ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN:

WRITERS OF THE CHRISTIAN KINGDOMS

CONFRONTING THE ETERNITY OF THE WORLD*

Ann Giletti

D iscussion of the reception of Aristotle's natural philosophy among Latin readers in the Middle Ages tends to focus on the great debates and pro­

hibitions of the thirteenth century, particularly at the University of Paris, and on the prior translation activity in Spain and Italy, which made the material accessible to V\Testern scholars.1 Rarely does it concentrate on Spain, where the Moorish courts had fostered the study of Aristotle and his Muslim interpreters, such as al-Eirahi (873-950), Avicenna (g8o-1037) and al-Ghazali (1058-1111), and where twelfth­century philosophers, most n otably the judge Averroes ( 1126-28) and the rabbi Maimonides (1135-1204), both Cordovans, had produced new books on the subject in Arabic. With the exception of the important work of Thomas and Joaquin Carreras y Artau, such modern scholarship as exists on the Iberian reception of Aristotelian philosophy focuses on iL~ literary echoes in the Celestina and Libro de buen amar, on the accounts of philosophising heretics by Alvaro Pelayo and Lucas de Tuy, and on unscholarly philosophical texts in the form of the Philosophia of Virgil of Cordova and the Lucidario of Sancho IV.2 The literary sources provide evidence of both admiration for and discomfort with Aristotle-

*This article is based on work done for a Ph .D. thesis supported by grants from the Cniversity of London (Knight Tmst. and Central Research Fund) and the British Ft,deration of Women Graduates. I am grateful for this help, as well as the valuable ad~ice and comments of Charles Bumett, Jill Kraye and Claudia La Malfa.

1. On the translation history of Aristorle and his interpreters see M.-T. D'Aiverny, Translatio ns and Translators', in Renaissance and Renewal in the

Twelfth Century, ed. R. L Benson and G. Constable, Oxford 1982, pp. 421-62, rcpr. in eadem, La trans­mission des textes philosophiques et scientifiques au mo)'en li.gf, Alders hot and Brookfie ld, VT 1 994, anicle H; and B. G. Dod, 'Aristotdes Latinus' , in The Cambridge llistory of Later Aledieval Philosophy, ed. :-J. Kretzmann, A. Kenny and J. Pin borg, Cambridge 1 g8z, pp. 4S-79· For the history of the prohibitions at the University of Paris see J. F. Whippel , 'The Condemnations of 1 270 and 1 277 at Paris', The Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies, VII, 1977, pp. 109-201; F. Van Stcenbcrghcn, La philosophic au Xlli' siixle, 2nd edn, Louvain-la-Xeuve HNl, pp. g~1 -426; and idem, MaitreSigerdeBrabant, Louvain and Paris 1977, pp. 74-79 and 139-58.

2. See T. Carreras y Artau and J. Carreras y Artau, Historia dl' lafilosofta espanola: ft losofia cristiana

de los siglos Xlll al Xl~ 2 vols, Madrid 1939-43; F. Marquez Villanueva, 'El casu del averroismo popular espariol (hacia La f'A~lestina) ', in Cinco siglos de Celestina: Aport.aciom's interpretativas, ed. R. Beltran andj. L. Canet, Valencia 1997, pp. 1 21 - 32; F. Rico, '"Por aver mantcnencia". El aristutelismo hetero­duxo en el Liln-o de huen amor', FJ r:rotal6n, 11, 1~)8,),

pp. 169--<3R; idem, '" A1istoteles llispanus": En torno a Gil de Zamora, Petrarca y Juan de Mena', ltalia medioevale e umanistirn., x , 1967, pp. 143-64, revised in his Tex los y contextos: estudios sobre la poesia esj)(lifinla

del siglo X¥; Barcelona 1990, pp. 55-94; and A. Martinez Casado, 'Aristot.clisrno hispano en la primera mitad del siglo XIII', }<,studios filnsnjim.l,

xxxm, 1984, pp. 59-f\4- Ir has even been a rgued that rhere was little study of Aristotelian philosophy O\\~n g, at least in part, to the di!licult:y of the texts and the need for L·u.in or Gr·eek to understand them; sec A. Escobar Chico, 'Sobre la fortuna de Arist6teles en Espai'ia', Revista e~paiiola de jilosojia

medieval, 1, 1994, pp. J4l-4i·

JOURNAl. OF Tl-ff, W.;\RRURG AND C OCRTA ULD INSTITC'TES, LXVII. 200 4

24 ANN GILETTI

sentiments shared by most medieval Christian philosophers-but references to his thought are oblique and do not demonstrate study of the actual teaching in his books, whether directly or filtered through secondary works. Among heretics with a philosophical bent only Alvaro Pelayo's held Aristotelian convictions (to be examined below); whereas the crime of those described by Lucas de Tuy was Albigensianism and their relationship with Aristotelian philosophy was incidental.3 The two unscholarly philosophical sources offer more substantial-though sketchy -accounts, the Lucidario responding directly to Aristotle's Physics (a discussion considered below).4 On the basis of this material, it would seem that, during the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, when Aristotle became both the core of philosophy and the root of a great controversy in Western Europe, in the Christian kingdoms of Spain little study of his natural philosophy was taking place. There are, however, other Spanish sources which suggest the careful reading of Aristotle's treatises.

In approaching the question of Christian Iberian writings on Aristotelian philosophy in the thirteenth century, we are hampered by the fact that nowhere do we find centres of philosophical study on the scale of the University of Paris with its attendant production of analyses of Aristotle.s Although the royal courts of

3· Lucas de Tuy reports (c. 1236) that a group of Albigensians in Leon called themselves natural philosophers and denied Creation and God's authorship of nature: Lucas de Tuy, De altera vita fideique controversiis, Ingolstadt 1612, pp. 156-57. Martinez Casado's 'Aristotelismo hispano' explores the link between these Albigensians and Aristotelian philosophy in terms of their attribution of the world and everything in it to nature rather than to God. While it is possible that their approach may have been influenced by Aristotelian science, for the purposes of the present study this cannot be regarded as evidence of their reading of Aristotle since there is no indication that the theories them­selves were drawn from his books. The Albigensian belief in the eternity of the world was a consequence of their adherence to the eternal principle of evil and matter. Their Catholic examiners used Aristo­telian arguments to refute this idea; but Aristotle was not the Albigensians' point of departure. It is, however, worth citing Lucas's claim in his Chronicon mundi that Aristotle was a native of Spain: 'Antiqui­tate praeterea philosophorum fulget Hispania, eo quod genuit Aristotelem, summum philosophum nobilem investigatorem astrorum, et Senecam facundissimum atque Lucanum, historiographum et poetam clarissimum'; and 'Magnus philosophus Aristoteles, Hispanus natione in Graecia Platonem audivit et in multis floruit, maxime dialecta et meta­physica.' For both quotations see Rico, 'Aristoteles Hispanus' (as inn. 2), p. 56.

4· The Philosophia (c. 1290?), supposedly written by 'Virgil of Cordova', discusses principles in the Aristotelian tradition (including Averroes's theory

of the unicity of the intellect) but, while it refers to the eternity of the world, it does not address Aristotle's theory and so will not be examined here. For the references to the eternity of the world see Virgil of Cordova, Philosophia, ed. M. Menendez Pelayo in Historia de los heterodoxos espaiioles, 8 vols,

Santander 1946-48, vn, pp. 339-85 (341, 343 and 348).

5· The first Iberian universities were founded in the 13th century (Palencia, 1208/09; Valladolid, mid-century; Salamanca, c. 1227/28; Lisbon/ Coimbra, 1290; and Lerida, 1300), but suffered setbacks and only approached stability in the 14th century. Castile, home to the first three, expanded into Moorish territory during this time: Ferdinand III (1217-52) conquered Cordova (1236), Murcia (1243),jaen (1246) and Seville (1248). Alfonso X (1252-84) had to contend with a rebellion of Mudejars (Muslims living under Christian rule) in the conquered territory, a revolt encouraged by a Marinid invasion from Morocco ( 1263). There were additional crises, such as ruined harvests resulting in famine in Palencia ( 1262). Funding shortages forced Palencia's closure by 1263, after several false starts, and prevented Salamanca's development until Alfonso X provided adequate grants. In Palencia and Valladolid, tithes were diverted with papal permission from church maintenance to the universities (a practice with a precedent in earlier papal grants for the conquest of Moorish terri­tories), but the consequent decay of the churches forced an end to these grants. In Lisbon, the university's struggle was with the city itself, and in 1308/09 it moved to Coimbra after riots broke out;

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN

Castile and Aragon engaged prominent thinkers and drew on their talents,Blittle or no evidence seems to survive of substantial study and writing there on the subject of Aristotle's natural philosophy and the problems it posed for Christian readers. Yet while we cannot speak of a circle or movement with respect to Aristo­telian philosophy, we do find individual works, varied in their natures and styles, which discuss the subject.

In the search for sources, we cannot limit ourselves solely to commentaries on Aristotle's works. To date, the inventory of medieval Latin Aristotle commentaries includes few representatives from the Iberian peninsula on natural philosophy during the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, the period of greatest con­troversy.7 The revelant sources only occasionally take this form (using the quaestio format rather than that of a commentary in the strict sense). Otherwise, they consist of treatises dealing specifically with Aristotelian issues or theological works touching on doctrine threatened by Aristotle's theories.

In order to trace the impact of Aristotle through these works, rather than looking for themes broadly relating to Aristotle, I shall proceed by examining the treatment of a particular principle which is both prominent in Aristotle's teaching and the source of one of the most characteristic of the Aristotelian controversies in the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries: the theory of the eternity of the world. This theory, which Aristotle taught and argued for in several ways in his Physics, was endorsed in Arabic interpretations to which Latin readers had access by means of translations made in Spain, such as those by Averroes and Avicenna. It was also fundamentally at odds with Christianity. In the works of seven Iberian authors, we find examples of confrontation with the theory as Aristotle presented it in the Physics. The writers are (in roughly chronological order): Ramon Marti (c. 122o-c. 1284/ 5), Alvaro de Toledo (late thirteenth century), Sancho IV of Castile

during the 14th century, similar circumstances forced it to move between Coimbra and Lisbon four times. In addition to these universities, Alfonso X issued a charter (1254) founding a studium generate in Seville; a papal bull ( 1260) confirmed it, but there is no evidence that it came into existence. See H. Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, 3 vols, Oxford 1936, n, pp. 63-96 and wS-14; C. M. Ajo Gonzales y Sainz de Zuniga, Historia de las universidades hispanicas: origenes y desarrollo desde su aparaci6n hasta nuestros dias, 11 vols, Madrid 1957-79, I, pp. 202-40; V. Beltran de Heredia, Bulario de la Universidad de Salamanca, 3 vols, Salamanca 1966, I, pp. 43-46; and idem, Cartulario de la Universidad de Salamanca, 6 vols, Salamanca 1970, I, pp. 37-53 and 96-g9.

6. The most famous of these courts is that of Alfonso X the Learned of Castille, patron to scientists and translators of Arabic works. Also important was the court of Aragon. For general background see Carreras y Artau (as inn. 2), I, pp. 3-41 ;J. E. Martinez Ferrando, 'The Scientific Works of the Court of Alfonso X of Castile: The King

and His Collaborators', Modern Language Review, XL,

1945, pp. 12-29; Emperor of Culture: Alfonso X the Learned of Castille and his Thirteenth-Century Renais­sance, ed. R. I. Burns, Philadelphia, PA 1990; E. S. Procter, Alfonso X of Castile, Patron of Literature and Learning, Oxford 1951; The Worlds of Alfonso the Learned and James the Conqueror: Intellect and Force in the Middle Ages, ed. R. I. Burns, Princeton, NJ 198 5; and J. Carreras y Artau, Relaciones de Arnau de Vilanova con los reyes de la casa de Aragon, Barcelona

1955· 7· There are several catalogues of medieval

Latin commentaries on Aristotle, including one specifically on Spanish works: C. Heusche, 'Index des commentateurs espagnols medievaux d'Aristote (Xne-xve siecles)', Atalaya, n, 1991, pp. 157-75. The most comprehensive general catalogue is: C. H. Lohr, 'Medieval Latin Aristotle Commentaries', Traditio, xxm-xxx, 1967-74. See also tile second­ary literature on authors cited in that catalogue in C. H. Lohr, Commentateurs d'Aristote au moyen-age latin: bibliographie de la litterature secondaire recente, Fribourg and Paris 1988.

