Abstract
This article intends to revise the still unrivalled opinion in Medieval Studies according to which knowledge of the Qur’ān in the early medieval Latin West is almost completely missing. For this purpose, it revises the current state of the art, enriches this panorama with some new findings in rarely studied or unknown sources and tries to assess a new profile of Latin reception of the Muslims’ central religious book. The study can show that authors of the early medieval Latin world ventured first, yet still polemical and apologetic approaches to the new religious phenomenon ‘Islam’ that produced not only superficial, hearsay-based, but first detailed knowledge of the Qur’ān.
SummaryChristian theologians can explain the Trinitarian faith today in dialogue with Islamic thinkers as “deepened monotheism”. Therefore it is important to widen the systematic-theological discourse in an ecumenical and transcultural perspective and to retrieve resources from Western and non-Western traditions of Trinitarian thought (I).In this paper I will first work out historically that the Trinitarian creed of Nicea and Constantinople was originally an ecumenical but non-Western creed (II). Afterwards, I investigate the philosophical-theological reflection on the Trinity by Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109) in the context of early interreligious encounters in the Latin West. Based on biblical, augustinian and Greek sources, he developed an approach to understand the mystery of the Trinity by rational arguments as “deepened monotheism” (III). Then I will proceed to explore the philosophical-theological dialogues on the Trinity from the Arabic philosopher and Syrian-orthodox theologian Yaḥyā ibn ‘Adī (893–974). Much earlier he developed rational arguments for the Triunity of God with reference to Aristotle. Thereby he answers to anti-trinitarian arguments from Islamic thinkers like al-Kindī and al-Warrāq. He intends that the Trinitarian faith of Christian minorities can thereby be understood and tolerated by Islamic thinkers as rationally founded “deepened monotheism” (IV).In the end I will evaluate what these classics from the Western and non-western traditions of Trinitarian thought contribute to explicate the doctrine of the Trinity today in a pluralistic religious context as “deepened monotheism” (V).
Although writings of Aldhelm (c. 635–c. 709) were widely known in early Spain, in modern Spain they are hardly known at all. An entry on Aldhelm in a recent Spanish book on medieval Latin makes the latter point vividly: ‘Bibliografía: Escasa. Autor casi olvidado. Totalmente ausente en algún catálogo bibliográfico.’ A survey of the transmission of Aldhelm's writings from a Spanish viewpoint, however, is able to alter this perspective and to show new aspects of his influence.
Early Medieval Exegesis in the Medieval Latin West: Sources and Forms. By Thomas O'Loughlin . Variorum Collected Studies Series 1035. Farnham, Surrey, England: Ashgate, 2013. xvi + 346 pp. $165.00 cloth.
