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A Duty to Kill: John of Salisbury's Theory of Tyrannicide

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Cary J. Nederman
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Extract

This article examines the doctrine of tyrannicide in John of Salisbury's mid-twelfth century political treatise, the Policraticus, in light of recent scholarly skepticism that John never meant to advocate a theoretical defense of slaying the tyrant. It is argued that John's conception of tyrannicide in fact possesses a philosophical foundation derived from his idea of the state as a political organism in which all the members cooperate actively in the realization of the common utility and justice. When the ruler of this body politic behaves tyrannically, failing to perform his characteristic responsibilities, the other limbs and organs are bound by their duty to the public welfare and God to correct and, ultimately, to slay the tyrant. John illustrates this position by reference to the many historical and scriptural instances of tyrants who have legitimately been killed. Thus, John not only proposes a theory of tyrannicide, but also roots it in a strong positive obligation to raise the sword against tyrannical rulers in the name of public benefit and justice.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Review of Politics , Volume 50 , Issue 3 , Summer 1988 , pp. 365 - 389
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1988

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References

Notes

1. The literature on John's doctrine of tyrannicide is enormous. Among the more significant or substantial studies of the topic are: Richard, H. and Rouse, Mary A., “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” Speculum 42 (10 1967): 693–709Google Scholar; Sporl, Johannes, “Gedanken zum Widerstandsrecht und Tyran-nenmord im Mittelalter,”Google Scholar in Pfister, B. and Hildmann, G., Widerstandsrecht und Grenzen zur Staatsgewalt (Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 1956), pp. 11–32Google Scholar; Garfag-nini, Gian Carlo, “Legittima ‘postestas’ e tirranide nel Policraticus di Giovanni di Salisbury,” Critica Storia 14 (1977): 575–610Google Scholar; Sivers, Peter von, “John of Salisbury: Konigtum und Kirche in England,” in Respublica Christiana, ed. von Sivers, P. (Munich: List Verlag, 1969), pp. 47–72Google Scholar; Kerner, Max, Johannes von Salisbury und die logische Struktur seines Policraticus (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1977), pp. 193–203Google Scholar; and Laarhoven, Jan van, “Die tirannie verdrijven … John of Salisbury als revolutionair?” in Geloofin revolutie: Kerkhistorische kanttekeningen bij een actueel vraagstuk, ed. Dankbar, W. F. (Amsterdam, 1977), pp. 21–50.Google Scholar

2. For a sampling of surveys of political thought which have propounded this conclusion, see: Berki, R. N., The History of Political Thought: A Short Introduction (London: Dent, 1977), p. 104Google Scholar; Chevalier, Jean-Jacques, Histoire de la Pensée Politique, 2 vols. (Paris: Payet, 1979), 1:172–73Google Scholar; Cook, Thomas I., History of Political Philosophy from Plato to Burke (New York: Prentice-Hall, 1937), pp. 215–16Google Scholar; Janet, Paul, Histoire de la Science Politique, 2 vols., 4th ed. (Paris: Librarie Felix Alcan, 1913), 1:341–44Google Scholar; Murray, Robert H., The History of Political Sciencefrom Plato to the Present (Cambridge, MA: W. Heffer and Son, 1926), pp. 54–55Google Scholar; McIlwain, Charles H., The Growth of Political Thought in the West (New York: Macmillan, 1932), pp. 320–23Google Scholar; and Sabine, George H. and Thorson, Thomas L., A History of Political Theory, 4th ed. (Hinsdale, IL: Dryden Press, 1973), p. 235.Google Scholar

3. The extent of John's impact may be measured from: Ullmann, Walter, “The Influence of John of Salisbury on Medieval Italian Jurists,” English Historical Review 57 (1944): 384–92CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Linder, Amnon, “John of Salisbury's Policraticus in Thirteenth Century England: The Evidence of Ms Cambridge Corpus Christi College 469,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 40 (1977): 276–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Linder, Amnon, “The Knowledge of John of Salisbury in the Late Middle Ages,” Studi medievali, 3rd ser. 18 (1977): 315/881–366/923Google Scholar; Ullmann, Walter, “John of Salisbury's Policraticus in the Later Middle Ages,” in Jurisprudence in the Middle Ages (London: Variorum, 1980)Google Scholar; Schoenstedt, Friedrich, Studien zum Begriff des Tyrannen und zum Problem des Tyrannenmordes im Spätmittelalter insbesondere in Frankreich (Würzburg: Buchdruckerei R. Mayr, 1938)Google Scholar; Macedo de Steffens, Dorotea C., “La Doctrina del Tiranicidio: Juan de Salisbury (1115–1180) y Juan de Mariana (1535–1621),” Annates de Historia Antiquay Medieval, 1957–1958 (Buenos Aires, 1957), pp. 123–33Google Scholar; Janet, , Histoire de la Science Politique, 1:341Google Scholar; and Castro, Fidel, History Will Absolve Me(New York: Liberal Press, 1959), p. 73.Google Scholar

