The Clerical Double Truth Theory in Thirteenth Century

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5

Ali Ghorbani Sini , PhD Candidate of Philosophy Department at the University of Isfahan . Iran

FathAli Akbari, Associate Professor of Philosophy Department at the University of Isfahan , Iran Abstract A period in which the ratio of religion to philosophy is of utmost importance is the European Middle Ages. Thirteenth century is one of the most important periods in which these two categories build up a very close and challenging relationship. During this century, some philosophers who are followers of Aristotle's doctrines and beliefs are accused of "double truth" by church and for this reason these philosophers are accused of heresy and blasphemy. From those times, there have been different views and opinions about the exact meaning of this term and this accusation among thinkers who have conducted research in this area and each one has appointed a specific meaning for this term and consequently, philosophers are either devoid or accused of this matter. Relying on an analysis of this accusation that could be led to blasphemous consequences , the present article is an attempt to embark on the meaning of this accusation made by church. Keywords: DOUBLE TRUTH, LATIN AVERROISM , CONTRADICTION, TRUTH.

Historical Background From the outset, the Middle Ages world was acquainted with Greek philosophy. They were trying to get closer to Platonians and Neoplatonians and philosophers were able to adapt and make the platonian doctrines compatible to Christian doctrines .The writings of Aristotle remained unknown to the Latin world for several centuries with the exception of a part of his logic translated by Boethius in the 6th century. But Aristotelian philosophy was rediscovered by the West during the 12th century. The works of Aristotle were translated into Latin – some from Arabic but some directly from Greek. The writings of Avicenna and Averroes were also translated . As soon as the translations emerged, the problem of the incompatibilities between Aristotle’s philosophy and Christian faith arose since some of the central theses of the Aristotle philosophy were contrary to important claims backed by the authority of the Holy Church. This century may justly be called the century of the establishment of European universities. Paris University was the centre of the ups and downs of the teaching of Aristotle’s works in these years so that Aristotle's doctrines were exposed by abundant good and hard days. Sometimes his doctrines were condemned but sometimes they were accepted. As early as 1210 the local Provincial Council of Paris prohibited the teaching of Aristotelian natural philosophy like mathematics, physics and metaphysics. Only five years later the Papal Legate, Robert de Courcon, banned Aristotle’s Metaphysics and other books on natural philosophy. On 13 April 1231 the ban was revised by Pope Gregory IX who decided that Aristotle’s Physics could be taught but in a censored version. It seems that the censored version was never produced but nevertheless the event signaled a potential shift in the official evaluation of Aristotelian philosophy. During the 1240’s at the Arts Faculty the Parisian masters studied all areas of Aristotle’s philosophy (Brozek, 2010.pp. 22-23). An interesting and extremely important fact is that at the same time the masters of the Theological faculty did not make use of this. These fight and clashes were accelerated after the 12th of March 1255 when the teaching of Aristotle’s doctrines was allowed in Paris. All of these kinds of factors combined to create a serious rivalry between the Arts and Theology faculties which revealed itself in a serious crisis at the Parisian

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5

University during the1270’s. December 10th, 1270, the Bishop of Paris Stephane Tempier condemned 13 philosophical theses as erroneous. So on September 2nd 1276 a decree for the entire university was issued which prohibited the teaching in private places of anything Aristotelian apart from logic and grammar. Finally, on March 7th, 1277 Tempier condemned 219 propositions based on Pope John XXI. The introduction of this incrimination includes:

Thus [some philosophers] state things to be true according to philosophy, but not according to the Catholic faith, as if there are two contrary truths and as if there is a truth in the sayings of pagans in hell that is opposed to the truth of Sacred Scripture.(Pine .1973. p. 31)

Steenberghen believes that "this fragment is the origin of the theory of double truth" (Brozek, 2010.p. 26) . Generally speaking, this introduction has been called the fact of double truth during the history and whenever a philosopher or someone is condemned by it, in fact, he is condemned to blasphemy. Now it should be investigated that what the meaning of this condemnation is and how it is ended up to blasphemy. What does the bishop mean by the fact that some of the philosophers believe as if there are two contrary facts? Is this possible or not?

