Council of Soissons

The Council of Soissons is commonly referred to as the Provincial Synod , through which, in March or April 1121, a book by the philosopher and theologian Peter Abelard , his book on the Holy Trinity , was branded as heretical and delivered to the fire.

occasion

As part of his feud with his former teacher and later opponent, the nominalist Roscelin of Compiègne , Peter Abelard called Bishop Gilbert of Paris in 1120 to confront him and Roscelin in a public hearing and to decide on the issues relating to Abelard's doctrine of the Trinity. It is no longer possible to reconstruct the specific theological questions that were at stake at the time, since all of the related documents have been lost. It is also not known whether Bishop Gilbert responded to Abelard's request. But in the following year, 1121, the internal church opposition to Abelard under the leadership of Alberich von Reims and Lotulfs von Novara , former fellow students of Abelard during his studies with Anselm von Laon , formed so much that Abelard can be brought to justice.

charge

At the instigation of Archbishop Radulf of Reims , Abelard was summoned to a provincial synod in Soissons so that he could justify himself because of his doctrine of the Trinity and his book Theologia Summi Boni . The official council acts are lost. In a Vita of Norbert von Xanten it is mentioned that the council was called because of the deterioration of clerical customs. Most of what is known about this council is learned from Abelard himself in his Historia Calamitatum .

Chair

The assembly was chaired by the Papal Legate for the provinces of Rouen, Sens and Reims, and Cardinal Bishop Kuno von Praeneste . Kuno was in no way interested in theological issues. Abelard himself criticized his scientific education.

Attendees

All eligible suffragan bishops of the ecclesiastical province of Reims, but also the archbishops and bishops of the neighboring ecclesiastical provinces took part. The following became known by name:

Gottfried von Lèves, Bishop of Chartres
Norbert von Xanten, founder of the Premonstratensian Order
Adam, Abbot of Saint-Denis
Gottfried, Abbot of Saint-Médard in Soissons
Alberich, head of the Reims Cathedral School
Lotulf von Novara, teacher at the cathedral school in Reims
Theodoric, teacher at the cathedral school in Chartres

Not mentioned by name, but were probably present:

Wilhelm von Saint-Thierry , the former college friend and later accuser of Abelard at the Council of Sens
Joscelin von Vierzy, future bishop of Soissons, currently archdeacon and head of the cathedral school of Soissons

course

At the beginning of the council, Peter Abelard personally presented his work to the papal legate, who, however, immediately passed it on to the Archbishop of Reims without an examination. Abelard also received support from Gottfried von Lèves, the Bishop of Chartres. He pointed out that Abelard's book about the Trinity did not contain any heretical content and advised against a coram publico negotiation, also because of the unfavorable publicity.

In the course of the following days of the Council Peter Abelard succeeded in public appearances in convincing the people of Soissons, who had wanted to stone him when he arrived, of the integrity of his intentions.

Magister Alberich von Reims , Abelard's counterpart, tried to involve Abelard privately in contradictions, but he failed completely.

Warned by this embarrassment, Alberich subsequently knew how to prevent a public hearing and discussion with Abelard and, with the support of his archbishop, pushed for Abelard to be condemned for purely formal reasons.

Legate Kuno von Praeneste finally consented to the condemnation after he had already wanted to release Abelard. Abelard was “called to the council, and without investigation, without examination, he is forced to throw his book into the fire with his own hand. And so it is burned. But so that it doesn't appear as if one has nothing to say, one of his opponents mumbles softly that he found the sentence in the book that God the Father alone is all powerful. When he heard this, the legate replied with astonishment: One should not even trust a child that someone is so wrong, since the common belief firmly confesses that all three persons of the Godhead are omnipotent. "

At this time the teacher Theodoric von Chartres , the brother of Bishop Gottfried, stood up for Abelard, albeit in vain. He began with a sentence from the creed of Athanasius - “And yet not three are omnipotent, but one is omnipotent.” - and followed up with a quote from the Bible: “Are you such fools of Israel that you condemn a son of Israel before you researched the matter and become certain? Return to court again and judge the judge yourself. For the judge whom you appointed to instruct the faith and to remove error, he judged himself through his own mouth, since he should judge others, while today the divine mercy an apparently innocent, like Susanna once, freed from his false accusers. "

Regardless of this, Abelard was forced to recite the Athanasian Creed aloud, "with sighs, sobs and tears," as Abelard himself remarked, and then he was transferred to monastery custody in Saint-Médard in Soissons, where he met with Claustral Prior Goswin von Anchin , an earlier one Student and opponent who was faced. But after a few days Abelard was released from prison, presumably with the help of his supporter in the background, Chancellor Stephan von Garlande , and was able to return to Saint-Denis.

meaning

At the end of the Council of Soissons the contrast between the new science and traditional church teaching became clear: reasons of reason, rationes , stand against tradition, auctoritates . Abelard's inaugurated, rationalistic view of the contents of faith resulted in the new great danger for the official Church at that time. It threatened to lose its authority and power. The primary goal was not understanding or open dialogue, but rather the suppression of problems and the maintenance of church power. And this was achieved with means that were hardly compatible with canon law.

reverberation

Back in Saint-Denis, Abelard worked on his main methodological work Sic Et Non and wrote other logical writings. When Abelard discovered a mistake in the founding legend of Saint-Denis and pointed it out to his confreres, he incurred their irreconcilable hostility. Fearing a new charge, now before the royal court, Abelard fled with the help of some supporters to a friend of his prior in Saint-Ayoul in Provins . This flight had a political dimension: Abelard left the sphere of influence of the French king . Provins belongs to the sphere of influence of Theobald the Great , the Count of Champagne. The count's house is closely related to Heloïsa's maternal family, and Abelard was supported in future by the count, whom he had already met earlier. Exactly 20 years later, at the Council of Sens in 1141, Peter Abelard was attacked again for his teachings and then condemned by Pope Innocent II to monastery imprisonment and eternal silence.

