Fedor Nekhaenko

Power and its sources have always been essential questions for political philosophy. One of the ways to legitimize power is political theology which was discussed at length during the XX century. The proposed paper considers Christian political theology as a project constructed by Carl Schmitt and Giorgio Agamben. Both thinkers defended their models and criticized their main “enemy”, Erik Peterson. While Schmitt believed in Christian legiti- mization for the status quo and Agamben dreamed of the coming community without an identity, Peterson argued that Christian doctrines (Trinity, Parousia, etc.) deem any political authority meaningless. A majority of researchers scrutinized and critically evaluated the level of theoretical arguments of the aforementioned thinkers. On the contrary, we have chosen to analyze all of the key and referenced theologians (Paul, Eusebius, Eunomius, Gregory of Nyssa, and Augustine) to prove that Schmitt-Agamben’s notion of Christian political the- ology is controversial. Like Peterson with Eusebius, Schmitt and Agamben employed loose translations in trying to integrate their ideas (sovereignty, absolute anarchy) into original Christian texts. The detailed analysis allows the paper to deliver a kind of negative conclusion that Christian political theology has no ground in the sources these thinkers have credited. Nevertheless, our research calls for a new round of discussion: was this critique caused by Christian sources selected inappropriately by Schmitt, Peterson, and Agamben, or by the essential incompatibility between Christianity and political theology? Polemics might get a new “positive” horizon with the help of this question.

The paper contains the first Latin transcription and an English translation of the first part of the second book of Hugh of Saint-Cher's Opus, his commentary on Peter Lombard's Sentences accomplished between 1231 and 1234. The transcription is based on the codex Vat. lat. 1098 collated with five auxiliary manuscripts. In line with William of Auxerre and Alexander of Hales Hugh critically disavows pagan and heretical stances represented by Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, and Manichean regarding the creation of the world. My foreword sheds light on the philosophical value of presented arguments plus the historical background of the issue and Hugh's relation with contemporary theologians whose ideas Hugh rearranges and modifies in one concise text. I argue that Hugh blends together these four authorities to challenge and reject the concepts of eternity and dualism. The theologian imputes dualism — contrary to the run-of-the-mill attribution of three beginnings — to the Stagyrite while putting the concept of opposite principles from Aristotle referenced before by William in Cathar's mouth. Even Plato and Epicurus become proponents of the heretical repudiation of creation from nothing in favor of divine production from adjacent matter which aligns the Greeks with Cathars' metaphysics. Hugh's Opus, if not original in the modern sense, anticipated a surge of refutations aimed at heretics and “Averroists”. The proposed isomorphism between Aristotle-Heretic and Cathar-Peripatetic partially molded early arguments in the theological Sentences as well as inquisitorial Summa. Whereas the focus on Сathars' dualism diminished when they were brutally wiped off the map, William, Alexander, and Hugh's reasons against the Peripatetic view on eternity continued to draw attention among theologians fighting back “Averroism”.

Though Daemonologia, like ontologia and anthropologia, is not genuinely medieval, but conceived in the Renaissance, it remains valid to apply such categories to the medieval intellectual culture. By doing so, we can restore the continuum of historical development. The present paper investigates the role of Hugh of Saint-Cher (ca. 1190-1263) within the domain of scholastic demonology. Specifically, it focuses on distinctions II.7-8 from Hugh's commentary on the Sentences (ca. 1231-1234) which has been transcribed, collated, and translated by me for the first time. I begin by examining Hugh's forerunners among scholastics in order to ultimately pick out Alexander of Hales. He was the sole precursor who invested in pushing demonology beyond conventional boundaries. Onwards, I demonstrate the diversity of thematic issues Hugh addresses. His text aims at accommodating a rational explanation and critique of the demonic procreation, healing, body assumption, locution, and wonders. Notably, Hugh's work demonstrates a relatively limited influence of Aristotle. The Dominican instead endows Lombard's text with illuminating stories about Balaam, Simon Magus, Apuleius, and Bartholomew. Hugh's ideas would go on to serve as the cornerstone for further elaboration of the demonology in the 1230s and 1240s. Subsequently, I offer an extensive overview of Hugh's impact on the handwritten tradition, clearly discernable through critical reception in Richard Fishacre, John de la Rochelle, and Eudes Rigaud's writings. What is more, I point out alternative ways to entail demonology by drawing upon evidence from Roland of Cremona and Alexander of Hales. After all, I consider Aristotle's impact on early scholastic demonology between 1225 and 1245.