4. As the Rouses have pointed out, historians of political thought have generally neglected or covered up the ostensive inconsistencies in John's discussion of tyrannicide; “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” pp. 693–94.Google Scholar

5. The various senses of “tyranny” in John's theory have been analyzed by Forhan, Kate Langdon, “The Twelfth Century Bureaucrat and the Life of the Mind: The Political Thought of John of Salisbury” (Ph.D. diss., Johns Hopkins University, 1987).Google Scholar

6. The standard edition is that by Webb, C. C. J. (1909: reprinted Frankfurt a.M.: Unveranderter Nachdruck, 1965), 2 volsGoogle Scholar, (hereafter P). The Policraticus has been translated into English in two distinct volumes, one by Dickinson, John containing the “political” sections under the tide The Statesman's Book (New York: Knopf, 1927)Google Scholar (hereafter S), the other containing moral advice to prince and courtiers by Pike, J. B. under the title Frivolities of Courtiers and Footprints of Philosophers (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1938)Google Scholar (hereafter F). For the convenience of nonspecialists, citations in the present article will be given to the existing translated versions (although translations have often been revised); corresponding citations from the Latin text, employing the marginal numeration of the Webb edition, will be provided in the notes.

7. F, pp. 211–12Google Scholar; P 511b–d.Google Scholar

8. S, pp. 335–410Google Scholar; P 777c–814d.Google Scholar

9. Salutati, Coluccio, “De Tyranno,” in Humanism and Tyranny: Studies in the Italian Trecento, ed. Emerton, E. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1925), p. 90Google Scholar. A discussion of the nature of Salutati's objections may be found in Condren, Conal, The Status and Appraisal of Classic Texts (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), pp. 278–79.Google Scholar

10. van Laarhoven, Jan, “Thou Shall Not Slay a Tyrant! The So-called Theory of John of Salisbury,” in The World of John of Salisbury, ed. Wilks, M. (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1984), p. 328.Google Scholar

11. Ibid., p. 329.

12. Ibid., p. 328.

13. Among the scholars who seem susceptible to this charge are: Berges, Wilhelm, Die Fürstenspiegel des hohen und späten Mittelalters (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1938), p. 59Google Scholar; Liebeschütz, Hans, Mediaeval Humanism in the Life and Writings of John of Salisbury (London: The Warburg Institute, 1950), p. 53Google Scholar; Rouse, and Rouse, , “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” p. 705Google Scholar; Kerner, , Johannes von Salisbury und die logische Struktur seines Policraticus, pp. 192–93Google Scholar; and Garfagnini, , “Legittima ‘potestas’ e tirannide nel Policraticus di Giovanni di Salisbury,” pp. 37, 43–44.Google Scholar

14. For a thorough survey of John's conception of the organic metaphor, see Nederman, Cary J., “The Physiological Significance of the Organic Metaphor in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” History of Political Thought 8 (Spring 1987): 211–23Google Scholar; and Struve, Tilman, “The Importance of the Organism in the Political Theory of John of Salisbury,”Google Scholar in Wilks, , The World of John of Salisbury, pp. 303–17.Google Scholar

15. John consequently defends a large measure of free speech and tolerance at S, pp. 323–31Google Scholar; P 705c–709b.Google Scholar

16. S, pp. 335–36Google Scholar; P 777d–778a.Google Scholar

17. See also John's defense of the biblical Judith, who engaged in flattery and dissimulation in order to defeat the tyrant Holofernes (S, p. 371Google Scholar; P 795b).Google Scholar

18. F, p. 211Google Scholar; S 512cGoogle Scholar. John's reference to the “secular literature” is apparently to Cicero, , De amicitus: “Shall we live with a friend upon the same cautious terms we must submit to live with a tyrant?” (ed. Warrington, J. [London: Dent, 1966], p. 209).Google Scholar

