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Grice e Capocci: la ragione conversazionale e
l’implicatura conversazionale del significare e santificare – il sacramento
evangelico significa grazia e sanctifica grazia – scuola di Viterbo – filosofia
lazia -- filosofia italiana – Luigi Speranza, pel Gruppo di Gioco di H. P.
Grice, The Swimming-Pool Library (Viterbo). Filosofo lazio. Filosofo
italiano. Viterbo,
Lazio. Grice: “I like Capocci; he was a Griceian; he opposed Aquinas on the
dependence of will and intellectus – surely they are independent, and possibly
the will is more basic! La ‘volonta,’ as the Italians call it! -- “That’s how I
shall call himothers favour “Giacomo da Viterbo.”” Essential Italian philosopher – Di famiglia
nobile, studia a Viterbo. His monicker was ‘il dottore speculativo”. Insegna a
Napoli. Il suo saggio più conosciuto, “De regimine christiano” Approfondisce
i temi della teocrazia, e del potere temporale del cesare e il suo stato. Altre opere: “Quaestiones disputatae de praedicamentis in divinis”. “Summa
de peccatorum distinctione” – “there are surely more than seven sins – Multiply
sins beyond necessity --. Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani.Vi sono
in cui Giacomo viene raffigurato con un'aureola – segno naturale accordo di
Peirce del santo.Mariani identified two manuscripts containing a Summa de
peccatorum distinctione: Biblioteca Nazionale di Napoli, cod. vii G. 101 and
Biblioteca di Montecassino, both of which ascribe the work to James. Ypma does
not mention. Summa de peccatorum distinctione Fratris Jacobi de Viterbio Sacrae
Theologiae Professoris, Fratrum Eremitarum Sancti Augustini, Archiepiscopi
Neapolitani. AMBRASI, La Summa de peccatorum distinctione del b. Giacomo
da Viterbo dal ms. VII G 101... GUTIERREZ, De vita et scriptis Beati Iacobi de
Viterbo, “ Analecta Augstiniana ”, XVI,Lectura super IV libros Sententiarum
Quaestiones Parisius disputatae De praedicamentis in divinis Quaestione de
animatione caeli Quaestiones disputatae de Verbo Quodlibeta quattuor
Abbreviatio In Sententiarum Aegidii Romani De perfectione specierum De regimine
christiano Summa de peccatorum distinctione Sermones diversarum rerum
Concordantia psalmorum David De confessione De episcopali officio Like many of
his contemporaries, James devotes serious attention to determining the status
of theology as a science and to specifying its object, or rather, as the
scholastics say, its subject. In Quodlibet III,
q. 1, he asks whether theology is principally a practical or a speculative
science. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, for an Augustinian, James responds that the
end of theology resides principally not in knowledge but in the love of God.
The love of God, informed by grace, is what distinguishes the way in which
Christians worship God from the way in which pagans worship their deities. For
philosophers—James has Cicero in mind—religion is a species of justice; worship
is owed to God as a sign of submission. For the Christian, by contrast, there
can be no worship without an internal affection of the soul, i.e., without
love. James allows that there is some recognition of this fact in Book X of
the Nicomachean Ethics, for the happy man would not be “most
beloved of God,” as Aristotle claims he is, if he did not love God by making
him the object of his theorizing. In this sense, it can be said that philosophy
as well sees its end as the love of God as its principal subject. But there is
a difference, James contends, in the way in which a science based on natural
reason aims for the love of God and the way in which sacred science does so:
sacred science tends to the love of God in a more perfect way. One way in which
James illustrates the difference between both approaches is by contrasting the
ways in which God is the “highest” object for metaphysics and for theology. The
proper subject of metaphysics is being, not God, although God is the highest
being. Theology, on the other hand, views God as its subject and considers
being in relation to God. Thus, James concludes, “theology is called divine or
of God in a much more excellent and principal way than metaphysics, for
metaphysics considers God only in relation to common being, whereas theology
considers common being in relation to God” (Quodl.). Another way in
which James illustrates the difference between natural theology and sacred
science is by using St. Anselm's distinction between the love of desire (amor
concupiscientiae) and the love of friendship (amor amicitiae).
The love of desire is the love by which we desire an end; the love of
friendship is the love by which we wish someone well. The love of God
philosophers have in mind, James contends, is the love of desire; it cannot, by
the philosophers' own admission, be the love of friendship, for according to
Aristotle, at least in the Magna Moralia, friendship involves a
form of community or sharing between the friends that cannot possibly obtain
between mere mortals and the gods. Now although James concedes that a
“community of life” between God and man cannot be achieved by natural means, it
is possible through the gift of grace. The particular friendship grace affords
is called charity and it is to the conferring of charity that sacred scripture
is principally ordered.Like all scholastics since the early thirteenth century,
James subscribes to the distinction between God's ordained power, according to
which “he can only do what he preordained he would do according to wisdom and
will” (Quodl.) and his absolute power, according to which he can do
whatever is “doable,” i.e., whatever does not imply a contradiction. Problems
concerning what God can or cannot do arise only in the latter case. James
considers several questions: can God add an infinite number of created species
to the species already in existence (Quodl. I, q. 2)? Can he make
matter exist without form (Quodl.)? Can he make an accident subsist
without a substrate (Quodl.)? Can he create the seminal reason of a
rational soul in matter (Quodl.)? In response to the first question,
James explains, following Giles of Rome but against the opinion of Godfrey of
Fontaines and Henry of Ghent, that God can by his absolute power add an
infinite number of created species ad superius, in the ascending
order of perfection, if not in actuality, then at least in potency. God cannot,
however, add even one additional species of reality ad inferius,
between prime matter and pure nothingness, not because this exceeds his power
but because prime matter is contiguous to nothingness and leaves, so to speak,
no room for God to exercise his power (Côté). James is more hesitant about the
second question. He is sympathetic both to the arguments of those who deny that
God can make matter subsist independently of form and to the arguments of those
who claim he can. Both positions can reasonably be held, because each argues
from a different (and valid) perspective. Proponents of the first position
argue from the point of view of reason: because they rightly believe that God cannot
make what implies a contradiction, and because they believe (rightly or
wrongly) that making matter exist without form does involve a contradiction,
they conclude that God cannot make matter exist without form. Proponents of the
second group argue from the perspective of God's omnipotence which transcends
human reason: because they rightly assume that God's power exceeds human
comprehension, they conclude (rightly or wrongly) that making matter exist
without form is among those things exceeding human comprehension that God can
make come to pass.Another question James considers is whether God can make an
accident subsist without a subject or substrate. The question arises only with
respect to what he calls “absolute accidents,” namely quantity and quality, as
opposed to relational accidents—the remaining categories of accident. God
clearly cannot make relational accidents exist without a subject in which they
inhere, for this would entail a contradiction. This is so because relations for
James, as we will see below, are modes, not things. What about absolute
accidents? As a Catholic theologian, James is committed to the view that some
quantities and qualities can subsist without a subject, for instance extension
and color, a view for which he attempts to provide a philosophical
justification. His position, in a nutshell, is that accidents are capable of
