The Glossa in Iv Libros Sententiarum by Alexander of Hales

THE GLOSSA IN IV LIBROS SENTENTIARUM BY ALEXANDER OF HALES Hubert Philipp Weber Alexander of Hales, an Englishman, master of theology at the Univer- sity in Paris, who at the height of his career entered the Franciscan order, is an important but little known fi gure of the thirteenth century. His commentary on the Sentences is an early example of this genre and an early expression of his theology. Its form and method are still fl uid. Aft er a short history of the scholarship and some historical remarks I will characterize Alexander’s commentary formally by describing the known manuscripts and attempting to establish its date. Th en I will discuss Alexander’s method and his approach to the Sentences, which he was the fi rst master to use for his ordinary lectures. Finally, a few texts on various theological questions will provide an insight into Alexander’s theology.1 History of Scholarship For seven centuries the search for Alexander of Hales’s commentary on the Sentences was unsuccessful. Nevertheless, there is an early tes- timony in the writings of Roger Bacon, who claimed that Alexander was the fi rst to give lectures on Peter Lombard’s textbook.2 Surely Alexander was not the fi rst to use theSentences with his students, but he gave the work a new importance in that he employed it as the one 1 In would like to thank Sandra Lang, who helped me with the English text of this chapter.—Alexander of Hales, Glossa in IV libros sententiarum Petri Lombardi, 4 vols., Bibliotheca Franciscana Scholastica Medii Aevi 12–15 (Quaracchi, 1951–1957), is cited as Glossa; idem, Summa theologica [seu ab origine dicta Summa fratris Alexandri], 4 vols. [= Books I–III] (Quaracchi, 1924–1948), is cited as Summa; the prolegomena to vol. 4 are a separate volume. 2 See Roger Bacon, Opus minus, ed. J. S. Brewer (London, 1859), 325–9; cited in the preface to Glossa I, 24*–26*. Also see Rega Wood, “Early Oxford Th eology,” in Mediaeval Commentaries, vol. 1, 289–343, at 299. 80 hubert philipp weber textbook in his ordinary lectures.3 Yet his commentary was not quoted in the schools or copied in the scriptoria. Some scholars assumed erro- neously that the Summa universae theologiae or Summa fratris Alex- andri was the Sentences commentary that resulted from Alexander’s lectures.4 Th e history of scholarship on this commentary is therefore closely connected with that of the Summa. For hundreds of years, the Summa was regarded as Alexander’s prin- cipal work; furthermore, he was thought to be its sole author.5 When, in the nineteenth century, the Franciscan friars of Quaracchi (near Florence, Italy) started the critical edition of St. Bonaventure’s works, fi rst doubts regarding Alexander’s authorship appeared. Book IV of the Summa was completed by William of Middleton aft er Alexander’s death. Th is fact had been well known before, but now it was discovered that even the other books include texts by William of Middleton and Bonaventure.6 At the time when the edition of the Summa was started, however, the patres editores did not pay attention to these historical facts. Th eir prolegomena to the fi rst book still defended Alexander’s sole authorship of the fi rst three books. Subsequently, this approach came under much criticism, and the Summa’s varied sources—texts 3 See Marcia L. Colish, “From the Sentence Collection to the Sentence Commentary and the Summa. Parisian Scholastic Th eology, 1130–1215,” inManuels, programmes de cours et techniques d’ enseignement dans les universités médiévales. Actes du Collo- que international de Louvain-la-Neuve (9–11 septembre 1993), ed. Jacqueline Hamesse (Louvain-la-Neuve, 1994), 9–29, esp. 17; also see Arthur Michael Landgraf, Einfüh- rung in die Geschichte der theologischen Literatur der Frühscholastik unter dem Gesi- chtspunkte der Schulenbildung (Regensburg, 1948), 45. Colish is right that the Book of Sentences already was “an authoritative textbook in its own right” (17) before Alex- ander of Hales, but aft er Alexander the Sentences replaced the other textbooks of the twelft h century. 4 Th is mistake can be found, for example, in Jacques Quétif and Jacques Échard, Scriptores ordinis praedicatorum, vol. 1 (Paris, 1721), 497a. Later, Cardinal Franz Ehrle and the editors of the fi rst volume of theSumma assumed that Alexander did not leave us a commentary on the Sentences. See François-Marie Henquinet, “Le commentaire d’Alexandre de Halès sur les Sentences enfi n retrouvé,” in Miscellanea Giovanni Mer- cati, vol. 2: Litteratura medioevale (Vatican City, 1946), 359–82, at 359–61. 5 Many codices from the thirteenth century are without title; others have titles such as Summa fratris Alexandri or Summa Sententiarum. Th ey regard Alexander as the author of the work (see Summa IV, prolegomena, l–liv), as does the papal bull De fontibus paradisi (see Glossa I, 22*). Stegmüller lists some manuscripts of the Summa as commentaries on the Sentences; see Repertorium, nos. 59–61, pp. 31–3. Victorin Doucet, Commentaires sur les Sentences. Supplément au Répertoire de M. F. Stegmüller (Quaracchi, 1954), 14, identifi es additional manuscripts of the Glossa. 6 See Summa I, nos. 262, 333, and 514–18; II, nos. 427–523. See Friedrich Pel- ster, “Literaturgeschichtliche Probleme im Anschluß an die Bonaventuraausgabe von Quaracchi,” Zeitschrift für katholische Th eologie 48 (1924): 500–32, esp. 500–06..

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