ANN GILETTI

andLeon (1284-95),RamonLiull (1232?-I315 / 16),GuidoTerreni (I26<>/ 7o­I 342), Alvaro Pelayo ( 127 5/80-1350) and Anfredo Gonteri Brito (active 1 320s). vVhile diverse in origin and nature, their works all stand against the theory, and they do so because it conflicts with Creation as taught in Genesis. Although argu­ments in the debate over this issue in the thirteenth century went beyond what Aristotle taught (for instance, propositions to do with God's eternal creative power), I shall only examine treatmenL'l of arguments presented by Aristotle himself in the Physics.

Aristotle's Casefor the Hternity of the Wo1'ld and the Problem in Christian Terms

Aristotle's case for the eternity of the world is quite involved but can be summed up in terms of his explanation of the coming into existence of all things through generation. Generation entails the production of things from previously existing matter by means of change or movement. In other words, the material of the universe is continually reformed into new things, generation after generation. In Aristotle's system, there is no logical reason to posit a first or last generation. So it follm'lrs that the existence of matter, and hence the world which is composed of it, extends infinitely into the past and the future. Aristotle summarises his argument in Physics, vm and De caelo, 1; and he clearly states his opinion that the world is eternal in the first lines of De caelo, n: 'heaven as a whole, neither came into being, nor admits of destruction, as some assert, but is one and eternal, with no end or beginning of its total duration, containing and embracing in itself the infinity of time ... 'R

The problem posed by the eternity of the world, from a Christian point of view, is quite simple: it does not square v.rith the teaching of Creation as revealed in Genesis. Genesis 1. 1 states: 'In the beginning, God created heaven and earth.' This conflict was immediately understood by any Christian first encountering the theory-though some scholars quoted Genesis in their treatment of the issue in order to drive the point home.9 There was no doubt that the Church held that Creation was a fundamental tenet of Christianity: the Fourth Lateran Council ( 1 2 1.5) had declared it an article of faith that God had created the world out of nothing and at the beginning of time.tll By the 1270s, within the University of

8. De caelo, ll.l, 283h27- 29; tran~l. The Complete 1Vorks of A.1istotle, ed. ]. Barnes, 2 vols, Princeton

1 gH4, I, P· 470. 9· For instance, Marti, Pug~o fidei adversus mauros

el judeos, Leipzig lfj87; t'Cpt·. Famborough 1967 , 1.11.4, p. :.124; idem. Explanatio symboli apostolomm, edited in S. J March , 'En Ramon Martf y a seva ".Explanatio Simboli Apostolorum"', ;1nuari de l'Jnslitul d'F:studi.l Catalans, tgofl, pp. 44:;-gti (464); and A. Gontcri, Sentences commcntat)' (1322), in Wrodaw, Uniwersytet MS 211, Lois 333"b, :~361b, 337"" and 342rb. Regar·ding this last citation see below, n. 26.

1 o. 'Pater generans .... unum universorum prin­cipium, creator omnium invisibilium ct visibilium.

spiritualium er corporalium, qui sua omnipol.enti virtute simul ab initio temporis, utramque de nihilo condidit creaturarn, spirimalem et corporalem, angelicam videlicet et mundanarn, ac dcinde humanarn quasi communcm ex spirim et corpore constitutam ': Finniter r;·ednnus, first decree of t.hc Fourth Lateran Council, in Dncrt'e.\ of the Ecumenical Councils, eel. N. P. Tanner, 2 vols, London and Washington , DC rggo, 1, p. 230. This decree was a reaction to issues of Christian heresy (the Cathars in particular) rather I han the errors of philosophy. The First Vatican Council ( 1 86g-7o) formally declared creation ex nihilo to be a doctrine of faith in response to the errors of material ism and pantheism (first canon ibid., 11, p. H 1 o).

ARISTOTLE IN ~EDIEVAL SPAIN

Paris, defending the eternity of the world 'vas a violation punishable by excom­munication. So that there was no doubt as to which principles in connection with the theory were intolerable, they were published in the Condemnations of 1270

and 1277, the latter censuring at least ten principles relating to the eternity of the world. ll

In addition to being in conflict with Creation, the eternity of the world had other dangerous implications. If there was no reason to posit a beginning of the world, there was equally none to posit a beginning of the human race. From this­or directly from the principle that the world will never end-it was possible to infer that there would be no resurrection of humans and no Last judgement. This problem was raised by Iberian critics of Aristotle's theory. Ramon Llull, the Catalan from Majorca famous today as a poet, novelist, missionary and mystic, as well as for his philosophical work, cites these points in his Liher de aeatione ( 131 3), comment­ing that those who hold this belief 'are not afraid to sin, since they do not believe that there is an afterlife', and later adding that the theory implies that there is no afterlife, resurrection or LastJudgement .12 In the Compendiosus tractatus de articulis

fidei catholicae ( 1 300), he attempts to show the absurdity of the position in natural terms: 'There can be no resurrection if the world is eternal, since there never was a first man, nor will there be a last man; and so all the matter of the world would not be sufficient for the resurrection of mankind, nor would there be sufficient space, since for man generation would be intinite.'13

It is rare to find individuals cited as adherents of the theory-indeed, even in Paris, we can only name Siger of Brabant and Boethius of Dacia as represcn­tath,cs of Aristotle's position in the thirteenth century. Alvaro Pelayo, a Gallician Franciscan famous for his De fJlanctu ecclesiae, described in his Collyrium fidei contra

haereses how he encountered in Lisbon an apostate of both the Dominican and Franciscan orders named Thomas Scot, who had travelled in the Iberian peninsula preaching heresy. 14 Pelayo met with him to debate his errors, which included deny­ing several truths of Scripture. 15 Thomas also elevated philosophy over revelation, 1&

1 1. Fo1· the text of the rwo condemnations see Chartutarium unhwmlalis jJ(rrisiensis, eel. H. Denifle and E. Chatelain, 4 vols, Paris !8') 1- 97, rep1. Brussels 1gf)4, r, pp. 1 Hb-R7 (Condemnations of 1270 ) and 54:~-5:) (Condemnations of 1277). Sec also R. Hisseue, En quite sur les 2 I 9 mticles condamnis

cl Paris le 7 mars 12i7• Louvain and Paris 1977, pp. 1 43 and 1.17-bo, for lists of the principles relating to the eternity of the wodrl and explanato ry analysis.

12. '[N]on timet peccare, cum non crcdant aliam vitam esse': Llull, Liberdecreatione (no. 233), in Ramon !.lull , Opera latina, ed. F. Stegmiiller et al., vo ls 1-v, Palma de Majorca 1959-67; vols VI- ,

in the series Corpus Christianomm, Cont.inuat.io Mediaevalis, Turnhout, HJ7:)- (hereafter ROL) , 1,

pp. 377-H7 (3f11; and see pp. :1R4 and J187). 13. 'Resurrectio autcm esse non potcst, si

mundus est aeternus, cum primus homo numquam fuit nequc ultimus homo crit., cl sic lota materia rnundi TlCfjue locus suflicere posset resurrectioni

hominum, cum generatio homini esset infinita': Llull, CornfJmdio.ms tractalus dt' artiwlis jidt'i catholicae

(no. 91 ) , in ROL, XIX, pp. 466-504 (;:;oo) . He makes the same pnin t in his Senrwnes mntm errores ,1verrois, of 1311 (no. 174), in ROL, vn, pp. 2;:17-62 (z;,z); Liber principimum lheologiae, of 1274-78?, in his Opem omnia, cd. I. Salzinger, 8 vols, Mainz q:n-42; repr. Frankli.lrt-am-:\fain 19b5 (her·caftcr AWG), T, pp. (io7-b6 (61g) ; and Uber principiorum

jJhi losophiat•, of 1274-78?, in lVWG, 1, pp. 667-732 (67.')).

14. Alvaro Pelayo, Collyrium fidei runtm haereses, ed. and Portuguese trans!. .\1. Pinto de Meneses, Colino dap amlm as heresias, 2 vols, Lisbon 19[,6, 11,

pp. 4o-7g. See also M. Menendez Pelayo, H i.\lun·a de

los heterodoxos esjHuloil's, H vnls, Santander 1946- 48, 111, pp. 31 3-14, and for excerpts f1·om the text see the appendix to vol. III, pp. 7R2-84. Citat.ions he low are to the Pinto de Meneses edition.

ANN GILETTI

and he argued for positions which are distinctly Aristotelian in origin, including the eternity of the world and of the human race, and, consequently, the denial of resurrection and the LastJudgement. According to Pelayo, Thomas maintained that: 'before Adam there were men and through those men Adam was made; and so he infers that the world has always existed, and in it men have always existed, since he, along with his idol Aristotle, holds that the world is eternal.'I7 Thomas further claimed 'that the world does not need to have an end. And he said this because he holds with the pagan philosopher that the world is eternal .... And so he denies the future judgement and resurrection and life in the time to come, which are articles of faith, as is apparent in the Apostles' Creed, "I believe in one God" .. .' 18 The root of Thomas's error regarding Creation lay in his insistence on rational explanation instead of accepting doctrine on faith. Pelayo's response to that position would address the two errors together; yet, as we shall see, in promoting faith over reason, he would take into account and refute a primary argument of Aristotle's.

The Ar!JUments against Aristotle's Theory

Aristotle's arguments for the eternity of the world focus on the three key factors in his physics which produce this conclusion: movement, matter and time. The sections below treat some of the main arguments relating to each of these factors and the counter-arguments presented by Iberian authors.

A. Aristotle's ar!JUment from the nature of movement

In Aristotelian terms, when things come into being, they do so through generation, that is, through change or movement from one thing to another. Aristotle taught that everything which exists has been generated out of something else, since motion must have a subject which exists before the change. For any existing thing, therefore, something from which it was generated existed before it; and some­thing else must have existed before that previous thing was generated, and so on ad injinitum.19 Consequently, generation and its material subject have always existed, and so too, therefore, has the world.

15. He said, for instance, that the longevity of the ancient patriarchs was invented, that there are no angels or demons and that Jesus was God's adopted (rather than natural) son. He also said that Moses, Jesus and Mohammed had tricked the Jews, Christians and Muslims respectively, and he spoke out against St Augustine, St Bernard and other holy doctors. See Pelayo, Collyrium fidei (as in n. 14), pp. 40-48, 56, 62-64 and 76-78. Our only knowledge of Scot's thought comes from Pelayo; we do not know where he was educated or whether he had a following.

16. Pelayo says he held that: 'fides melius probatur per philosophiam quam per decretum et decretales et testamentum novum et vetus', ibid., p. s6; 'mundus melius regeretur per philosophiam quam per decreta et decretales', ibid., p. 62;

'Aristoteles fuerat sapientior, subtilior et altius fuerat locutus quam Moyses', ibid., p. 72; and 'melior erat Aristoteles quam Christus, qui fuerat homo malus et suspensus pro suis peccatis', ibid., p.

70. 17. '[A]nte Adam fuerunt homines et per illos

homines fuerat factus Adam, et sic infert quod semper fuit mundus, et in eo homines semper fuerint, quod ipse cum suo idolatra Aristotele mundum ponit aeternum': ibid., p. 66.