The Meaning of the Double Truth 2.1.The analyze of the meaning of Double truth from the Church's Viewpoint Here, we will discuss this problem that what the purpose of church was by attributing this term to philosophers and how they were accused by church. In other words, what was the aim of church to choose this term and attribute it to Averroisms? In order to clarify this issue, it should be noted that if the double truth being attributed to some philosophers by church were proved, the corruption of both wisdom and faith would be confirmed. But something that made this term to be so important and imposed negative load to it is not related to the corruption of wisdom, but the corruption of faith. This means that this accusation is more an impious and blasphemous one than being a philosophical or thoughtful one. For this, the person who issues this accusation is a lecturer and a church man. Therefore, accusing the philosophers by this term, church makes blasphemous conclusions and accuses them to impiety. This shows the particular analysis of church from this problem, i.e. from church's view, this term should have the meaning of leading to blasphemous results. Accordingly, church should have a kind of analysis from this problem so that it could be led to blasphemous results because this inference of blasphemous results has made this term equal to impiety. Therefore, wherever there is the discussion of the double truth, the problem of denial of propositions or religious teachings and impiety given to philosophers is observable, though this term includes the lack of solidarity and corruption of wisdom. The bishop of Paris believes that there are philosophers who say: "something relevant to philosophy is correct but relevant to Catholics it is not correct, as if there are two contrary truths". Two things come out of this statement from church's document: Firstly, according to this document, Averroes and then Averroeisms are accused that they believe in two independent truths. Here it should be noted that what is meant by truth? Truth means a True proposition. But what is the meaning of true proposition? The scholars' answer to this question is: if a proposition is "relevant to reality", we call it a correct one. A proposition relevant

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5 to reality is a kind of proposition which its truth could be pursued in the real universe and the outer world. For example, if it is said that "it is hot now", the truth of this proposition could be confirmed by referring to the external world and observing and experiencing the fact that "the weather is really hot now". However, if it is claimed that "the sum of angles in a triangle equals two right angles", then, experiential method is not enough to prove its truth and it demands its own specific methods–here we try to ignore the other values of truth which came into existence during the next centuries like "correspondence with reality" to say that a proposition is real because those values of truth were not available in the 13th century. Therefore, the meaning of reality is correspondence and conformity with reality. And this means that truth is identical to reality and there is no difference between truth and reality. Then, in church's view, those who believe in two kinds of truth, inevitably should believe in two realties because truth and reality are correspondent with each other; therefore, if there are two kinds of truths, necessarily there should be two kinds of realities. These two kinds of truths and realities should have ontological difference with each other i.e. they should really be distinct from each other so that they could be considered as "two". Therefore, confirming the existence of two kinds of truths in philosophers' view from which one is on the domain of religion and the other one on the domain of philosophy does not mean that there is one truth that appears one time under the disguise of wisdom and another time under the disguise of religion, but the necessity of their belief should be the fact that generally, the truth has two parts. That is to say, these two thought domains or these two origins of recognition–wisdom and revelation–create the context of reality and because these are "two", then, the truth itself is "two", hence, each one has a completely independent truth in their own domains. This could be confirmed, asserts that "Averroes's interpretation of Aristotle, and Averroisms as his followers, are some of the reasons of Renaissance emergence and after that the rationalism current"( Kalbasi .2004. p: 1) . At that time, Averroes and Averroisms , relying on pure wisdom recognition which was feasible by following Aristotelian principles, could achieve some truths which were independent of truth of faith. Since before that time the truth was only known as faith and only one unique domain – revelation–was available for the truth, by discovering the other origin of recognition –wisdom– the church considered it as a kind of truth which is ontologically equal to faith but it possesses some facts which have no relationship with the truth of faith. Accordingly, the church can claim that because philosophers have achieved a truth through wisdom which is independent of truth of faith, then there are two kinds of truths in the real world and in fact in the context of the universe i.e. philosophical truth and truth of faith. They consider that the world includes two kinds of truths or in other words, two existences from which one is wisdom (A) and the other one is religion (B) and each one reveals its own particular truth, distinctively. Therefore, these two truths are indicative of two independent realities while they have no relationship with each other in their essence and existence. It seems that a requisite of this statement is that the world itself should go to two pieces so that there is no unity in the world. In view of that, because the world itself goes to two pieces, then the world realities are also different and they are two kinds of truths. This state could be taken as an ontological variety of truth in that "despite of those who seek to recognize the truth or the language from which they speak or the foundation which they choose to act upon, the truth in the real world is various and different" (Yousefian, 2010. P : 57 ). In other words, it could be said that truth means the universe itself and now that we have two kinds of truths, it means that we have two universes and not two observations from one universe (because two observations of one universe does not lead to duality of the truth).