19. Laarhoven, Van, “Thou Shall Not Slay a Tyrant!” p. 320.Google Scholar

20. For instance, Pike, 's translation (p. 211)Google Scholar omits altogether any English equivalent for the sentence “Amico utique adulari non licet, sed aures tiranni mulcere licitum est”; for similar errors, see Laarhoven, van, “Thou Shall Not Slay a Tyrant!”, p. 320, note 3.Google Scholar

21. F, p. 211Google Scholar; P 512c.Google Scholar

22. These are the terms under which John recurrently defines tyranny: S, pp. 351–52, 338 and 381Google Scholar; P 785d–786c, 778d and 800b.Google Scholar

23. See Nederman, Cary J. and Brückmann, J., “Aristotelianism in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” Journal of the History of Philosophy 21 (04 1983): 224–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24. S, p. 338Google Scholar; P 778d.Google Scholar

25. F, p. 212Google Scholar; P 512d.Google Scholar

26. For a more thorough discussion of majesté, see S, p. 259–60Google Scholar; P 626d–627c.Google Scholar

27. F, p. 212Google Scholar; P 512d.Google Scholar

28. S, p. 4Google Scholar; P 514a.Google Scholar

29. F, p. 212Google Scholar; P 512d.Google Scholar

30. See Stuve, Tilman, Die Entwicklung der Organologischen Staatsauffassung im Mittelalter (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1978), pp. 123–48Google Scholar; Dutton, Paul Edward, “Illustre civitatis et populi exemplum: Plato's Timaeus and the Transmission from Calcidius to the End of the Twelfth Century of a Tripartite Scheme of Society,” Mediaeval Studies 45 (1983): 108–12CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Nederman, , “The Physiological Significance of the Organic Metaphor in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” pp. 211–16.Google Scholar

31. S, p. 64Google Scholar; P 540a.Google Scholar

32. S, p. 64Google Scholar; P 540b.Google Scholar

33. S, p. 83Google Scholar; P 548d.Google Scholar

34. S, p. 83Google Scholar; P 548d.Google Scholar

35. S, p. 107Google Scholar; P 560b.Google Scholar

36. S, p. 108Google Scholar; P 560b–d.Google Scholar

37. S, pp. 123, 145Google Scholar; P 567c, 576c–d.Google Scholar

38. S, p. 65Google Scholar; P 540c.Google Scholar

39. S, p. 173Google Scholar; P 589a–b.Google Scholar

40. S, p. 65Google Scholar; P 540d.Google Scholar

41. See Millor, W. J., Butler, H. E. and Brooke, C. N. L., eds., The Letters of John of Salisbury (London: Thomas Nelson, 1955), 1:181Google Scholar; and John of Salisbury, Metalogicon, ed. Webb, C. C. J. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1929), 825d–827dGoogle Scholar. I have attempted to dispel the predominant hierarchical interpretation of John's organic metaphor in “The Physiological Significance of the Organic Metaphor in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” pp. 213–15.Google Scholar

42. S, p. 95Google Scholar; P 554d–555a.Google Scholar

43. S, p. 257Google Scholar; P 626a.Google Scholar

44. S, p. 243Google Scholar; P 619b.Google Scholar

45. S, p. 256Google Scholar; P 625b–c.Google Scholar

46. S, p. 246Google Scholar; P 620d.Google Scholar

47. S, p. 244Google Scholar; P 619c.Google Scholar

48. S, p. 276Google Scholar; P 634a.Google Scholar

49. S, p. 247Google Scholar; P 621c.Google Scholar

50. Throughout the Policraticus, aequitas is used interchangeably with iustitia; where there is a distinction between them, it seems to turn on the legal character of equity in relation to the moral nature of justice. John most clearly articulates this difference at S, p. 6Google Scholar; P 514c–d.Google Scholar

51. S, p. 58Google Scholar; P 537c–dGoogle Scholar. Compare with Cicero, , De officiis, 1.7.3.Google Scholar

52. S, p. 58Google Scholar; P 538a.Google Scholar

53. S, pp. 74–75Google Scholar; P, 544d–545bGoogle Scholar. The definition of the virtues in terms of habitus was a favorite theme in John's work; see Nederman, and Brückmann, , “Aristotelianism in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” pp. 216–23Google Scholar; and Nederman, Cary J., “Aristotelian Ethics and John of Salisbury's Letters,” Viator 18 (1987): 162–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

54. It should be noted, however, that John was hardly alone among twelfth-century thinkers in adopting this position; see Nederman, Cary J., “Nature, Ethics and the Doctrine of Habitus: Aristotelian Moral Psychology in the Twelfth Century,” TraditioGoogle Scholar (forthcoming).

