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The Sentences (. ) is a compendium of Christian theology written by Peter Lombard around 1150. It was the most important religious textbook of the Middle Ages.
Lombard went a step further by compiling them into one coherent whole.Bougerol, Jacques Guy. "The Church Fathers and the Sentences of Peter Lombard", in: Irena Backus, ed., The Reception of the Church Fathers in the West – From the Carolingians to the Maurists, Vol. I. Leiden, 1997. 113–164. There had been much earlier efforts in this vein, most notably in John of Damascus' The Source of Knowledge. When John of Damascus' work was translated into Latin in 1150, Lombard had access to it.
Lombard was not alone in his project. Many other contemporary theologians were compiling glossaries, such as Robert of Melun's Sententiae and Hugh of Saint Victor's De sacramentis christianae fidei.Martin O.P., Raymond M. “Introduction,” in OEuvres de Robert de Melun, vol. 3.1, ed. Raymond M. Martin, O.P., Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense 21 (Louvain: Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense, 1947), v-xxi, at xiv.Ghellinck S.J., Joseph de. Le mouvement théologique du XIIe siècle. Sa préparation lointaine avant et autour de Pierre Lombard. Ses rapports avec les initiatives des canonistes. Études, recherches et documents, 2d ed. Museum Lessianum, Section historique 10. Bruges: Éditions de Tempel; Brussels: L' Édition universelle; Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1948. In 1134, Lombard went to Paris to study with Hugh, who was finishing his work at the time. Their work was the signal development of 12th-century religious scholars: a systematic theology that treated the activity as a coherent practice.Colish, Marcia L. Peter Lombard (2 vols.). Brill's Studies in Intellectual History, Volume: 41. Leiden: Brill. 1993
Lombard's twin hurdles were devising an order for his material and reconciling differences among sources. His Sic et Non employed a method for reconciling authorities that Lombard knew and used. Abelard had also conceived of his work as a textbook.Abailard, Peter. Sic et non: A Critical Edition. Edited by Blanche E. Boyer, Richard McKeon. University of Chicago Press, 1977. Prologus, p. 103, l. 330–p. 104, l. 350. Lombard's previous work, Magna glossatura, was an enormous success and quickly became a standard reference work.Hamel, Christopher de. Glossed Books of the Bible and the Origins of the Paris Booktrade. Woodbridge, Suolk: Brewer, 1984. 9. Compiling the Magna glossatura prepared Lombard for the definitive synthesis of the Sentences.Glunz, H.H. History of the Vulgate in England from Alcuin to Roger Bacon. Cambridge University Press, 1933. 255.
In addition to Lombard's Magna glossatura and the Glossa Ordinaria, the Sentences relied heavily on the works of Augustine, citing him over 1,000 times.Cavallera, Ferdinand, "Saint Augustin et le Livre des Sentences de Pierre Lombard", Archives de philosophie 7, no. 2. 1930. 186–99. Julian of Toledo's eschatology was heavily reflected in Lombard's work.Wicki, N. "Das Prognosticon futuri saeculi Julians von Toledo als Quellenwerk der Sentenzen des Petrus Lombardus," Divus Thomas 31. Fribourg. 1953. 349-60. The Sentences were also a remarkable snapshot of current thought.Ghellinck S.J., Joseph de. “Pierre Lombard,” Dictionnaire de théologie catholique XII/2. 1931. Editorial choices like including a table of contents made Peter's book a much more helpful reference than other glossaries.
After the Fourth Council of the Lateran in 1215, the Sentences became the standard textbook of theology at Middle Ages universities.Joseph Rickaby. Scholasticism. Archibald Constable, 1908. 23.Rosemann, Philipp W. Peter Lombard. Great Medieval Thinkers. Edited by Brian Davies. Oxford University Press, 2004. Stephen Langton's commentary on the Sentences helped establish the form.Landgraf, Artur. " The First Sentence Commentary of Early Scholasticism," The New Scholasticism 13. 1939. 126–7. Until the 16th century, no work of Christian literature, except for the Bible itself, was commented upon more frequently. All the major medieval thinkers in western Europe relied on it, including Albert the Great, Alexander of Hales, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, Marsilius of Inghen, William of Ockham, Petrus Aureolus, Robert Holcot, Duns Scotus, and Gabriel Biel.
