The papers collected in this volume fall into three main groups. Those in the first group are concerned with the origin and early development of the idea of natural rights. The author argues here that the idea first grew into existence in the writings of the 12th-century canonists. The articles in the second group discuss miscellaneous aspects of medieval law and political thought. They include an overview of modern work on late medieval canon law. The final group of (...) articles is concerned with the history of papal infallibility, with especial reference to the tradition of Franciscan ecclesiology and the contributions of John Peter Olivi and William of Ockham. (shrink)

Based on papers from sessions held at the International Congress on Medieval Studies in Kalamazoo, Mich. from 1979 to 1981.

This is a reprint of chapters 4–5 of The Medieval Polish Doctrine of the Laws of Nations: Ius Gentium by Stanisław Wielgus (Lublin: Redakcja Wydawnictw Katolickiego Uniwersytetu Lubelskiego, 1998), 55–101. The original chapter and section numbering has been retained, but footnote numbers have been adapted. Reprinted with the Author’s permission. In attempting to summarize in a few sentences the achievements of the medieval scholars of the Polish school of ius gentium, we must emphasize that by employing the inherited (...) legal and philosophico-theological tradition and intellectual achievements of the University of Kraków, coupling it with their own genius, they manager to create a coherent and universal system of international law. It was a system so modern, wise, tolerant and universal that it was able to be applied not only in solving the painful problem stemming from the lengthy conflict between Poland and the Teutonic Knights but was also used in resolving global problems of the contemporary Christian’s world conflict with the non-Christian one. That legal system, based upon the eternal principles of Divine and natural law, taking account of the Gospel Law of Love and inseparably connecting law with morality and justice with truth, remains valid even today. (shrink)

Introduction : questions and research -- Objectivity versus subjectivity -- The foundation of political and moral order -- The long road to a common lexicon -- Breaks, continuities, and shifts -- Highlights and shadows of a portrait -- Conclusion.

In medieval texts the term ius naturale can mean either natural law or natural right; for the latter sense see the article Natural Rights ”. Ius naturale in the former sense, and also lex naturalis, mean the universal and immutable law to which the laws of human legislators, the customs of particular communities and the actions of individuals ought to conform. It is equivalent to morality thought of as a system of law. It is called “natural” either (a) because (...) it is taught by natural instinct, i.e. some capacity innate in human beings, or (b) because it is accessible to “natural reason”, i.e. to personal reflection independent of any special revelation from God (such as the Christian faith claims to be) and independent of the moral authority of other human beings; or for both reasons. (shrink)

An important aspect of the contemporary controversies over John Calvin’s natural law doctrine has been his relation to the medieval natural law inheritance. This paper attempts to put Calvin in better context through a detailed examination of his ideas on natural law, in comparison with those of Thomas Aquinas. I argue that significant points of both similarity and difference between them must berecognized. Among important similarities, I highlight their grounding of natural law in the divine nature and the relationship (...) of natural to civil law. Among important differences I note issues of participation, conscience, and the two kingdoms doctrine. Calvin resides in the same broad tradition of natural law as Thomas Aquinas, although he represents a somewhat different strand of it. (shrink)

Reflection on natural law reaches a highpoint during the Middle Ages. Not only do Christian thinkers work out the first systematic accounts of natural law and articulate the framework for subsequent reflection, the Jewish and Islamic traditions also develop their own canonical statements on the moral authority of reason vis-à-vis divine law. In the view of some, they thereby articulate their own theories of natural law. These various traditions of medieval reflection on natural law, and their interrelation, merit further (...) study, particularly since they touch upon many current philosophical concerns. They grapple with the problem of ethical and religious pluralism. They consider whether universally valid standards of action and social life are accessible to those who rely on reason rather than divine law. In so doing, they develop sophisticated accounts of many central issues in metaethics, action theory, jurisprudence, and the philosophy of religion. However, do they reach a consensus about natural law, or do they end up defending incommensurable ethical frameworks? Do they confirm the value of arguments based on natural law or do they cast doubt on it? This collection brings together contributions from various expert scholars to explore these issues and the pluralism that exists within medieval reflection on natural law. It is the first one to study the relation between the natural law theories of these various traditions of medieval philosophy: Jewish, Islamic, Byzantine, and Latin. Each of the first four essays surveys the 'natural law theory' of one of the religious traditions of medieval philosophy-Jewish, Islamic, Byzantine, and Latin-and its relation to the others. The next four essays explore some of the alternative accounts of natural law that arise within the Latin tradition. They range over St. Bonaventure, Peter of Tarentaise, Matthew of Aquasparta, John Duns Scotus, and Marsilius of Padua. (shrink)

