Peter Abelard's Ethics : An Edition with Introduction, English Translation and Notes By D. E. Luscombe

by Pierre Abélard

An edition with introduction, English translation, and notes by D. E. Luscombe.

Genres: Philosophy, Medieval, France, Religion

206 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1129

About the author

Nominalist application of French theologian, philosopher, and composer Peter Abelard or Pierre Abélard of the principles of ancient Greek logic to the doctrines of the medieval Catholic Church led to charges of heresy; after his pupil Héloise, his pupil and the object of his lust affair, bore him a child, he secretly married her, whose angered family castrated him, after which he served as a monk.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_A...

Reviews

[SilveryTongue · Rating 4 out of 5]

0,4 estrellas

Pietro Abelardo (1079-1142) una de las personalidades más controvertidas del medioevo. Un espíritu eminentemente dialéctico,el hecho de razonar filosófica y teológicamente. Intencionalmente su genio gozaba de una profunda actitud analítica-socrática.

Lo interesante de abelardo, y esto puede tomarse como una inconsitencia racionalista (anacrónica a su tiempo), es que no siempre actúa como un puro filósofo sino como un hombre de muy profunda fe. En sus coordenadas históricas, es un monje medieval que hace glosa dialéctica o teología dialéctica, y muchas veces este elemento suele pasarse por alto en interpretaciones poco cuidadas, que ven al pensador separado del hombre espiritual.

Personalmente, lo más interesante del tratado de Abelardo es la acusación hecha por san Bernardo de Claraval, que contribuyó a la condena de algunas doctrinas de Abelardo en el sínodo provincial de Sens del año 1140, y solicitó también la intervención del Papa Inocencio II. El abad de Claraval, como he recordado, rechazaba el método demasiado intelectualista de Abelardo, que a su parecer reducía la fe a una simple opinión separada de la verdad revelada. Los temores de Bernardo no eran infundados, sino que, por lo demás, los compartían otros grandes pensadores de su tiempo. Efectivamente, un uso excesivo de la filosofía hizo peligrosamente frágil la doctrina trinitaria de Abelardo y, así, su idea de Dios. En el campo moral su enseñanza no carecía de ambigüedad: insistía en considerar la intención del sujeto como única fuente para describir la bondad o la malicia de los actos morales, descuidando así el significado objetivo y el valor moral de las acciones: un subjetivismo peligroso.

Como dijo un filosofo actual:
Más agudo que erudito, más crítico que sistemático, más dotado de fuerza analítica que de poder sintético, su pensamiento ocupa un lugar único dentro de la Escolástica. Sin el aliento especulativo de un Escoto Erígena, sin la profundidad metafísico-mística de un Eckhart, sin el vasto y variado saber de Alberto de Sajonia, sin el rigor constructivo y el talento arquitectónico de un Tomás de Aquino, Abelardo los supera a todos en la sutileza de los análisis críticos.

[julia! · Rating 4 out of 5]

fun fact: he was castrated and continued to write, while I got scratched by a squirrel and want to rot if I have to write another philosophical essay.

[Steven H · Rating 5 out of 5]

A CLASSIC OF MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY

Peter Abelard (1079-1142) was a medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian, and logician; his love affair with a female student, Héloïse, is both famous and infamous (her father hired thugs to castrate Abelard, who was pledged to celibacy). [NOTE: this edition has the Latin original on the left-hand side, and the English translation on the right-hand side.]

He states, “however much men prevail over us, they bring no turpitude into our lives after the manner of vices and having, as it were, converted us to vices they submit us to a shameful consent. When they command our bodies, so long as the mind remains free, true freedom is not in peril and we do not fall into an indecent subjection. For it is shameful to serve vice, not man; subjection to vices soils the soul, bodily servitude does not. For whatever is common to good and bad men alike is of no importance to virtue or vice.” (Pg. 5)

He notes, “And so our sin is contempt of the Creator and to sin is to hold the Creator in contempt, that is, to do by no means on his account what we believe we ought to do for him, or not to forsake on his account what we believe we ought to forsake. So, by defining sin negatively… as not doing or not forsaking what is fitting, we plainly show there is no substance of sin; it subsists as not being rather than being, just as if in defining darkness we say it is the absence of light where light used to be.” (Pg. 7)

He points out that the author of Ecclesiasticus “taught us not to fulfill our lusts, but not to be entirely without them. The former is vicious, but the latter is not possible for our weakness. SO sin is not lusting for a woman but consenting to lust; the consent of the will is damnable, but not the will for intercourse.” (Pg. 13-15)

