9 October 1253 A.D. Robert Grosseteste Passes—Bishop of Lincoln &
Chancellor of Oxford University. Calls
the Pope “Antichrist.”
Wiki-offerings.
Contents
Biography
Scholarly career
There is very little direct evidence about Grosseteste's
education. He may have received training in the Liberal Arts at Hereford, in
light of his connection to the Bishop of Hereford William de Vere in the 1190s and
a recommendation from Giraldus Cambrensis. It is fairly certain that Grosseteste was a master by 1192, but
whether that indicated he completed a course of studies is unclear. Grosseteste
acquired a position in the bishop's household, but at the death of this patron,
he disappeared from the historical record. He appears again in the early
thirteenth century as a judge-delegate in Hereford, but there are no specific
details of where he resided or whether he had continued to study.
By 1225, he had gained the benefice of Abbotsley in the diocese of
Lincoln by which time he was a deacon. On this period in his life scholarship
is divided. Some historians argue that he began his teaching career in theology at Oxford in this year, whereas others have more recently argued that he used the
income of this ecclesiastical post to support study in theology at the
University of Paris. However, there is clear evidence that by 1229/30 he was
teaching at Oxford, but on the periphery as the lector in theology to
the Franciscans who had established a convent in Oxford about 1224. He remained at this post until March, 1235.
Grosseteste may also have been appointed Chancellor
of the University of Oxford. However, the
evidence for this comes from a late thirteenth century anecdote and its main
claim is that Grosseteste was in fact entitled the master of students (magister
scholarium).
At the same time he began lecturing in theology, Hugh of Wells, Bishop of
Lincoln, appointed him Archdeacon
of Leicester.[3] and he also
gained a prebend that made him a canon in the Lincoln
cathedral. However, after a severe illness in 1232, he resigned all his
benefices (Abbotsely and Leicester), but retained his prebend. His reasons were
due to changing attitudes about the plurality of benefices (holding more than one
ecclesiastical position simultaneously) and that after seeking advice from the papal court, he tendered his
resignations. The angry response of his friends and colleagues to his resignation
took him by surprise and he complained to his sister and his closest friend,
the Franciscan Adam Marsh, that his intentions had been completely misunderstood.
As a master of the sacred page (manuscripts of theology in the Latin),
Grosseteste trained the Franciscans in the standard curriculum of university
theology. The Franciscan Roger Bacon was his most
famous disciple, and acquired an interest in the scientific method from him.[4] Grosseteste
lectured on the Psalter, the Pauline epistles, Genesis (at least the creation account), and possibly on Isaiah, Daniel and Sirach. He also led
disputations on such subjects as the theological nature of truth and the
efficacy of the Mosaic Law. Grosseteste also preached at the university and appears to have been
called to preach within the diocese as well. He collected some of those
sermons, along with some short notes and reflections, not long after he left
Oxford; this is now known as his Dicta. His theological writings reveal
a continual interest in the natural world as a major resource for theological
reflection and a unique ability to read Greek sources (if he ever learned
Hebrew it would be not until he became bishop of Lincoln). His theological
index (tabula distinctionum) reveals the breadth of his learning and his desire
to communicate it in a systematic manner. However, Grosseteste's own style was
far more unstructured than many of his scholastic contemporaries and his writings
reverberate with his own personal views and outlooks.
Bishop of Lincoln
In February 1235 Hugh de Wells died, and the canons of Lincoln cathedral met to elect his successor. They soon were at a deadlock and could not
reach a majority. Fearing that the election would be taken out of their hands,
they settled on a compromise candidate, Grosseteste. He was consecrated in June
of that same year[5] at Reading.[6] He instituted an
innovative program of visitation, a procedure normally reserved for the
inspection of monasteries. Grosseteste expanded it to include all the deaneries in each archdeaconery
of his vast diocese. This scheme brought him into conflict with more than one
privileged corporation, but in particular with his own chapter, who vigorously
disputed his claim to exercise the right of visitation over their community.
The dispute raged hotly from 1239 to 1245, with the chapter launching an appeal
to the papacy. In 1245, while attending the First
Council of Lyons, the papal court ruled in favor of
Grosseteste.
A 13th-century portrait of Grosseteste.