existing independently if they are thing-like (dicunt rem). Numbers,
place (locus), and time are not thing-like and are thus not capable of
independent existence; extension, however, is and so can be made to exist
without a subject. The same reasoning applies to quality. This is somewhat
surprising, for according to the traditional account of the Eucharist, whereas
extension may exist without a subject, the qualities, color, odor, texture,
necessarily cannot; they inhere in the extension. James, however, holds that
just as God can make thing-like quantities to exist without a subject, so too
must he be able to make a thing-like quality exist without the subject in which
it inheres. Just which qualities are capable of existing without a subject is
determined by whether or not they are “modes of being,” i.e., by whether or not
they are relational. This seems to be the case with health and shape: health is
a proportion of the humors, and so, relational; likewise, shape is related to parts
of quantity, without which, therefore, it cannot exist. Colors and weight, by
contrast, are non-relational, according to James, and are thus in principle
capable of being made to exist without a subject.The fourth question James
considers in relation to God's omnipotence raises the interesting problem of
whether the rational soul can come from matter. James proceeds carefully,
claiming not to provide a definitive solution but merely to investigate the
issue (non determinando sed investigando). The upshot of the
investigation is that although there are many good reasons (the soul's
immortality, its spirituality and its per se existence) to
say that God cannot produce the seminal reason of the rational soul in matter,
in the end, James decides, with the help of Augustine, that such a possibility
must be open to God. Thus, it is true that in the order which God has de
facto instituted, the soul's incorruptibility is repugnant to matter,
but this is not so in absolute terms: if God can miraculously cause something
to come to existence through generation and confer immortality upon it (James
is presumably thinking of the birth of Christ), then he can make it come to
pass that souls are produced through generation without being subject to
corruption. Likewise, although it appears inconceivable that something material
could generate something endowed with per se existence, it
is not impossible absolutely speaking: if God can confer separate existence
upon an accident—despite the fact that accidents naturally inhere in their
substrates—then, in like manner, he can confer separate existence upon a soul,
although it has a seminal reason in matter. Scholastics held that because God
is the creative cause of all natural beings, he must possess the ideas
corresponding to each of his creatures. But because God is eternal and is not
subject to change, the ideas must be eternally present in him, although
creatures exist for only a finite period of time. This doctrine of course
raised many difficulties, which each author addressed with varying degrees of
success. One difficulty had to do with reconciling the multiplicity of ideas
with God's unity: since there are many species of being, there must be a
corresponding number of ideas; but God is one and, hence, cannot contain any multiplicity.
Another, directly related, difficulty had to do with the ontological status of
ideas: do ideas have any reality apart from God? If one denied them any kind of
reality, it was hard to see how they could function as exemplar causes of
things; but to attribute full-blown essential reality to them was to run the
risk of introducing multiplicity in God. One influential solution to these
difficulties was provided by Thomas Aquinas, who argued that divine ideas are
nothing else but the diverse ways in which God's essence is capable of being
imitated, so that God knows the ideas of things by knowing his essence. Ideas
are not distinct from God's essence, though they are distinct from the essences
of the things God creates (De veritate). One can discern two answers
to the problem of divine ideas in the works of James of Viterbo. At an early
stage of his career, in the Abbreviatio in Sententiarum Aegidii Romani—assuming
one accepts, as seems reasonable, the early dating suggested by Ypma
(1975)—James defends a position that is almost identical to that of Thomas
Aquinas (Giustiniani). In his Quodlibeta, however, he moves to a
position closer to that of Henry of Ghent. In the following I will sketch
James' position in the Quodlibeta as it provides the most
mature statement of his views. Although James agreed with the notion that ideas
are to be viewed as the differing ways in which God can be imitated, he did not
think that one could make sense of the claim that God knows other things by
cognizing his own essence unless one supposed that the essences of those things
preexist in some way (aliquo modo) in God. James' solution is to
distinguish two ways in which ideas are in God's intellect. They are in God's
intellect, firstly, as identical with it, and, secondly, as distinct from it.
The first mode of being is necessary as a means of acknowledging God's unity;
but the second mode of being is just as necessary, for, as James puts it (Quodl. I,
q. 5, p. 64, 65–67), “if God knows creatures before they exist, even insofar as
they are other than him and distinct (from him), that which he knows is a
cognized object, which must needs be something; for that which nowise exists
and is absolutely nothing cannot be understood.” But James also thinks
that the necessity of positing distinct ideas in God follows from a
consideration of God's essence. God enjoys the highest degree of nobility and
goodness. His mode of knowledge must be commensurate with his nature. But
according to Proclus, an author James is quite fond of quoting, the highest
form of knowledge is knowledge through a thing's cause. That means that God
knows things through his own essence. However, he does so by knowing his essence as a
cause, and that is possible only by knowing “something (aliquid)
through a cause, not merely by knowing that which is the cause (i.e., God)”.
Although James' insistence on the distinctness of ideas with respect to God's
essence is reminiscent of Henry of Ghent's teaching, it is important to note,
as has been stressed by M. Gossiaux (2007), that James does not conceive of
this distinctness as Henry does. For Henry, ideas possess esse
essentiae; James, by contrast, while referring to divine ideas as things (res),
is careful to add that they are not things “in the absolute sense but only
determinately,” viz., as cognized objects (Quodl. I, q. 5, p. 63,
60). Thus, divine ideas for James possess a lesser degree of distinction from
God's essence than do Henry of Ghent's. Nevertheless, because James did
consider ideas to be distinct in some sense from God, his position would be
viewed by some later authors—e.g., William of Alnwick—as compromising divine
unity. The concept of being, all the medievals agreed, is common. What was
debated was the nature of the commonness. According to James of Viterbo, all
commonness is founded on some agreement, and this agreement can be either
merely nominal or grounded in reality. Agreement is nominal when the same name
is predicated of wholly different things, without there being any objective
basis for the application of the common name; such is the case -of equivocal
names. Agreement is real in the following two cases: (1) if it is based on
some essential resemblance between the many things to which
a particular concept applies, in which case the concept applies to these many
things by virtue of the self same ratio and is said of them
univocally; or (2) if that concept is truly common to the many things of which
it is said, although it is not said of them relative to the same nature (ratio),
but as prior to one and posterior to the others, insofar as these are related
in a certain way to the first. A concept that is predicated of things in this
way is said to be analogous, and the agreement displayed by the things to which
it applies is said to be an agreement of attribution (convenientia
attributionis). James believes that it is according to this sense of
analogy that being is said of God and creatures, and of substance and accident
(Quaestiones de divinis praedicamentis I, q. 1, p. 25, 674–80).