He states, “For although we may want to do that which we know ought to be punished or for which we may deserve to be punished, we do not, however, want to be punished. Obviously we are wicked in this, that we want to do what it wicked, yet we do not want to submit to the fairness of a just punishment. The punishment which is just is displeasing; the action which is unjust is pleasing. Moreover, it often happens that when we want to lie with a woman whom we know to be married … yet we by no means want to be adulterous with her—we would prefer that she was unmarried. There are, on the other hand, many men who … desire the wives of the mighty more keenly because they are married to such men than they would if they were unmarried; they want to commit adultery rather than fornication… to transgress by more rather than by less. There are people who are wholly ashamed to be drawn into consent to lust or into a bad will and are forced out of the weakness of the flesh to want what they by no means want to want.” (Pg. 17)

He says, “It is clear … from all this that no natural pleasure of the flesh should be imputed to sin nor should it be considered a fault for us to have pleasure in something in which when it has happened the feeling of pleasure is unavoidable. For example, if someone compels a religious who is bound in chains to lie between women and if he is brought to pleasure, not to consent, by the softness of the bed and through the contact of the woman beside him, who may presume to call this pleasure, made necessary by nature, a fault?” (Pg. 21)

He explains, “Truly, it is not a sin to kill a man not to lie with another’s wife; these sometimes can be committed without sin… The Law forbids us to take our sisters of commingle with them, but there is no one who can keep this ordinance, since one is often unable to recognize one’s sisters---no one, I mean, if the prohibition refers to the act rather than to consent. And so when it happens that someone through ignorance takes his sister, he is surely not the transgressor of an ordinance because he does not know what the Law has forbidden him to do?” (Pg. 27)

He says, “when we speak of a man’s good intention and of his good work, we in fact distinguish between two things, namely intention and work, but one goodness of the intention… And so there is one goodness whence the intention as much as the action is called good, just as there is one goodness by which are described the good man and the son of the good man, or one goodness by which we speak of a good man and of a man’s good will.” (Pg. 47)

He argues, “However, it one asks whether those persecutors of the martyrs or of Christ sinned in what they believed to be pleasing to God, or whether they would without sin have forsaken what they thought should definitely not be forsaken, assuredly, according to what one believes should not be consented to, we cannot say that they have sinned in this, nor is anyone’s ignorance a sin or even the unbelief with which no one can be saved. For those who do not know Christ and therefore reject the Christian faith because they believe it to be contrary to God, what contempt of God have they in what they do for God’s sake, and therefore think they do well… where we do not presume against our conscience our fear of being judged guilty of fault before God is groundless; alternatively, if the ignorance of such men is not to be imputed to sin at all, now does the Lord pray for his crucifiers, saying: ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.’” (Pg. 57) Later, he adds, “And so we say that those who persecuted Christ or his disciples, who they thought should be persecuted, sinned in deed, yet they would have sinned more gravely if they had spared them against their own conscience.” (Pg. 67)

He points out, “And because often the freed of the priest is no less than that of the people… the cupidity of priests seduces many of the dying by promising them a false security if they offer their property in sacrifices and buy Masses which they would certainly not get free.. In this trade they clearly have a fixed price, namely one denarius for a Mass and five solidi for Masses and all the hours for thirty years and sixty for once a year.” (Pg. 85)

He states, “Therefore, whoever have thus sinned against Christ, that is, by saying against their conscience that he casts out devils by Beelzebub, the prince of devils, are thus proscribed absolutely from the kingdom of God and excluded wholly from his grace, so that none of them subsequently deserves his indulgence through repentance... We do not deny that they can be saved if they repent, but we say only that they will not pursue acts of repentance.\” (Pg. 97)

This book will be “must reading” for anyone seriously studying medieval philosophy and theology.

[Zachary · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Ethics represents the culmination of a trend toward interiority in the Christian tradition whose inception was, in broad strokes, the Confessions of Augustine. For Peter Abelard, the locus for moral responsibility is located not in virtuousness or viciousness, i.e. the disposition to act well or badly, nor in desire, over which we in many respects have no control, nor even in the nature of action, but rather in our consent prior to an action to what is morally appropriate or inappropriate. Radically, this means that the performance of a bad action to which one has already consented does not increase moral responsibility, or in medieval Christian terms, sin. “Deeds,” Abelard insists, “are in themselves all indifferent,” and that this is true is clear from the fact that praiseworthy actions are “equally common to reprobates and to the elect” (90). In other words, that moral responsibility concerns consent or intention and not action is clear from the fact that the same ostensibly praiseworthy action can be done with or without consent to what is morally salutary, defined in this context by the will of God. Alternatively, the same ostensibly blameworthy action can be done with or without consent to what is morally prohibited, as in the case of the mother who accidentally smothers her baby in an effort to keep him warm. Abelard claims we consent to that which is not permitted by God when we are “wholly ready to carry it out should the opportunity arise,” and, in accordance with the principle that consent is wholly sufficient for sin, that we do carry out the bad action in no way increases our sin (29).

