Abelard Pierre. Medieval French philosopher, poet and musician. Ticket. Philosophical views of Pierre Abelard
PIERRE ABELARD (also PETER ABELARD) (1079-1142) was a famous French philosopher and Christian theologian, who during his lifetime gained fame as a brilliant polemicist. He had many students and followers. Also known for his romance with Eloise.
Biography of Abelard.
Abelard's biography is well known thanks to the autobiographical book “The History of My Disasters” written by him. He was born the son of a knight in Brittany, south of the Loire River. He donated his inheritance and refused a promising military career for the study of philosophy and logic. Abelard developed a brilliant philosophy of language.
Abelard was essentially a wanderer, he moved from one place to another. In 1113 or 1114 he traveled to the north of France to study theology under Anselm of Laon, the leading biblical scholar of the time. However, he quickly developed a dislike for Anselm's teachings, so he moved to Paris. There he openly spread his theories.
Abelard and Eloise
When Abalard lived in Paris, he was hired as a tutor for the young Heloise, niece of Fulbert, one of the prominent clerics. A relationship developed between Abelard and Eloise. Fulber prevented this relationship, so Abelard secretly sent his beloved to Brittany. There Eloise gave birth to a son, whom they named Astrolabe. After the birth of their son, Abelard and Eloise married in secret. Fulber ordered Abelard to be castrated so that he could not take a high church position. After that, Abelard, out of shame, accepted monastic life at the Royal Abbey of Saint-Denis near Paris. Eloise became a nun at Argenteuil.
In Saint-Denis, Abelard shone with his knowledge of theology, while he tirelessly criticized the lifestyle that his fellow monks led. Daily reading of the Bible and the works of the Fathers of the Church allowed him to make a collection of quotations - inconsistencies in the teachings of the Christian church. He collected his observations and conclusions in the collection Yes and No. The collection was accompanied by an author's preface, in which Pierre Abelard, as a logician and as a connoisseur of language, formulated the basic rules for reconciling the contradictions of meaning and feelings.
The book Theology was also written at Saint-Denis and officially condemned as heretical. The manuscript was burned at Soissons in 1121. Abelard's dialectical analysis of God and the Trinity was found to be erroneous, and he himself was placed under house arrest in the abbey of Saint-Médard. Soon Pierre Abelard returned to Saint-Denis, but in order to avoid trial, he left and took refuge in Nogent-sur-Seine. There he led the life of a hermit, but he was pursued everywhere by students who insisted that he continue his philosophical research.
In 1135 Abelard went to Mont-Saint-Genevieve. There he again began to teach and wrote extensively. Here he produced An Introduction to Theology, in which he analyzed the origins of the belief in the Trinity and praised the pagan philosophers of antiquity for their merit and for their intellectual discovery of many of the fundamental aspects of Christian revelation. He also wrote a book called Know Thyself, a short masterpiece in which Abelard analyzed the concept of sin and concluded that human actions do not make a person better or worse in the eyes of God, for actions in themselves are neither good nor bad. The main thing in business is the essence of intention.
At Mont Sainte-Genevieve, Abelard attracted crowds of students, among whom were many future famous philosophers, for example, the English humanist John Salisbury.
Abelard, however, was deeply resented by adherents of traditional Christian theology. So the activities of Pierre Abelard attracted the attention of Bernard of Clairvaux, perhaps the most influential figure in the Western Christian world while. Abelard was condemned by Bernard, who was supported by Pope Innocent II. He was imprisoned in the monastery of Cluny in Burgundy. There, with the able mediation of Father Superior Peter the Venerable, he made peace with Bernard and remained a monk at Cluny.
After his death, a huge number of epitaphs were written, indicating that Abelard impressed many of his contemporaries as one of the greatest thinkers and teachers of his time.
Works by Pierre Abelard.
Major works of Abelard:
- Introduction to Theology
- Dialectics,
- Yes and no,
- Know yourself,
- History of my disasters.
The most popular work is the story of my disasters. This is the only medieval autobiography of a professional philosopher that has come down to our time.
Philosophy of Abelard.
Pierre Abelard rationalized the relationship of faith and reason. He considered understanding prerequisite faith - "I understand that I may believe."
Pierre Abelard criticized the authorities of the church, questioned the absolute truth of their works. He considered only the infallibility and truth of Holy Scripture to be unconditional. The theological fabrications of the Church Fathers were radically questioned.
Pierre Abelard believed that there was two truths. One of them is the truth about invisible things that are beyond the real world and human understanding. Understanding it comes through the study of the Bible.