For being is said in a prior sense of God and in a posterior sense of creatures
by virtue of a certain relation between the two; likewise, being is said first
of substance and secondarily of accidents, on account of the relation of
posteriority accidents have to substance. The reason why being is said in a
prior sense of God and in a secondary sense of creatures and, hence, the reason
why the ‘ratio’ or nature of being is different in the two cases is
that being, in God, is “the very thing which God is” (Quaestiones de
divinis praedicamentis, q. 1, p. 16, 412), whereas created being is only
being through something added to it. From this first difference follows a
second, namely, that created being is being by virtue of being related to an
agent, whereas uncreated being has no relation. These two differences can be
summarized by saying that divine being is being through itself (per se),
whereas created being is being through another (per aliud) (Quaestiones
de divinis praedicamentis, q. 1, p. 16, 425–6). In sum, being is said of
God and creature, but according to a different ratio: it is said
of God according to the proper and perfect nature of being, but of creatures in
a derivative or secondary way.James' most detailed discussion of the
distinction between being and essence occurs in the context of a question that
asks if creation could be saved if being (esse) and essence were not
different (Quodl. I, q. 4). His answer is that although he finds
it difficult to see how one could account for creation if being and essence
were not really different, he does not believe it is necessary to conceive of
the real distinction in the way in which “certain Doctors” do. Which Doctors
does he have in mind? In Quodl. I, q. 4, he summarizes the
views of three authors: Godfrey of Fontaines, according to whom the distinction
is only conceptual (secundum rationem); Henry of Ghent, for whom esse is
only intentionally different from essence, a distinction that is less than a
real distinction but greater than a rational distinction; and finally, Giles of
Rome, for whom esse is one thing (res), and essence
another. Thus, James agrees with Giles, and disagrees with Henry and Godfrey,
that the distinction between being and essence is real; however, he disagrees
with Giles about the proper way of understanding the real distinction.The
starting point of his analysis is Anselm's statement in the Monologion that
the substantive lux (light), the infinitive lucere (to
emit light), and the present participle lucens (emitting
light) are related to each other in the same way as essentia (essence), esse (to
be), and ens (being). The relation of lucere to lux,
he tells us, is the relation of a concrete term to an abstract one. To-emit-light
denotes light as an act, just as to-be (esse) denotes essence from the
point of view of an act. Now, a concrete term signifies more things than the
corresponding abstract term, e.g., esse signifies more
things than essence, for essence signifies only the form, whereas esse signifies
the form principally and the subject secondarily. By ‘subject’ James means the
actually existing thing, which he also calls the aggregate or supposit (Wippel
1981). Esse and essence thus signify the same thing principally,
but differ in terms of what they signify secondarily. Although this difference
is only conceptual in the case of God, it is real in the case of creatures. It
is this difference that explains why one does not predicate to-emit-light (lucere)
of light itself (lux) or being of essence: what properly exists is
that which has essence, viz., the supposit. Esse denotes
essence as existing in a supposit.The kernel of James' solution, then, lies in
the distinction between what terms signify primarily and secondarily. To his
mind, this is what makes his solution closer in spirit to Giles of Rome than to
either Godfrey or Henry, without committing him to a conception of the
distinction as rigid as that of Giles. The distinction is real for James, but
in a qualified way (Gossiaux 1999). Because identity or difference between
things is determined to a greater degree by primary rather than by secondary
signification, it follows that essence and existence are primarily and
absolutely the same (idem) and conditionally or secondarily distinct.
Yet, although the distinction is conditional or secondary, it is nonetheless
James devotes five of his Quaestiones de divinis praedicamentis (qq.
11–15), representing some 270 pages of edited text, to the question of
relations. It is with a view to providing a proper account of divine relations,
he explains, that it is “necessary to examine the nature of relation with such
diligence” (Quaestiones de divinis praedicamentis, q. 11, p. 12,
300–301). But before turning to Trinitarian relations, James devotes the whole
of q.11 to the status of relations in general. The following account focuses
exclusively on q. 11. James in essence adopts Henry of Ghent's “modalist”
solution, which was to exercise considerable influence among late thirteenth-century
thinkers (Henninger 1989), although he disagrees with Henry about the proper
way of understanding what a mode is.The question boils down to whether
relations exist in some manner in extra-mental reality or solely through the
operation of the intellect, like second intentions (species and genera). Many
arguments can be adduced in support of each position, as Simplicius had already
shown in his commentary on Aristotle's Categories—a work that
would have a decisive influence on James' thought. For instance, in support of
the view that relations are not real, one may point out that the intellect is
able to apprehend relations between existents and non-existents, e.g., the
relation between a father and his deceased son; yet, there cannot be anything
real in the relation given that one of the two relata is a non-existent. But if
so, then the same must be true of all relations, as the intellectual operation
involved is the same in all cases. Another argument concerns the way in which
relations come to be and cease to be. This appears to happen without any change
taking place in the subject which the relation is said to affect. For instance,
a child who has lost his mother is said to be an orphan until the age of
eighteen, at which point it ceases to be one, although no change has occurred:
“the relation recedes or ceases by reason of the mere passage of time.”But good
reasons can also be found in support of the opposing view. For one, Aristotle
clearly considers relations to be real, as they constitute one of the ten
categories that apply to things outside the soul. Furthermore, according to a
view commonly held by the scholastics, the perfection of the universe cannot
consist solely of the perfection of the individual things of which it is made;
it is also determined by the relations those things have to each other; hence,
those relations must be real.The correct solution to the question of whether
relations are real or not, James contends, depends on assigning to a given
relation no more but no less reality than is fitting to it. Those who rely on
arguments such as the first two above to infer that relations are entirely
devoid of reality are guilty of assigning relations too little reality; those
who appeal to arguments such as the last two, showing that relations are
distinct from their subjects in the way in which things are distinct from each
other, assign too great a degree of reality to relations. The correct view must
lie somewhere in between: relations are real, but are not distinct from their subjects
in the way one thing is distinct from another.That they must be real is
sufficiently shown by the first Simplician arguments mentioned above, to which
James adds some others of his own. However, showing that they are not things is
slightly more complicated. James' position, in fact, is that relations are not
things “properly and absolutely speaking,” but only “in a certain way according
to a less proper way of speaking.” A relation is not a thing in an absolute
sense because of the “meekness” of its being, for which reason “it is like a
middle point between being and non-being” (Quaestiones de divinis
praedicamentis, q. 11, p. 30, 668–9). The reasoning behind this last
statement is as follows: the more intrinsic some principle is to a thing, the
more that thing is said to be through it; what is maximally intrinsic to a
thing is its substance; a thing is therefore maximally said to be on account of
its substance. Now a thing's being related to another is, in the constellation
of accidents that qualify that thing, what is minimally intrinsic to it and
thus farthest from its being, and so closest to non-being. But if relations are
not things, at least in the absolute sense, what are they? James answers that
they are modes of being of their foundations. “The mode of
being of a thing does not differ from the thing in such a way as to constitute
another essence or thing. The relation, therefore, is not different from its
foundation” (Quaestiones de divinis praedicamentis, q. 11, p. 33,
745–7). Speaking of relations as modes allows us to acknowledge their reality,
as attested by experience, without hypostasizing them. A certain number's being
equal to another is clearly something distinct from the number itself. The number
and its being equal are two “somethings” (aliqua), says James; they
are not, however, two things; they are two in the sense that one
is a thing (the number) and the other is a mode of being of the number.In
making relations modes of being of the foundation, James was
clearly taking his cue from Henry of Ghent, who has been called “the chief
representative of the modalist theory of relation” (Henninger 1989). For Henry
and James, relations are real in the sense that they are distinct from their
foundations and belong to extra mental reality. However, James' understanding
of the way in which a relation is a mode differs from Henry's. For Henry, a
thing's mode is the same thing as its ratio or nature; it is
the particular type of being that thing has, what “specifies” it. But according
to James' understanding of the term, a mode lies beyond the ratio of
a thing, like an accident of that thing (Quaestiones de divinis
praedicamentis, p. 34, 767–8). In conclusion, one could say that in his
discussion of relations, James was guided by the same motivation as many of his
contemporaries, namely securing the objectivity of relations without conferring
full-blooded existence upon them. Relations do exhibit some form of being,
James believed, but it is a most faint one (debilissimum), the
existence of a mode qua accident. James discusses individuation in two
places: Quodl. I, q. 21 and Quodl. II, q.