The chief reason Abelard refuses to identify viciousness, evil desires, and evil deeds with sin is that these are frequently not in our voluntary control, whereas consent to what God prohibits is entirely within our control. In relation to moral vice, he observes that one may be no more responsible for an irascible or lustful disposition than one is for a physical disability; with respect to desire, he insists that it is impossible for us to eliminate evil desires “in our feeble state” (27); and when it comes to action, he notes that circumstances may prevent the performance of what God commands or the ability to refrain from the performance of an evil action, as when someone is coerced to sin. Still, even if each of these three aspects of the moral life—vice, evil desire, and evil action—is alone not sufficient for sin, this does not rule out the possibility that they are partial constituents for sin. To defend his claim that consent and consent alone constitutes sin, Abelard would need to explain why what is not sufficient by itself to constitute sin cannot contribute to sin and thereby qualify as sin as well.

With this scheme in place, Abelard addresses the problem of civic punishment: if sin is located in consent, which is invisible except to those who sin, whereas civic punishment can only be administered in relation to visible actions, then civic justice can only administer punishment based on what in fact does not qualify as sin, and some may therefore suffer punishment for deeds they did not commit sinfully. Nevertheless, Abelard claims, punishment may be warranted even for those who have not sinned for the purposes of social utility, specifically in the form of deterrence. There can thus be a notable rift between civic justice and divine justice, which may only in some cases overlap. Whereas the law is finite and can only address outward action, God “pays attention not so much to the deeds that are done as to the mind with which they are done,” and in this sense only God administers perfect justice (82).

As is probably self-evident, the possibility of moral subjectivism looms over the Ethics, since Abelard insists so strictly on the particularity and individuality of moral intentions. If I believe my intention does not scorn God, is this sufficient to establish that my intention is not sinful? Abelard is keen to avoid this conclusion: “An intention is not to be called good because it appears good, but more than that, because it is such as it is considered to be—that is, when if one believes that what he is aiming at is pleasing to God, he is in addition not deceived in his evaluation” (109). To make this claim, Abelard maintains that universal, objective moral ideas exist prior to the human mind in the divine intellect and it is in relation to these ideas that humans make moral evaluations. More specifically, because humans are made in the imago Dei, we know, or at least can know, what pleases and what scorns God, and our conscience deliberates with an eye to these moral norms. With this moderate form of moral realism, Abelard sows the seeds for what would later come to be known as the natural law, which manifests in conscience but is ultimately located in the divine mind.

Now, whether Abelard successfully rebuts subjectivism with this proto-natural law response is certainly up for debate. For instance, he also maintains that the Jews who called for and condoned the crucifixion of Jesus did not sin, since they did not intend to show contempt for God. Yet would this not represent for Abelard one of the most salient examples in which an intention that appeared good was not, in fact, good? That is, were not the Jews who believed that the execution of Christ would please God obviously mistaken, and thus blameworthy in precisely the sense that Abelard seeks to deny? Yet Abelard insists that “ignorance is hardly to be counted a sin at all,” and insofar as the Jews did not consent to what they believed should not be consented to—i.e. because they did not violate their own consciences—they did not sin (110). While, in terms of his anachronistic tolerance, Abelard should be commended for this conclusion, it nevertheless underscores some notable issues with his attempt to rebut subjectivism—and with any philosophical attempt to locate moral responsibility solely in intention or consent.

[Socrate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Există numeroase vicii sau înclinaţii bune ale spiritului, care sînt legate de obiceiuri; ele nu fac însă viaţa omului demnă de critică sau laudă prin necunoaştere sau cunoaştere: amorţeala spiritului sau iuţeala firii, a fi uituc sau a avea memorie bună. Chiar dacă toate acestea există în egală măsură ca demne de dispreţ sau bune, ele nu ţin cu nimic de alcătuirea obiceiurilor şi nici nu fac viaţa mai ruşinoasă sau cinstită. Tocmai de aceea, cînd am subliniat mai sus, ale spiritului, am adăugat îndată, pentru eliminarea unora de felul celor arătate, care ne dovedesc înclinaţi spre făptuiri rele, adică acestea înclină voinţa către ceva ce doar în cea mai mică măsură se cade să existe sau să fie iertat.

[Fortunato Ferrara · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are some very interesting points made in this book, even if you are not religious (like me). Moreover I really like how he makes a lot of examples to explain his arguments.

[Alex Powlina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Abelard has a certain mystique to him lacking in most of the Church's mystics and certainly in all of her schoolmen. To quote Ovid in a Christian ethics is impressive work.

[Jaq · Rating 4 out of 5]

«Chi potrebbe definire colpa quel piacere che la natura rende inevitabile?»
Si giudica dalle intenzioni dell'animo, non dalle azioni né dalla volontà: rivoluzione del 1110.