However, according to Abelard, truth can also be achieved through dialectics or logic. Peter Abelard emphasized that logic works with linguistic concepts and is able to help with the true statement, and not with the true things. Thus, we can define the philosophy of Pierre Abelard as critical linguistic analysis. It is also safe to say that Pierre Abelard solves problems in terms of conceptualism.
Universals, according to Pierre Abelard, do not exist in reality as such, they exist only in the divine mind, but they acquire the status of being in the sphere of intellectual knowledge, forming “ conceptual world.
In the process of cognition, a person considers various aspects and, by means of abstraction, creates an image that can be expressed in words. According to Pierre Abelard, a word has a definite sound and one or more meanings. It is in this that Abelard sees a possible contextual ambiguity and internal inconsistency in Christian texts. Contradictory and dubious places in theological texts require analysis with the help of dialectics. In the case when the inconsistency is irremovable, Abelard proposed to turn directly to the Holy Scriptures in search of truth.
Pierre Abelard viewed logic as required element Christian theology. He finds support for his point of view in :
"In the beginning was the word (Logos)."
Peter Abelard contrasted dialectic with sophistry, which does not reveal the truth, but hides it behind the intertwining of words.
Pierre Abelard's method involves identifying contradictions in theological texts, their classification and logical analysis. Above all, Pierre Abelard valued the opportunity to build independent judgments, free from authorities. There should be no authority other than Holy Scripture.
Often, finding contradictions in theological texts, Pierre Abelard gave own interpretation which is very different from the generally accepted one. Of course, this entailed the wrath of the orthodox.
Pierre Abelard proclaimed the principle of religious tolerance, explaining the discrepancies in creeds by the fact that God directs the pagans to the truth in different ways, therefore, in any doctrine there can be an element of truth. The ethical views of Pierre Abelard are characterized by the desire to abandon religious dictates. He defines the essence of sin as the deliberate intention of a person to commit evil or transgress the divine law.
Pierre Abelard (1079-1142), the eldest son of a rather noble father, was born in Pallet (Pallet), a village near Nantes, and received very good upbringing. Carried away by the desire to devote himself to scientific activity, he renounced the birthright and the military career of a noble person. Abelard's first teacher was Roscellin, founder of nominalism; then he listened to the lectures of the famous Parisian professor Guillaume Champeau and became a researcher of the system of realism he founded. But she soon ceased to satisfy him. Pierre Abelard developed a special system of concepts for himself - conceptualism, a middle ground between realism and nominalism, and began to argue against the Champeau system; his objections were so convincing that Champeau himself modified his concepts in some very important issues. But Champeau was angry with Abelard for this dispute, and, moreover, began to envy the fame he had acquired with his dialectical talent; the envious and irritated teacher became a bitter enemy of the brilliant thinker.
Abelard was a teacher of theology and philosophy in Melun, then in Korbeul, at the Parisian school of St. Genevieve; his fame grew; on the appointment of Champeau as the Bishop of Chalons, Pierre Abelard became (1113) the chief teacher of the school at the Paris Cathedral Church of Our Lady (Notre Dame de Paris) and became the most famous scientist of his time. Paris was then the center of philosophical and theological science; young men and people of middle age gathered, converged from all lands Western Europe listen to the lectures of Abelard, who expounded theology and philosophy in a clear, elegant language. Among them was Arnold Brescian.
A few years after Pierre Abelard began lecturing at the school at the temple of Our Lady, he underwent a misfortune that gave his name a romantic fame even louder than his scholarly fame. Canon Fulber invited Abelard to live in his house and give lessons to his seventeen-year-old niece Eloise, a beautiful and extremely gifted girl. Abelard fell in love with her, she fell in love with him. He wrote songs about his love and composed melodies for them. In them he showed himself to be a great poet and a good composer. They quickly gained popularity and discovered Fulber secret love his nieces and Abelard. He wanted to stop her. But Abelard took Heloise to Brittany. There her son was born. Abelard married her. But a married man could not be a spiritual dignitary; in order not to interfere with Abelard's career, Eloise hid her marriage and, returning to her uncle's house, said that she was Abelard's mistress, not wife. Fulber, indignant at Abelard, came with several people to his room and ordered him to be castrated. Pierre Abelard retired to Saint-Denis Abbey. Eloise took the vows as a nun (1119) at the Argentey monastery.