55. The royal function as legislator is attributed at S, p. 7Google Scholar; P 515c–d.Google Scholar

56. S, p. 86Google Scholar; P 550c–d.Google Scholar

57. S, p. 126Google Scholar; P 569a.Google Scholar

58. S, p. 112Google Scholar; P 562b–d.Google Scholar

59. S, p. 123Google Scholar; P 567c.

60. S, p. 166Google Scholar; P 588a.Google Scholar

61. S, p. 173Google Scholar; P 589a–b.Google Scholar

62. S, pp. 199–200Google Scholar; P 600d–601a.Google Scholar

63. S, p. 244Google Scholar; P 609c.Google Scholar

64. For further discussion of the emphasis placed on the royal will in medieval political theory, see Nederman, Cary J., “The Royal Will and the Baronial Bridle: The Place of the Addicio de Cartis in Bractonian Political Thought,”Google ScholarHistory of Political Thought (forthcoming).

65. S, p. 356Google Scholar; P 788d.Google Scholar

66. Rouse, and Rouse, , “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” pp. 703–704, 709.Google Scholar

67. S, pp. 375–77Google Scholar; P 797a–798b.Google Scholar

68. S, p. 375Google Scholar; P 797b.Google Scholar

69. See S, p. 373Google Scholar; P 796c–d.Google Scholar

70. This doubt has been explicitly raised by van Laarhoven, , “Thou Shall Not Slay a Tyrant!”, pp. 328–29.Google Scholar

71. I have discussed John's notion of liberty at length in “The Aristotelian Doctrine of the Mean and John of Salisbury's Concept of Liberty,” Vivarium 24 (11 1986): 128–42.Google Scholar

72. S, p. 47Google Scholar; P 533a.Google Scholar

73. S, p. 335Google Scholar; P 777c–d.Google Scholar

74. S, p. 339Google Scholar; P 779c–d.Google Scholar

75. This doctrine is entailed by John's supposition of a unity between head and members, such that the character and moral status of each is ordinarily reflected in the other. See S, pp. 258–59, 264Google Scholar; P 626b–d, 629a–b.Google Scholar

76. S, p. 403Google Scholar; P 811b.Google Scholar

77. John stresses the king's moderating influence at S, pp. 367–78Google Scholar; P 793c–dGoogle Scholar. The theme of moderation is an extremely significant one in the Policraticus and throughout John's other works. See Nederman, and Brückmann, , “Aristotelianism in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” pp. 210–16Google Scholar; Nederman, , “The Aristotelian Doctrine of the Mean and John of Salisbury's Concept of Liberty,” pp. 128–42Google Scholar; Nederman, , “Aristotelian Ethics and John of Salisbury's Letters,” pp. 166–72Google Scholar; and Nederman, Cary J., “Knowledge, Virtue and the Path to Wisdom: The Unexamined Aristotelianism of John of Salisbury's Metalogicon,” Mediaeval Studies (forthcoming 1989).Google Scholar

78. S, p. 376Google Scholar; P 797a.Google Scholar

79. S, p. 368Google Scholar; P 794a.Google Scholar

80. Plato argues at Republic 571a–577e that the tyrant necessarily arises out of the society in which men are least just and most self-interested, namely, democracy.

81. S, p. 368Google Scholar; P 794a.Google Scholar

82. S, p. 369Google Scholar; P 794a–b.Google Scholar

83. Among the scholars who have emphasized this are Ullmann, “The Influence of John of Salisbury on Medieval Italian Jurists,” p. 388Google Scholar; and Rouse, and Rouse, , “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” pp. 698–99.Google Scholar

84. S, p. 373Google Scholar; P 796c.Google Scholar

85. S, p. 373Google Scholar; P 796d.Google Scholar

86. John's general conception of human knowledge lays stress on its fallible character; see P 446a–bGoogle Scholar and Metalogicon 935b.Google Scholar

87. John uses the term “publicum hostem” recurrendy throughout the Policraticus, as at F, p. 212Google Scholar; S, pp. 371, 393Google Scholar; P 512d, 795d, 807a.Google Scholar

