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Volume XLIV September Number 4 Luther and the Late Medieval Augustinians: Another, Look David C OCT 1 1973 ARCHIVES Volume XLIV September Number 4 Luther and the Late Medieval Augustinians: Another, Look David C. Steinmetz The author is professor of history at Duke University, Durham, N. C. On July 17, 1505, Martin Luther, the writings of St. Augustine.3 And M. A., of the University of Erfurt, there is probably, among the late applied for admission to the Reformed medieval scholastics, no doctor whose Congregation of the Order of the mastery of the theology of St. Augus­ Hermits of St. Augustine. When, later tine is more impressive 4 or whose that year in September, he received ability to interpret the ideas of St. the tonsure and black habit of the Augustine in the categories of his own Austin Friars in the monastery church time is more successful 5 than the of the Augustinian cloister near Leh­ famous general of the Augustinian mann's bridge in the northeastern Order, Gregory of Rimini. part of Erfurt, he entered an order The question of the relationship dedicated to theological study, espe­ of Martin Luther to the theological cially to the study of the writings of traditions of his own order, to ,hie St. Augustine. At Oxford, Cambridge, he was exposed in a lesser or greater Paris, and other centers of medieval degree, has remained one of the inter­ learning - but especially at Paris 1 esting, if unsolved problems of Luther -doctors of the Augustinian Order research. Was there a revival of Augus- had distinguished themselves for the breadth and profundity of their learn­ 3 "Without wishing to make of this connec­ ing. Thomas Aquinas had no more tion more than the evidence can sustain, it does famous pupil than Giles of Rome, not seem likely that Petrarch could have been whose independence of his teacher unaware of the Augustinians' theological views, especially since he was introduced to the study was so marked that he was even re­ of St. Augustine by the Augustinian Hermit, garded by some Thomists as a rival of Dionigi of Borgo San Sepolcro," Charles Aquinas.2 Petrareh found in the Augus­ Trinkhaus, In Our Image and Likeness: Humanity tine scholarship of the Italian Augus­ and Divinity in Italian Humanist Thought, Volume 1 (London: Constable, 1970), p.61. tinians an aid for his own studies in See A. Zumkeller, "Augustinerschule," pp. 1 Of the Augustinians whose commentaries 206-207. on the Sentences have survived, 42 Out of 75 4 "What is so new in Gregory is the fact that lectured on the Sentences at Paris, including such he is the best Augustine scholar of the Middle famous doctors as Giles of Rome, James of Ages from the milieu which created the Mil­ Viterbo, Alexander of San Eipidio, Henry of leloquium," Damasus Trapp, "Augustinian Friemar, Augustinus of Ancona, William of Theology of the 14th Century: Notes on Edi­ Cremona, Henry of Friemar the Younger, tions, Marginalia, Opinions, and Book-Lore," Hermann of Schild esche, Thomas of Strassburg, Augustiniana 6 (1956), p. 181. Gregory of Rimini, Alfons Vargas of Toledo, 5 Gordon Leff, Gregory of Rimini, Tradition Hugolino of Orvieto, Dionysius of Montina, and Innovation in Fourteenth Century Thought to name only a few. See the table found on (Manchester: The University Press, 1961), pages 174-176 of Adolar Zumkeller, "Die pp.241-242: " ... what the Augustinians did for Augustinerschule des Mittelalters: Vertreter tradition in the thirteenth century he achieved und philosophisch-theologische Lehre," Analecta in the fourteenth. He recast it and adapted it; August-iniana 27 (1964), 167-262. and thereby preserved it. When the full history 2 "Dafuer spricht auch der Umstand, dass of fourteenth-century thought comes finally to manche Thomasschueler seiner Zeit in ihm be written, Gregory may well prove to have [Giles of Rome] einen ausgesprochenen Gegner been its St. Bonaventure: the very divergence des Aquinaten sehen wollen," A. Zumkeller, between them is the measure of his achieve­ "Augustinerschule," p. 180. ment." 246 LUTHER AND THE AUGUSTINIANS tlO1anism in the Augustinian Order, If he rejects the Augustinian teaching which played an important role in the concerning predestination, he may theological development of Martin affirm with real gusto Augustinian Luther? As straightforward and simple ecclesiology. No Donatist rides againSt as this question appears, it has proven the enemy with the banner of a dis­ unbelievably complex and difficult to credited heretic flying overhead. The answer. This paper will try, in as brief teaching of St. Augustine's opponents a manner as possible, to point out the is far more likely to be introduced difficulties which confront the his­ under the aegis of an Augustine, now torian when he attempts to address at last authentically understood. And this question, to survey the history of one can always appeal to the moderate the answers which have thus far been Augustine against the Augustine who suggested, to indicate some of the spoke excessively. more obvious