18. '[Qluod mundus non debeat habere finem. Et hoc ideo dixit quia ponit cum pagano philo­sopho mundum aeternum .... Et sic negat futurum iudicium, et resurrectionem et vitam futuri saeculi, qui sunt articuli fidei ut apparet in symbolis fidei "Credo in unum Deum"': ibid., p. 68.

19. Physics, VIII. I.

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN 29

This is one of the stock arguments for the eternity of the world in medieval discussions. There is an example of the proof of eternal generation in the late thirteenth-century Lucidario, a book which reports philosophical issues in a non­scholarly context and which tradition holds was written by Sancho IV of Castile and Leon, presumably with help from others in his court.2o Sancho was the son of Alfonso X the Wise, the great philosopher-king who surrounded himself with learned thinkers and promoted the study of science. Sancho is better known for his ruthless ambition (he took up arms against his father to usurp his nephew as heir to the throne) than for his intellectual pursuits. Yet his authorship of, or involvement in, the Lucidario shows him to share some interests with Alfonso X. The work is composed in Spanish in the form of a dialogue between a teacher and a student. They discuss Creation, following which the student asks about the end of the world. The teacher explains it in broadly religious terms and then says that, having responded 'according to theology' (segund teologia), he will give an account of what the ancient natural philosophers said:

[Regarding] Aristotle, who was a great philosopher, we found what he said in a book he wrote which they call the Physics, and physics means natural things which are proved by reason .... Aristotle proved it [i.e., the eternity of the world] thus in his book by arguments composed of proofs so that you see and understand what he says, proving it according to what the nature of each thing is. And Aristotle said in Book VIII of this book called the Physics that in the world, according to nature, there cannot seem to be, or be, an end.2I And he said this because God made the world and ordered it on the course of nature that he gave it. According to this course, it is fitting that some things are born and others die, and that from the corruption which occurs to some, others are generated. And for this reason, Aristotle said that there will be one generation into another and this will go on forever in such a way that it will not have an end. And since the generations of natures are not to have an end, in this way he proves that the world will not have an end.22

The teacher rejects this conclusion on the grounds that we creatures do not live forever, and therefore the world, which is made up of us, cannot endure eternally. This argument-although not particularly convincing-allows him to conclude that through theology and natural philosophy he has proved that the world is destined to end.23

A standard version of Aristotle's argument appears in a commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard (d. 1160) written by Anfredo Gonteri in 1322. Peter Lombard had composed his Sentences in order to collect together the received

20. Sancho IV, Lucidario, ed. R. P. Kinkade, in Los 'Lucidarios' espaiioles, Madrid 1968.

21. See above, n. 19. 22. 'Aristoteles, que fue gran filosofo, fallamos

nos que dixo en vn libro que fizo que llaman Fisicos, e fisicos tanto quiere dezir commo cosas prouadas naturales que se prueuan por rrazon .... Aristoteles prouaua lo asy en aquel su libro por rrazones de proeuas por que veas e entiendas que dize, prouando lo por naturas segund que es. E dixo Aristoteles en el libra otauo deste que a nonbre Fisicos, que en el mundo, secund natura non puede pares<;;er nin auer fin; e dize esta rrazon

porque Dios fizo el mundo e le ordeno a! curso de Ia natura que dio para ello. Segund este curso, conuiene que algunas cosas nascan e otras mueran, e del corronpimiento que toman las vnas en si, se engendran las otras. E por esta rrazon dixo Aristoteles que de vn engendramiento en otro aura y [v?]a a yr esto para sienprejamas, en guisa que no aura fin; e pues que los engendramientos de las naturas non auian auer fin, en esta guisa proeua el que el mundo non aura fin': Sancho IV, Lucidario (as inn. 20), chapter 30, p. 157; cf. pp. 84 and 95 on Creation.

2 3. Ibid., pp. 157-58.

AN~ GILETTI

,..,isdom of the Church Fathers and other authorities in connection with Christian doctrine. The work, in four books, covers the sul~jects of God and the Trinity; Creation and the corporeal world; Christ; and the sacraments. Since Peter Lombard had organised the teaching of theology into a coherent system, his compendium became a standard textbook, and the practice developed of theology students commenting on the Sentences (using the quaestio format) to demonstrate their learning, usually to earn their licence in theology.24 In connection with Creation, commentaries often considered the question of whether the world was eternal.

Anfredo Gonteri, although he was not from the Iberian peninsula, taught theology in Barcelona in 1322. His Sentences commentary provides a rare witness to teaching on Aristotle in the Iberian peninsula at the time. He was a Franciscan from Brittany who was educated in Paris, where he attended the lectures of Duns Scotus (c. 1265-1308) and completed his baccalaureate. Later, when he was teach­ing in Barcelona in 1322, he composed the first of two Sentences commentaries. In 1325, he was back in Paris preparing for his licence in theology, for which he wrote his second commentary.2~ The first, Barcelona version, is more detailed and treats several of Aristotle's arguments for the eternity of the world in the context of discussing Creation.26 One of these is Aristotle's argument on generation, which Gonteri restates: 'If the world was made, it was made through motion or change. But motion and change presuppose a subject not made through that change. Therefore, the world was not wholly made [i.e., ex nihilo]. '2 i He later produces what had become a common refutation of this argument, stating that, since Creation is a supernatural act, above the laws of physics, it is possible for the world not to be eternal: 'It is not necessary that everything which is produced should be produced through change, but only that which is produced from matter. That, however, which is created is not produced through change because creation is not change

'28

~4- On Peter Lombard's Sentenas see :Yf. L. Colish, Petn Lumbard, 2 vols, Leidcn etc. l994·

2!). For biographical information on him see L.

Amor6s, 'Anfredo Gontero , O.F.M., Disclpulo de EscrJto y lector en el estudio general de Barcelona: su comentario al lib. TI y TTI de las Sentcncias', Revista espanola de tmlogia, l, 1941, pp. 545-72. Responding to confusion about Gontcri's place of origin, Arnor6s shows he came from Brittany: ibid., pp. 547-49. The fact that he taught in Barcelona is documented in his own works: in the second version of his commentary on Book u of the Sentences, he mentions that he was a lecturer on the Sentences at the studium generate in Barcelona in 1 :322; a second reference in this work shows that he was a teacher with a baccalaureate in 132 2; and his De f'aaperlal'! Christi begins and con dudes with references to his position as a teacher in Barcelona: ibid., pp. ;,:,o-51.

26. Parts of Anfredo's commentaries survive in three manuscripts: Vatican City, Biblioteca

Apostolica Vaticana MS Vat. Lat. 111 :~; Wrodaw, Cniwersytet :>.1S 211 (formerly LF. 184); and

Pamplona, Biblioteca de Ia Catedral MS 5· None of the manuscripts contains the full text of either the Barcelona or Paris versions, and none collects together all the surviving books. For the Barcelona version, Book I is found in the Vatican MS (fols I '-Ifls'). and Book n in the Wroclaw MS (fols :1og'-7o8"); for the Paris version, Book 1 is found in the \Vroclaw :YIS (lols 1 "-3o6'), and Books n and m

in the Pamplona MS (fols 1 '-• 1 9' and 12 1 ' -96", respectively). References herein are to Book J 1 of the Barcelona version in the v'l'roclaw MS, cited as 'Senleru:es commentary, 13 2 2 '.

27. ' [S]i mundus est factus, factus est per motum vel rnutationem. Sed motus et mutatio praesuppo~ nunt subiectum non factum per illam mutationem. Ergo mundus non est universaliter factus': Gontcri, Sentences commenta ry, 1322 (as inn. ~6), 'Utrum Deus per potentiam creativam infinitam possit aliquid de novo producere de nibilo sive creare', fols 3g6r-4or (:n7v•). This argument docs not appear in Gontcri 's revised commentary of •;)25·

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN

Another example comes from the work of Ramon Marti, a Catalan Dominican in Barcelona. Marti read Arabic and Hebrew and was knowledgeable about Muslim and .Jewish Scripture, as well as Aristotle and his Muslim and jewish interpreters, and consulted these sources in the original language. He travelled tVv;ce to North Africa to help establish and maintain an Arabic school for training missionaries to preach to Muslims. He was the head of a Hebrew school in the Santa Catalina monastery in Barcelona, also for training missionaries, where one of his students was Arnold of Villanova (c. 1 240-1 31 1), the great medical wri Ler and physician. He wrote several works defending Christianity against.Judaism, Islam and dangerous philosophical theories.29 His Pugiojidei (probably completed in 1278), which in separate books attacks Judaism and the errors of philosophy, addresses the eternity of the world. Book I, the part dealing with philosophy, has direct correspondences with the Summa contra gentiles of Thomas Aquinas (completed 1 264) .~0 In many places the texts are identical; in others Marti quotes Arabic sources unavailable in Latin translation. It appears that Marti copied sections of Thomas's text, sup­plementing it with additional arguments and his own translations of Arabic sources pertinent to the discussion. 31

In Book I of the Pugio fidei, Marti presents four arguments for the eternity of movement or generation, drawing for three of them on both the Summa contm

gentiles and the Summa theolog·iae of Thomas Aquinas. They are all variations on the example above;32 and they are all resolved according to the same principle: creation is not the same as motion or generation, but is rather a divine act to which natural laws do not apply. It entails production into existence out of nothing, it does not require a pre-existing subject and only in a metaphorical sense can it be called movement.33

28. '[N)on oportet quod omne quod producitur producal.Ur per mut.ationem, sed illud tanr.um quod producitur de materia. Illud autcm quod creatur non producitur per mutationem quia creario non

est mutatio': ibid., fol. :1~9'"d. 29. For information about Manf and his work

sec: A. lknhicr, 'Un maitre oricntaliste du XIIIe siede: Ra~mond Martin O.P.', !l.rchivum Fratrum

Pmediratorum, VI, 1936, pp. 267-311; and A. Corta­barrfa Beitia, 'L'etude des langucs au moyen age chez les dominicains: Espagne, Orient, Raymond :Vlartin', ,I;Jetanges de l'lnstitut dominimin d 'hudr•s

otienlali!.l, x , 1970, pp. 189-248. 30. For the various hypotheses concerning the

dating of the Summa wnlra gentiles sec .J. A. \'1-'eisheipl, F'riar Thomas d:4.quino: H is Life, Thought and Works, 2nd edn, Washington DC 19R3, pp. 1;~o-32 and ~?jg-6o. Book 11 of the Summa contra {!;enlili!.l, to which parr., of Book T of the the Pugio

fidei relate, was not written before 1261: ibid., p. 360.

~1. On the correlation bct\WCTl the Pugio fidei

and rhe Summa mntm gentiles see L. Robles, 'En tomo a una vicja pole mica: cl "Pugio fidei" y Tomas de Aquino', Revista espanola de teologia, XXXIV, 1974,

pp. ;)21-:;o, and xxxv, 1975, pp. 21-41; idem, 'Escritores dominicos de Ia Corona de Aragon (siglos XIII-XV)', Repntorio de histmia de /(~5 ciencia.:s

alesirhlicas en F.\paria, l.ll, 1 97 1, pp. 11-17 j; and A. lluerga, 'Hip6tesis sobre Ia genesis de Ia "Summa contra gentiles" y del "Pugio fidei'", 1ingelicum, u,

1974· pp. 533-57· 32. The four arguments appear in: ( 1) :\fani,

Pugiojidri (as inn. g). 1.8.3, p. 219 (related to an argument for God's eternally creating the world); d. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, Jr.~:J; (2)

Pugio fidei, 1.10.2, p. 222; cf. Summa wntm gentiu'S,

11.34; Ccl) Pugiofidei, 1.1 .1.2, p. 230 (based on Ph~sics, V111.1); cf. Thomas Aquina.~. Summa theologiae, I , q. 46, art. 1, 5; and (4) Pugiojidei, 1.14-2, p. 231 (based on De generatione, 1. 1; no parallel text of Thomas Aquinas).

