Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2010, 189 pgs.

Summary: In 3.6.3.2 (pg. 27), he quotes as Augustine (354-430) Lanfranc (1010-1089) as found in Berengar (c.1010-1080) in defense of essentially transubstantiation. Here we have simply reached the point of no return as to Peter accidentally misquoting from bad notes or quotations. Peter is correcting Augustine according to current church practice. Augustine ought to have taught the current practice of the church and so he is spoken of as if he did.

At the same time, we find that Peter is defending Augustine’s view of God’s sovereignty and man’s free will as compatible: “The work of Christ and the Father was good, because the will of Christ and the Father was good; the work of Judas and the Jews was evil, because their intention was evil. The deeds or works there differed, that is, the acts were different; but there was one thing or deed, namely the passion itself” (3.20.5.2-3, pg. 87).

Peter also follows Augustine in non-egalitarian love or ordered love: [God] loved some of them for greater goods and others for lesser goods, some for better uses and others for less good ones. For all our goods come to us from his love. And so, from all of eternity and even now, he loved and loves some of the elect more and others less, because out of his love he prepared greater goods for the first and lesser ones for the second, just as in time he confers greater goods on some and lesser ones on others, and as a result of this he is said to love these more and those less” (3.32.2.3, pg. 133). . .Yet it is not to be simply said that he loved [the reprobate], lest they be understood to be predestined, but with this qualification: he loved them insofar as they were to be his work, that is, he loved what and of what kind he was going to make them” (3.32.5, pg. 134).

William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1989, 262 pgs.

Summary: A carefully written and researched defense of the traditional view of the soul over and against anthropological monism. Monism refers to the body and the soul being the same thing and dualism refers to the soul continuing to exist independently of an earthly body.

Under a variety of pressures, Christian scholars have been moving away from understanding the Bible to teach dualism in anthropology.  In some circles dualism has become the supposed cause of almost all ills. The more academically palatable view is now monism.

Among Christians who have a high view of Scripture, the pressure comes from a concern to decouple biblical theology from Platonic or philosophical influences, an unfortunate confusion about proper inference and speculation in developing theological outcomes from the Bible, and confusing the historical literalism of Augustine and the Reformation with Spinoza’s literalism.
Among liberals the theological pressure includes a similar mix but also a bias towards materialism and against the supernatural. The materialistic bias is so ambient as to influence all parties.

Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2010, 236 pgs.

Summary: Peter Lombard presents a confused understanding of Augustine’s view of creation and anthropology modified to a semi-Pelagian to almost Pelagian theology either purposely or through ignorance of Augustine’s authentic works.

According to Peter, “For there is in the rational soul a natural will, by which it naturally wills what is good, although weakly and feebly, unless grace assists. . .” (2.24.1.3, pg. 109). This free will is described as such “because, without compulsion or necessity, it is able to desire or elect what it has decreed by reason” (2.25.4.2, pg. 118). “And yet we do not deny that there are many good things which are done by man through free choice before this grace and apart from grace” (2.26.7.2, pg. 130).

And then this lovely quote which he attributes to Jerome, but since the Renaissance is now recognized as Pelagius:

Jerome teaches in his Explanation of the Catholic Faith to Pope Damascus, where he strikes at the errors of Jovinian, Manichaeus, and Pelagius, saying: “We acknowledge that choice is free so as to say that we are always in need of God’s aid; and that both those are in error who say with Manichaeus that man cannot avoid sin, and those who assert with Jovinian that man cannot sin. Each of them takes away freedom of choice. But we say that man is always able to sin and not to sin, so that we confess ourselves to be ever free in our choice. This is the faith which we learned in the Catholic Church and which we have always held.”

Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2010, 278 pgs.

Summary: Peter Lombard (1100-1160) or the Master of the Sentences wrote the basic theological compendium of the Middle Ages. He was a student of Abelard (1079-1142/3)—the founder of “understanding seeking faith.” Peter’s essential task was to harmonize the church authorities—the fathers and the Bible—with each other over and against heterodoxy.

The Sentences are a review of past theological debates, organized as lecture notes, for the purpose of assisting priests, canon lawyers, and theologians in developing current applications and to maintain orthodoxy. Silano, the translator, argues that The Sentences need to be read as a theological “casebook.”

In The Mystery of the Trinity, the first book of four, Peter Lombard presents a clear defense and review of the early church’s position on the Trinity. He generally follows Augustine on the issue of God’s grace, predestination, and foreknowledge in salvation and within the being of God.

Baker Academic, 2006, 358 pgs.

Summary: An exceedingly helpful book for Christians attempting to understand modernity written by Dr. John W. Cooper of Calvin College and recommended by Paul Helm. It draws together the historical strings of modernity and Christian liberalism with alacrity.

Traditional Christian and Jewish theology have argued that while God is immanent creation remains wholly separate from God. God categorically transcends creation even as he remains present everywhere. God’s Being is separate from the universe. At the same time there has been a minority view among Christian theologians called panentheism. Panentheism is the view that while God is greater than the universe, God’s Being is in every part of the universe. In pantheism God’s being is the universe.

The philosophical roots of panentheism can be found in Plato’s most careful theological dialogue called the Timaeus as well as in other scattered references. In this openly speculative dialogue, Plato locates “the world in the World-Soul” (35). Thus a stream of interpretation concluded that “the Soul of eternal divine Reason can be identified with the World-Soul of Timaeus, then the World-Soul is an aspect of God, and Plato is a panenetheist” (Ibid.).

Content from 1908, E-Book

Summary: An intelligent review and summary of Nietzsche’s canon, by the autodidact, debunker, and newspaperman H. L. Mencken (1880-1956). Fredrick Nietzsche (1844-1900) is the father of the most popular form of nihilism. His adherents include the likes of Adolf Hitler and David Brookes, and he has influenced everyone from Heidegger to Leo Strauss. The book includes a dated but accessible biography and history of Nietzsche’s work. Mencken’s purpose in writing the book was not as an academic review but to offer nihilism as a way of life for his readers.

According to Mencken and Nietzsche (1844-1900), human beings are driven by the “ever-dominant and only inherent impulse in all living beings, including man, . . the will to remain alive—the will, that is to attain power over those forces which make life difficult or impossible” (Loc. 42-44).

There are essentially two strategies for remaining alive; the first is as a collective parasite on the powerful and the second is as the powerful. The parasites function as those who limit the powerful from enjoying all that their intrinsic powers will allow. The parasites must have social order, morality, and peace to live; but they maintain this peace by subjecting the great and the great’s impulse to obtain power.