In this essay I address a little-known chapter in the lengthy history of crimes against animals. My focus is not crimes committed by humans against animals, as such, but a practical outcome of the seemingly bizarre belief that animals are capable of committing crimes against humans.2 I refer here to the medieval practice whereby animals were prosecuted and punished for their misdeeds, aspects of which readers are likely to have encountered in the work of the historian Robert Darnton.

A detailed study of the moral philosophy of medieval Jewish thinkers Saadia Gaon, Bahya ibn Pakuda, and Moses Maimonides. Jon Jacobs emphasizes their distinctive contributions, emphasises the shared rational emphasis of their approach to Torah, and draws out resonances with contemporary moral philosophy.

What did it mean to keep a secret in early medieval England? It was a period during which the experience of secrecy was intensely bound to the belief that God knew all human secrets, yet the secrets of God remained unknowable to human beings. In Bonds of Secrecy, Benjamin A. Saltzman argues that this double-edged conception of secrecy and divinity profoundly affected the way believers acted and thought as subjects under the law, as the devout within monasteries, and as (...) readers before books. One crucial way it did so was by forming an ethical relationship between the self and the world that was fundamentally different from its modern reflex. Whereas today the bearers of secrets might be judged for the consequences of their reticence or disclosure, Saltzman observes, in the early Middle Ages a person attempting to conceal a secret was judged for believing he or she could conceal it from God. In other words, to attempt to hide from God was to become ensnared in a serious sin, but to hide from the world while deliberately and humbly submitting to God's constant observation was often a hallmark of spiritual virtue. Looking to law codes and religious architecture, hagiographies and riddles, Bonds of Secrecy shows how legal and monastic institutions harnessed the pervasive and complex belief in God's omniscience to produce an intense culture of scrutiny and a radical ethics of secrecy founded on the individual's belief that nothing could be hidden from God. According to Saltzman, this ethics of secrecy not only informed early medieval notions of mental activity and ideas about the mind but also profoundly shaped the practices of literary interpretation in ways that can inform our own contemporary approaches to reading texts from the past. (shrink)

Jon Jacobs emphasises their distinctive contributions, emphasises the shared rational emphasis of their approach to Torah, and draws out resonances with ...

In the present chapter, the design of select margins of late medieval Old Norse manuscripts containing the Icelandic ‘Jónsbók’, ‘Kristinréttr Árna biskups’ and Norwegian ‘Landslǫg’ law codes is addressed. In particular, it discusses the size and fillings of margins in these codices and the relation to their modes of use by original clients and later owners. Although it is well-known that Scandinavian law manuscripts contain a large number of notes written by both original and later users, the particular use (...) of marginal spaces by original scribes and illuminators for glosses and other annotations and illuminations has scarcely been investigated to date. In my contribution, two distinctive features will be addressed: (1.) The different use of margins by Norwegian and Icelandic readers of the manuscripts, and (2.) the use of margins by illuminators surrounding the column(s) and incorporated initials. (shrink)

Coming of Age in Medieval Egypt: Female Adolescence, Jewish Law, and Ordinary Culture. By Eve Krakowski. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018. Pp. xvi + 350. $39.95, £32.95.

This paper applies a very traditional position within Natural Law Theory to Cyberspace. I shall first justify a Natural Law approach to Cyberspace by exploring the difficulties raised by the Internet to traditional principles of jurisprudence and the difficulties this presents for a Positive Law Theory account of legislation of Cyberspace. This will focus on issues relating to geography. I shall then explicate the paradigm of Natural Law accounts, the Treatise on Law, by Thomas Aquinas. From this account will emerge (...) the structure of law and the metaphysics of justice. I shall explore those aspects of Cyberspace which cause geography to be problematic for Positive Law Theory and show how these are essential, unavoidable and beneficial. I will then apply Aquinas’s structure of law and metaphysics of justice to these characteristics. From this will emerge an alternative approach to cyberlaw which has no problem with the nature of Cyberspace as it is but treats it as a positive foundation for new legal developments. (shrink)

Journal of Religious Ethics, Volume 49, Issue 4, Page 638-656, December 2021.