1. I will focus on the first treatment, because it is the lengthier of the two
and because the tenor of James' brief remarks on individuation in Quodl. II,
q. 1, despite certain similarities with his earlier discussion (Wippel 1994),
make it hard to see how they fit into an overall theory of individuation.The
question James faces in Quodl. I, q. 21 is a markedly
theological one, namely whether, if the soul were to take on other ashes at
resurrection, a man would be numerically the same as he was before. In order to
answer that question, James tells us, it is first necessary to determine what
the cause of numerical unity is in the case of composite beings. There have been
numerous answers to that question and James provides a short account of each.
Some philosophers have appealed to quantity as the principle of numerical
unity; others to matter; others yet to matter as subtending indeterminate
dimensions; finally, others have turned to form as the cause of individuation.
According to James, each of these answers is part of the correct explanation
though it is insufficient if taken on its own. The correct view, according to
him, is that form and matter taken together are the principal causes of
numerical identity in the composite, with quantity contributing something “in a
certain manner.” Form and matter, however, are principal causes in different
ways; more precisely, each accounts for a different kind of numerical unity.
For by ‘singularity’ we can really mean two distinct things: we can mean the
mere fact of something's being singular, or we can point to a thing qua
“something complete and perfect within a certain species” (Quodl. I,
21, 227, 134–35). It is matter that accounts for the first kind of singularity,
and form for the second. Put otherwise, the kind of unity that accrues to a
thing on account of its being a mere singular, results from the concurrence of
the “substantial” unity provided by matter and the “accidental” unity provided
by quantity. By contrast, the unity that characterizes a thing by virtue of the
perfection or completeness it displays is conferred to it by the form, which is
the principle of perfection and actuality in composites.Although James thinks
he can quite legitimately enlist the support of such prestigious authorities as
Aristotle and Averroes in favor of the view that matter and form together are
constitutive of a thing's numerical unity, his solution has struck commentators
as a somewhat contrived and ad hoc attempt to reach a compromise solution at
all costs (Pickavé 2007; Wippel 1994). James, it has been suggested, “seems to
be driven by the desire to offer a compromise position with which everyone can
to some extent agree” (Pickavé 2007: 55). Such a suggestion does accord with
what we know about James' temperament, namely, his dislike of controversy and
his tendency, on the whole, to prefer solutions that present a “middle way” (Quaestiones
de divinis praedicamentis, q. 11, p. 23, 513; Quodl. II,
q. 7, p. 108, 118; De regimine christiano, 210; see also Quodl. II,
q. 5, p. 65, 208–209). However, James' professions of moderation must sometimes
be taken with a grain of salt, as there are some positions he wants to pass off
as moderate that are quite far from being so, as we will see in Section 7 below.The
belief that matter contains the ‘seeds’ of all the forms that can possibly
accrue to it is one of the hallmarks of James of Viterbo's thought, as is the
belief that the soul pre-contains, in the shape of “propensities” (idoneitates),
all the sensitive, intellective, and volitional forms it is able to take on. We
will look at James' doctrine of propensities in the intellect in Section 5, and his
doctrine of propensities in the will in Section 6. In this
section, we present James' arguments in favor of seminal reasonsOne important
reason for subscribing to the existence of seminal reasons is that the doctrine
enjoys the support of Augustine. Although James is sometimes quite
critical of his Augustinian contemporaries, including his predecessor Giles of
Rome, he is an unreserved follower of Augustine, especially when it comes to
the greater philosophical issues, such as knowledge and natural causation.
However, what is particularly interesting about James is the way in which he
enlists such decidedly un-Augustinian sources as Aristotle, Averroes, and
especially Simplicius in the service of his Augustinian convictions (Côté
2009). James offers a thorough discussion of seminal reasons in Quodl. II,
q. 5. The question he raises there is not so much whether there are
seminal reasons, for this is “admitted by all Catholic doctors” (Quodl. II,
q. 5, p. 59, 16), but rather, how one is to properly conceive of them. A
seminal reason, according to James, has two characteristics: it is (1) an
inchoate state of the form to be, and (2) an active principle. Most of the
discussion in Quodl. II, q. 5 is devoted to establishing the
first point. James thinks that the thesis that forms are present in potency in
matter is consonant with the teaching of Aristotle, who, he claims, follows a
“middle way” on the issue of generation, eschewing both the position that forms
are created, and also Anaxagoras' “hidden-forms hypothesis,” according to which
all forms are contained in act in everything. Now to say that forms are present
in matter inchoately or in potency, according to James, entails that the
potency of matter is something distinct from matter itself.
One argument in favor of this thesis is that matter is not corrupted by the
taking on of a form: it remains in potency towards other forms. Also, potency
is relational, whereas matter is absolute. When James states that matter is
distinct from potency he does not mean to say that they are entirely distinct
or unconnected, quite the contrary: potency is the potency of matter.