3~- The solutions appear in: ( 1) Manf, Pugioji.dRi

(as in n. g), 1.9·3· p. 220; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles. 11.36; (2) Pugio fidei, 1.1 1 .2 , p. 224, ')Jam creatio mutatio dici non potest, nisi secundum metaphoram'; cf. Summa rontra gentiles,

11.37; (3) Pugiofidri, 1.q.2, p. 231, 'Incepit enim esse, cum prius non fuisset: hoc autem non fuit per mutationem, sed per creationcm, quae nequaquam

ANN GILETTI

In connection with a related argument, Martf reproduces an explanation by Thomas which distinguishes between the production of things in the physical world and that of the essence of things, or universal being, assigning the two types of production to the realms of natural philosophy and metaphysics respectively:

This kind of making [i.e., that of essence or universal being) was not touched on by the earliest natural philosophers, among whom there was a common opinion that nothing comes to be from nothing. Or, if there were those who touched on it, they did not consider the term 'making' to apply properly to it, since the term 'making' implies motion or change. In this origin of all being from one first being, however, change of one being into another cannot be understood .... Consequently, it is not the role of the natural philosopher to consider the origin of things of this kind but rather of the metaphysician, who considers universal being and those things which are separated from motion. Nevertheless, we, on the basis of a certain similarity, shall also transfer the term 'making' to that origin, so that we may say that those things arc 'made' whose essence or nature originates from other things.34

In other words, for Martf, applying the term 'making' to both types of production is a convenient and common practice; but when it is used in connection with the production of universal being, the attendant meanings of 'movement' and 'change', understood according to natural philosophy, must be set aside. He adds a warning against the careless use of the term, in the form of a quotation from al-Ghazall about the need to be precise in one's terminology in order to avoid the abuse of language: 'Doing violence to words, for which the meaning is apparent, is the habit of those with narrow learning and a defective intellect. '35

Marti had already defined creation and making in his Explanatio symboli apostolorum ( 1256-s7), a commentary on the Apostles' Creed which discusses the eternity of the world in a section on Creation.3G There he argued that creation is the bringing of something into being from non-being or out of nothing, which only God can do; whereas making (jacere) something is a process involving matter, which human beings and angels can do. In God, the powers of creating and making converge into one, and that power is above nature.37 Thus, when we read in the

est nnttatio'; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa theologiae,

I, q. 16, art. 1, ad_:;; and Ctl Pugio fidei, 1.14.2, p. 2;~1, '[U]nius generatio sit alterius corruptio; non ramen creatio unius est corruptio alicuius' (no pan\llcl text of Thomas Aquinas). Elsewhere Martf states: '[Qluod materia et caelum non inceperunt per ge nerat.ionem ... sed quod materia et caelum producta sunt in esse per creationem' (Pugio fidei,

l.J4.2, p. 230; cf. Summa theologiar, 1, q. 4fi, art. 1, ad

3 ) . 34· 'E.t hanc quidem factioncm non attigerunt

primi naturales, quorum erat communis sententia, ex nihilo nihil fieri; vel si qui eam attigerunt,

non proprie ei nomen factionis compctere con­sideraverunt cum nomen facr.ionis motum vel mutationem importet. In hac autem totius entis originc ab uno primo entc intelligi non potest transmutatio unius en tis in aliud ... : quare nee ad

naruralem philosophum pertinct huiusmodi rerum uriginem considerarc, sed ad philosophum prim urn, qui considerat ens commune et ea quae sunt separata a motu. Kos t.amen sub quadam simili· tudine etiam ad illam origincm nomen factionis lransfcremus, ut dicamus ilia facta, quorum esscntia vel natura ab aliis origin em habet•: Marti. Pugio fidei

(as inn. g ), 1.11.1, pp. 223-24; cf. Thomas Aquinas. Summa contra gentiles, 11.37.

:~:)· 'Facerc \·im in verbis, e x quo sententia patct. mos est brevem habentium ~cienLiam el cunum intdlcnum'. Marti. Pugio fidei (as inn. g), 1.11.1,

p. 224. Marti cites an unidentifiable work, the PmhaLarium of al·Ghazali, as his source.

36. Marti, Explanatio symboli aposlolorum (as in n. g).

37· 'Creare autem esl de non esse vel de nihilo aliquid in esse producere. Et hoc soli Deu convcnit,

ARISTOTLE IN \IEDIEVAL SPAIN 33

Bible that God 'made' the world, we are to understand that he created it out of nothing. Marti gives several examples in which the making, fabricating or existence of things through God means that they were created: Job 12.g, 'Quis ignorat quod haec omnia manus Domini fecerit?'; David in Psalm 14.5·~)-6, 'Beatus, cuius Deus Jacob adiutor eius, spes eius in domino Deo ipsius, qui fecit caelum et terram, mare et omnia quae in eis sunt'; Ecclesiastes 1 1.5, 'Quomodo ignoras quae sit via spiritus et qua ratione compungantur ossa in ventre pregnantis; sic nescis opera Dei, qui fabricator est omnium';John 1.3, 'Omnia per ipsum sunt'; and Revelation 14.7, 'Adorate eum qui fecit caelum et terram, mare et omnia quae in eis sunt. ':IS

Other authors took pains to distinguish between creation and generation or making. In his commentary on the Sentences, Anfredo Gonteri carefully defined creation as the production of something new out of nothing, before proceeding through quaestiones on the eternity of the world.3!1 Another example is Ramon Llull, who travelled widely, including to North Africa to convert Muslims, to the papal curia in Avignon to promote his ideas and methods, and to Paris, where he encountered discussion of Aristotelian errors. Of the over 200 works he composed on various subjects, at least thirty address these errors, including, in most of them, the eternity of the world. He had devised a system of philosophical and theological reasoning which he called his 'Art' and which used algebraic notation and diagrams. By means of it, he offered a solution to the problem of proving Creation against the Aristotelian position.4° An explanation of the Art and its application to this problem would go beyond the scope of this article, which is to discuss arguments referring specifically to Aristotle's case in the Physics for the eternity of the world. The arguments and objections by Llull which I discuss here are of this type and can be understood without knowledge of the Art. One objection, which focuses on the distinction between generation and creation, appears in the Declaratio Ra)•mundi per modum dialogi edit a ( 1 2 g8), a commentary on each of the 219 principles which had been censured at the University of Paris in 1277.11 In his discussion of Article 141 of the Condemnations of 1277, Llull

cum hoc sit infinitac potentiae. Facere vero est aliquid operari de materia; unde et homo et angelus diciwr aliquid faccrc , sed non crcarc; Dco vcm et crean: et facere t·onvenit': Marti, t.'xplanatio ;;•mboli

apostolorum (as in n. g), art. 1, p. 464. 3H. Ibid. 39· Gonteri, Sentences commentary, 1J22 (as

in n. 26). Gonte ri's quaestio titles provide the

definitions: 'Ltrum producere aliquid de nihilo sive crcare implicet et indudat repugnantiam tcnninonun per sc secunda modo' (fols 333"-35v); 'Utrum Deus pn· potcntiam cr·eativarn infinitam possit aliquid de novo producere de nihilo sive crean·' (fols :~36r-4or); and 'L'trum Deus ab aeterno potuit aliquid creare, sive aliquid de nihilo producerc' (fols 340L4(i~") .

40. For biographical information on Llull see: .J. N. Hillganh, Ramon Lull and I.ullism in Fourteenth­

Century France, Oxford 1971, pp. t-1:34; A. Bonner, S1dn·ted Works of Ramon Llull (I2)2-IJr6), 2 vols,

Princeton, NJ 19fl5, T. pp. 10-52; and a biography written towards the end of Llull"s life by some of his Pa1isian followers who recorded his account first­hand, the Vita roaelanenof 1311 (no. 18g), in ROL, vm, pp. 27z-3oH. There arc numerous studies on l.lull's Art; for introductions to its structure and development sec R Pring-Mill. 'The Lullian "/l.rt

of Finding Truth'": A Medieva l System of Enquiry', Catalan Review, IV. 1990, pp. 55-74; and Bonner. 1, pp. 56-7o. 307-1:) and 571-76. Llull reworked the Art several times; the most significant versions are: Ars demonstmtiva, in ;\JOG, 111, pp. 93-204; An genemlis ullima (no. 128), in ROL, xrv. pp. 5-527= and 1h:~ bre-uis (no. 126) . in ROT., XII, pp. 191 - 255· For English translations with helpful introductions of Ars demonstrativa and An 1Yreoi.1 sec Bonner, 1, pp.

c\07-,-,6fl and 571--i)16 respectively. 41 . Llull, Dedumtio Raimundi p er modwn dialogi

edita contra aliquorum philosophonnn et eonan sequutium

opininnes emmea5 et damnatas a venem.bili patre domino

34 AN.'i GILETTl

wrote that God did not create 'naturally' but in a way that was 'above nature' . 4~ He also described creation as artificial, rather than natural, in Article 138.43 In the Condemnations of 1'.!77• Article 217 states that Creation, God's act of making, 'should not be called change (mutatio) into being' .44 Llull's analysis of this article emphasises the point: 'a being newly produced, not from something else, is not the su~ject of change in [the process of] creating' . 1"

It is on this resolution of the problem that Alvaro Pelayo relies in addressing the adherence of Thomas Scot to the eternity of the world in the Coll)1rium fidei contra haereses. As a child, Pelayo spent time in the court of Sancho IV of Castile, and he was educated and taught canon law in Bologna. He became Bishop of Silva in 13~~3. where he was unpopular with the clergy and resented by Alfonso IV of Portugal, who had not given his approval for the appointment. By 1345 he moved to Lisbon, where he taught canon law at the university, and in 1348 he moved to Seville where he died two years later.46 He wrote against Islam and weakness among members of the Church. He composed the Coll)'rium fidei, a descriptive catalogue of ancient heresies and new errors, sometime after 1345. In discussing the modern heresies perpetrated by Thomas Scot, he comes to Thomas's belief in the eternity of the world. He maintains that faith, the Bible and theological authorities should be relied on, rather than rational efforts, when speaking of the world's origins; and he shows that, by recognising God's omnipotence, one can logically accept Creation:

... if it can be said that there is some proof of faith, it exists only by the authority of Sacred Scripture and not by natural reason, because the articles of faith are above natural reason. The person who has true faith, however, achieves understanding of obedience to Christ and to his faith. Thus, Gregory [the Great] said: 'Faith for which human reason provides proof has no merit' .4 i 'What natural reason can be adduced that from nothing something can come to be? Consequently, the Philosopher, speaking in natural terms, said: 'From nothing, nothing can come to be.' 18 And therefore he said that the world was eternal. But he committed heresy because he did not have faith; because God, being omnipotent, produced everything in created essence from nothing, since he is supreme being and the first uncreated entity from whom all essences exist through creation .. ,49

tjliscopo parisiensi (no. 8o), in IWL, XVII, pp. 25:1-402.

12- '[Deus] crcavit mundum non naturalitcr, sed supra naturam': ibid., p. 364.

13- 'l CJ reatio non fuit naturalis, sed artificialis':

ibid., p. 36:1-44· 'Quod creatio non debet dici mutatio ad

esse': Chm1ularium (as inn. 11 ), 1, p. 555-·15- '[E]ns de novo productum, non de aliquo,

non est subiectum mutationis in creando': Llull, Declaratio (as inn. 41), p. 39K.