deficiencies in those It seems to me a serious mistake to answers, and to recommend some regard as nothing more than theolog­ directions which further historical ical posturing this universal respect research might profitably pursue. for the teaching of St. Augustine, even when that teaching is misunderstood or abandoned. Men can venerate St. 1. INITIAL DIFFICULTIES Paul and come to very different con­ Some difficulties only become ap­ clusions about the import of his teach­ parent when one has immersed oneself ing. A medieval theologian may be in the primary sources; but other genuine in his commitment to Augus­ difficulties dog the historian's footsteps tinianism and yet, for a variety of from the very outset. What, for ex­ historical reasons beyond his own taste ample, is meant by the term "Augus­ and preference, only be receptive to tinian"? There are, so far as I am able certain Augustinian motifs, while re­ to determine, five different senses in maining totally deaf to others. What which this term is used by historians is at stake is not his sincerity, but the who discuss the phenomenon of late theological climate of an epoch. When medieval Augustinianism. Apart from Thomas Aquinas meets St. Augustine, the sheer confusion which this plurality he changes him into an Aristotelian; of meanings introduces, there is the when Martin Luther meets him, he additional danger that an historian, transforms him into a modernus. It is who has demonstrated the Augus­ the strength of the Augustinian tra­ tinianism of a late medieval theologian dition that it can speak with many in sense three, will assume that he has tongues and is attractive even in a proven it in senses two, four, and five stunted and truncated form. as well; and, what is worse, will begin The term "Augustinian" may also to draw conclusions on the basis of be used to describe the theology of those unproven assumptions. the Augustinian Order. When it is The term "Augustinian" may be used in this sense, it is not used used simply to designate the theology evaluatively to mean agreement with of the Latin West in general. No Latin the teaching of St. Augustine, but theologian, however Pelagian his own descriptively to mean the actual teach­ theological instincts, is absolutely ings of members of the Augustinian unaffected by the teaching of St. Order, whether those teachings are Augustine. If he finds little that is faithful to St. Augustine or not. Adolar relevant for his own theological situ­ Zumkeller,6 and to some extent ation in the anti-Pelagian writings of St. Augustine, he nevertheless will 6 For Zumkeller, "Augustinerschule" and cite the early anti-Manichaean writings "Ordensschule" are interchangeable terms. See in support of his theological position. Zumkeller, "Augustinerschule," p. 169. LUTHER AND THE AUGUSTINIANS 247 Damasus Trapp as well, have used Ages without paying any attention "Augustinian" in this somewhat more whatever to the affiliation of that theologically neutral and descriptive right wing with any of the orders. If a sense. Are there any tendencies in the theologian is Augustinian in a more teaching of the Augustinian Order radical sense than, say, Thomas which characterize the order as a Aquinas, he qualifies to be regarded as whole and not simply a party within a late medieval Augustinian.9 Perhaps, the order? If so, those tendencies right wing is the wrong term to use, deserve to be called Augustinian, as since it carries the connotation of op­ similar tendencies within the other position to all theological currents of mendicant orders might be called one's own time. Thomas Bradwardine Franciscan or Dominican. could be said to be a right-wing "Augustinian" may also be used Augustinian who resisted the theolog­ evaluatively to describe a party within ical currents of the 14th century, but the Augustinian Order which agrees hardly Gregory of Rimini, who gave with St. Augustine on a wide range of Augustine a 14th-century voice. issues and at a depth which is more Augustinian in this fourth sense is the profound than the merely nominal designation for a sentiment in theology Augustinianism of all medieval which takes Augustine without ice or theologians. A. V. Mueiler is certainly water and translates him into the using Augustinian in this evaluative theological categories of a later age. and descriptive sense when he at­ In the later Middle Ages to be tempts to show the continuity between Augustinian in this sense generally the teaching of Hugolino of Orvieto, meant such things as a stress on Simon Fidati of Cassia, Augustinus predestination, on concupiscence as an Favaroni of Rome, Jacobus Perez of essential ingredient of original sin, on Valencia, and Martin Luther.7 To grace as the precondition of moral some extent, H . A. Oberman wishes virtue as well as of merit, and on the to use Augustinian in this sense,8 merits of the Christian as nothing though, since Oberman is a more more than merita de congruo or half­ subtle historian than Mueller, he uses merits.
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