Abelard's farewell to Heloise. Painting by A. Kaufman, 1780
After some time, Abelard, yielding to the requests of the students, resumed his lectures. But orthodox theologians raised a persecution against him. They found that in his treatise "Introduction to Theology" he did not explain the dogma of the Trinity in the way that the church teaches, and they accused Abelard of heresy before the Archbishop of Reims. A council held in Soissons (1121), presided over by a papal legate, condemned Abelard's treatise to be burned, and himself to imprisonment in the monastery of St. Medard. But the harsh sentence aroused great displeasure in the French clergy, many of whose dignitaries were students of Abelard. The murmur forced the legate to allow Pierre Abelard to return to Saint-Denis Abbey. But he incurred the enmity of the Saint Denis monks by his discovery that Dionysius, the founder of their abbey, was not Dionysius the Areopagite, the disciple apostle paul, and another saint who lived much later. Their anger was so great that Abelar fled from them. He retired to the desert near Nogent on the Seine. Hundreds of disciples followed him there, built their own huts in the forest near the chapel dedicated to Abelard Paraclete, Comforter, leading to the truth.
But a new persecution arose against Pierre Abelard; his bitterest enemies were Bernard of Clairvaux and Norbert. He wanted to flee France. But the monks of Saint-Gildes monastery (Saint Gildes de Ruys, in Brittany) chose him as their abbot (1126). He gave the Paraclete Monastery to Eloise: she settled there with her nuns; Abelard helped her with advice in the management of affairs. He spent ten years in Saint Gildes Abbey, trying to soften the rough morals of the monks, then returned to Paris (1136) and began to lecture at the school of St. Genevieve.
Once again irritated by their success, the enemies of Pierre Abelard, and especially Bernard of Clairvaux, initiated a new persecution of him. They selected passages from his writings in which thoughts were expressed that disagreed with generally accepted opinions, and renewed the accusation of heresy. At the Council of Sens, Bernard acted as Abelard's accuser; the accuser's arguments were weak, but his influence was powerful; the council submitted to the authority of Bernard and declared Abelard a heretic. The convict appealed to the pope. But the pope was completely dependent on Bernard, his patron; moreover, the enemy of papal power, Arnold of Brescian, was a student of Abelard; therefore the pope condemned Abelard to eternal imprisonment in a monastery.
The abbot of Cluniac, Peter the Venerable, gave shelter to the persecuted Abelard, first in his abbey, then in the monastery of St. Marcellus near Chalons on the Saone. There, the sufferer for freedom of thought died on April 21, 1142. Peter the Venerable allowed Eloise to transfer his body to the Paraclete. Eloise died on May 16, 1164 and was buried next to her husband.
The grave of Abelard and Heloise in the Pere Lachaise cemetery
When the Paraclete Abbey was destroyed, the ashes of Pierre Abelard and Heloise were transferred to Paris; now he rests in the Pere Lachaise cemetery, and tombstone they are still decorated with fresh wreaths.
Pierre (Peter) Abelard or Abelar(fr. Pierre Abelard/Abailard, lat. Petrus Abaelardus)
medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian, poet and musician; one of the founders and representatives of conceptualism; The Catholic Church repeatedly condemned Abelard for heretical views
short biography
In 1079, in the family of a Breton feudal lord, who lived near Nantes, a boy was born, who was expected by the fate of one of the most famous philosophers of the Middle Ages, theologian, outrageous mind, poet. Young Pierre, having renounced all rights in favor of the brothers, became a vagant, wandering schoolboys, and listened to lectures by the famous philosophers Roscelin and Guillaume de Champeau in Paris. Abelard turned out to be a talented and daring student: in 1102 in Melun, not far from the capital, he opened his own school, from where his path to fame as an outstanding philosopher began.
Around 1108, having recovered from a serious illness provoked by too intense activity, Pierre Abelard came to conquer Paris, but he did not succeed in settling there for a long time. Due to the intrigues of the former mentor Guillaume de Champeau, he was forced to teach again in Melun, was at home in Brittany for family reasons, and received a theological education in Lana. However, in 1113 the famous master of the "liberal arts" was already lecturing on philosophy at the Paris Cathedral School, from where he was expelled in due time for dissent.
The year 1118 broke the calm course of his life and became a turning point in the biography of Pierre Abelard. A short but bright love affair with the 17-year-old student Eloise had a truly dramatic outcome: the dishonored ward was sent to a monastery, and the revenge of her guardian turned the loving teacher into a mutilated eunuch. Abelard came to his senses already in the monastery of Saint-Denis, also tonsured a monk. After some time, he again began to lecture on philosophy and theology, which, as before, attracted great attention not only from enthusiastic students, but also from influential enemies, of whom the freethinker-philosopher always had a lot. Through their efforts, in 1121, a Church Council was convened in Soissons, obliging Abelard to set fire to his heretical theological treatise. This made a grave impression on the philosopher, but did not force him to renounce his views.