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5

The prerequisite of this inference should be the fact that a person who believes in this viewpoint should certainly consider that the relationship between these two areas of universe–which we called them A (wisdom) and B (religion) – is a real contradiction, because according to the analysis made about the truth of "two", then, if these two kinds of truths are not really contradictory, therefore, they will not be "two". One who believes in this inference accepts the contradiction of these two realities. This contradiction is so severe that one can not imagine the possibility of any compatibility between two sides of this conflict. Therefore, in this viewpoint, the contradiction of propositions or religious doctrines is natural and there should be no fear of contradiction appearance. In other words, this contradiction between wisdom and religion is natural and inherent and the nature of these two realities is consisted of this contradiction. Secondly, regarding the truth, this part attributes another characteristic to Averroes and Averroisms. This characteristic says that these two realities of the universe are in contradiction with each other, too. Here it should be mentioned that contradiction between two propositions happens when "two propositions could not be solved with each other and they could not be summed together". Hence, according to church's view, Averroisms believe that in addition to the fact that the universe includes and contains two kinds of truth, these two kinds of truths are incompatible and in contradiction with each other i.e. a contradictory truth. Thus, referring to the first point we have two realities or universes of A and B and based on the second point, two contradictory propositions could be made out of these two realities; therefore, it could be said that (A is B) and (A is not B). Since we say that the truth is contradictory, the contents of this regulation should be applied to these two propositions. According to the definition of the contradiction principle, we can not consider both of these propositions correct at the same time. If we take both of them correct with one another, then they are one i.e. there is one thing that is "that" and also it is "this" at the same time. And this is against what we discussed in the first point related to truth about being "two". In the same manner the propositions could not be false together, because the same consideration could be emerged again and it is incompatible with being "two" of the truth. The only solution is that because these two propositions are in contradiction, then, each one removes the other one and it is unacceptable to believe in both of these realities , simultaneously. If we prove or believe or accept one of these realities, we will block the path of acceptance to the other side of the truth–as this is the demand principle of contradiction –and we have believed that the other side does not enjoy any kind of truth. Since Averroisms were encountered by this situation about propositions and religious teachings which were taken through revelation and the teachings against faith which were taken from Aristotle's doctrines and also because they were those who discovered the reality of wisdom, church accused them to blasphemy and this term (double truth) is indicative of their blasphemy and impiety. Accordingly, if you prove some kinds of truths through philosophy–which leads to irreligious results– and then believe in them, based on the contradiction principle, you will reject the faith propositions and principles which are included on the other side of the matter; therefore, it is a truth in contradiction with what you have discovered. As the common sense demands, the person who repudiates the truth of faith deserves to be accused of blasphemy and profanity. Obviously, the above interpretations indicate that what the aim of church was by proposing the term of double truth. Through this term, church could condemn philosophers to blasphemy. However, the present interpretation of truth contradiction includes some cases which confirm the past ones in that whatever had been considered necessary for the previous interpretation receives a formal state in the subsequent interpretation. This means that the contradiction between religious teachings and the rational ones receives emphasis and even the relationship between

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5 them is deemed as a contradictory relationship. Consequently, the lack of reconciliation and agreement between religious propositions and wisdom propositions is more prominent in this interpretation. However, another interpretation about the latter case could be offered which is worthy to be mentioned and the authors have not seen it anywhere. As it was mentioned, in addition to corruption of faith, this accusation includes corruption of wisdom in that church accuses this group of philosophers to a logical and philosophical accusation–though this accusation could be ended up in blasphemy–and also accuses them to contradictory statements in that it has been attributed to them that they believe that there are two kinds of contradictory truths simultaneously, but stating two kinds of contradictory truths is self-contradictory and it is against our statement about truth. It means that if I believe in the statement of "A is the truth" and also believe in its opposite statement, i.e. "A is not the truth", this statement is not different from the fact that I reject the truth from the foundation, because by this, we made the truth itself contradictory and considered the truth and contradiction to be synonyms, and contradictory truth means destruction of the truth i.e. there is not any kind of truth. This is because of the fact that principle of contradiction does not have evidence at all and no such a thing exists, and in general, it is "naught". Therefore, by leveling the truth and contradiction or in other words, by believing in "contradictory truth", in fact, we considered the truth to be "naught" and we have rejected it. This notion could be defined as a self-destructive twofold truth( French. 1987: 481) that is the most complete definition for this matter because the necessity of being a contradictory truth is that we need to believe that "the truth is not the truth". This is a logical and philosophical problem about philosophers created by a bishop. If this could be proved, philosophy and philosopher would not be existed anymore. This bishop puts the philosophers in straits of contradictory statement and total rejection of the truth, and attributes this idea to them that 'you do not accept the truth at all and your thinking method is against the truth'. This is because of the fact that this requires to ignore the most fundamental principle of thinking that you (philosophers) i.e. Aristotle has constructed. Therefore, the bishop's disagreement with philosophers is changed and this time he expressed his disagreement by philosophical and logical tools. Presupposition of this interpretation from double truth theory includes denial of two indisputable rational principles that is not only far from philosopher's view but also far from any other common person's, i.e. the rejection of the "principle of contradiction" and "principle of identity". For this reason, in some people's view, the acceptance of the double truth is not intellectual at all .From a cognitive perspective, simultaneous admission of two contradictory principles is impossible and unfeasible. One who accepts the double truth, he admits that (A is B) and (A is not B) while this is just nullifying the contradictory principle and based on Aristotle's doctrines this principle is the foundation of human thought. Therefore, attributing this principle to people is the same as attributing a kind of imprudence to them and for this, some scholars called it a 'disgraced opinion' (Tavakoli, 2008. p: 2). In this regard, Gilson asserts that "I have never seen a philosopher to acknowledge the theory of double truth" (Gilson, 1992: 40). Windelband points out that "the teaching of double truth could not be attributed to any thinker or any school of thought" (Harell,1998 : 1). And "nobody can have two masters and nobody could believe in two realities" (French, 1987 : 487). As it was mentioned, the bishop is able to accuse the philosophers to blasphemy and impiety because, according to this interpretation, the philosopher has denied a truth in general, and he does not believe in truth. While church believes in the truth of faith, revelation and celestial

