John Buridan: Portrait of a 14th-Century Arts Master 0268032556, 0268032564

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John Burt�an

Copyright© 2003 by University of Notre Dame Notre Dame, Indiana 46556 www.undpress.nd.edu All Rights Reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Chapter 13 is a revised version of ((What Is the Science of the Soul? A Case Study in the Evolution of Late Medieval Natural Philosophy;' first published in Synthese 110.2 (February 1997): 297- 334. Copyright© 1997 Kluwer Academic Publishers, with kind permission from Kluwer Academic Publishers. Section 2 of Chapter 15 is a revised version of ((Freedom of Choice in Buridan's Moral Psychology;' first published in Mediaeval Studies 57 (1995): 75 -99, by permission of the publisher. Copyright© 1995 by the Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto. Material from John Buridan: (Summulae de Dialectica: translated by Gyula Klima, Yale Library of Medieval Philosophy (New Haven, Conn., and London: Yale University Press, 2001), is used by permission of Yale University Press. Copyright© 2001 by Yale University. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Zupko, Jack. John Buridan : portrait of a fourteenth-century arts master/ Jack Zupko. p. cm. - (Publications in medieval studies) Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-268-03255-6 (cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 0-268-03256-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Buridan, Jean, 1300 -1358. I. Title. II. Series. B765.B844 z86 189'-4-dc21

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This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Now in regard to every matter it is most important to begin at the natural beginning. - Plato, Timaeus 29B

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments Introduction Abbreviations

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PART ONE: METHOD

Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine

Language The Science of Logic Propositions, Predicables, and Categories Suppositions Syllogisms Topics Fallacies Demonstrations Insoluble Propositions PART

Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen

T wo:

3 29 49 59

71 78

90 100

123

PRACTICE

139

Ultimate Questions Bodies and Souls Knowledge Natural Science Virtue Freedom Buridan's Legacy Works by Buridan Notes Works Cited Index of Quotations from Buridan's Writings Index of Names Index of Subjects

164

183 203 227

243 271 275 279 409 429

437

441

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

• Reflecting on Aristotle's authority in psychology, Buridan writes, ((nobody, however wise, can write or say everything that can be written or said about this science" (Summulae 6.5.10). This is also true for works in the history of philosophy, where it is not just that things get left unsaid but that so much of what is said (and a great deal of what is valuable in that) depends on the painstaking efforts of others. This book owes much to those primary source scholars who have brought Buridan's texts to light over the past few decades, as well as to discussions with many other historians of philosophy about their significance. Their influence is evidenced partly-but only partly-by the Works Cited bibliography below. I would like in particular to thank my teachers Jenny Ashworth and the late Norman Kretzmann, who inspired me to pursue my love of philosophy and from whom I learned almost everything I know about philosophical scholarship. Mary Gregor, my late colleague at San Diego State University, offered valuable advice early in my career and showed me how it is possible to carry out a serious research program and be a conscientious teacher of large numbers of undergraduate stuqents at the same time. This book has benefited at every stage of its construction from the com­ ments of wise and perceptive critics. Jenny Ashworth, Kent Emery, Jr., Jerry Etzkorn, Peter King, and Martin Tweedale all read the manuscript and offered helpful comments and suggestions. Jenny in particular drew my attention to some recently published articles in the history of logic, which led to many improvements in Part One. Gyula Klima's comments on chapter 1 alerted me to several errors, as did Henrik Lagerlund's on chapters 5 and 6. Some years ago, Terry Parsons helped me make sense of a difficult text on parts and wholes in Buridan's Summulae, and the results inform my discussion in the latter sections of chapter 10. I have learned a great deal from Calvin Normore's as­ tute observations about Buridan over the years, and continue to marvel at the way he is able to knit medieval and modern concerns together so seamlessly. Gyula Klima, who embodies most every· scholarly virtue I know, shared his expertise on Buridan with me from the beginning and served as a sounding •

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Acknowledgments

board for many of my own ideas. I am also grateful to him for giving me ac­ cess to his translation of Buridan's Summulae prior to its publication. Carole Roos, my editor at Notre Dame, read a long manuscript with patience and care, and saved me from numerous mistakes my author's eye prevented me from seeing. Many others, more than I could ever recall here, have assisted me in my travels with Buridan over the past decade. I have not always followed their advice, and where that is the case, I alone am responsible for the result. Initial research for the book was completed in 1994-95 thanks to an NEH Fellowship forCollegeTeachers and Independent Scholars (No. FB-31403-94), which enabled-me to work at the Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure Uni­ versity. I am grateful for the hospitality shown to me by the members of the Institute during that year, especially Jerry Etzkorn, Rega Wood, and its then­ director, Br. Ed Coughlin. My colleagues in the philosophy departments first at San Diego State and more recently at Emory University have always been supportive of the medievalist in their midst. I would also like to thank the Dean of Arts and Letters at SDSU, Paul Strand, and the former Dean of Arts and Sciences at Emory, Steven Sanderson, for support in the form of research leaves during which most of the book was written. Several chapters are revisions of articles originally published elsewhere. Chapter 11 appeared as «How Are Souls Related to Bodies? A Study of John Buridan;' in The Review of Metaphysics 46.3 (March 1993): 575-601; chapter 12 as «Buridan and Skepticism;' in the Journal of the History of Philosophy 31.2 (April 1993): 191-221; chapter 13 as «What Is the Science of the Soul? A Case Study in the Evolution of Late Medieval Natural Philosophy;' in Syn these 110.2 (February 1997): 297-334; and section 2 of chapter 15 as «Freedom of Choice in Buridan's Moral Psychology;' in Mediaeval Studies 57 (1995 Annual): 75-99. I am grateful to these journals for permission to use this material here. I would also like to thank Yale University Press for permission to quote_ from Gyula Klima's translation of the Summulae. This book is lovingly dedicated to my wife, Frances, and my son, Neil.