In summary, Otto von Freising wrote about the Council of Soissons:

“That is why a provincial synod was called against him in Soissons in the presence of a papal legate, and he was condemned as a Sabellian heretic by the eminent men, and in particular by the magisters Alberich of Reims and Lotulf of Novara, and he was forced to take the books he had published to throw them into the fire before the bishops. He was not given the opportunity to answer what was considered suspicious by everyone in his disputation practice. This happened under Ludwig the Elder, the King of the Franks. "

literature

Otto von Freising: Gesta Friderici I. imperatoris seu rectius Cronica. The deeds of Frederick or, more correctly, Cronica (Latin-German); ed. by Franz-Josef Schmale; Selected sources on German history in the Middle Ages, 17; Darmstadt: Scientific Book Society, 1965.
Historia Calamitatum Abelard ; in: E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.
Constant J. Mews: Peter Abelard ; in: Valerie IJ Flint, Patrick J. Geary (ed.): Authors of the Middle Ages: Historical and Religious Writers of the Latin West, Nos 5 & 6: ; Aldershot: Variorum, 1995; ISBN 978-0860784883 .
Michael T. Clanchy: Abelard, A Medieval Life ; Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1999 ¹⁰ ; ISBN 978-0631214441 .
Adalbert Podlech: Abelard and Heloisa, or Theology of Love ; Munich, Zurich: Piper; ISBN 3-492-03245-1 .

Remarks

^ E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.
↑ As a former Canon Regular, the Swabian was the oldest and most feared of all papal legates. On his own initiative he had already excommunicated Emperor Heinrich V in 1111 and 1114. In 1119 he had been proposed by Pope Gelasius II as the successor to the chair of Peter, but had lost out to Bishop Guido von Vienne, who later became Pope Calixt II . As a church diplomat, Kuno repeatedly toured France and Germany on matters relating to the investiture dispute and Gregorian reform.
↑ ^a ^b ^c Historia Calamitatum Abelard ; in: E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.
^ At that time Wilhelm signed a document together with Kuno von Praeneste and Gottfried von Chartres.
↑ The chronicler Otto von Freising later reports on the accusation of Sabellianism , according to which the divine unity does not consist of three persons, but only of one, who reveals itself in three ways as father, son and spirit, while Abelard himself speaks of having him the opposite, accused of tritheism .
↑ According to the Historia calamitatum Abelard he accuses the latter of denying the self-generation of God, but does not recognize that the incriminated sentence from Abelard's book is actually a quote from the church teacher Augustine: “Whoever believes that God has them Power to generate oneself is all the more wrong as not only is God not like that, but no other spiritual or physical creature at all. There is absolutely no being that could produce itself. ”Cf. Historia Calamitatum Abelard ; in: E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.
↑ Otto von Freising describes the fear of Abelard: "He was not given an opportunity to justify himself because his dexterity in disputing was feared by everyone." Cf. Otto von Freising: Gesta Friderici I. imperatoris seu rectius Cronica. The deeds of Frederick or, more correctly, Cronica (Latin-German); ed. by Franz-Josef Schmale; Selected sources on German history in the Middle Ages, 17; Darmstadt: Scientific Book Society, 1965.
↑ Alberich and Radulf made it clear to Legate Kuno that it was sufficient to condemn the book that there was no papal or other ecclesiastical approval. Incidentally, in the history of the Church this is the first desire for a papal imprimatur !

[1] E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.

[2] As a former Canon Regular, the Swabian was the oldest and most feared of all papal legates. On his own initiative he had already excommunicated Emperor Heinrich V in 1111 and 1114. In 1119 he had been proposed by Pope Gelasius II as the successor to the chair of Peter, but had lost out to Bishop Guido von Vienne, who later became Pope Calixt II . As a church diplomat, Kuno repeatedly toured France and Germany on matters relating to the investiture dispute and Gregorian reform.

[hca-3] Historia Calamitatum Abelard ; in: E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.

[4] At that time Wilhelm signed a document together with Kuno von Praeneste and Gottfried von Chartres.

[5] The chronicler Otto von Freising later reports on the accusation of Sabellianism , according to which the divine unity does not consist of three persons, but only of one, who reveals itself in three ways as father, son and spirit, while Abelard himself speaks of having him the opposite, accused of tritheism .

[6] According to the Historia calamitatum Abelard he accuses the latter of denying the self-generation of God, but does not recognize that the incriminated sentence from Abelard's book is actually a quote from the church teacher Augustine: “Whoever believes that God has them Power to generate oneself is all the more wrong as not only is God not like that, but no other spiritual or physical creature at all. There is absolutely no being that could produce itself. ”Cf. Historia Calamitatum Abelard ; in: E. Hicks: La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame ; Paris, 1991.

[7] Otto von Freising describes the fear of Abelard: "He was not given an opportunity to justify himself because his dexterity in disputing was feared by everyone." Cf. Otto von Freising: Gesta Friderici I. imperatoris seu rectius Cronica. The deeds of Frederick or, more correctly, Cronica (Latin-German); ed. by Franz-Josef Schmale; Selected sources on German history in the Middle Ages, 17; Darmstadt: Scientific Book Society, 1965.

[8] Alberich and Radulf made it clear to Legate Kuno that it was sufficient to condemn the book that there was no papal or other ecclesiastical approval. Incidentally, in the history of the Church this is the first desire for a papal imprimatur !