However, potency adds three characteristics to the concept of matter. First, it
adds the idea of a relation to a form (matter is in potency towards a form);
second, it adds the idea that the form to which it is related is a form it
lacks; finally, it implies that the form which matter lacks is a form it has
the capacity to acquire, for as James explains, one does not say that a stone
is in potency toward the power of sight merely because it lacks sight. In order
for something to be in potency toward a particular form it must both lack that
form and also possess an aptitude to take it on. James neatly summarizes his
views in the following passage: “[the potency of matter] denotes a respect of
the matter toward the form, attendant upon its lacking that form and having the
aptitude to take it on, so that four properties are included in the concept of
potency, namely matter, lack of form, aptitude toward the form and a respect
toward the form insofar as it is educible by an agent and motor cause” (Quodl. II,
q. 5, p. 69, 359 – p. 70, 363). The originality of James' position lies in the
way in which he conceives matter's aptitudes. The term “aptitude” has a precise
technical meaning, which he fleshes out with the help of Simplicius' commentary
on the Categories. It denotes a certain incipient or inchoative
state of the form in matter. Potency and act, James tells us, are two states or
modes of the same thing, not two distinct things. What exists in the mode of actuality
must preexist in the mode of potency, but in an inchoate way. James is aware of
the several objections that may be leveled against his conception of aptitudes
or propensities. The most serious of these is perhaps the charge that their
existence makes generation, i.e., the production of new beings, impossible or
useless. James replies by suggesting that those who argue in this fashion
misconstrue Aristotle's doctrine of change. For change, according to Averroes'
understanding of Aristotle (see Quodl. III, q. 14), does not
result from an agent's implanting a form in a receiving subject, for this would
imply that forms “migrate” from subject to subject; it results rather from an
agent's making that which is in potency to be in act. For this to occur,
however, more is required than the mere passive potency of matter: the seminal
reason must also be viewed as an active principle. The activity of potency
manifests itself in the shape of a natural inclination or tendency to attain
its completion. Generation thus requires two things (besides God's
general operative causality): the “transmutative” agency of an extrinsic cause
and the intrinsic agency of the formae inchoativum which
inclines the potency to attain its completion. James' doctrine of seminal
reasons would elicit considerable criticism in the early fourteenth century and
beyond (Phelps 1980). The initial reaction came from Dominicans, e.g., Bernard
of Auvergne, the author of a series of Impugnationes (i.e.,
attacks) contra Jacobum de Viterbio, and John of Naples who
argued against James' distinction between the potency of matter and potency.
But James' theory would also encounter resistance from within the Augustinian
Order, e.g., from Alphonsus Vargas of Toledo. James' doctrine of cognition must
also be understood in the context of his thoroughgoing Augustinianism and
against the backdrop of the late thirteenth-century arguments against Thomistic
abstraction theories. According to Thomas Aquinas' theory of knowledge, the
agent intellect abstracts a thing's form or essential information from the
image or representation of that thing. The outcome of this process was what
Aquinas called the intelligible species, which was then taken to “move” the
possible intellect to conceptual understanding. However, as thinkers such as
Vital du Four and Richard of Middleton were to point out (see the articles by
Robert and Noone), the information coming in through the senses is related to a
thing's accidental properties, not to its substance. How, then, could abstraction
from the senses produce an intelligible species relating to the thing's
essence? Although James of Viterbo agreed by and large with the spirit of this
objection and believed that the replies by proponents of abstractionism were
unsuccessful, he had another reason for rejecting the theory. This was because
it implied a view of the intellect which he thought to be profoundly mistaken,
namely, the view that there is a real distinction between the agent intellect
(which abstracts the species) and the possible intellect (which receives it).
If it were truly the case, he reasoned, that one needed to posit a distinct
agent intellect because phantasms are only potentially intelligible, then, by
the same token, one would have to posit an “agent sense”, because sensibles
“are only sensed in potency” (Quodl. I, q. 12, p. 164, 234). But
given that no proponent of abstraction admits an agent sense, one should not
allow them an agent intellect. Furthermore, if there were an agent intellect
distinct from the possible intellect, it would be a natural power of the soul
and so would be required for the cognition of all intelligibles,
not just a certain class of them. Similarly, qua natural power, its use would
be required not only in the present life but also in the afterlife. But of
course that would be absurd, as the agent intellect, ex hypothesi,
is only necessary to abstract form from matter, something the mind does only
when it is joined to a corruptible body. James was well aware that by
denying the distinction between the two intellects, he was opposing the
consensus view of Aristotle commentators. Indeed, his views seem to run counter
to the De anima itself, though, as he would mischievously
point out, it was difficult to determine just what Aristotle's doctrine was, so
obscure was its formulation (Quodl. I, q. 12, p. 169, 426—170,
439). He replied that what he was denying was not the existence of a
“difference” in the soul, but merely that the existence of a difference implied
a distinction of powers (Quodl. I, q. 12, p. 170, 440–45). The
intellect, he held, was both in act and in potency, active and passive, but one
could account for its having these contrary properties without resorting to the
two intellect model. This is because intellection is not a transient action
(like hitting a ball), requiring an active subject distinct from a passive
recipient; rather, it is an immanent action (like shining). James' solution, in
other words, was to conceive of the intellect (as indeed the will) as
essentially dynamic, as an “incomplete actuality”, its own formal cause,
spontaneously tending toward its completion, much in the way seminal reasons
tend toward their completing forms—indeed both discussions drew their
inspiration from the same source: Simplicius' commentary on Aristotle's
analysis of the second species of quality. The intellect was described as a
general (innate) propensity made up of a series of more specific (equally
innate) propensities, the number of which was a function of the number of
different things the intellect is able to know: “The intellective power is a
general propensity with respect to all intelligibles, that is, with respect to
the actual conforming to all intelligibles. On this general propensity are
founded other specific ones, which follow the diversity of intelligibles” (Quodl. VII,
q. 7, p. 93, 453–55). Of course, as James readily acknowledged, although the
intellect is its own formal cause, it cannot issue forth an act of intellection
without some input from the senses. However, the type of causality the senses
were viewed as exercising was deemed to be purely “excitatory” or “inclinatory”
(Quodl. I, q. 12, p. 175, 613–16), making the senses not the
principal but rather an instrumental cause of intellection. In all, three
causes account for the operation of the intellect, according to James: 1) God
as efficient cause; 2) the soul and its propensities as formal cause, and 3)
the object presented by the senses as “excitatory” cause. Although, as we have
just seen, James rejected the distinction between the agent and possible
intellects, there was another, equally widely-held distinction in the area of
psychology that he did maintain, namely the distinction between the soul and
its powers.For the purposes of this article, it will suffice to think of the
debate regarding the relation of the soul to its powers as being motivated at
least in part by the need to provide a coherent understanding of the soul's
structure and operations in view of two inconsistent but equally authoritative
accounts of the soul's relation to its powers. One was that of Augustine, who
had asserted that memory, intelligence, and will (i.e., three powers) were one
in substance (De trinitate X, 11), and so believed that the soul
was identical with its powers; the other was Aristotle's, who clearly believed
in a certain distinction, and whose remarks about natural capacities (dunameis)
as belonging to the second species of quality, in Categories c.
