Chapter 8 - Using Seneca to read Aristotle

Summary

By the latter half of the fourteenth century, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics (N.E.) had assumed its rightful place in the arts curriculum of most medieval European universities, though it seems only M.A. students were required to attend lectures on it. But there had in fact been much interest in the work since Albert the Great first commented on the entire text in the previous century, so that by the time it appeared in the university statute books, there was already a tradition of commentary on it going back several generations.

In commenting on the works of Aristotle, most arts masters saw their task as twofold, viz., that of explaining the littera or literal meaning of Aristotle's text, and then (usually in a separate work) of identifying and trying to resolve the philosophical questions raised by it. In the case of N.E., the latter task provided ample opportunity for the master to address conflicts between Aristotle and other authors whose works were regarded as authoritative in ethics. This would have included not just philosophers from Greek and Roman antiquity available in Latin translation, but also the Bible, Church Fathers, and earlier medieval commentators on N.E. such as Albert and Thomas Aquinas. In the Latin West there had always been a tension, or perhaps uneasy alliance, between Christian ethics and its pagan forbears, but most commentators regarded Aristotle as having important things to say in moral philosophy, and the belief that Aristotle's views, and especially his arguments for them, should be seen as complementing Christian doctrine was widespread.