A serious yet unstudied consequence of the Christian-Muslim conflict in medieval Spain was the capture and enslavement of soldiers and civilians. Men, women, and children who were seized on raids, taken in battle, or pirated off ships were regarded by their captors as booty, to be used as slaves or to be sold for profit. Since warfare in twelfth-century Spain pitted Christians against Muslims, the usual prohibitions against enslavement of coreligionists clearly did not apply. For Muslims and Christians alike, (...) capture meant a life of slavery. Christian chronicles of this era are replete with stories of captives taken off to be sold in the slave markets of al-Andalus in southern Spain or, even worse, in those of North Africa. Some of these slaves, however, were able to regain their freedom through redemption — that is, to purchase their liberty by paying a ransom. Since the ransom price frequently exceeded what could be gained in the slave auctions, redemption became an attractive option to both captor and captive. (shrink)

Max Weber· e Troeltsch perceberam a importância que o conceito de direito natural, tal como o entenderam os medievais, teve para a formação e desenvolvimento da civilização Ocidental. Não se pode negar esta importância, mas os estudos posteriores mostram claramente que a leitura feita por aqueles dois cientistas necessita de diversas correções, principalmente quando se toma como para digmática a obra de Tomás de Aquino.

The Curia dei Foretani, or the Court of the Countrymen, of the commune of Lucca was a sort of rural small-claims court. Designed by an urban government to hear minor civil cases which originated in the countryside, it was occupied with the variety of issues that punctuated country life, most especially cases brought by landlords, merchants, and speculators whose living was tied to the rural economy of northwestern Tuscany. The records of the Curia dei Foretani offer an unusual opportunity to (...) investigate landlord-tenant, lender-borrower, and speculator-producer relations during the critical period of the fourteenth century when urban interest in the countryside was intense. As will become clear, the streamlined procedure used by the court was designed to allow rapid petition, hearing, and judgment, which, it has been argued, were designed to favor the wealthy, usually urban, elites. Yet as analysis of the actual functioning of the court will show, villagers in this part of Tuscany were able to avoid, or at least moderate, the most complete forms of landlord domination. The reasons why are complex, but one aspect was the court procedure itself, which could be manipulated by knowledgeable members of strong, semi-autonomous rural communities who had access to legal advice or who had broadly based communal support for their actions. Urban landlords in the Lucchesia never achieved the sort of economic domination of rural life which seems to have typified the region around Florence and Siena. (shrink)

This book explores the emergence of the fundamental political concepts of medieval Jewish thought, arguing that alongside the well known theocratic elements of the Bible there exists a vital tradition that conceives of politics as a necessary and legitimate domain of worldly activity that preceded religious law in the ordering of society. Since the Enlightenment, the separation of religion and state has been a central theme in Western political history and thought, a separation that upholds the freedom of conscience (...) of the individual. In medieval political thought, however, the doctrine of the separation of religion and state played a much different role. On the one hand, it served to maintain the integrity of religious law versus the monarch, whether canon law, Islamic law, or Jewish law. On the other hand, it upheld the autonomy of the monarch and the autonomy of human political agency against theocratic claims of divine sovereignty and clerical authority. Postulating the realm of secular politics leads the author to construct a theory of the precedence of politics over religious law in the organization of social life. He argues that the attempts of medieval philosophers to understand religion and the polity provide new perspectives on the viability of an accommodation between revelation and legislation, the holy and the profane, the divine and the temporal. The book shows that in spite of the long exile of the Jewish people, there is, unquestionably, a tradition of Jewish political discourse based on the canonical sources of Jewish law. In addition to providing a fresh analysis of Maimonides, it analyzes works of Nahmanides, Solomon ibn Adret, and Nissim Gerondi that are largely unknown to the English-speaking reader. Finally, it suggests that the historical corpus of Jewish political writing remains vital today, with much to contribute to the ongoing debates over church-state relations and theocratic societies. (shrink)