Peter Lombard (review)

With this volume, Philipp Rosemann has produced a very readable introduction to Peter Lombard, master of theology and then Bishop of Paris (d. 1160), and his Four Books of Sentences, a work that became the central textbook of Christian theology for several centuries. He argues perceptively and persuasively that the genius of the Lombard's work lay in its method, its organization, its completeness, and in its humility in addressing the mysteries of the faith.

Rosemann opens with a brief overview of the development of Christian thought, starting from the story presented in Scripture to the canonical and philosophical elaborations of it at the beginning of the twelfth century. He then turns to the Lombard himself, providing a comprehensive account of Peter's biography, together with a description of his works apart from the Sentences, notably his glosses on the Psalms and the Letters of St. Paul.

As Rosemann approaches the main focus of his book, he addresses briefly the date of the composition of the Sentences (1154/1158), the Lombard's sources (largely Augustine in all his works), the structure of the work ( a more "rationalized" order than that of Hugh of St. Victor's De Sacramentis, and a more biblically "narrative" order than that found in the works of Peter Abelard), and the method of reconciling authorities that so predominates medieval (as well as modern, one might add) academic theology. With this prolegomenon, he plunges into a consideration of the contents of the Sentences. Book 1 treats of God, the Trinity of persons and the unity of essence. Book 2 addresses Creation: angels, the "six days," the creation of man and woman, the Fall, and Sin both original and actual. Book 3 is given over to a consideration of the Incarnation: how the Son of God could "be made flesh," the union of the divine and human natures in Christ, and Christ's saving work, including the virtues of his human nature. Book 4 discusses the Sacraments (the seven that became fixed: Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist, Penance, Unction, Ordination, and Marriage) and Last Things, namely, the Resurrection and Last Judgment. Rosemann gives lucid descriptions of Peter's text, making it come alive through the glimpses we get of his classroom teaching from his students, exposing the dynamism of the debate that did not always produce an unambiguous resolution, and highlighting the Lombard's essentially conservative approach, with respect both to doctrine and to contemporary innovations in philosophical methods.

As he proceeds through the Sentences, Rosemann touches on a few controversial issues: in Book 1, the Lombard's conclusion that "the human love of God and neighbor is nothing other than the unmediated presence of the Holy Spirit in the human soul" (p. 87)—a position that could claim strong, conservative, Augustinian support—was already being debated as theological anthropology came to be informed by a more positive assessment of human capacities, and was eventually rejected by later scholastic tradition. As he recounts the Lombard's Christology in Book 3, he discusses the charge of Christological Nihilianism, that Christ qua human person was not a something (aliquid)—a charge leveled against Peter after his death (though, as Rosemann notes, it is not clear that Peter held a firm opinion on the matter).

Peter's discussion of penance in Book 4, a controversial topic in his own day, leads to further controversy in Rosemann's treatment: was a sinner's contrition sufficient for the sacrament and were confession and satisfaction unnecessary? Rosemann says "no" against Marcia Colish's "yes" (pp. 163-165). As a matter of fact, throughout his discussion of the Sentences, Rosemann carries on a running dialogue with Colish (Peter Lombard, 1994), generally approving of her work, but sometimes rather critical, as here. The criticism is largely prompted by what he calls her "overinterpreting," that is, her tendency to read the Lombard through the lens of Aristotelian thought. In his discussion of Book 1, he critiques her analysis of the Lombard's "ways" to God as proofs derived from a framework of...