In ecclesiastical politics the bishop belonged to the
school of Becket. His zeal for reform led him to advance, on behalf of the courts,
Christian pretensions which it was impossible that the secular power should
admit. He twice incurred a rebuke from Henry III upon this subject; although it was left for Edward I to settle the question of principle in favour of the state. The devotion
of Grosseteste to the hierarchical theories of his age is attested by his
correspondence with his chapter and the king. Against the former he upheld the
prerogative of the bishops; against the latter he asserted that it was impossible for a bishop to
disregard the commands of the Holy See. Where the liberties of the national
church came into conflict with the pretensions of Rome he stood by his own
countrymen.
Thus in 1238 he demanded that the King should release
certain Oxford scholars who had assaulted the legate Otto Candidus. But at least up
to the year 1247 he submitted patiently to papal encroachments, contenting
himself with the protection (by a special papal privilege) of his own diocese
from alien clerks. Of royal exactions he was more impatient; and, after the
retirement of Archbishop (Saint) Edmund, constituted
himself the spokesman of the clerical estate in the Great Council.
In 1244 he sat on a committee which was empanelled to
consider a demand for a subsidy. The committee rejected the demand, and
Grosseteste foiled an attempt on the king's part to separate the clergy from
the baronage. "It is
written", the bishop said, "that united we stand and divided we
fall."
The last years of Grosseteste's life and episcopacy were
embroiled in a conflict with the new Archbishop of Canterbury, Boniface
of Savoy. In 1250, he travelled to the papal court where one of
the cardinals read his complaints at an audience with Innocent IV. Not only did he
claim that Boniface was threatening the health of the church, the pope was just
as guilty for not reining him in and that was symptomatic of the current
malaise of the entire church. Most observers noted the personal animus between
the bishop of Lincoln and the pope, but it did not stop the pope from agreeing
to most of Grosseteste's demands about the way the English church ought to
function.
Grosseteste continued to keep a watchful eye on
ecclesiastical events. In 1251 he protested against a papal mandate enjoining
the English clergy to pay Henry III one-tenth of their revenues for a crusade; and called
attention to the fact that, under the system of provisions, a sum of 70,000
marks was annually drawn from England by the alien nominees of Rome. In 1253, upon
being commanded to provide in his own diocese for a papal nephew, he wrote a
letter of expostulation and refusal, not to the pope himself but to the
commissioner, Master Innocent, through whom he received the mandate. The text
of the remonstrance, as given in the Burton Annals and in Matthew Paris, has
possibly been altered by a forger who had less respect than Grosseteste for the
papacy. The language is more violent than that which the bishop elsewhere
employs. But the general argument, that the papacy may command obedience only
so far as its commands are consonant with the teaching of Christ and the
apostles, is only what should be expected from an ecclesiastical reformer of
Grosseteste's time. There is much more reason for suspecting the letter
addressed "to the nobles of England, the citizens of London, and the
community of the whole realm", in which Grosseteste is represented as
denouncing in unmeasured terms papal finance in all its branches. But even in
this case allowance must be made for the difference between modern and medieval
standards of decorum.
Grosseteste's Tomb and Chapel in Lincoln Cathedral
Grosseteste numbered among his most intimate friends the
Franciscan teacher, Adam Marsh. Through Adam he came into close relations with Simon de Montfort. From the Franciscan's letters it appears that the earl had studied a
political tract by Grosseteste on the difference between a monarchy and a tyranny; and that he
embraced with enthusiasm the bishop's projects of ecclesiastical reform. Their
alliance began as early as 1239, when Grosseteste exerted himself to bring
about a reconciliation between the king and the earl. But there is no reason to
suppose that the political ideas of Montfort had matured before the death of
Grosseteste; nor did Grosseteste busy himself overmuch with secular politics,
except insofar as they touched the interest of the Church. Grosseteste realised
that the misrule of Henry III and his unprincipled compact with the papacy
largely accounted for the degeneracy of the English hierarchy and the laxity of
ecclesiastical discipline. But he can hardly be termed a constitutionalist.
Death and burial
Grosseteste died on 9 October 1253.[5] He must then have
been between seventy and eighty years of age.
He is buried in a tomb within his memorial chapel within
Lincoln Cathedral. Its dedicatory plaque reads as follows:
In this place lies the body of ROBERT GROSSETESTE who was
born at Stradbroke in Suffolk, studied in the University of Paris — and in 1224
became Chancellor of Oxford University where he befriended and taught the newly
founded orders of Friars : In 1229 he became Archdeacon of Leicester and a
Canon of this Cathedral — reigning as Bishop of Lincoln from 17th. June 1235
until his death.
