who was Moses Maimenides and when did he live?

Answer 18

1137-1204
“RaMBam”
He was a Jewish Philosopher and Rabbi from Cordoba, Spain. He was forced to moved to Egypt (Alexandria, 4th century BC: Septuagint) when he refused to convert to Islam.

Question 19

What is Rabbinic Judaism?

Answer 19

Centered on the study of the Torah and Talmud (Balvi) (2nd - 11th century series of debates and commentary on the Torah by Rabbi).

Question 20

How did Maimenides reconcile the system of Aristotle with Rabbinic Judaism/how did he get these writings?

Answer 20

The Muslims had copies of Aristotle and he used allegorical interpretation. Aristotle represented the new and best science.

Question 21

What was so important about Alexandria?

Answer 21

• It was the birth of allegorical interpretations: Plato’s disciples applying his ideas to ancient texts.
• Important center of Scriptural Interpretation.

Question 22

What does “Quod habet, hoc est” mean?

Answer 22

“What it has, this it is.”

Question 23

What did Maimenides write in 1190? What was it’s goal?

Answer 23

“A Guide for the Perplexed”
It was to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with the Jewish Scriptures and the Talmud.

Question 24

Why was Maimenides rejected by the Jews?

Answer 24

He was called a heretic for “over rationalizing”.

Question 25

What is the Kabbalah?

Answer 25

Mystical understanding of the Scriptures.
1. Everything else came to exist, God did not: Eternal.
2. He has no body: Spirit.
3. None other than He: One.

Question 26

What is Esoteric and Exoteric?

Answer 26

Esoteric: The meaning is known to the few. “Inner Circle.”
- Gnostic: “Knower” (Greek) - Anti-body/flesh

Exoteric: The meaning is knowable to the public. “Outer Circle.”

Question 27

Who was Averroes?

Answer 27

1126-1198
He was a Muslim physician, astronomer, and philosopher from Cordoba, Spain. He was extremely learned in Aristotle, as he wrote many commentaries on his works, which is what Aquinas used to get to know Aristotle.

Question 28

Why did Averroes favor Aristotle over the Koran?

Answer 28

He favored Aristotle’s “philosophical” explanations of God’s nature and Aristotle’s “scientific” explanations of the universe compared to a literal reading of the Koran. He believed that Aristotle was more learned than Muhammad.

Question 29

What were the 3 controversies of Averroes?

Answer 29

1. Seems to affirm the eternality of the world: Aristotle teaches this.
2. Seems to deny the immortality of the soul: Aristotle is unclear on this.
3. Seems to espouse a Double Theory of Truth (theology has its own truth and philosophy has its own truth. These might contradict one another, but still be true).

Question 30

Who was Al-Ghazali?

Answer 30

1058-1111
He was against science, and believed that behind every single act is solely God. Everything in the universe is solely attributed to God as its efficient cause. He denied that there’s a logical connection between cause and effect.

Question 31

What is Determinism?

Answer 31

The teaching that everything in the universe is solely explainable with reference to prior events.

Question 32

What is Occasionalism?

Answer 32

Every act is solely explainable with reference to God’s decisions. Al-Ghazali rejects the notion of strict or scientific laws of the universe.

Question 33

What was Al-Ghazali’s Kalam Cosmological Argument?

Answer 33

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe begun to exist (the Big Bang).
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

Question 34

Who was Avicenna?

Answer 34

980-1036
“The Commentator”: He commented and explained many of Aristotle’s most notable texts. He claims that Aristotle is superior to Muhammad because he is more enlightened.

Question 35

What was Al-Ghazali’s “The Destruction of Philosophy”?

Answer 35

He tried to rebut Avicenna and undermine philosophy and science. His disciples tried to do the same with Averroes.