The transformation of thought and learning
The polemics of the papal-imperial debate revealed the importance of establishing a set of canonical texts on the basis of which both sides could argue. A number of academic disciplines, particularly the study of dialectic, had developed considerably between the 9th and 12th centuries. By the 12th century it had become the most widely studied intellectual discipline, in part because it was an effective tool for constructing and refuting arguments. The Gregorian reformers had also based their arguments on canon law, and a number of Gregorian and post-Gregorian collections, particularly that of Ivo of Chartres (c. 1040–1116), pointed the way toward the creation of a commonly accessible canon law. That goal was achieved in about 1140–50 in two successive recensions (perhaps by two different authors) of a lawbook called Concordia discordantium canonum (“Concordance of Discordant Canons”), or Decretum, attributed to Master Gratian. The Decretum became the standard introductory text of ecclesiastical law. Simultaneously, the full text of the 6th-century body of Roman law, later called the Corpus Iuris Civilis (“Body of Civil Law”), began to circulate in northern Italy and was taught in the schools of Bologna. The learned character of the revived Roman law contributed powerfully to the development of legal science throughout Europe in the following centuries.
Early in the 12th century, Hugh of Saint-Victor (1096–1141), schoolmaster of a house of canons just outside Paris, wrote a description of all the subjects of learning, the Didascalicon. Hugh’s contemporary, Peter Abelard (1079–1142), taught dialectic at Paris to crowds of students, many of whom became high officials in ecclesiastical and secular institutions. The teaching methods of scholars such as Gratian, Hugh, Abelard, and others became the foundation of Scholasticism, the method used by the new schools in the teaching of arts, law, medicine, and theology. In theology itself, comparable canonical work was done by Peter Lombard (c. 1100–60) in his Sententiarum libri iv (“Four Books of Sentences”), which became, next to the Bible, the fundamental teaching text of theology.
But not all Christians admired the new Scholastic theology. The Scholastic teaching of Scripture replaced the early contemplative monastic style of exegesis with dialectical investigative techniques and speculative theology. Many monks and some outraged laity thought that Scripture was being mishandled, stripped of its dignity and mystery in the service of feeble human logic and cold rationality. They did not, however, stop the tide, as Scholastic theology created a complex, effective, and highly persuasive means of discussing both the complexities of divinity and the moral obligations of Christians on earth.
As groups of teachers organized themselves into guilds in the late 12th and early 13th centuries, they and their students received imperial, papal, and royal privileges. About 1200 these associations, modeling themselves on ecclesiastical corporations, developed into the first universities. During the remainder of the 13th century, clerical teaching authority within the universities was articulated. The first guilds were formed for the teaching of law at several schools in Bologna and for the teaching of arts and theology at Paris and later at Oxford, Cambridge, and other towns. With the foundation of the University of Prague in 1348, the model crossed the Rhine River for the first time. By the 15th century it had become a standard fixture of European learning.
University teachers insisted on the right to define teaching authority. Proclaiming the earliest version of academic freedom, they rejected outside interference and asserted that their professional competence alone entitled them to determine the content of disciplines and the standards for admitting, examining, graduating, and certifying students. They also transformed both the written script and the nature of the material book. Since teaching required a readable script and books whose texts were as close to identical as possible, the distinctive “Gothic” or “black letter” script was developed, which standardized abbreviations and the writing style used in texts.
The presence of universities of teachers and students in western European society was significant in itself. The universities reflected favourably on the cities in which they were located and on the rulers who protected them. The rulers also benefited from the opportunity to recruit increasingly educated public servants and bureaucrats from these institutions. The church benefited too, since the universities produced theologians, canon lawyers, and other officials that the church—even the papal office—now seemed to require.
The universities aided in the recovery and dissemination of Aristotelianism, particularly in the physical sciences and metaphysics. Only the new universities, moreover, could have housed and spread the intellectual work of Thomas Aquinas (1224/25–1274) and Bonaventure (1217–74), the greatest theologians of the 13th century, and of Henry of Segusio (Hostiensis; c. 1200–71) and Sinibaldo Fieschi (later Pope Innocent IV, reigned 1243–54), the greatest canon lawyers of the century.