He was a man of learning and an inspiration to scholars a wise administrator
while a true shepherd of his flock, ever concerned to lead them to Christ in
whose service he strove to temper justice with mercy, hating the sin while
loving the sinner, not sparing the rod though cherishing the weak — He died on
8th. October 1253.
Reputation and
legacy
Grosseteste was already an elderly man, with a firmly
established reputation, when he became a bishop. As an ecclesiastical statesman, he showed the
same fiery zeal and versatility of which he had given proof in his academic
career; but the general tendency of modern writers has been to exaggerate his
political and ecclesiastical services, and to neglect his performance as a scientist and scholar. The
opinion of his own age, as expressed by Matthew Paris and Roger Bacon, was very
different. His contemporaries, while admitting the excellence of his intentions
as a statesman, lay stress upon his defects of temper and discretion. But they
see in him the pioneer of a literary and scientific movement; not merely a
great ecclesiastic who patronized learning in his leisure hours, but the first mathematician and physicist of his age. He
anticipated, in these fields of thought, some of the striking ideas to which
Roger Bacon subsequently gave a wider currency.
Bishop
Grosseteste University, a stone's throw
away from Lincoln Cathedral, is named after Robert Grosseteste. The university provides Initial
Teacher Training and academic degrees at all levels. In 2003, it hosted an
international conference on Grosseteste in honor of the 750th anniversary of
his death.
Works
Grosseteste wrote a number of early works in Latin and
French while he was a clerk (see biography above), including one called Chasteau d'amour, an allegorical poem on the
creation of the world and Christian redemption, as well as several other poems
and texts on household management and courtly etiquette. He also wrote a number
of theological works including the influential Hexaëmeron in the 1230s. He
was also a highly regarded author of manuals on pastoral care and produced
treatises that dealt with a variety of penitential contexts, including
monasteries, the parish and a bishop's household.
However, Grosseteste is best known as an original thinker
for his work concerning what would today be called science or the scientific method.
From about 1220 to 1235 he wrote a host of scientific
treatises including:
- De sphera. An introductory text on
astronomy.
- De luce. On the "metaphysics of
light." (which is the most original work of cosmogony in the Latin
West)
- De accessu et recessu maris. On tides
and tidal movements. (although some scholars dispute his authorship)
- De lineis, angulis et figuris. Mathematical reasoning in the natural sciences.
- De iride. On the rainbow.
for the strengthening of the Christian faith and the
confusion of the Jews", who were said to have deliberately hidden the book
away "on account of the manifest prophecies of Christ contained therein.[7]
He also wrote a number of commentaries on Aristotle, including the
first in the West of Posterior
Analytics, and one on Aristotle's Physics, which has survived as a loose collection of notes or glosses on the text.
Science
It has been argued that Grosseteste played a key role in
the development of scientific method. Grosseteste did introduce to the Latin
West the notion of controlled experiment and related it to demonstrative
science, as one among many ways of arriving at such knowledge.[8] Although
Grosseteste did not always follow his own advice during his investigations, his
work is seen as instrumental in the history of the development of the Western
scientific tradition.
Grosseteste was the first of the Scholastics to fully
understand Aristotle's vision of the dual path of scientific reasoning: generalizing from
particular observations into a universal law, and then back again from
universal laws to prediction of particulars. Grosseteste called this
"resolution and composition". So for example looking at the
particulars of the moon, it is possible to arrive at universal laws about
nature. And conversely once these universal laws are understood, it is possible
to make predictions and observations about other objects besides the moon.
Further, Grosseteste said that both paths should be verified through
experimentation in order to verify the principles. These ideas established a
tradition that carried forward to Padua and Galileo Galilei in the 17th
century.
As important as "resolution and composition"
would become to the future of Western scientific tradition, more important to
his own time was his idea of the subordination of the sciences. For example
when looking at geometry and optics, optics is subordinate to geometry because
optics depends on geometry (and so optics was a prime example of a subalternate
science). Thus Grosseteste concluded, following very much in what Boethius had argued, that
mathematics was the highest of all sciences, and the basis for all others,
since every natural science ultimately depended on mathematics. He supported
this conclusion by looking at light, which he believed to be the "first
form" of all things, it was the source of all generation and motion
(approximately what we know as biology and physics today). Hence since light
could be reduced to lines and points, and thus fully explained in the realm of
mathematics, mathematics was the highest order of the sciences.
Optic studies from
Roger Bacon's De multiplicatione specierum. The diagram shows light
being refracted by a spherical glass container full of water.
