Henry of Ghent and John Duns Scotus on Divine Illumination

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Biography

Henry of Ghent, also known as Doctor Solemnis, was born early in the 13^th century in Ghent, Belgium. Little is known about his life, but there are records of him working as an archdeacon in Bruges and Tournai. He also lived in Tournai for some time, working as a secular priest and canon. Although he did not live in Paris, his reputation at the University of Paris suggests that he taught there frequently. He was named a Doctor of Theology in 1277, and became famous for his lectures. Henry was censured by the Catholic Church in 1290 for opposing the mendicant orders, which relate to the vow of poverty certain leaders of the Church are required to take. His influence in Tournai and the University of Paris continued until his death in 1293.

Further details about Henry's life and works, reliable or not, are difficult to come by partially because he didn't leave a strong historical record and also because his work is largeley inaccessible to modern scholars and philosophers. Many of his works remain unpublished.

His works include: Quodlibeta, Summa Theologica, Treatise on Logic, Commentary on Aristotle's Physics, De Virginitate, and Questiones super Decretalibus.

Original image: "Map of Central Europe 1555"

John Duns Scotus, a Franciscan philosopher and scholastic theologian, was likely born in 1266; the location and precise date of his birth is still contested (the name we use for him today suggests that he was a Scot, from Duns). He studied and taught at Oxford for some time, and founded the Scotist School, which loosely followed the writings of Aristotle and Augustine, also including some elements of Plato. He worked briefly in Paris as the Franciscan regent master in theology before being sent to Cologne, where he died in 1308.

Around 1298 Scotus wrote a commentary on Peter Lombard's Sentences. This work became the basis of his lectures in Paris around 1302. The next year Scotus and eighty other friars took the Pope's side in an argument with the king and were subsequently banished from France after a "shakedown" at the convent in Paris. They were readmitted about ten months later, after the old Pope died and his replacement settled the dispute with the king.

His works include: parva logicalia, questions on Porphyry's Isagoge and Aristotle's Categories, Peri hermeneias, De sophisticis elenchis, Quaestiones super De anima, Quaestiones subtilissimae super Metaphysicam Aristotelis, and Expositio on Aristotle's Metaphysics.

Records of his lectures on Sentences are fragmented and difficult to sort. They are collected from student notes and several different versions of Scotus's self-arranged commentaries. No definitive version exists, and it is believed that he worked on the piece until his death.

Scotus was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1993.

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Sources

1. "Henry of Ghent" at Encyclopedia Britannica.
2. "John Duns Scotus" at New Advent.
3. "Henry of Ghent" at New Advent.
4. "John Duns Scotus" at Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
5. "John Duns Scotus (1266-1308)" at Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.