8,14–27, and hence to the category of accident, making them distinct from the
soul's essence, were commonly applied by the scholastics to the soul's powers.
Each view, of course, had its supporters; and, naturally, as was so often the
case, attempts were made to find a middle way that would accommodate both
positions. During James' tenure as Master at the University of Paris, the
majority view was very much that there was a real distinction. It was the view
held by many of the scholastics whose teachings he studied most carefully,
namely Aquinas, Giles of Rome, and Godfrey of Fontaines. There was, however, a
commonly discussed minority position, one that eschewed both real distinction
and identity: that of Henry of Ghent. Henry believed that the powers of the
soul were “intentionally”, not really, distinct from its essence. James,
however, sided with Thomas, Giles, and Godfrey, against Henry (Quodl. II,
q. 14, p. 160, 70–71; Quodl. III, q. 5, p. 83, 56—84, 63).
His reasoning was as follows. Given that everyone agreed that there was a real
distinction between the soul and one of its powers in act (between the soul
and, e.g., an occurrent act of willing), then if one denied that there was a
real distinction between the soul and its powers, as Henry had, one would be
committed to the existence of a real distinction between the power in act
(e.g., an occurrent act of willing) and that same power in potency (that is,
the will, qua power, as able to produce that act), since the power in act is
really the same as the soul. But as we saw in the preceding section, something
in potency is not really distinct from that same thing in act. This followed
from James' reading of Simplicius' account of qualities in the latter's
commentary on Aristotle's Categories. For instance, seminal
reasons are not really distinct from the fully-fledged forms that proceed from
them, nor are intellective “propensities” really distinct from the fully
actualized cognized forms. Hence, James concluded, the powers must be really
distinct from the soul's essence. The question of the will's freedom was of
paramount importance to the scholastics. Unlike modern thinkers, for whom
establishing that the will is free is tantamount to showing that its act falls
outside the natural nexus of cause and effect, showing that the will is free,
for medieval thinkers, usually involved showing that its act is independent of
the apprehension and judgment of the intellect. Although the
scholastics generally granted that a voluntary act results from the interplay
between will and intellect, most of them preferred to single out one of the two
faculties as the principal determinant of free choice. Thus, for Henry of
Ghent, the will is the sole cause of its free act (Quodl. I, q. 17),
so much so that he tends to relegate the intellect's role to that of a sine qua
non cause. For Godfrey of Fontaines, by contrast, it is the intellect that
exercises the decisive motion (Quodl. III, q. 16). Although James of
Viterbo sometimes claims to want to steer a middle course between Henry and
Godfrey (Quodl. q.), his preferences clearly lie with a position like
that of Henry's, as can be gathered from his most detailed treatment of the
question in Quodl. I, q. 7. James' thesis in Quodl.
I, q. 7 is that the will is a self-mover and that the object grasped by the
intellect moves the will only metaphorically. His main challenge is to show is
that this position is compatible with the Aristotelian principle that whatever
is moved is moved by another. As we saw in the previous section, James believes
that the soul is made up of what he calls “aptitudes” or “propensities” (idoneitates),
which are the similitudes of all things knowable and desirable, “before [the
soul] actually knows or desires them” (Quodl. I, q. 7, p. 91, 407 – p.
92, 408). The pre-existence of such aptitudes implies that the soul is neither
a purely passive potency nor made up of fully actualized forms, but rather an
“incomplete actuality” or, perhaps more correctly, a set of “incomplete
actualities,” which James describes as being “naturally inserted in [the soul],
and thus, remaining in it permanently, though sometimes in an imperfect state,
sometimes in a state perfected by the act” (Quodl. I, q. 7, p. 92,
419–24). In order to show how this view of the soul is compatible with
Aristotle's postulate that every motion requires a mover distinct from the
thing moved, James introduces a distinction between two sorts of motion:
efficient and formal. Efficient motion occurs when motion is caused by a thing
that possesses the complete form of the particular motion caused; formal motion
occurs when the moving thing has the incomplete form of the thing moved.
Heating is given as an example of the first kind of motion; “gravity” or rather
heaviness, i.e., the tendency of heavy bodies to fall, is cited as an example
of the second kind of motion. Aristotle's principle applies only to the first
kind of motion, James asserts, not the second. Things which possess an
incomplete form naturally—i.e., in and of themselves without an external
mover—tend to their completion and are prevented from reaching it only by the
presence of an external obstacle. For instance, a heavy object naturally tends
to move downward and will do so unless it is hindered. Such, mutatis
mutandis, is the case of the soul and especially of the will: the will as
an incomplete actuality naturally tends to its completion; in that sense, that
is, formally but not efficiently, it is self-moved. The difference between it
and the heavy object is that whereas the object moves upon the removal of
an obstacle, the will requires the presence of an object; it
requires, in other words, the intervention of the intellect in order to direct
it to a particular object. However, once again, the intellect's action is
viewed by James as being merely metaphorical, that is, extrinsic to the will's
proper operation. Like Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas, James of Viterbo
holds that the moral virtues, considered as habits, i.e., virtuous dispositions
or acts, are connected. In other words, he believes that one cannot have one of
the virtues without having the others as well. The virtues he has in mind are
what he calls the “purely” moral virtues, that is, courage, justice, and
temperance, which he distinguishes from prudence, which is a partly moral,
partly intellectual virtue. In his discussion in Quodl. II, q. 17
James begins by granting that the question is difficult and proceeds to expound
Aristotle's solution, which he will ultimately adopt. As James sees it,
Aristotle proves in Nicomachean Ethics VI the connection of
the purely moral virtues by showing their necessary relation to prudence, and
this is to show that just as moral virtue cannot be had without prudence,
prudence cannot be had without moral virtue. The connection of the purely moral
virtues follows from this: they are necessarily connected because (1) each is
connected to prudence and (2) prudence is connected to the virtues (Quodl.
II, q. 17, p. 187, 436 – p. 188, 441). Since the time of Augustine, theologians
had agreed that man needs the gift of grace in order to love God more than
himself, and that he cannot do so by natural means. However, in the early
thirteenth century, theologians raised the question of whether, at least in his
pre-lapsarian state, man did not love God more than himself. That this was in
fact the case was the belief of Philip the Chancellor as well as Thomas
Aquinas. Other authors, such as Godfrey of Fontaines and Giles of Rome, argued
further that to deny man the natural capacity to love God more than himself,
while allowing this to happen as a result of grace, was to imply that the
operations of grace went counter to the those of nature, which was contrary to
the universally accepted axiom that grace perfects nature and does not destroy
it. By contrast, James of Viterbo famously argues in Quodl. II,
q. 2, against the overwhelming consensus of theologians, that man naturally
loves himself more than God. He has two arguments to show this (see Osborne
1999 and 2005 for a detailed commentary). The first is based on the principle
that the mode of natural love is commensurate with the mode of being and,
hence, of the mode of being one. Now a thing is one with itself by virtue of
numerical identity, but it is one with something else by virtue of a certain
conformity. For instance Socrates is one with himself by virtue of his being
Socrates, but he is one with Plato by virtue of the fact that both share the
same form. But the being something has by virtue of numerical identity is
“greater” than the being it has by reason of something it shares with another.