In 1126 he was appointed abbot of the Breton monastery of St. Gildasia, but because of relations that did not work out with the monks, the mission was short-lived. It was in those years that the autobiographical History of My Disasters was written, which received a fairly wide response. Other works were written, also not left without attention. In 1140, the Council of Sens was convened, appealing to Pope Innocent II with a request to ban Abelard from teaching, writing works, destroy his treatises, and severely punish his followers. The verdict of the head of the Catholic Church was positive. The spirit of the rebel was broken, although subsequently the mediation of the abbot of the monastery in Cluny, where Abelard spent last years life, helped to achieve a more favorable attitude of Innocent II. On April 21, 1142, the philosopher died, and his ashes were interred by Eloise, the abbess of the monastery. Their love story ended with a burial in one place. Since 1817, the remains of the couple have been buried in the Pere Lachaise cemetery.
The works of Pierre Abelard: “Dialectics”, “Introduction to Theology”, “Know Thyself”, “Yes and No”, “Dialogue between the Philosopher, the Jew and the Christian”, a textbook of logic for beginners - put him in the ranks of the largest medieval thinkers. He is credited with the development of the doctrine, which was later called "conceptualism". He turned against himself church orthodoxies not so much with polemics on various theological postulates, but with a rationalistic approach to matters of faith (“I understand in order to believe” as opposed to the officially recognized “I believe in order to understand”). The correspondence of Abelard and Heloise and the "History of my disasters" are among the brightest literary works era of the Middle Ages.
Biography from Wikipedia
The son of Lucy du Palais (before 1065 - after 1129) and Berenguer (before 1053 - before 1129), was born in the village of Palais near Nantes, in the province of Brittany, into a knightly family. It was originally intended for military service, but irresistible curiosity and, in particular, the desire for scholastic dialectics prompted him to devote himself to the study of the sciences. He also renounced the right of primacy and became a clergyman. At a young age, he listened to the lectures of John Roscelin, the founder of nominalism. In 1099 he arrived in Paris to study with the representative of realism - Guillaume de Champeaux, who attracted listeners from all over Europe.
However, he soon became a rival and opponent of his teacher: from 1102, Abelard himself taught in Melun, Corbel and Saint-Genevieve, and the number of his students increased more and more. As a result, he acquired an irreconcilable enemy in the person of Guillaume of Champeaux. After the latter was elevated to the rank of Bishop of Chalons, Abelard in 1113 took over the management of the school at the Church of Our Lady and at that time reached the apogee of his glory. He was the teacher of many famous people later, of which the most famous are: Pope Celestine II, Peter of Lombard and Arnold of Brescia.
Abelard was the universally recognized leader of the dialecticians, and by the clarity and beauty of his exposition he surpassed the other teachers of Paris, the then center of philosophy and theology. At that time, the 17-year-old niece of Canon Fulber Eloise, who was famous for her beauty, intelligence and knowledge, lived in Paris. Abelard was inflamed with passion for Heloise, who answered him with complete reciprocity. Thanks to Fulber, Abelard became Eloise's teacher and housewife, and both lovers enjoyed complete happiness until Fulber found out about this connection. The attempt of the latter to separate the lovers led to the fact that Abelard transported Heloise to Brittany, to her father's house in Palais. There she gave birth to a son, Pierre Astrolabe (1118-about 1157) and, although not wanting this, secretly married. Fulber agreed in advance. Soon, however, Eloise returned to her uncle's house and refused marriage, not wanting to prevent Abelard from receiving spiritual titles. Fulber, out of revenge, ordered Abelard to be castrated, so that, according to canonical laws, the path to high church positions was blocked for him. After that, Abelard retired as a simple monk to a monastery in Saint-Denis, and 18-year-old Eloise got her hair cut in Argenteuil. Later, thanks to Peter the Venerable, their son Pierre Astrolabe, raised by his father's younger sister Denise, received a canon in Nantes.
Dissatisfied with the monastic order, Abelard, on the advice of friends, resumed lecturing at Maisonville Priory; but the enemies again began to initiate persecution against him. His work "Introductio in theologiam" was committed in 1121 to be burned at the cathedral in Soissons, and he himself was condemned to imprisonment in the monastery of St. Medard. Having hardly received permission to live outside the monastery walls, Abelard left Saint-Denis.