Aquinas' Summa Theologica would not eclipse the Sentences in importance until around the 16th century. Even the young Martin Luther still wrote glosses on the Sentences, and John Calvin quoted from it over 100 times in his Institutes.
David Luscombe called the Sentences "the least read of the world's great books".Luscombe, David Edward. The School of Peter Abelard: The Influence of Abelard's Thought in the Early Scholastic Period. Cambridge University Press, 1969. 262. In 1947, Friedrich Stegmüller compiled a 2-volume bibliography of commentaries on the Sentences.Stegmüller, Friedrich. Repertorium commentariorum in Sententias Petri Lombardi. 2 vols. Würzburg: F. Schöningh, 1947. By 2001, the tally of Lombard commentators ran to 1,600 authors.Livesey, Steven J. "Lombardus Electronicus: A Biographical Database of Medieval Commentators on Peter Lombard’s Sentences". in Mediaeval Commentaries on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, Volume 1. Editor G.R. Evans. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2002. 5.
Modern English Translation
Commentaries on The Sentences:
Composition
The Sentences were compiled in two phases. By 1154, he had completed an initial version of the text which he read to his students in Paris during the 1156–7 academic year. The following term, he had significantly revised the Sentences, and this became the definitive version.Brady O.F.M., Ignatius. Book of Sentences: Magistri Petri Lombardi, Sententiae in IV libris distinctae, vol. 1, part 1: Prolegomena, Spicilegium Bonaventurianum 4. Grottaferrata: Editiones Collegii S. Bonaventurae Ad Claras Aquas, 1971. 122–29. The first major manuscript of the Sentences was copied by Michael of Ireland in 1158. There are nearly 900 extant manuscripts of Lombard's work, which indicates how widely it was used.
Contents
Lombard arranged his material from the Bible and the Church Fathers in four books, then subdivided this material further into chapters. Probably between 1223 and 1227, Alexander of Hales grouped the many chapters of the four books into a smaller number of "distinctions".Brady, Ignatius. “THE DISTINCTIONS OF LOMBARD’S BOOK OF SENTENCES AND ALEXANDER OF HALES.” Franciscan Studies, vol. 25, 1965. 95. In this form, the book was widely adopted as a theological textbook in the high and late Middle Ages (the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries). A commentary on the Sentences was required of every master of theology, and was part of the examination system. At the end of lectures on Lombard's work, a student could apply for bachelor status within the theology faculty.
Legacy
In 1170, Pope Alexander III instructed William of Champagne to "convoke your Suffragan bishop at Paris" and renounce the "vicious doctrine" ( pravae doctrinae) of Peter Lombard. Enchiridion symbolorum definitionum et declarationum de rebus fidei et morum. Ed. Heinrich Denzinger and Adolf Schönmetzer, S.J., 34th ed. Barcelona: Herder, 1967. no. 749–50. p. 239. The Pope was accusing Lombard of espousing Christological Nihilianism: the idea that Christ's Docetism and his sole identity was divine."Nihilianism", The Concise Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. Oxford University Press, 2006. The concerns centered on Book III of the Sentences where Peter Lombard discusses the hypostatic union from a variety of angles. The debate lingered long enough that the Pope reiterated his concerns in a second letter to William seven years later. The Pope's position was not universally supported among the Cardinals who felt the Church faced more pressing issues.Nielsen, Lauge Olaf. Theology and Philosophy in the Twelfth Century. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. 1982. 359–60.
Editions
See also
Further reading
External links
The Sentences Online:
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