4ti. For further information on Ah<tro Pelayo see: J. Chorao Lavajo, 'Alvaro Pelagia dans le cornexte medieval, islamo-chretien iberique', Mediaevalia,

v-vr, 1994, pp. :1o9-4o; A. Domingues de Sousa Costa, Estudios sobra Alvaro Pais, Lisbon 1966; K lung, Un franciscan, theolo!!;ien du po·twoir fJontifical au

XIV' siixle: 1ilvaro Pelayo, eveque et penitrncier de Jmn XXII, Paris 1931; and A. Amaro, 'Fr. Alvaro Pelagio, su vida sus ob,·as y su posicion respecto de Ia cues­ti6n de Ia probeza te6rica en Ia Orden Franciscana, bajo Juan XXII ( 13 r G-34) ', Archivo Jbero-AmPrimno, v, 1916, pp. 5-32, It was once thought that Pelayo studied under Duns Scotus in Pal'is, but this hypothesis cannot be supported; see Domingues de Sousa Costa, p. 1 ~-

47- Gregory the Great, Homilia in Evangelia, cd. R. F.taix, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina,

CXLI, Tumhout 1999, pp. 217-28 (In 8).

4/l. See n. 51 below, with accompanying text. 49· ' ... si qua probatio fidei potest dici, non cs1

nisi per auctoritatem sacrosanctae scripturae, non

per rationem naturalern, quia articuli fidei super rationem naturalcm sunL Sed qui veram fidem

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN 35

B. Aristotle's argument from the nature of matter

The argument from the nature of movement, as well as the refutation of it (that God is above nature), relates closely to the argument from the nature of matter. The argument for eternal movement presupposes that prior to each existing thing there was something out of which that thing was made. All things which exist are composed of matter and form, that is, the material ofwhich they are made and the form which they take.so Generation involves the re-forming of matter into some­thing new. Aristotle held that matter could not be brought into existence from non-existence (generated out of nothing)51-'ex nihilo nihil fit', as the scholastics expressed it-so it must exist eternally; therefore, so too did the world.

The issue revolves around the production of prime matter. Aristotle described all things as coming into being through a 'substratum' .52 The substratum of a thing is material by its very nature: matter is the substratum from which things come into existence. Even if matter as a whole came into existence, it would do so out of a substratum, and so something prior would already have existed: matter would have existed before the creation ofmatter.s3 Therefore, matter is eternal. If matter is eternal, then the world (which is made of matter), or at least the material of the world, is eternal.

Anfredo Gonteri presents the argument thus:

Everything which comes to be comes to be from matter. And Aristotle proved this through induction in Physics I and VIII in all made things which we see.54 Therefore, if the world was made anew, the matter from which it was made preceded its making, but not without form, because without form it cannot exist. Therefore, before the making of the world, some material, unmade entity came before. Therefore, the world was not wholly made [i.e., ex nihilo] .55

His counter-argument points once again to the difference between generating and creating:

When it is said that everything which comes to be comes to be from matter, it is true because it comes to be through change and through the action of a particular agent. But, because it [i.e., the world] is produced through simple emanation by an agent of infinite might whose power is in his whole being, it is not true. 56

habet, captivat intellectum circa obsequium Christi et fidei eius. Unde Gregorius: "Fides non habet meritum cui humana ratio praebet experimentum". Quae ratio naturalis potest induci quod de nihilo aliquid fiat? Unde dicit Philosophus naturaliter loquens De nihilo nihil fit, et ideo dixit mundum aeternum, sed haereticavit quia fidem non habuit, quia Deus omnipotens de nihilo produxit omnia in essentia creata, cum ipse sit summum ens et primum increatum, a quo omnia essentia sunt per crea­tionem': Pelayo, Collyrium fidei (as inn. 14), p. 58.

50. Physics, J.7, 190a32-34. 51. Ibid., J.4, 187a27-29. 52. Ibid., 1.7; see also De generatione, 1.1, 314b26-

315a2. 53· Physics, I.g, 192a25-33.

54· Ibid., 1.7; and vm.1, 251a8-b10. 55· '[O]mne quod fit, fit de materia. Et hanc

probat Aristoteles per inductionem in omnibus factionibus quas videmus, primo et 8 Physicorum. Ergo si mundus factus fuit de novo, materia ex qua factus fuit praecessit eius [actionem, sed non sine forma, quia sine forma esse non potest. Ergo ante [actionem mundi praecesset aliquod individuum materiale non factum. Ergo mundus universaliter non est factus': Gonteri, Sentences commentary, 13 2 2 (as inn. 26), 'Utrum Deus per potentiam creativam infinitam possit aliquid de novo producere de nihilo sive creare', fol. 337va. This argument does not appear in Gonteri's revised commentary of 1325.

56. '[C]um dicitur omne quod fit, fit de materia, verum est quod fit per mutationem et per actionem

ANN GILETTI

So, while generation, which functions according to the terms of natural philosophy, presupposes the existence of matter, creation, which takes place outside nature, does not; and therefore matter can come into existence from nothing.

In the Pugio fidei, Ramon Martf, following the Summa contra gentiles of Thomas Aquinas, devotes two chapters to the problem of the production of prime matter.57

In his first argument, he presents Aristotle's principle 'ex nihilo nihil fit' and the consequence that matter is eternal. Everything which is not eternal, the argument runs, must have been made; and whatever these things were made out of must be eternal, otherwise there would be an infinite regress of causes for one act of generation. 58 The eternal entity out of which the new thing is made must be material because, in Aristotelian terms, all things are generated out of previously existing matter. That eternal entity cannot be God, because he is immaterial; so, something in addition to God must be eternal, and that thing is prime matter.59

Three more arguments for the eternity of matter follow, 5o all largely based on the first. The main point against all four arguments is the one examined above in the discussion of arguments from the nature of movement: we cannot speak of creation using natural terms. 51 While generation is a process of making which requires a material substratum, creation, the production of things from nothing, is a supernatural act and therefore not subject to the laws of nature.

C. Aristotle's argument from the nature oftime

Aristotle also argues for the eternity of the world from the point of view of time itself. His arguments assume a necessary relationship between time, motion and matter. While motion cannot exist without a subject, matter, motion and time cannot exist without each other. Consequently, if either motion or time can be shown to be eternal, the world, too, must be eternal.

Aristotle showed that time and motion are linked because they measure each other reciprocally. We mark movement with time by recognising the time in which an event occurs; conversely, we mark time by movement because our only evidence

agentis particularis. Sed quod producitur per simplicem emanationem ab agente potentiae infinitae in cuius virtute est tota entitas eius, non est verum': ibid., fol. 339va.

57. Marti, Pugio fidei (as inn. g), 1.10 (arguments for the eternity of matter) and 1.11 (contra argu­ments), pp. 222-24; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, Il.34 and Ii.37·

58. According to Aristotle, an infinite regress of causes for a single act of generation is impossible (the act would be infinite and never complete): Physics, V111.5, esp. 256a7-21.

59· Marti, Pugiofidei (as inn. g), 1.10.1, p. 222; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, Il.34· Marti adds tlle argument's source: Physics, I (see 1.9, 192a25-33).

6o. The first of these three focuses again on matter as the subject of motion and the necessary existence of an eternal subject, or matter. The second argument uses the association between

matter and Aristotle's concept of potentiality: anything which exists existed potentially before actually existing; potential existence itself existed prior to actual existence; yet if notlling existed prior to the world's beginning, then potential existence could not exist, which is impossible; therefore, the world must be eternal. The third argument also states that something existed prior to the world's existence because, in the process of making, there must be a pre-existing subject; that subject was either eternal or the latest of an infinite series of subjects which underwent change; as the latter involves an impossibility (an infinite regress of causes for one movement), prime matter must be eternal. See Marti, Pugiofidei (as inn. g), 1.10.2-4, pp. 222-23; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra

gentiles, II. 34· 61. Marti, Pugiofidei (as inn. g), 1.11.1-4, pp.

223-24; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles,

II.37·

ARISTOTLE I:'\' MEDIEVAL SPAIN 37

of the passage of time is the movement we perceive in the world around us. An obvious example (my own, not Aristotle's) of evidence of time passing is the apparent movement of the sun, which indicates the passage of hours and days. The accumulation of repeated motions, such as the regular appearance of the sun, enables us to use t1me as a measuring device with respect to motion itself, since we can then speak ofthe hours or days in which something took place.62

Since time and motion are co-extant, if Aristotle can show that time is eternal, then motion must be, too.63 If motion is eternal, then so is matter, the subject of motion. Two of Aristotle's arguments for the eternity of time became common­places, one based on his concept of 'now', the other on his notion of 'before'.

( i) The argument for eternity from 'now'

In the Physics, Aristotle describes time as a continuum composed of past and future, which are divided by an instant, or 'now' .64 'Now' is not properly speaking the present, nor is it part of time. Aristotle does not include the present in his descrip­tion of time: he says that while there is time that has been and time that will be, there is no time that is.65 In explaining his thoughts, he compared time \\>ith a line and considered the ways in which 'now' was similar to a point.66 A crucial differ­ence is that, unlike a point, the instant of 'now' is fluid. It serves to make time continuous: in the flow of time, wherever 'now' is, it divides past and future. The reason Aristotle can argue for the eternity of time is that, since throughout time 'now' has an attendant past and future, if one were to posit a beginning or end of time, one would find at its hypothetical extremity a 'now' \Vith a concluding past and an emerging future. Time therefore necessarily extends beyond that proposed extremity, and so has no beginning or end.ti7

Alvaro de Toledo, a cleric under Archbishop Gonsalo Garcia Gudiel of Toledo (d. 1299), sets out the problem in his commentary on Averroes's De substantia orbis, written sometime between 1286 and 12g8.6s Although Ah·aro says in the intro­duction that his purpose is to remove the errors from philosophy for Christians by gathering together 'poisonous sophisms' ( venenosa sophisrnata) and exposing their faults, his commentary is remarkably restrained, given that Averroes argues throughout the work for the eternal circular motion of the heavens. Alvaro mentions having written a treatise, De creatione mundi, in which he refutes these errors, but the work is unfortunately lost.69 In the commentary on Averroes he describes the argument using 'now' as follows:

62. Physics. JV, esp. 11, ~~~9"17-25.

63. On the eternity of both time and motion see f'h)•Sics, JV.14, 223"4-15 , and Vlll.1, 251b1o-28.

64. Ibid., 1v.tt, zzo"s, vr.3, 2;~3b32-2 :H•4, and 234a~2-!!3.

6:)· Ibid., 1\'.JO, 218"5-G. 66. Although Aristotle resisted seeing the 'now'

as entirely like a point, he made the following comparison: while one could posit points in a line, the line was not composed of 1hem; similarly. time was not composed of 'nows ': ibid., IV.lO, 2t8at8-19 and 11, 220"19-21, and Vt.l, 231b6-7.

67. Ibid .. VIII.l, 251b1g-28.

68. Alvaro de Toledo, Commentary on Averroes·s De substantia m"bis, ed. M. Alonso Alonso, Comentario

al 'De substantia mbis' de .1vnToes par Alvaro de Toledo,

1\fadrid 1941. For what little we know about Alvaro's life see the introduction to the edition, pp. 14-rf!; and F. Escobar Garcia, 'Alvaro , lilosofo ovetcnse ' , Boletin dellnstituto de Estudio.1 .A.stun"anos, XXI, 1 q67, pp. ~!3-65.

Gg. Alvaro de Toledo, CommentaiJ' (as in n. 68) , p. 276.

ANN GILETTI

Every instant is the intermediary between two times; and in every time there is an instant, for we call the instant that which stands at the end of the past and the start of the future, making them continuous. On account of this, a person who imagines an initial or final instant says that that instant is a 'not-instant'. And so he unites contradictions .... There­fore, before every time there is time. Since, however, we call time the number of motion according to before and after, it is necessary that motion exist when time exists. Therefore, because time is eternal (since before every time there is time), it is necessary that motion in general is eternaJ.7°

A.Jvaro does not refute the theory; he sets it out (and explains it further) in discussing Averroes's thinking.