And given that the species of natural love follows the mode of being, it
follows that it is more perfect to love oneself than to love another (Quodl.
II, q. 20, p. 206, 148 – p. 149, 165). The second argument attempts to infer
the desired thesis from the universally accepted premise that “the love of
charity elevates nature” (Quodl. II, q. 20, p. 207, 166–67). This
is true both of the love of desire and the love of friendship. In the case of
love of desire, grace elevates by acting on the character of love: by natural
love of desire we love God as the universal good. Through grace God is loved as
the beatifying good. Regarding love of friendship, James explains that God's
charity can only elevate nature with respect to its “mode,” that is, with respect
to the object loved, by making God, not the self, the object of love. In other
words, James is telling us that if we are to take seriously the claim that
grace elevates nature, there is only one way in which this can occur, namely by
making God, not the self, the object of greatest love, which implies that in
his natural state man loves himself more than God. James' opposition to the
consensus position on the issue of the love of self vs. the love of God would
not go unnoticed. In the years following his death, such authors as Durand of
Saint-Pourçain and John of Naples criticized him vigorously and attempted to
refute his position (Jeschke 2009). Although James touches briefly on political
issues in Quodl. I, q. 17 (see Côté, 2012), his most extensive discussions
occur in his celebrated De regimine christiano (On
Christian Government), written in 1302 during the bitter conflict pitting
Boniface VIII against the king of France Philip IV (the Fair). De
regimine christiano is often compared in aim and content with Giles
of Rome's De ecclesiastica potestate (On Ecclesiastical
Power), which offers one of the most extreme statements of pontifical
supremacy in the thirteenth century; indeed, in the words of De
regimine's editor, James' goal is “to formulate a theory of papal monarchy
that is every bit as imposing and ambitious as that of [Giles]” (De
regimine christiano: xxxiv). However, as scholars have also recognized,
James shows a greater sensitivity to the distinction between nature and grace
than Giles (Arquillière 1926). De regimine christiano is
divided into two parts. The first, dealing with the theory of the Church, is of
little philosophical interest, save for James' enlisting of Aristotle to show
that all human communities, including the Church, are rooted in the “natural
inclination of mankind.” The second and longest part is devoted to defining the
nature and extent of Christ's and the pope's power. One of James' most
characteristic doctrines is found in Book II, chapter 7, where he turns to the
question of whether temporal power must be “instituted” by spiritual power, in
other words, whether it derives its legitimacy from the spiritual, or possesses
a legitimacy of its own. James states outright that spiritual power does
institute temporal power, but notes that there have been two views in this
regard. Some, e. g., the proponents of the so-called “dualist” position such as
John Quidort of Paris, hold that the temporal power derives directly from God
and thus in no way needs to be instituted by the spiritual, while others, such
as Giles of Rome in De ecclesiastica potestate, contend that the
temporal derives wholly from the spiritual and is devoid of any legitimacy
whatsoever “unless it is united with spiritual power in the same person or
instituted by the spiritual power” (De regimine christiano: 211).
James is dissatisfied with both positions and, as he so often does, endeavors
to find a “middle way” between them. His solution is to say that the “being” of
the temporal power's institution comes both from God—by way of man's natural
inclination—in “a material and incomplete sense,” and from the spiritual power
by which it is “perfected and formed.” This is a very clever solution. On the
one hand, by rooting the temporal power in man's natural inclination, albeit in
the imperfect sense just mentioned, James was acknowledging the legitimacy of
temporal rule independently of its connection to the spiritual, thus
“avoid[ing] the extreme and implausible view of [Giles of Rome]” (Dyson 2009:
xxix). On the other hand, making the natural origins of temporal power merely
the incomplete matter of its being was a way of stressing its subordination and
inferiority to the spiritual order, in keeping with his papalist convictions.
Still, James' very choice of analogies to illustrate the relationship between
the spiritual and temporal realms showed that his solution lay much closer to
the theocratic position espoused by Giles of Rome than his efforts to find a
“middle way” would have us believe. Thus, comparing the spiritual power's
relation to the temporal in terms of the relation of light to color, he
explains that although “color has something of the nature of light, (…) it has
such a feeble light that, unless there is present a more excellent light by
which it may be formed, not in its own nature but in its power, it cannot move
the vision” (De regimine christiano: 211). In other words, James is
telling us that although temporal power does originate in man's natural
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Lehre,”Analecta Augustiniana, Giacomo da Viterbo. L’iconografia
dell’aureola tra Oriente e Occidente ARTE L’iconografia dell’aureola tra
Oriente e Occidente di Federico Nozza. Nell’arte cristiana occidentale, ma
anche in quella orientale, l’elemento dell’aureola costituisce sicuramente uno
degli attributi iconografici più riconoscibili. La sua immagine
identifica subito la rappresentazione di un Santo, di Cristo stesso, ma anche
della Madonna. Può essere crocesegnata(ossia dotata di croce), per esempio
nelle rappresentazioni di Cristo, oppure semplice, come nei santi. Come
elemento figurativo, la sua origine è stata codificata iconograficamente fin
dagli albori della figuratività cristiana, ovvero nel IV secolo.
