Medieval France
(Albertus Magnus; ca. 1200–1280). Now remembered as a theologian and philosopher, this teacher of Thomas Aquinas is perhaps most original in his scientific works. Albert was born into a noble family in Lauingen on the Danube, near Ulm. He studied at Bologna and Padua, where he entered the Dominican order in 1222. His theological training was in Germany, but ca. 1241 he went to Paris, where from 1245 to 1248 he was a Dominican regent master and taught his most famous pupil, Thomas Aquinas. In 1248, he and Thomas went to Cologne to start a new Dominican studium generale. In 1253–56, he was provincial of the German Dominican province, journeying to Rome in 1256 to defend the mendicants against the attacks of William of Saint-Amour and his followers. In 1260, he agreed to take the see of Ratisbon, simply to sort out its administrative disorder. He resigned two years later to return to Cologne and teaching. There was to be no peace: in 1264–66, he taught at the Dominican house in Würzburg; in 1268, he was at Strasbourg and elsewhere; in 1269–80, he was based in Cologne (where he is buried), although he attended the second Council of Lyon (1274) and was in Paris in 1277 to take part in the arguments over Aristotelian and Averroist doctrine.
Albert, known as Doctor universalis or Doctor expertus, has suffered from the proximity of his gifted pupil, Thomas, in particular from comparison with Thomas in theology and philosophy. Albert is a less systematic thinker than Thomas and less comprehensive. But this is to misjudge his gifts, which were much more for personal observation, new information, and experimentation. He was much more influential in the natural sciences, especially biology and zoology, where his warmth comes through with a sense of his own observations, than in theology.
Albert was fascinated by the created world and wanted to know all about it. The sheer amount and variety of his work make him difficult to classify and assess: some is simple collation, some is close analysis. In the mold of a Paris master, he wrote biblical commentaries, a commentary on the Sententiae of Peter Lombard, theological tracts, and questions. He commented on the whole of Aristotle and used him for work on the natural sciences and psychology. Although he could use and understand philo-sophical principles, he is not a philospher through preference; he prefers to use philosophy as a tool in other, more interesting, fields.
Lesley J.Smith
[See also: AQUINAS, THOMAS; ARISTOTLE, INFLUENCE OF; PHILOSOPHY; THEOLOGY]
Albert the Great. Opera omnia, ed. Auguste Borgnet.
38 vols. Paris: Vivès, 1890–99.
——. Opera omnia ad fidem codicum manuscriptorum edenda. Monasterii Westfalorum: Institutum Alberti Magni, 1951–. [15 vols. of a projected 40 have appeared to date.]
——. On the Intellect and the Intelligible (Book I). In Selections from Medieval Philosophers, ed. Richard McKeon. 2 vols. New York: Scribner, 1929–30, Vol. 1, pp. 326–75.
De Libéra, Alain. Albert le Grand et la philosophie. Paris, 1990.
Glorieux, Palémon. Répertoire des maîtres en théologie de Paris au XIIIe siècle. 2 vols. Paris: Vrin, 1933, Vol. 1, pp. 62–77. [Complete listing of works.]
Ostlender, H., ed. Studia Albertina: Festschrift für Bernhard Geyer. Münster: Aschendorff, 1952.
van Steenberghen, Fernand. “Albert le Grand et l’Aristotélisme.” Revue internationale de philosophie 34(1980):566–74.
Weisheipl, James A. Albertus Magnus and the Sciences: Commemorative Essays 1980. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1980.
Zimmerman, Albert, ed. Albert der Grosse, seine Zeit, sein Werk, seine Wirkung. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1981.
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