Abelard - Avicenna Flashcards
When did Peter Abelard live?
1079 - 1142
What was Abelard’s relationship with his teachers?
He was very arrogant and enjoyed arguing with his teachers.
What is the story of Abelard and his love, Heloise?
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.
What is the translation of the title of Abelard’s “Sic Et Non,” what is it, and when did he write it?
- “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.
What was the first C of Peter Abelard?
Contribution:
- Cathedral Schools of Paris became Universities of Paris.
- Helped create Theology as Scientia (Unified body of knowledge).
- Popularized Scholasticism.
What was the second C of Peter Abelard?
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).
What was the third C of Peter Abelard?
Conceptionalist:
- Universals exist only in the mind.
What were the 3 problems of the High Middle Ages?
- What’s the relationship between faith and reason?
- What’s the relationship between the will and the intellect?
- What’s the relationship between universals and reality?
What is a Universal?
Something shared/common by/to individual things.
What must we assume if Universals are real?
Particularity becomes irrelevant: Denigration of the body.
What is a Realist?
Realism:
- Immaterial: Is the Universal separable from the thing?
- Material: The Universal is inseparable from the thing.
If Universals aren’t real, what consequences follow?
Skepticism.
Who was Roscellin and when did he live?
1045-1120
He was the first Nominalist: Universals aren’t real, they’re just names.
What is Extreme Realism?
Universals are real and they are separable from particular things (Plato).
What was Plato’s Idea/Form?
The highest and most perfect realization.
What’s Moderate Realism?
Universals are real but are inseparable from particular things.
What is form (with a lowercase “f”)?
The shape of intelligible unity of a thing.
Who was Moses Maimenides and when did he live?
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.
What is Rabbinic Judaism?
Centered on the study of the Torah and Talmud (Balvi) (2nd - 11th century series of debates and commentary on the Torah by Rabbi).
How did Maimenides reconcile the system of Aristotle with Rabbinic Judaism/how did he get these writings?
The Muslims had copies of Aristotle and he used allegorical interpretation. Aristotle represented the new and best science.
What was so important about Alexandria?
- It was the birth of allegorical interpretations: Plato’s disciples applying his ideas to ancient texts.
- Important center of Scriptural Interpretation.
What does “Quod habet, hoc est” mean?
“What it has, this it is.”
What did Maimenides write in 1190? What was it’s goal?
“A Guide for the Perplexed”
It was to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy with the Jewish Scriptures and the Talmud.
Why was Maimenides rejected by the Jews?
He was called a heretic for “over rationalizing”.