Other Christian writers did, however, argue explicitly against this theory. An early treatment of the argument from 'now' appears in Ramon Marti's Pugio fidei. Marti employs texts from the Summa contra gentiles in presenting the argument and its counter-argument, supplemented by an addition of his ownJ1 He uses Thomas's refutation, which states that it is possible to compare the 'now' of time with a point of a line (as Aristotle had): since there can be a point at a line's extremity which has no line beyond it, similarly there can be a 'now' with no time beyond it. Aware that Aristotle intended the instant of 'nov/ to be fluid, .Marti, following Thomas, says that, even if it is fluid, we can still posit a different, first 'now' and a begin­ning of time. The ground for this proposal is that when we observe a particular movement, there is indeed a flow of movement and time; but, with respect to that particular movement, we can spot a beginning and an end of both_72

Marti introduces this argument with an additional one of his own. He seems to have noticed a potential snag in Thomas's refutation, in that, when comparing time to a line, while bearing motion in mind, one must remember that there are two kinds of motion, rectilinear and circular; and circular motion is not necessarily finite. Rectilinear motion is movement from one point to another along a straight line. In movement of this kind, it is immediately clear where the beginning and end are. Circular movement differs because the arc describing a circle has no apparent beginning or end. If we observe movement along this line, we have no way of knowing where the movement began or ended, as there are no terminal points.

The concept of circular lines and motion introduces an entirely different argument for the eternity of the world, one which is not taken into account in Thomas's counter-argument. It is the basis of an argument for the eternity of the world which, in the Middle Ages, was considered one of Aristotle's most convincing: that of the eternal movement of the heavenly spheres. Since with circular move­ment we come up against a continuum with nothing tojustif)· positing a start or an

70. '(O]mne instans est medium duorum temporum, et in omni tempore est instans. Tnstans enim inquimus quod de praeterito instal ad futurum, utntmque continuans. Propter hoc qui fantasiatur instans initiate aut terminate, dicit instans esse non instans. F.t ita congregat contra­dictoria .... Tgitur ante ornne tempus est tempus. Quoniam autem tempus inquimus numerum motus

secundum prius et posterius, necesse est moturn esse durn tempus est; quia ergo tempus est

aeternum, eo quod ante ornne tempus est ternpus, ncccssc est motum in genere esse aeternum': ibid.,

PP· 43-44; cf. pp. 16i-68. 71. For the pro aq~ument see Marti, Pug~o fidei

(as in n. q), 1.8-4, p. 219; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, 11.33; for the contra argument see Pugio fidei, L9-4· pp. 220-21; cf. Surrmw umlro gentiles, 11.36.

72. According to Aristotle, a single movement cannot be infinite: Physics, v 111.2, 2 ,j 2 u 1 o-1 2.

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN 39

end, movement along this line must be infinite; and the subject of this movement must move infinitely and so must exist eternally. The heavenly spheres have circular movement; therefore, they must be eternal.73

Marti does not mention this argument in discussing 'now'. Yet he is clearly mindful of it when he prepares the counter-argument because he introduces it with an additional point designed to pre-empt any objection based on circular move­ment. He mentions circular movement along with the rectilinear motion Thomas discusses, making the point that we can speak of time, movement and anything existing in nature in two ways: according to their coming into being, where ipso facto they have a beginning; or according to their completed states, where, in Aristo­telian terms, we have no reason to posit a beginning. These two ways of thinking are incompatible since neither accurately tells us about the state of things in the other. Marti explains that this inconsistency is like that between the states of a foetus in a uterus and a living human being, or a bird before and after being born from an egg. Philosophers err, he says, because they try to discuss the origin of the world based solely on information they have about its completed state: 'And in this, philosophers are deceived and deceive, applying proofs from the nature of the world as it is in its completed state of being to its nature as it was when it first came into being. '74 What Marti is saying is that the Aristotelian method of reasoning from the evidence in nature cannot enlighten us as to whether the world began. His purpose in saying this is to support the idea that time itself came into being from nothing; and, if his reader were to raise an objection based on the argument for eternal circular motion of the heavens, Marti would be able to defend the coming to be ex nihilo of movement as a whole, that is, both rectilinear and circular.

Later treatments of the argument from 'now' also consider the problem of circular motion. Anfredo Gonteri and Guido Terreni, a Catalan theologian, both highlight the argument from 'now' as one of Aristotle's strongest and include circular motion in their analysis, though neither solves the problem as Marti did. While Marti never suggested a source behind the objection about circular motion, both Gonteri and Terreni trace the idea to Averroes_75

In the Physics, after Aristotle demonstrates the eternity of time from 'now', 76 he immediately provides an argument for the eternity of motion on similar grounds (the argument explained in section A, above pp. 28ff).77 In his commentary on the Physics, when treating the first passage, Averroes elaborates on Aristotle's proof from 'now', recalling the terms in which the Philosopher had said earlier that 'now' is like a point in a straight line. Averroes compares time and rectilinear movement and explains that just as, if one takes a point within a process of move­ment, one will find movement before and after that point, so too, if one takes any 'now', one will find time before and after it. 7s

73· Ibid., vm.S, 261b26-262a1 and 264b9-265a11, and g, 265a11-b16.

74· 'Et in hoc decepti sunt decipiuntque philo­sophi, inducentes probationes a natura mundi prout est in esse suo completo, ad naturam eius prout primo fuit in fieri': Marti, Pugio fidei (as in n. g), 1.9·4• p. 2 21. Marti develops this idea further in chapter 14; see esp. section 6, pp. 233-34.

75· Averroes, Long Commentary on the Physics, VIII, comment 12, in Aristotle, Opera cum Averrois commentariis, g vols and 3 suppls, Venice 1562-74; repr. Frankfurt am Main 1962, IV, fol. 347r-v.

76. Physics, vm.1, 251b1g-28. 77· Ibid., 251b29-252a1. 78. Averroes, Long Commentary on the Physics,

VIII, comment 11, fols 346v-47r.

ANN GILETTI

Against this it was possible to argue, as Thomas Aquinas would do, that lines and movement can have a point of beginning. Yet, in his comment to the subse­quent argument, Averroes embellishes Aristotle's demonstration of the eternity of motion in a way which makes this counter-argument ineffective. When Aristotle spoke of motion, he clearly meant rectilinear motion. Averroes, however, applies the demonstration to circular motion (primus motus), which he says is eternal; and he shows that, even if circular motion were to come into being, this would involve prior motion, as Aristotle had shown in relation to rectilinear motion. 79 This reasoning leads to the trap of infinite prior motions (and infinite causes for one motion).so Thus, both rectilinear and circular motion are eternal and can in no way come into being. Averroes's argument probably lies behind Marti's addition to Thomas's response to the problem of 'now'.

When Anfredo Gonteri takes up the argument,s1 his approach is to point out that motions do begin, even circular ones, such as the turning of a potter's wheel. If we adhered strictly to Averroes's argument, the beginning of such a motion would be impossible, which is absurd.s2 If both kinds of motion can begin, then the argument for a beginning of time based on the beginning of a line can be used, whether that line is straight or circular.

79· Ibid., comment 12, fol. 347r-v. Averroes calls circular motion the primus motus because Aristotle defines it thus in Physics, vm.g.

So. See above, n. 58, on the impossibility of an infinite regress of causes.

81. Gonteri presents the Aristotelian position as follows: '[I] nstans in tempore est finis praeteriti et initium futuri. Ergo ante quodcumque instans signatum vel signabile fuit tempus. Et ante illud tempus aliud instans in infinitum. Ergo tempus est aeternum. Probatio ... quia sicut tempus sequitur motum ita motus magnitudinem (4 et 6 Physicorum [IV.II and v1.3-4]) et indivisibile temporis indivi­sibile motus et magnitudinis. Sed in magnitudine circulari caeli non est significare aliquod punctum quod non sit finis partis prioris et initium posteri­oris. Ergo, etc. Hanc rationem tangit Commentator 8 Physicorum, commento 12 [see above, n. 75]. Et confirmatur quia, sicut dicit Philosophus 8 [6 MS] Physicorum, in motu non est dare primum mutatum esse, ergo nee in tempore primum instans. Si ergo corpus de necessitate mobile est perpetuum et motus perpetuus et tempus et species omnium generabilium et corruptibilium et continuitas et perpetuitas motus in universo et ita a primo ad ultimum totus mundus est aeternus': Gonteri, Sentences commentary, 1322 (as inn. 26), 'Utrum Deus per potentiam creativam infinitam possit aliquid de novo producere de nihilo sive creare', fol. 337va. His final reference to the Physics is perhaps to VI.2, 233a17-21 (if eit!Ier time or motion is infinite, the other is too); though it is more likely an inversion of Physics, VIII.I, 2 51 b 10-

252a5, to which Averroes's comment 12 to Physics,

VIII relates. This argument does not appear in Gonteri's revised commentary of 1325.

82. Gonteri's counter argument (with his refu­tation of Averroes italicised): '[C]um dicitur ins tans est principium futuri et finis praeteriti, dicendo quod illud non est necessarium, et hoc negatur probabiliter, quia, si hoc conceditur, videtur quod novus motus posset incipere. Simile enim videtur de principio motus et de primo instante, quia, sicut motus et quicquid est in eo fluit, ita tempus et quic­quid est in eo, et ita non videtur sorte inconveniens dare instans inchoativum temporis, sicut non est inconveniens dare initium motus. Dico ergo quod instans unde instans non est finis praeteriti et principium futuri nisi sit instans continuatum sicut punctus in linea; sed instans initiativum non sic[ut], nee punctus initiativus lineae vel terminativus. Alii dicunt tamen probabiliter quod, licet tempus inceperit, non incepit in instante temporis positive, primo quia primum dicitur respectu secundi se habentis. Sed incepit in instante negative, secundum quod primum dicitur ante quod nullum prius .... . . . Ad aliud, cum dicitur "tempus est in circulo ", etc., verum est substantive, cum forma/iter est linearis dimensionis habens principium lineatim; et motus similiter, quia ad suppositum videmus alios motus incipere. Et per rationem illam Commentatoris, si valeret, probaret etiam quod tota rota figuli non posset moveri incipere. Cum dicitur in motu non est principium mutatum, est verum, quia mutatum esse de vi vocis dicit relationem ad motum praecedentem cuius ipsum est terminus; est tamen dare instans principium motus. Unde non esse indivisibile possi­bile signari in motu est mutatum esse, quia non

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAll\:

Guido Terreni's method is different. Like Gonteri, Terreni took part in the Parisian discussion of Aristotle. He was a Carmelite from Perpignan, which was part of Catalonia at the time. He studied in Paris under Godefroid de Fontaines (c.

1250-13o6/ g), becoming a master of theology in 131~) and later a doctor. He taught there until 131 7 or 13 1 8, during which time he wrote most of his philo­sophical writings. His most notable student was John Bacon thorpe (c. 1290-c. 1348), whose understanding ofAverroes's theory of the intellect would later cause Agostino Nito ( 1473-1545?) to call him-erroneously-'Prince of the Averroists'.s3 In 1318, Terreni was elected superior general of his order. He was named bishop of~ajorca in 1321 and transferred as bishop to Elna, in Roussillon, in 1332. He was involved in the royal politics of Aragon and had ties to the papal curia in Avignon, where he spent time assisting in political and doctrinal issues. On behalf of the Church he helped to pursue the Spiritual Franciscans, participating in the investigation of followers of Pierre Jean Olivi ( 124H-g8), as well as in the exami­nation of William of Ockham (c. 1285-1347/ 49) for heresy.~4 Terreni wrote a number of works on philosophy and theology, including a book of questions on the Physics, which includes analyses of Aristotle's arguments for the eternity of the world.85

In treating the argument from 'now' ,86 his tactic is to address Averroes first and to reject the application of circular lines to Aristotle's analogy of time with a line because it is not an adequate expression of movement generically. This allows him to restrict the comparison of time to a straight line which can have a starting point with nothing before it, thus maintaining the possibility that time, motion and the world began:

I say that 'now' is not the beginning and end of time. Consequently, they [i.e., the begin­ning and end of time] are not similar to a circular line, as Averroes imagines, but rather to a straight line, because what is demarcated was motion and time, on account of which

est indivisihile motum inchoans·: Gonteri, Sentences

commentary, 1 •)22 (as inn. 26), 'L'trum Deus per potcntiam creat.ivam infinit.am possit aliquid de novo producere de nihilo sivc cn:are'. fol. 339rb-va.