Abelard became a hermit in Nogent-sur-Seine and in 1125 built himself a chapel and a cell in Nogent on the Seine, called the Paraclete, where, after his appointment as abbot in Saint-Gildas-de-Ruge in Brittany, Eloise and her pious monastic sisters settled. Finally freed by the pope from the management of the monastery, which was difficult for him by the intrigues of the monks, Abelard devoted the coming time of calm to revising all his writings and teaching at Mont Saint-Genevieve. His opponents, led by Bernard of Clairvaux and Norbert of Xanten, finally reached the point that in 1141, at the council of Sens, his teaching was condemned and this sentence was approved by the pope with the order to subject Abelard to imprisonment. However, the abbot of Cluny, the Monk Peter the Venerable, managed to reconcile Abelard with his enemies and with the papacy.
Abelard retired to Cluny, where he died in the monastery of Saint-Marcel-sur-Saone in 1142 at Jacques-Marin.
Abelard's body was moved to the Paraclete and then buried in the Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Next to him was buried his beloved Eloise, who died in 1164.
Abelard's life story is described in his autobiography Historia Calamitatum (The History of My Troubles).
Philosophy
In the dispute between realism and nominalism, which dominated philosophy and theology at that time, Abelard occupied a special position. He did not consider, like Roscelin, the head of the nominalists, ideas or universals (universalia) only mere names or abstractions, nor did he agree with the representative of the realists, Guillaume of Champeau, that ideas constitute a universal reality, nor did he admit that the reality of the general is expressed in every single being. On the contrary, Abelard argued and forced Guillaume of Champeau to agree that the same essence approaches each individual person not in its entire essential (infinite) volume, but only individually, of course (“inesse singulis individuis candem rem non essentialiter, sed individualiter tantum"). Thus, in the teachings of Abelard, there was already a reconciliation of two great opposites between themselves, the finite and the infinite, and therefore he was rightly called the forerunner of Spinoza. But still, the place occupied by Abelard in relation to the doctrine of ideas remains a controversial issue, since Abelard, in his experience of acting as an intermediary between Platonism and Aristotelianism, speaks out very vaguely and shaky.
Most scholars consider Abelard to be a representative of conceptualism. religious doctrine Abelard was that God gave man all the strength to achieve good goals, and therefore the mind to keep the imagination within the limits and guide religious belief. Faith, he said, rests unshakably only on conviction achieved through free thinking; wherefore, faith acquired without the aid of mental strength and accepted without independent verification is unworthy of a free person.
Abelard argued that the only sources of truth are dialectic and Scripture. In his opinion, even the apostles and fathers of the Church could be mistaken. This meant that any official church dogma that was not based on the Bible could, in principle, be false. Abelard, as noted by the Philosophical Encyclopedia, asserted the rights of free thought, for the norm of truth was declared thinking, which not only makes the content of faith understandable to the mind, but in doubtful cases comes to independent decision. Engels highly appreciated this side of his activity: “For Abelard, the main thing is not the theory itself, but resistance to the authority of the church. Not "believing in order to understand", as in Anselm of Canterbury, but "understand to believe"; an ever-renewed struggle against blind faith."
The main work "Yes and no" ("Sic et non") shows the inconsistency of the judgments of the authorities of the church. He laid the foundation for dialectical scholasticism.
Literary and musical creativity
For the history of literature, the tragic love story of Abelard and Heloise, as well as their correspondence, are of particular interest.
Already in the Middle Ages, becoming the property of literature in vernacular languages (the correspondence of Abelard and Eloise was translated into French at the end of the 13th century), images of Abelard and Eloise, whose love turned out to be stronger than separation and tonsure, more than once attracted writers and poets: Villon, "The Ballad of the Ladies of Bygone Times" ("Ballade des dames du temps jadis"); Farrer, "La fumée d'opium"; Pope, Eloisa to Abelard; a hint at the story of Abelard and Heloise is contained in the title of Rousseau's novel "Julia, or New Eloise" ("Nouvelle Heloïse").
Abelard is the author of six extensive poems in the genre of lamentation (planctus; paraphrases of biblical texts) and many lyrical hymns. Perhaps he is also the author of sequences, including the very popular in the Middle Ages "Mittit ad Virginem". All these genres were text-musical, the verses assumed chant. It is almost certain that Abelard wrote the music for his poems himself. Of his musical compositions, almost nothing has survived, and the few lamentations recorded in the system of adiastematic non-mental notation cannot be deciphered. Of the notated hymns of Abelard, one has survived - "O quanta qualia".
"Dialogue between a Philosopher, a Jew and a Christian" is the last unfinished work of Abelard. In "Dialogue" analysis of three ways of reflection that have ethics as a common basis.
