The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Philosophy ed. by A. S. McGrade (review)

632 BOOK REVIEWS than a hypothetical sense, Balthasar's analogy supports the Church's concrete efficacy as the sacrament of salvation. This is a move that Rahner's system, grounded in analogy, could easily have exploited, perhaps more effectively than did Balthasar. As a tribute to its competence, each chapter of Burke's book is a tour de force inviting Rahner's enduring legacy to interpret issues of immediate concern. May it serve as a vade mecum for all who, like Rahner, share the conviction that metaphysics is the only adequate hermeneutic of the Christian religion. Georgetown University Washington, D.C. STEPHEN M. FIELDS, S.J. The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Philosophy. Edited by A. S. MCGRADE. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Pp. 405. $60.00 (cloth), $24.00 (paper). ISBN 0-521-80603-8 (cloth), 0-521-00063-7 (paper). Seldom has a scholar had a more productive retirement. Professor emeritus at the University of Connecticut, Arthur Stephen McGrade has produced several substantive scholarly works in the years since he left the classroom, the latest being one of the celebrated Cambridge Companion series, namely, The Cambridge Companion to Medieval Philosophy. McGrade has assembled for his volume an array of authorities from both sides of the Atlantic and issued his assignments according to a combination of historical and thematic approaches. Far from approaching medieval philosophical texts as discussions to be gotten through, it is McGrade's aim in this volume to stimulate readers to get into the discussions. While he avoids weighing the solutions, the editor aims instead at a presentation of the range and freshness of medieval thought; at the same time, he allows that some have found and still find timeless truth in the amazing insights of those pre-Enlightenment thinkers. The distinguishing feature of philosophy in the medieval period, however, is that most often it served the ends of religious belief; in fact, the paradox is that the best philosophy was done by theologians and within a theological context. While acknowledging the distinctiveness of the disciplines, McGrade sagely confronts the historical situation and invites his authors to attend to the mutual relationships of faith and reason as they arise in the different contexts discussed in their respective chapters. In an elegantly written introductory chapter, Steven Marrone provides the context for what will follow, giving due attention to societal, ecclesiastical, and economic factors. As an organizing principle, Marrone's division of medieval philosophy into three phases (the patristic, monastic, and high medieval) makes BOOK REVIEWS 633 good sense. Sketched also is the rise of political philosophy, spurred by the bitter conflicts between the papacy and the Holy Roman Empire, a struggle that left both sides depleted and prey to the rising national states of the fourteenth century. Marrone, moreover, restores a semblance of balance to scholarly assessment of that troubled century; the revised view, prompted in large measure by the preoccupations of analytic philosophers, sees the period as one of creative and vibrant philosophical activity, unlike the Gilson school of an earlier generation that saw it as one of disintegration and decline, the rupture of the Scholastic synthesis. Helpful is the table of Greek and Arabic works and the dates of their translation into Latin. Also helpful is a concluding section on the various genres of philosophical writing, With respect to the enigmatic Peter of Spain, Marrone correctly disassociates him from Pope John XXI; it is, however, not certain that he was a Dominican, as Marrone asserts. There follows a chapter on "two medieval ideas," as they are labeled: namely, eternity and hierarchy, which at first glance sound like so many History of Ideas sessions at medieval-studies conferences. But the authors, John Marenbon and David Luscombe, have found a connection: "eternity and hierarchy can be regarded as something like the temporal and ontological coordinates of medieval thought." The studies on both counts are useful. As complements to Marrone's overview, which focuses principally on philosophy by Christians, are lucid appraisals on philosophy in Islam (as author Therese-Anne Druart appropriately calls it) and the philosophy of DiasporaJews, by Idit Dobbs-Weinstein. The latter has the courage to confront the painful fact that at certain times and places...