Grosseteste's work in optics was also relevant and would
be continued by Roger Bacon, who often mentioned his indebtedness to him although there is no proof
that the two ever met. In De Iride Grosseteste writes:
This part of optics, when well understood, shows us how
we may make things a very long distance off appear as if placed very close, and
large near things appear very small, and how we may make small things placed at
a distance appear any size we want, so that it may be possible for us to read
the smallest letters at incredible distances, or to count sand, or seed, or any
sort of minute objects.
Editions of the original Latin text may be found in: Die
Philosophischen Werke des Robert Grosseteste, Bischofs von Lincoln (Münster
i. W., Aschendorff, 1912.), p. 75.[9]
Grossesteste is now believed to have had a very modern understanding
of colour, and supposed errors in his account have been found to be based on
corrupt late copies of his essay on the nature of colour, written in about 1225
(De Luce). In 2014 Grosseteste's 1225 treatise De Luce (On
Light) was translated from Latin and interpreted by an interdisciplinary
project led by Durham University, that included Latinists, philologists,
medieval historians, physicists and cosmologists. De Luce explores the
nature of matter and the cosmos. Four centuries before Isaac Newton proposed
gravity and seven centuries before the Big Bang theory, Grosseteste described
the birth of the Universe in an explosion and the crystallization of matter to
form stars and planets in a set of nested spheres around Earth. De Luce
is the first attempt to describe the heavens and Earth using a single set of
physical laws.[10] The 'Ordered
Universe' collaboration of scientists and historians at Durham University studying medieval science regard him as a key figure in showing that
pre-Renaissance science was far more advanced than previously thought.[11]
Notes
1.
Jump up ^ Richard
of Bardney in his work
‘The Life of Robert Grosstête’ gives Stow as Grosseteste's birthplace, without
mentioning Suffolk. R. W. Southern (1986, p. 77) notes that there are three
Stows in Suffolk.
2.
Jump up ^ G.M. Miller, BBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British
Names (London: Oxford UP, 1971), p. 65.
4.
Jump up ^ John Freely, Aladdin's Lamp: How Greek Science Came
to Europe Through the Islamic World, Alfred A. Knopf, 2009
5.
^ Jump up to: a b Fryde, et al. Handbook of British
Chronology p. 255
Attribution
References
- British History Online Archdeacons of Leicester accessed
on 28 October 2007
- British History Online Bishops of Lincoln accessed on 28 October 2007
- Crombie,
A. C. Robert Grosseteste and the Origins of Experimental Science.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971, OCLC 401196. ISBN 0-19-824189-5 (1953).
- Fryde, E.
B.; Greenway, D. E.; Porter, S.; Roy, I. (1996). Handbook of British
Chronology (Third revised ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
ISBN 0-521-56350-X.
- Ginther,
James R. Master of the Sacred Page: A Study of the Theology of Robert
Grosseteste (ca. 1229/30-1235). Aldershot: Ashgate Publishers, 2004. ISBN 0-7546-1649-5.
- Luard, Henry Richards
(1890). "Grosseteste, Robert". In
Stephen, Leslie; Lee, Sidney. Dictionary of National
Biography 23. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
- McEvoy,
James. The Philosophy of Robert Grosseteste. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, 1992. ISBN 0-19-824645-5.
- McEvoy,
James. Robert Grosseteste. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.
- Southern,
R. W. Robert Grosseteste: The Growth of an English Mind in Medieval
Europe. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1986. ISBN 0-19-820310-1 (Oxford University Press, USA; 2 edition (1
February 1992) pbk)
- L. Baur
(editor) Die Philosophischen Werke des Robert Grosseteste, Bischofs von
Lincoln in Baeumker's Beitradge zer Geschichte der Philosophie des
Mittelalters series, vol. IX (Munster i. W.: Aschendorff, 1912).
Translations
- Mystical
theology: The Glosses by Thomas Gallus and the Commentary of Robert Grosseteste
on De
mystica theologia , ed. J McEvoy, (Paris: Peeters, 2003)
- On the Six
Days of Creation, tr. CFJ Martin, (Oxford, 1996)
- The Greek
Commentaries of the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle in the Latin
Translation of Robert Grosseteste, ed. H Mercken, (Corpus
Latinum Commentariorum in Aristotelem Graecorum VI), (Leiden: Brill,
1973-1991)
- On Light, ed. C
Riedl, (Milwaukee, WI, 1942)
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