Poetic and musical compositions (selection)
- Lament of Dina, daughter of Jacob (Planctus Dinae filiae Iacob; inc.: Abrahae proles Israel nata; Planctus I)
- Jacob's lament for his sons (Planctus Iacob super filios suos; inc.: Infelices filii, patri nati misero; Planctus II)
- Lamentation of the Virgins of Israel for the Daughter of Jephthah of Gilead (Planctus virginum Israel super filia Jepte Galadite; inc.: Ad festas choreas celibes; Planctus III)
- Lamentation of Israel for Samson (Planctus Israel super Samson; inc.: Abyssus vere multa; Planctus IV)
- Lamentation of David for Abner, slain by Joab (Planctus David super Abner, filio Neronis, quem Ioab occidit; inc.: Abner fidelissime; Planctus V)
- David's Lament for Saul and Jonathan (Planctus David super Saul et Jonatha; inc.: Dolorum solatium; Planctus VI). The only cry that can be confidently deciphered (preserved in several manuscripts, written in square notation).
Pierre Abelard - one of the most famous philosophers and poets of France - was born in 1079 in the village of Pale near the city of Nantes in a noble knightly family of the Breton feudal lord Berenguer. The boy was the eldest son in the family. On the rights of birthright, Pierre was supposed to inherit the family estate and the knighthood of his father, but he nobly renounced all privileges in favor of his younger brothers. Incredible inquisitiveness, the desire to know himself and the world around him prompted young Pierre to devote himself entirely to the study of science.
Abelard's rise as a philosopher
Leaving his native village, Abelard chose the path of a vagant - a wandering creator, completely absorbed in prose, poetry and singing. Having changed many schools and attended an immense number of lectures, Pierre could not find answers to his questions. Then he, a 20-year-old boy, went to Paris, where he began studying with Guillaume de Champeaux, a philosopher-theologian who was one of the most prominent representatives of realism. His lectures gathered many listeners from all over Europe, and Abelard was incredibly glad to have the opportunity to become one of them.
Having studied the theory of realism expounded by Champaud, Pierre formed for himself a special system of concepts - conceptualism, the middle between realism and nominalism, and began to argue with the teachings of the realist; Abelard's objections were so strong that Champeau subsequently revised his judgments on several important points.
However, having criticized the philosophical doctrine of his teacher, Abelard provoked not only an increase in interest in his person, but also great dissatisfaction on the part of the mentor. As a result of the scandal that broke out, Pierre left the cathedral school, and Champeaux himself, envious and embittered, became an inveterate enemy of the gifted thinker.
Saying goodbye to the cathedral school, Pierre decided to open his own school in Melun (1102). At this time, his popularity is rapidly gaining momentum - a myriad of students want to get to lectures on such, at first glance, complex sciences like theology and philosophy. His secret, so to speak, was in simplicity - Abelard expounded easily, elegantly and accessible to the understanding of every listener. Inspired by such a quick success, he decided to move closer to Paris, where already in 1114 he headed the faculty of the Notre Dame school.
Philosopher's personal drama
The year 1119 was truly fatal for the outstanding philosopher. A real drama broke out in the scientist's life - the young girl Eloise, whom Abelard gave philosophy lessons at home, fell in love with him without memory. Needless to say, the feelings were absolutely mutual.
The young people met in the house of Fulbert, Eloise's uncle, who kindly invited the scientist to visit. Then the fateful meeting took place. Pierre decided to act decisively and asked to rent a room in Fulbert's house, in return promising to study science with his niece. Their relationship could not remain a secret for long, and when the truth was discovered, a huge scandal broke out. Abelard had to leave the temporary shelter. Young people communicated for a long time by letters, in one of which Eloise announced her pregnancy. Then Pierre, again secretly, took her to Brittany. The couple, not without remorse, gave the child to be raised by strangers.
Secretly married (Eloise did not want to interfere with Abelard's career, since married man according to the then laws of the church, he could not be a spiritual dignitary), the young return to their homeland - Eloise to his uncle's house, Abelard to continue to lecture. But sooner or later, everything secret becomes clear - Fulbert, unable to withstand the humiliation (after all, in the Middle Ages it was considered a shame to have a premarital affair with a man), wants to clear his name and makes public the fact of the marriage of Pierre and Eloise. The girl reacted extremely negatively to such an act of her uncle - she publicly denies the fact of marriage and openly calls herself Abelard's mistress. After numerous quarrels with Fulbert, Eloise decided to leave for the Arzhateysky monastery.
In revenge, the distraught Fulbert, assisted by three servants and a doctor, breaks into Pierre's room in the middle of the night and orders him to be castrated. The next day, all of Paris learned about such a horrific act.
For Fulbert himself, this story turned into a deprivation of property, church posts and placement in a lunatic asylum, in which he died a few years later. The accomplices were judged to the fullest extent of the Middle Ages, having treated them in exactly the same way as they did with Abelard - they were castrated and, on top of that, they were blinded. As for the philosopher, he took monastic vows in the same tragic year of 1119. The fatal love story for Eloise is detailed in Abelard's autobiographical work, The History of My Disasters.