83. The name stuck beyond the time of Ernest Renan, but Banomcu Xibcna and James Ev.wiln showed it to be inappropriate: J. P. Etzwiler, 'Baconthorpe and Latin Averroism: The Doctrine of the Unique Intelkct', Cannelus, XVIII, 1971, pp. 235-92; idem, 'John Baconthorpe. "Prince oi' the Avcrroists?'", Franciscan Studies, xxxv1, 1976, pp. 148-76; B. M. Xiberta, 'joan Baconthorp. Averroista?', Criterion, m, 1927, pp. 45-60 and 2gb­~) H); and idem, De scriptm·ibus schulastids saeculi Xi\! ex(Jrdinecmmelitarum, Louvain 19cP• pp. 213-27.

84. For 1110rc infon!lation on Tcrrcni sec ~.

M. Xiberta, Guiu Terrena, CaTIIU!lita de Perpinya, Barcelona 1!.)32; idem, 'De doctrinis theologit:is magistri Cuidonis Terrini', Ilnalecta Ordinis Carmeli­

laram, v, 1925, pp. 233-376; and P. Fournier, 'Cui Terre (Guido Terreni), theologicn', Hi.sluire littf:ruire

de la France. XXXVI, 1927, pp. 432-·73.

85. Guido Tcrrcni, Quaestiones in librosPhysicarum,

Rome, Archivio Generale dell'Ordine Carmclitano MS 1 , Pcrs. 56 (15th century), t;v; folios.

86. Terreni renders Ariswtle's argument: '[N)unc est principium et finis tcmpOiis, ita quod ncccs.sario nunc est inter duo tempora. Quod ideo patet: nam si nunc sit principium l.emporis, quod autem est p1·incipium tcmporis est prius et ante, sed ante est prioris temporis. Ergo ante non fuit tempus quia ex quo est principium ct prius, prius autern antcquam nihil. Ergo necessaria, si nunc est principium ternporis, et est linis et sic erit intc1· duo tempora. Si ergo tempus fucrit antequam tempus esset, esset tempus quia tum fieri tum nunc et ipsum nunc praecedit. Ergo primum tempus praecedit tempus. Igitur tempus est aeternum. Ergo et motus erit aeternus cum tempus non sit sine motu': ibid., VIII, Q. 3 ('LtTum rnotus sit aeternus'), hll. Iogr. In his counter-argument, Terreni treats the argument from the 'now' along with the argument for 'before' as time (explained in Section (ii), below); see n.

99·

42 ANN GILETTI

there was an instant of time and there will be an end of time which is not a beginning, just as in a straight line there is a first beginning which is not an end, and there is an end which is not a beginning. Consequently, the sun did not exist from eternity, nor will it endure for eternity, because time will not exist forever.s7

(ii) The argument for 'before' as time

In a related argument for the eternity of time, Aristotle points out that the terms 'before' and 'after' presuppose time itself in that they are expressions which connote time.ss So, too, does the term 'beginning'. If one speaks of a beginning, one can speak of a 'before' prior to that beginning. Consequently, one can speak of time before the beginning of time. Time, therefore, is eternal, and so are move­ment and matter.

In confronting this argument, Marti once again reproduces Thomas's text, offering a refutation which hinges on the question of how time can be supposed to have existed before time.s9 He draws a comparison between time and the con­cept of place.9o Place, in Aristotle's system, is not a thing's location; it is something distinct which immediately and completely surrounds it. It is not surfaces of other things, such as what it rests on, or the surrounding air. Neither is it part of the thing or the outer extreme of its body. Place is a thing's boundary; it cannot exist without the thing it contains, and when the thing is moved, its place accompanies it.91

According to Aristotle, outside the universe there is nothing, not even a place (which must have something in it) nor a void (a place with nothing in it) .92 Marti, following Thomas, offers a refutation of the argument for infinite time based on a comparison with place: just as the world and the place of the world can exist without any place beyond them, so too the world and the time of the world can exist without any prior time. It is thus possible that there was no time before Creation.

The refutation ends with a variation on the comparison of time and place which considers the relative measures of duration and size. Marti, still following Thomas, says that the imagination may be able to add greater time and size to what exists, but an actual infinity in the case of size is inadmissible in Aristotelian terms. He cites Physics, III, where Aristotle contends that bodies cannot be infinite in size;93 and he argues that just as the world's size cannot be infinite, neither can its time.

87. '[D] ico quod nunc non est principium et finis temporis, unde non assimilantur lineae circulari ut fingit Averroes, sed magis lineae rectae, quia quod terminatur fuit motus et tempus propter quod ita fuit instans temporis et ita erit finis temporis quod non principium, sicut in linea recta primum principium non finis et finis quod non principium. Unde sol ab aeterno non fuit, nee etiam in aeternum durabit, quia non erit tempus in saecula': ibid., fol. 110r. This contra argument continues with a refutation of Aristotle's argument from 'before'; see below, n. gg, and accompanying text.

88. Physics, IV.14, 223a4-5, and VIII.l, 251b11. 8g. The pro argument is in Marti, Pugio fidei

(as in n. g), 1.8.6, p. 21g; cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentiles, 11.33· The contra argument is in Pugio fidei, 1.g.6, p. 2 21; cf. Summa contra gentiles,

11.36. go. Comparing time and place has a precedent

in Physics, IV .12. g1. Ibid., IV.1-7. g2. Decaelo, I.g, 27ga12-13, and 11.4, 287a13-14.

Aristotle denies that a void can exist: Physics, 1v.6-g. g3. Physics, m.6.

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN 43

At the conclusion of this explanation, Marti comments that al-Ghazali, in his Tahiifut alfaliisifa (Incoherence of the Philosophers), says that philosophers, falsely imagining such infinite measure to exist, are led into error.94 In the Tahiifut alfaliisifa, al-Ghazali had developed a similar response to the argument for the infinity of time based on the comparison of time with place and the teaching of Aristotle that no thing, place or void exists beyond the world. He explained that the imagination cannot comprehend something without supposing something prior to it; and this 'before' was assumed to be something existing itself, that is, time. Al-Ghazali went on to make the comparison with place outside the universe to resolve the problem.95 That Marti recalls al-Ghazali's handling of the argument and uses him as an authority against the eternity of the world is striking because the Tahiifut alfaliisifa was not translated into Latin and its contents were unknown to Marti's contemporaries.96 They took al-Ghazali for a supporter of Aristotle's theory because they misread views he reported in a companion work, the Maqiisid alfaliisifa (Aims of the Philosophers), as being his own.97 Instead, the arguments found there in favour of the eternity of the world were al-Ghazali's renditions of the teaching of Avicenna and al-Farabi, which he attacked in the Tahiifut alfaliisifa. Here and elsewhere in the Pugio fidei Marti uses al-Ghazali as an ally in combatting Aristotle's theory.9s

Guido Terreni refutes the argument that 'before' constitutes time by making precisely the same points as Marti and Thomas Aquinas: 'before' constitutes time only according to the imagination, just as, if one posits a beginning of a magnitude beyond which nothing exists, there cannot be beyond that beginning any place existing in nature; there can only be a place according to the imagination, as is the case ifwe say 'outside the heavens'.99 Anfredo Gonteri responds to the problem in

94· 'Et haec falsa imaginatio seduxit procul dubio Philosophos, ut dicit Algazel in libro Praecipitii vel ruinae Philosophorum': Marti, Pugio fidei (as in n. g), 1.g.6, p. 221.

95· Al-Ghazali, Tahiifut alfaliisifa, English transl. S. Ahmad Kamali, Al-Ghazali's Tahafut al-Falasifa (Incoherence of the Philosophers), Lahore 1963, pp.

37-39· g6. Al-Ghazali's Tahiifut alfaliisifa was never trans­

lated into Latin; Averroes's commentary on it, the Tahiifut al-tahiifut, consists of al-Ghazal!'s text broken into passages interspersed with Averroes's critique, so when the Tahiifut al-tahiifut was translated into Latin in 1328, the Tahiifut alfaliisifa also became available to Latin readers. The Latin translation of the Tahiifut alfaliisifa, however, appears not to have been widely read before the 16th century, nor to have cleared up the misunderstanding of al-Ghazali's thought: see B. H. Zedler's introduction to her edition of Tah'fut alfal'sifa: Averroes' Destructio destructionem philosophiae Algazelis in the Latin Version ofCalo Calonymos, Milwaukee, WI 1961, pp. 24-27; and M.-T. d'Alvemy, 'Algazel dans !'Occident latin', in Academie du royaume du Maroc, session de novembre r985, Rabat rg86, pp. 3-24; repr. in eadem, La

transmission des textes philosophiques et scientifiques au moyen age, Aldershot and Brookfield, VT 1994, art.

VII, PP· 15-17. 97· For example, see Giles of Rome, Errores

Philosophorum, ed. ]. Koch, English transl. ]. 0. Riedl, Milwaukee, WI 1944, pp. 38 and 44, and p. xlv in the editor's introduction. A notable excep­tion is Albert the Great who, although he thought al-Ghazali was a follower of Avicenna and al-Farabi, knew he had defended the world's beginning: A. Cortabarrfa Beitia, 'Literatura algazeliana de los escritos de San Alberto Magno', Estudios Filosoficos, XI, 1962, pp. 255-76, p. 271; and H. A. Wolfson, The Philosophy of the Kalam, Cambridge, MA and London 1976, pp. 595-g6.

98. Other references to al-Ghazal!'s stand against the eternity of the world in the Pugio fidei are at 1.1.8-9, p. 194, and 1.5·5· p. 209.

99· In Physics, VIII.l, Aristotle presents the argu­ment from the 'now' together with the argument from 'before' (251 b11-28). Most scholastic authors addressed them separately, but Terreni treats them as variations of one argument. Thus, for the one pro argument explaining the argument from the 'now' (see above, n. 86), he gives a complex answer

44 ANN GTLETTI

a similar way. 100 In an argument so abbreviated that it seems to acknowledge its status as a commonplace, he says that in this case the terms 'previously' or 'before' connote time only in the imagination and that time cannot exist beyond them any more than place or any thing can exist outside the heavens, even though we say 'outside':

When understanding the 'now' of eternity which preceded l.ime, that 'previously' or 'before' was not real but in the imagination, just as, [when l we say 'outside the heavens', 'outside' is not understood as positing [that some thing or place is outside]. 10 1

Imagining 'before' and concluding from this fantasy that the world must have existed before it actually did is a hypothesis which Ramon Llull skilfully circum­vents in his Ars m)•stica theologiae et philosophiae ( 1309). After treating the question 'vVhether the heavens are eternal' ,102 he addresses the question 'When were the heavens?' 103 In doing so, he takes into account the Aristotelian assumptions about 'now' and 'before', refusing to allow that there could be any past prior to the first 'now'. He does so by defining 'now' as an accident (quality or attribute) of the heavens. This is possible because time cannot exist on its own, relating as it does to motion and motion's subject. Llull proceeds as follows:

It is asked: when were the heavens?t04 It should be answered that it was in that 'now' in which they were begun; from which 'now', along with other qualitative accidents (and from substance), the body of the heavens was composed, just as they became coloured when colour was fixed to them.