INTRODUCTION

• John Buridan (c. 1300-c. 1361) was the most famous philosopher of his time, and probably the most influential, but we know very little about his life. From historical documents we are able to infer that he was born around 1300 in the Diocese of Arras in Picardy. He studied as a young man at the College Lemoine in Paris, where he was awarded a benefice or stipend for needy stu­ dents, and later in the arts faculty at the University of Paris, where he received his master's degree and formal license to teach by the mid-132os. There he re­ mained until his death some forty years later. He received a number of stipends and benefices over the course of his long career. One of these, in 1348, was awarded by a committee consisting of a theologian, two members of the fac­ ulty of law, a proctor from each of the four nations at Paris, and the rector of the University-no mean feat in a period of uneasy relations among these competing educational constituencies. He twice served as rector of the Univer­ sity, in 1327/8 and 1340. He is last mentioned in a document of 1358 as helping to resolve a jurisdictional dispute between the English and Picard nations. He must have died shortly thereafter because in 1361, one of his benefices was awarded to another person.1 Buridan's academic career was unusual in two respects. First, he spent his entire career as a master of arts without ever moving on to seek a doctor­ ate in theology, the more typical career path for academics in the later Middle Ages. Arts masters usually lectured for only a short time, leaving their teach­ ing posts as soon as they were able to begin their studies in theology.2 As a re­ sult, virtually all of Buridan's written work is based on the arts curriculum at Paris, and reflects his pedagogical concerns as a member of that faculty. His logical writings, for example, consist of textbooks and commentaries in­ tended for use by actual students of logic. Likewise, most of his non-logical writings are in the form of literal commentaries ( expositiones) and longer critical studies ( quaestiones) derived from his lecture-courses on the works of Aristotle. In addition to the entire Organon, these include studies of the Metaphysics, Physics, De Caelo, De Anima, the books of the Parva Naturalia, and Nicomachean Ethics. 3 Buridan frequently lectured more than once on the •

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Introduction

same text, a fact which medieval scribes and editors were careful to note by marking their copies as containing Buridan's first, second, or ((third or final teaching [ tertia sive ultima lectura]" on, e.g., Aristotle's De Anima. But al­ though these works make numerous references to each other, and can them­ selves be ordered according to their different versions, none can be dated pre­ cisely. What is certain is that Buridan's works were widely read. Handwritten copies and early printed versions were distributed by his students and fol­ lowers throughout Europe, where they served as the primary texts for courses on logic and, j\.ristoteli�n 'philosophy. This trend continued for nearly two hundred years 'after his death, with the via Buridani continuing to shape Eu­ ropean thought well into the Renaissance. The other way in which Buridan's career followed the road less traveled was that he remained a secular cleric rather than joining a religious order such as the Dominicans or the Franciscans. By the early fourteenth century, the distinct intellectual traditions created by these mendicant orders had transformed the study of theology at Paris, as the identity of each tradition began to coalesce around the thought of its major figures. These are the au­ thors of many of the canonical texts of medieval philosophy: Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, Robert Holcot, and Meister Eckhardt on the side of the Do­ minicans, and Roger Bacon, Bonaventure, Duns Scotus, and William of Ock­ ham on the side of the Franciscans. But the impact of Dominican and Fran­ ciscan thought was felt primarily in the more prestigious faculty of theology. By remaining among the ((artists [ artistae];' Buridan was able to develop his ideas independently of these traditions, freed from their authority as well as from doctrinal disputes that arose between them. We can see this in the occasionally eclectic character of his remarks, which borrow from both Dominican and Franciscan sources. Institutionally, his independence was reinforced by the fact that Dominican and Franciscan novices received their liberal arts training at custodial schools run by their own orders, rather than in the arts faculty at the university. This meant that most of Buridan's stu­ dents were as secular as he was, and, like any good teacher, he tailored his message to the circumstances of his audience. But even though we know very little about Buridan's life, his writings say a great deal about him as a philosopher. It is Buridan's vision of the philo­ sophical enterprise that I aim to capture in this book. Rooted in the study of grammar, first among the liberal arts, this vision develops a distinctive philo­ sophical method in the Summulae de Dialectica, the compendium of logical teachings that was Buridan's masterwork, and then puts it into practice through careful investigation of the Aristotelian speculative sciences. Accord­ ingly, this book is divided into two parts. The first part,