Gli esempi del Mausoleo di Sant’Elena a Roma e della Chiesa di San Vitale
a Ravenna Testimonianza preziosa e paradigmatica sono, ad esempio, i due
mosaici delle calotte absidali del Mausoleo di Santa Costanza a Roma. Si tratta
di un cimelio architettonico costruito attorno alla metà del IV secolo per la
sepoltura della figlia di Costantino. Nei due mosaici, parzialmente restaurati
e tra i pochi ad essersi conservati delle volte, si trovano due
rappresentazioni di Cristo. La prima lo vede seduto sul Globo, mentre consegna
le chiavi del Regno dei Cieli a Pietro (traditio clavium). La seconda,
invece, lo identifica giovane e apollineo mentre si erge sul monte da cui
sgorgano i quattro fiumi dell’Eden, consegnando a Paolo la parola/legge della
Nuova Alleanza (traditio legis). In entrambe le rappresentazioni musive, che
costituiscono alcuni dei primi esempi di iconografia cristiana a Roma, il volto
di Cristo è circonfuso da un’aureola blu-azzurra. Quest’ultima conferisce e
immediatamente attribuisce alla figura un alone di divinità, disancorandolo
dalla contingenza terrena e proiettandolo nella dimensione del
trascendente. Traditio clavium (a dx) e traditio legis (a sx) in due
calotte del deambulatorio del Mausoleo di Santa Costanza a Roma (IV secolo)
L’aureola è anche regale Talvolta, poi, sono i sovrani-imperatori stessi ad
auto-rappresentarsi col capo circonfuso da aureola, come negli straordinari
mosaici che arricchiscono il presbiterio della chiesa di San Vitale a
Ravenna.Quest’ultimo, databile al secondo quarto del VI secolo, raffigura, tra
gli altri, anche i ritratti degli imperatori Giustiniano e della moglie
Teodora,entrambi corredati da aureola dorata. L’imperatrice
Teodora (a sx), moglie dell’imperatore Giustiniano (a dx), in due mosaici del
presbiterio della Chiesa di San Vitale a Ravenna (VI secolo) Entrambi gli
esempi, sebbene distanziati da ben due secoli, testimoniano alle origini del
Cristianesimo ufficiale (ossia istituzionalizzato in una ecclesiae)
un’iconografia dell’aureola già compiutamente codificata diffusa. I
primi esempi figurativi di aureole Sebbene, come detto, l’aureola costituisca
un inconfondibile attributo iconografico cristiano, non è però nel
Cristianesimo (che del resto si istituzionalizza nei primi secoli d.C.) che
affondano le radici della sua nascita. Queste infatti, come del resto molti
altri aspetti della liturgia e religione cristiana, devono essere rintracciate
ben prima della nascita del Cristianesimo stesso. Tale scelta
figurativa risale a diversi secoli, se non millenni prima di Cristo.
Consiste nel rappresentare divinità (qualora queste potessero essere
rappresentate) inscritte, totalmente o parzialmente, in aloni di luce
funzionali a proiettare le figure in dimensioni ultraterrene ed evocarne la
natura divina. Per esempio, nella pittura parietale egizia, il dio Ra è
quasi sempre rappresentato con un disco solare situato sopra il suo capo e
inglobato da un cobra. In questo caso dunque, nelle rappresentazioni di Ra, il
disco solare ha soprattutto la funzione di rappresentare l’attributo del
sole, di cui Ra, secondo la cosmologia egizia, era il dio referente.Rappresentazione
di Ra e Imentet (a sx.) sulle pareti della tomba di Nefertari nella Valle delle
Regine a Luxor (Egitto) Quando l’aureola era ancora una corona raggiante
Tuttavia, per poter conoscere i primi veri esempi di aureole, occorre risalire
alle prime rappresentazioni della divinità di Mitra. Questa è nata in origine
dallo Zoroastrismo (dal profeta Zarathustra, o Zoroastro) e successivamente,
soprattutto presso l’Impero Romano, si è costituita come divinità indipendente
e inscritta in uno specifico culto (quasi monoteista), detto appunto
Mitraismo. Nella fase imperiale soprattutto, il Mitraismodivenne la
religione dominante dell’ecumene (sebbene non la sola) e poi concorrente al
Cristianesimo delle origini. Quello che interessa rilevare però è che, in
quanto dio solare e dunque simbolo di vita, anche nelle rappresentazioni di
Mitra, la divinità venne ben presto corredata con attributi iconografici quali,
per esempio, una “corona” raggiante. Rappresentazione di Mitra come Sol
Invictus su un disco argenteo romano Un simbolo trasversale della divinità tra
Occidente e Oriente Possono forse essere questi i primi significativi
antecedenti dell’iconografia dell’aureola? Ben presto questa divenne un vero e
proprio simbolo trasversale adottato in molte altre religioni di origine
orientale. Forse la sua adozione è legata all’efficacia visiva con cui riesce a
restituire allo sguardo un immediato riferimento alla dimensione trascendente
e/o spirituale. Dapprima adottato nel Cristianesimo, questo riferimento venne
poi, attraverso scambi culturali, trasmesso anche ad altre religioni orientali,
tra le quali il Buddismo. Sotto questo profilo appare infatti singolare
che proprio negli stessi secoli in cui l’iconografia cristiana si codifica (tra
il IV e il VI secolo), l’adozione dell’aureola come attributo iconografico si
manifesta anche in diverse rappresentazioni buddiste in area cinese. Come si
spiega questo utilizzo pressoché contemporaneo dell’aureola come attributo
figurativo del divino, in due religioni così distanti e appartenenti a mondi
diversi? La chiave di volta è costituita ancora dal Mitraismo.
Reliquiario di Bimaran, I sec. d.C. circa Il Mitraismo è la chiave di lettura
Per comprendere infatti la trasmissione di tali scelte figurative tra la
cultura latina e quella asiatica, occorre risalire al primo secolo d.C. Per
precisione quando gli Indo-sciti (popolazioni nomadi originarie dell’attuale
Iran, dove lo zoroastrismo e con lui il Dio Mitra ebbero origine) e alcune
popolazioni dell’Impero Kusana (originario dell’attuale Afghanistan), invasero
e conquistarono alcuni territori degli attuali Pakistan e India. Portarono
dunque con sé e trasferirono alle popolazioni conquistate alcuni tratti
della loro cultura e della loro religione, tra cui anche il Mitraismo con i
rispettivi attributi iconografico-rappresentativi. Nella latinità
mediterranea, dunque, l’iconografia di Mitra avrebbe influenzato parzialmente
quella cristiana. Parallelamente, attraverso un processo di osmosi culturale,
la medesima iconografia veniva trasmessa anche alle culture e alle religioni
orientali (Pakistan, India meridionale e, attraverso questa, la Cina), tra le
quali anche il Buddismo. Questo processo pare avvenne precocemente, come
testimonia il celebre reliquiario di Bimaran (città al confine con il
Pakistan), databile al primo secolo d.C. Dipinto cinese
raffigurante Buddha (al centro) Ci sono poi altre importanti manifestazioni
figurative del Buddismo, quali ad esempio alcune statue di Buddha risalenti al
II sec. d.C. e oggi conservate al Tokyo National Museum. Oppure ancora diverse
pitture cinesi raffiguranti Buddha sempre con il capo circonfuso da
aureola. Insomma, dalla pur brevissima disamina effettuata, ci si rende
conto di quanto la cultura occidentale e quella orientale, dopo tutto, non
siano poi così distanti. In questo senso, le testimonianze figurative nate
dalle rispettive pratiche cultuali e religiose ne costituiscono un memorandum
preziosissimo. Capocci. Keywords: peccatum – sin – holiness – aureola
segno naturale della santita. Refs.:
Luigi Speranza, “Grice e Capocci” – The Swimming-Pool Library. Capocci.
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