It is asked: when was the 'now' of the heavens in the succession of motion? It should be answered that it was then, when motion was fixed to the motion of the heavens.

covering this and the argument from 'bcfon:', so

that the text quoted here immediately follows that quoted above (n. 87): 'Nee valet quod dicitur, "guia principiurn est prius", non igitur sicut principium est prius sed prius antequam nihil. "Ante" autem est tempus. Ergo non fuit sine tempore praecedenre. Dico quod non est necesse quod , si nunc est principium ct sit finis, quia ibi non est proprie prius sed tantum secundum imaginationem nostram ut, cum dicitur quod principium magnitudinis est extra quod nihil est, non oportet quod extra illud principium significet aliquem locum in natura ex­istentem, sed imaginabile tantum sicut non oportet quod, cum dicitur "extra caelum", imelligatur locus

realis sed tantum secundum irnaginationern. Sed, cum dicitur quod non est principium tcmpor·is ame quod nihil est, si au tern significet tempus non reate sed tantum secundum imaginationem, quare non oportet quod antt' principium temporis sit tempus': Terreni, Quaestiones in libros Physicorum (as in n. 8 ~ ),

Vlll, Q. 3, fol. 1 1 or. 100. Gonteri ,·enders the pro argument: '(S)i

tempus ponitur factum de novo, ante suum esst' fuit suum non esse; sed "ante·' et "post", cun1 sinL

differentiae tt>mporis, ncccssario praesupponunt tempus. Ergo qui negat ipsum semper fuisse ponit

necessario ipsum h1isse. Et per idem probatu1· quod non potest desinirc esse quia si desinit esse post non erit. Sed post est differt'ntiae temporis': Gomeri, Sentences commentary, 1322 (as in n. 26) , 'Ltrurn Deus per potentiam creativam infinitam possit aliquid de novo producere de nihilo sive crcare', fol. 337rb·va. This aq~ument does not appear in

Gonteri's revised commt'ntary of 1325. 101. '[l)llud "prius" vel "ante" non li1it reale sed

in imaginatione intelligendo nunc eternitatis quod praecessit tcmpu,, sicut dicimus "extra caelum", "extra" accipitur non ponitive': ibid., fol. 33~{b.

102. Llull, Ars myslica lheologiae et philosophiae (no. 154), in ROL, v, pp. 2:;9-4G6 (410-14).

103. l.lull is testing his Art on theological and philosophical questions. Ht>n! he applies its inter· rogatory clements (a series of words for posing questions including 'whether', 'what' and 'why') to

the term caelum in order to come to conclusions about the nature of the heavens.

104. This question is part of a series of questions including: '\Vhat are the heavens)', 'Why are the heavens?', 'How much are the heavens?' and '\-Vhcre a1·e the heavens?' It is answert'd as if the question were: 'Since when were the heavens?'

ARISTOTLE II\ MEDIEVAL SPAIN 45

It is asked: why did God not create the heavens before he did create them?J05 And it should he answered: because there was not a 'before' of time ... because if you consider them [i.e., the heavens] before being [and] before time, this is a fiction.m;

It will be helpful to restate Llull's argument. Time, motion and the heavens began together in the first 'now'. Time and motion are accidents of the heavens, just like colour. The question of why God did not create the world before he did is invalid because the heavens could not exist before time, since time is merely an attribute of the heavens. In posing such a question, one is imagining the heavens before they existed and before time, which is pure fantasy.

Conclusion

The examples cited above derive from works of diverse character, and their authors originate from different kingdoms. This makes it difficult to speak of these Iberian writers as a group. They cannot be said to constitute a network and, in fact, there is little hard evidence that they knew each other. 107 vVe do know that, when he was a boy, Alvaro Pelayo lived and studied in the court of Sancho IV. 10R There is no indication that any acquaintances were formed benveen Iberian scholars in Paris, though Anfredo Gonteri and Guido Terreni overlapped there (Gonteri, already in Paris by 1;)03, remained afterwards, and Terreni was certainly there by 1304),109

and Terreni was still there when Ramon Llull visited during the years 1309-11

(when Llull's most copious anti-Aristotelian writing took place). Ephrem Longpre, examining an anecdote which Llull told disapprovingly about a missionary he had met who had visited Tunis and who had unsuccessfully attempted to convert the sultan to Christianity, connected the details of the story 'vith fact~, known and

105. This question was a commonplace in scholastic discourse, relating to the theory of God's eternal creation of the world: what could have induced God to create when he did, rather than

before? 1 o6. 'Quaeritur: Quando fuit caelum' Respon­

dendum est quod in illo nunc, in quo inceptum fnil; ex quo nunc cum aliis accidentibus prae­dicamentalibus et ex substantia componitur corpus caeli; sicut coloratum est, quando color in ipsum contractus est.

Quaeritur: Quando nunc caeli fuit in successione motus? Respondendum est, quod tunc, quando motus fuit contractus ad motum caeli.

Quaeritur: Quare Deus non crea~it caelum, ante~ quam creavit ipsum) Et respondendum est, quia non erat ante temporis ... quia si consideres illud ante esse ante tempus, figmentum est': Llull, ilrs

HI)'Stica (as inn. 102), p. 417.

107. Although I am speaking here about authors who treated the eternity of the world, even when one considers Iberian writers on Aristotelian natural philosophy more generally, there are only rare

examples of acquaintances among them. :Vfost notable is Alvaro Pelayo's mention in his De planctu

ecclesiaeofGonsalvo de Balboa, also a Gallician Fr.m­ciscan, who became a theologian at the University of Paris and taught Duns Scotus, later becoming Master General of the Franciscans. Pelayo, in De

planctu ecclesiae, compliments Consalvo and recalls how Gonsalvo received him into the Franciscan Order in Assisi; for an analysis of these references see L. Amoros, introduction to his edition of Gonsalvus Hispanus, O.F.M., Quaestiones disputatae

et de quodlibet (probably c. 1 ;)02-<)3), Florence 1 935, esp. p. xxviii, and pp. xix, xx, xxi-xxii and xxx~iii.

108. See Chord.o Lavajo (as inn. 46), p. 309. tog. v'l'e know that Gonteri attended the lectures

of Duns Scotus in Paris in t:3o;3, when he submitted to the order of Philip IV of France t.o ignore a council summons issued by Boniface Vlll so that he could continue to study in Paris; see Amor6s, ' :\nfredo Gm1tero' (as in n. 25), p. 549· Philip's order was one event in his struggle with Boniface vnr for control of the clergy; members of the university who did not obey were expelled from France. We know that Terreni was in Paris before 1304 because his teacher, Godefmid de Fontaines,

was master of theology there until that date.

ANN GILETTI

supposed, about Ramon Marti.llO It has since been considered plausible that Llull met Marti and wrote this story about him, and that the events described in the anecdote actually occurred.m I have doubts about this, however, since Llull repeated the tale in seven works over a period of around twenty-five years,m with the identifYing details appearing only in later versions; moreover, these details are inconsistent with each other and with what we know about Marti.l 13 If Llull did indeed write the story about Marti, or superimposed his impression of Marti on the character in the tale, he was sorely ignorant of his work. In fact, in a treatise containing a late version of the story (of March 1309, the same date as that of the version on which Longpre based his analysis), before speaking disparagingly about the missionary character, Llull cites as an admirable model Thomas Aquinas's Summa contra gentiles, the work to which Marti had already paid great reverence in his Pugio fidei)I4

Although in themselves these thinkers do not constitute a network, their writings-precisely because of the variety which they represent-indicate that diffusion and study of Aristotle's natural philosophy was taking place. In each

110. E. Longpre, 'Le B. Raymond Lulie et Raymond Marti O.P.', Bolleti de la Societat Arqueo­logica Lul.liana, XXIV, 1933, pp. 269-71, repr. in Estudios Lulianos, XIII, 1969, pp. 197-200. The details of the story which seem to fit with Marti are: the missionary is ajraterwho travels to Tunis with a group of associates (socii), as Marti did in 1250 and 1268-69; he is literate (litteratus) in Arabic and speaks it with the sultan; he reads and speaks Hebrew and is a magister in Hebrew; he offers the sultan an exposition of the Creed in Arabic, a text which Marti could have composed, possibly by translating his Explanatio symboli apostolorum; and he participates in a debate with a Jew in Barcelona, as Marti may have done in the famous debate of 1263 before Jaume I of Aragon.

111. See, e.g., J. Chorao Lavajo, 'Urn confronto metodologico no dialogo islamo-christao medieval: Raimundo Marti e Raimundo Lulo', Revista de Hist6ria das Ideias, III, 1981, pp. 315-40, repr. as 'The Apologetical Method of Raymond Marti According to the Problematic of Raymond Lull', Islamochristiana, XI, 1985, pp. 155-76; E. Colomer, 'Ramon Llull y Ramon Marti', Estudios Lulianos, xxvm, 1988, pp. 1-37 (4); A. Cortabarria Beitia, 'Connaissance de !'islam chez Raymond Lulie et Raymond Martin O.P. paralle!e', Cahiers de Fanjeaux, xxn ('Raymond Lulie et le Pays d'Oc'), 1987, pp. 33-55 (38); A. Bonner, 'L'apologetica de Ramon Marti i Ramon Llull davant de !'islam i del judaisme', Estudi General, IX, 1989 (El debat inter­cultural als sebles XII i XlY, Actes de les I Jornades de Filosofia Catalana, Girona April 1988), pp. 171-85 (17g-8o); idem, 'Ramon Llull and the Dominicans', Catalan Review, IV, 1990, pp. 337-92 (379 and 384); and Hillgarth (as in n. 40), pp. 21-22.

112. Llull, Libre de Blanquerna, of 1283, in Obres de Ramon Lull, ed. S. Calmes et a!., 21 vols, Palma de Majorca 1906-50, IX, p. 326; Felix or Llibre de meravelles, of 1288-89, in Obres selectes de Ramon Llull, ed. A. Bonner, 2 vols, Majorca 1989, 11, pp. 19-393 (47-48); Liber de quinque sapientibus, of 1294, in MOG, 11, pp. 125-74 (126-27); Disputatio fidei et intellectus, of 1303, in MOG, IV, pp. 479-504 (48o); Liberdefine, of 1305 (no. 122), in ROL, IX,

pp. 25o-91 (267-68); Liber de convenientia fidei et intellectus in objecto, of March 1309, in MOG, IV,

pp. 571-75 (574); and Liber de acquisitione Terrae Sanctae, of March 1309, ed. E. Longpre, in 'Le Liber de acquisitione Terrae Sanctae du bienheureux Raymond Lulie', Criterion, m, 1927, pp. 265-78 (276-77); the passage with the story is reproduced in idem, 'Le B. Raymond Lulie', on pp. 197-98.

113. While Longpre's argument is based largely on the Liber de acquisitione Terrae Sanctae, earlier versions are strikingly different: in Blanquerna, the story is recounted in a letter from a Saracen king to the pope requesting proof of Christian doctrine in order for the king and his subjects to convert (all of which duly happens); in the Liber de quinque sapientibus, the Saracen is not a king but a wise man encountering a Christian hermit, not a missionary. Other late versions contain details which certainly do not fit Marti: the Liber de convenientia fidei et intellectus describes the missionary as learned in Arabic, history and ethics, but not in logic and natural philosophy; the Liber de fine has him ill­trained in philosophy and theology (while in the Liber de acquisitione Terrae Sanctae the missionary offers the sultan an exposition on the Creed).

1 14. Llull, Liber de convenientia fidei et intellectus (as inn. 112), p. 572. On the date of this work see Bonner, Selected Works (as inn. 40), I, p. 97 n. 13.

ARISTOTLE IN MEDIEVAL SPAIN 47

author we find discussion of the arguments for the eternity of the world as presented by Aristotle in the Physics. The treatments of the problem show an understanding of Aristotle's arguments, whether on a basic level, as in the Lucidario of Sancho IV, or on a sophisticated one, even incorporating the thoughts of Averroes and al-Ghazali:, as in the cases of Guido Terreni and Ramon Martf. What all the writers were primarily concerned about was how to disprove the theory so that the doctrine of Creation would remain unchallenged. As a collection, their arguments reflect participation in the high-profile debate in Paris as well as the distillation of Aristotle's teaching in Latin Iberian thought.