Life in exile
In the monastery, the philosopher again began to lecture, which caused a storm of indignation among many church leaders, and the Church Council made an open statement against the teachings of Abelard. By decision of the same Council, the philosopher had to burn his own book "Introduction to Theology" and go to a monastery with a different, more stringent charter.
Thanks to the active assistance of Abelard's adherents, among whom were spiritual dignitaries, he was still allowed to return to Saint-Denis Abbey. But here, too, the dissident philosopher's relations with the monks did not work out. Abelard's discovery regarding the founder of the abbey, Deonisius, caused an incredible wave of contempt and aggression. The philosopher argued that the founder is not Dionysius the Areopagite, a disciple of the Apostle Paul, but a completely different saint who lived much later. The anger of the monks was so great that Pierre was forced to immediately leave the monastery.
Against all odds, Abelard creates one school after another - he is driven by an irresistible craving for enlightenment and a love of philosophy. In 1122, in the small town of Nogent-sur-Saint-Pierre, with the help of several students, he built a small chapel, which he called the "Paraclete" (ancient Greek - comforter). A few years later, the thinker returned to Paris and again broke into lecturing in school of st. Genevieve. His teachings were a tremendous success among students, but the number of ill-wishers of the scientist grew day by day.
By the decision of the council of 1140, Abelard was declared a heretic. An attempt to appeal to Pope Innocent II was not successful - he only approved the decision taken by the Council of Sana, and Abelard was doomed to "silence forever." Abelard received a negative assessment of the Church not because of his theological views set forth in his writings, but because of his rationalistic approach to matters of faith. He wanted to show everyone the countless discrepancies and inconsistencies that are present in the text of the Bible, in the writings of the Fathers of the Church and other Christian theologians.
Nothing more than doubts about the validity of church dogmas became the main basis for condemning Abelard. The abbot of Cluniy - Peter the Venerable - sheltered the exiled Abelard, first in his abbey, then in the monastery of Saint-Marseille-sur-Saone, where Abelard lived until the end of his days. Pierre Abelard died in April 1142 - the philosopher died in prayer. The ashes of the philosopher and his beloved Heloise now rest in Paris, at the Pere Lachaise cemetery.
Abelard's works such as "Dialectic", "Yes and No", "Dialogue between Philosopher, Jew and Christian", "Introduction to Theology", "Knowing Oneself", a beginner's guide to logic - made him one of the greatest medieval thinkers. He also developed a doctrine that was later called "conceptualism".
Abelard himself called his ideas the main cause of all his life's disasters. But still, it was they that turned out to be the most significant for the development of Western European science, and received the widest distribution.
Pierre (Peter) Abelard (fr. Pierre Abélard / Abailard, lat. Petrus Abaelardus; 1079, Le Palais, near Nantes - April 21, 1142, Saint-Marcel Abbey, near Châlons-sur-Saone, Burgundy) - Medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian, poet and musician. Catholic Church repeatedly condemned Abelard for heretical views.
The son of Lucy du Palais (before 1065 - after 1129) and Berenguer N (before 1053 - before 1129), Pierre Abelard was born in the village of Palais near Nantes, in the province of Brittany, into a knightly family. It was originally intended for military service, but irresistible curiosity and, in particular, the desire for scholastic dialectics prompted him to devote himself to the study of the sciences. He also renounced the right of primacy and became a clergyman. At a young age, he listened to the lectures of John Roscelin, the founder of nominalism. In 1099 he arrived in Paris to study with the representative of realism - Guillaume de Champeaux, who attracted listeners from all over Europe.
However, he soon became a rival and opponent of his teacher: from 1102, Abelard himself taught in Melun, Corbel and Saint-Genevieve, and the number of his students increased more and more. As a result, he acquired an irreconcilable enemy in the person of Guillaume of Champeaux. After the latter was elevated to the rank of Bishop of Chalons, Abelard in 1113 took over the management of the school at the Church of Our Lady and at that time reached the apogee of his glory. He was the teacher of many famous people later, of which the most famous are: Pope Celestine II, Peter of Lombard and Arnold of Brescia.
Abelard was the universally recognized leader of the dialecticians, and by the clarity and beauty of his exposition he surpassed the other teachers of Paris, the then center of philosophy and theology. At that time, the 17-year-old niece of Canon Fulber Eloise, who was famous for her beauty, intelligence and knowledge, lived in Paris. Abelard was inflamed with passion for Heloise, who answered him with complete reciprocity.