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5 speech, a philosopher does not accept any of these realities. Therefore, church is allowed to accuse the philosophers to blasphemy and impiety because they do not believe in religious truth. Conclusion Along with the above discussion, one can conclude that church moved hastily in accusing the Averroisms philosophers and embarked on an ill-considered action. Philosophers are accused of something that is basically unacceptable and there is no common sense to believe in what has been claimed by church, let alone the philosophers who consider themselves indebted and followers of Aristotle and most of them have been acquainted with Aristotelian logic. We observed that admitting this term and this accusation demands the denial and rejection of some evident rational principles such as the principle of contradiction and principle of identity which are among the bases of human thought. However, this accusation does not end up here and it could be said that those philosophers who think that Averroeisms believe in the double truth have considered other meanings for this term. And based on these meanings ,Aristotelian philosophers in the late 13th century were known as double truth believers so that these meanings led neither to blasphemy and profanity nor to corruption and thought destruction.

ijcrb.webs.com SEPTEMBER 2013 INTERDISCIPLINARY JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH IN BUSINESS VOL 5, NO 5

References 1. Brozek . Bartosz .( 2010) . The double truth controversy: An Analytical Essay.Copernicus center press 2. French. F. C. (1984) . The doctrine of twofold truth . The Philosophical review .vol 1 .no 5 Duke university press 3. Ebbesen.sten . (1998) . “Averroism” in :vol.1: Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy ed Edwrad Craig,vol .I, (Routledge; Bk &CD Rom edition ) 4. Gilson, Etienne. (2010). The History of Christian Philosophy during Middle Ages. Reza Gandomi-e Nasrabadi. Qom, Religions University Publication.0 5. Gilson, Etienne . (1992). Wisdom and Revelation during Middle Ages. Shahram Pazuki, Tehran: Cultural Research and Studies. 6. Harrel . Bill.j .( 1998) . Question of value in Sociology and the doctrine of tow-fold truth . Available in : http://people.sunyit.edu/~harrell/billyjack/two-fold-truth.htm 7. Kalbasi hosein ( 2004 ) . "The school of latin Averroism and new Rationalisme". Philosophy Magazine of Ltr Faculty of Tabriz university .year 47. No 191 8. Martin Pine .( 2003). “Double Truth” in vol:2 of Dictionary of History of Ideas (University of viriginia)

9. Szyndler . lech . Averroism. in : Internet version of Universal Encyclopedia of Philisophy . Available in: http://peenef2.republika.pl /angielski/ hasla /a/averroism.html

10. Tavakoli, Gholam hosein, (2010). Double Truth. Journal of Humanity Faculty. Tabriz University. No. 203, Spring and Summer.

11. Thijssen. Hans, “condemnation o f 1277” from : Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

12. Uckelman . S . L . (2009) . logic and condemnation of 1277 . University of Amsterdam (UvA)

13. Yousefian, Hasan. (2010). Double Truth from Averroes's Viewpoint and his Latin Followers. Qom: Imam Khomeini Research Publication.