Editorials
Anselm of Canterbury Died 900 Years Ago
An outstanding theologian, courageous reformer, modest Christian
April 21, 2009
One of the most independent thinkers of the Middle Ages, Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109) tried to join faith and reason and in so doing, influenced the history of Christian theology like no other person. He has been referred to as the "father of scholasticism," though misleadingly so, for he was not a systematic thinker, he did not found a school and he held significantly different views from those of great scholastics such as Thomas Aquinas or Albertus Magnus. He may be regarded, however, as the most important precursor of this scientific method of reasoning which emerged and developed in the Middle Ages. Anselm of Canterbury died 900 years ago on April 21, 1109.
Born to a wealthy family in what is now Aosta, Italy, the young Anselm, hungry for knowledge and full of idealism, set off in search of a good teacher, as was customary at the time. He found this teacher in Normandy, in the Benedictine monastery of Bec where the famous prior Lanfranc had founded an open monastic school. Lanfranc took it upon himself to look beyond the Bible and the Church Fathers to solve theological problems by including secular sciences such as grammar, dialectics and logic.
Anselm was so fascinated that he remained at Bec where he succeeded Lanfranc as prior three years later. He produced his first writings-intimate prayers and meditations of great clarity and in an intensely personal tone. These were soon followed by serious theological works such as "An example of Meditation on the Meaning of Faith" or "Fides quaerens intellectum" (faith in search of understanding), a title which has become a well-known phrase. These works, while not extremely comprehensive, nonetheless contained explosive material.
This was the great preoccupation of the late scholastic period, namely to be guided by intellect on the path to ultimate truth rather than to rely on a given authority for an understanding of the nature of God and the purpose of humanity. According to Anselm the insight of faith should be achieved "by means of reason alone . . . by the necessary reason without the authority of the scriptures," indeed, "as if nothing were known about Christ"(quasi nihil sciatur de Christo).
This was by no means intended as a rebellious emancipation from God's revelation and church tradition; rather, Anselm, like his contemporaries, regarded intelligence as a gift of God, and "ratio"-reason-in the Middle Ages signified something different from what it does today, namely, an insight for which the necessary preliminary was possession of the Christian faith. Accordingly, reason does not compete with divine revelation, but rather, constitutes an instrument for understanding it better.
Nearly 1,000 years ago Anselm of Canterbury asked modern questions such as Can we even speak about God? Ultimately, when we talk about God, are we not really making statements about ourselves? To resolve this, he developed the so-called ontological proof of God: "We believe that you are a being than which nothing greater can be conceived." But, such a reality cannot exist in the understanding alone. It is logically impossible that "that, than which nothing greater can be conceived," can be thought not to exist. (1)
The second question with regard to which Anselm made theological history is stated in the title of his book Cur deus homo ("Why God Became Man"). Why did God assume human nature and die on the cross? Could God not redeem humanity in some other more comfortable, milder or more elegant way? Could not God put away sins by compassion alone?
A man of the Middle Ages, Anselm said God could not have done so. It would not have been satisfactory for God to pass over humanity's denial of love, its turning away from God, unpunished. That would not have been merciful enough and above all, it would have been unjust. Humanity cannot atone for its enormous debt by itself, and God cannot forego this atonement. At the same time, Anselm says, God cannot simply condemn humanity, because God created humanity out of love and willed it to be happy for eternity.
Anselm's answer: Since "none but God can make and none but man ought to make [satisfaction], it is necessary for the God-man to make it". Today, this "substitutionary atonement theology" is being called into question, for it refers to an offended God who must send His son to death, because He cannot give up this "satisfaction." Present day substitutionary theology thinks in legal categories and in terms of honor and reconciliation. At the time, however, it was an astonishing insight.
In the latter years of his life, Anselm, as Archbishop of Canterbury had to face intense conflicts with the money-hungry English king, who enriched himself by seizing church property and tried to incite Anselm to side with him against the pope in his conflict with Rome. He went into exile several times. Anselm's efforts to oblige the clergy to lead austere, virtuous, monastic-style lives were partially successful. He died on April 21, 1109 in Canterbury, where he was buried next to his teacher Lanfranc. (epd)
Footnotes:
(1) St. Anselm: Proslogium; Monologium: An Appendix in Behalf of the Fool by Gaunilo; and Cur Deus Homo. Trans. Sidney Norton Deane (Chicago: Open Court Publishing Company, 1903).