Thanks to Fulber, Abelard became Eloise's teacher and housewife, and both lovers enjoyed complete happiness until Fulber found out about this connection. The attempt of the latter to separate the lovers led to the fact that Abelard transported Heloise to Brittany, to her father's house in Palais. There she gave birth to a son, Pierre Astrolabe (1118-about 1157) and, although not wanting this, secretly married. Fulber agreed in advance. Soon, however, Eloise returned to her uncle's house and refused marriage, not wanting to prevent Abelard from receiving spiritual titles. Fulber, out of revenge, ordered Abelard to be castrated, so that, according to canonical laws, the path to high church positions was blocked for him. After that, Abelard retired as a simple monk to a monastery in Saint-Denis, and 18-year-old Eloise got her hair cut in Argenteuil. Later, thanks to Peter the Venerable, their son Pierre Astrolabe, raised by his father's younger sister Denise, received a canon in Nantes.
Dissatisfied with the monastic order, Abelard, on the advice of friends, resumed lecturing at Maisonville Priory; but the enemies again began to initiate persecution against him. His work "Introductio in theologiam" was committed in 1121 to be burned at the cathedral in Soissons, and he himself was condemned to imprisonment in the monastery of St. Medard. Having hardly received permission to live outside the monastery walls, Abelard left Saint-Denis.
In the dispute between realism and nominalism, which dominated philosophy and theology at that time, Abelard occupied a special position. He did not consider, like Roscelin, the head of the nominalists, ideas or universals (universalia) only mere names or abstractions, nor did he agree with the representative of the realists, Guillaume of Champeau, that ideas constitute a universal reality, nor did he admit that the reality of the general is expressed in every single being.
On the contrary, Abelard argued and forced Guillaume of Champeau to agree that the same essence approaches each individual person not in its entire essential (infinite) volume, but only individually, of course (“inesse singulis individuis candem rem non essentialiter, sed individualiter tantum"). Thus, in the teachings of Abelard, there was already a reconciliation of two great opposites between themselves, the finite and the infinite, and therefore he was rightly called the forerunner of Spinoza. But still, the place occupied by Abelard in relation to the doctrine of ideas remains a controversial issue, since Abelard in his experience acted as an intermediary between Platonism and Aristotelianism, he speaks out very vaguely and shaky.
Most scholars consider Abelard to be a representative of conceptualism. Abelard's religious teaching was that God gave man all the strength to achieve good goals, and therefore the mind, to keep the imagination within the limits and guide religious belief. Faith, he said, rests unshakably only on conviction achieved through free thinking; wherefore, faith acquired without the aid of mental strength and accepted without independent verification is unworthy of a free person.
Abelard argued that the only sources of truth are dialectic and Scripture. In his opinion, even the apostles and fathers of the Church could be mistaken. This meant that any official church dogma that was not based on the Bible could, in principle, be false. Abelard, as noted by the Philosophical Encyclopedia, asserted the rights of free thought, for the norm of truth was declared thinking, which not only makes the content of faith understandable to the mind, but in doubtful cases comes to an independent decision. highly appreciated this side of his activity: "Abelard's main thing is not the theory itself, but resistance to the authority of the church. Not "to believe in order to understand", as in Anselm of Canterbury, but "to understand in order to believe"; an ever-renewing struggle against blind faith.
The main work "Yes and no" ("Sic et non") shows the contradictory judgments of the authorities of the church. He laid the foundation for dialectical scholasticism.
Abelard became a hermit in Nogent-sur-Seine and in 1125 built himself a chapel and a cell in Nogent on the Seine, called the Paraclete, where, after his appointment as abbot in Saint-Gildas-de-Ruge in Brittany, Eloise and her pious monastic sisters settled. Finally freed by the pope from the management of the monastery, which was difficult for him by the intrigues of the monks, Abelard devoted the coming time of calm to revising all his writings and teaching at Mont Saint-Genevieve. His opponents, led by Bernard of Clairvaux and Norbert of Xanten, finally reached the point that in 1141, at the council of Sens, his teaching was condemned and this sentence was approved by the pope with the order to subject Abelard to imprisonment. However, the abbot of Cluny, the Monk Peter the Venerable, managed to reconcile Abelard with his enemies and with the papacy.
Abelard retired to Cluny, where he died in the monastery of Saint-Marcel-sur-Saone in 1142 at Jacques-Marin.
Abelard's body was moved to the Paraclete and then buried in the Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Next to him was buried his beloved Eloise, who died in 1164.
Abelard's life story is described in his autobiography Historia Calamitatum (The History of My Troubles).