88. S, p. 395Google Scholar; P 808a.Google Scholar

89. S, p. 364Google Scholar; P 792c.Google Scholar

90. S, p. 265Google Scholar; P 629b.Google Scholar

91. S, p. 43Google Scholar; P 531d.Google Scholar

92. This is consistent with what scholars have asserted about John's use of examples more generally in the Policraticus. See Liebeschütz, , Mediaeval Humanism in the Life and Writings ofJohn of Salisbury, pp. 67–73Google Scholar; and von Moos, Peter, “The Use of Exempla in the Policraticus of John of Salisbury,”Google Scholar in Wilks, , The World of John of Salisbury, pp. 207–61.Google Scholar

93. A judgment widely held by scholars: compare the remarks of Webb, Clement C. J., “John of Salisbury,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 2, no. 2, ii (1894): 96Google Scholar; Painter, Sidney, “John of Salisbury and the Renaissance of the Twelfth Century,” in The Greek Tradition, ed. Boas, G. (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1939), p. 87Google Scholar; Pepin, Ronald E., “John of Salisbury: An American Tribute,” Hatcher Review 9 (1980): 17.Google Scholar

94. The recent work of Janet Martin, establishing the precise manuscript sources of John's references, in no way diminishes his reputation, but only demonstrates that some classical works thought to be directly accessible in the mid-twelfth century were actually known only through intermediates; see Martin, , “John of Salisbury's Manuscripts of Frontinus and Gellius” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 40 (1977): 1–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar; “Uses of Tradition: Gellius, Petronius and John of Salisbury,” Viator 10 (1979): 57–76Google Scholar; and “John of Salisbury as Classical Scholar,” in Wilks, , The World of John of Salisbury, pp. 179–201Google Scholar. On the other hand, it seems clear that John was one of the very first to know and use the full text of Aristotle's Topics; see Nederman, and Brückmann, , “Aristotelianism in John of Salisbury's Policraticus,” p. 204.Google Scholar

95. The suggestion that John himself created the Institutio Traiani as a pseudo-authoritative source was first proposed by Liebeschütz in a 1943 article and has been actively debated ever since. For a brief review of the debate including a full bibliography, see Kerner, Max, “Randbemerkungen zur Institutio Traiani,” in Wilks, The World of John of Salisbury, pp. 203–206.Google Scholar

96. S, pp. 256–57Google Scholar; P 788dGoogle Scholar (italics supplied).

97. S, p. 367Google Scholar; P 793c (italics supplied).Google Scholar

98. S, pp. 372–73Google Scholar; P 798b.Google Scholar

99. This follows from John's more general discussion of feudal bonds at S, p. 261Google Scholar; P 627d–628a.Google Scholar

100. S, p. 373Google Scholar; P 796b–c.Google Scholar

101. S, p. 359Google Scholar; P 789d.Google Scholar

102. S, p. 373Google Scholar; P 796c.Google Scholar

103. For example, the suggestion of Roger II of Sicily by Wieruszowski, Helene, “Roger II of Sicily, Rex-Tyrannus, in Twelfth-Century Political Thought,” Speculum 38 (01 1963): 68–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Frederick Barbarossa by Spörl, , “Gedanken zum Widerstandsrecht und Tyrannenmord im Mittelalter,” p. 21Google Scholar; of King Stephen by Liebeschütz, , Mediaeval Humanism in the Life and Writings of John of Salisbury, p. 52Google Scholar; and (perhaps) of Henry II by Rouse, and Rouse, , “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” pp. 704–709.Google Scholar

104. S, pp. 392–93Google Scholar; P 806d–807bGoogle Scholar. For an interesting discussion of this passage, see von Sivers, , “John of Salisbury,” pp. 70–71.Google Scholar

105. Thus, Clement Webb, John of Salisbury (London: Methuen, 1932), p. 66Google Scholar, remarks that John's treatment of tyrannicide “was a natural development of the republican rhetoric which he found in classical writers; and we have no reason to think that he was ever disposed to make a practical application of it.” Similarly Rouse and Rouse, “John of Salisbury and the Doctrine of Tyrannicide,” p. 709, conclude that “the doctrine of tyrannicide is purely theoretical, in the sense that John was not proposing it as a plan of action.”

106. On John's conception of philosophy as “practical,” and his consequent reservations about its academic aspects, see Nederman, , “Aristotelian Ethics and John of Salisbury's Letters,” pp. 172–73Google Scholar and “Knowledge, Virtue and the Path to Wisdom.”

107. An earlier version of this paper was read at the University of California, Log Angeles. Thanks are due to Professors Richard Rouse and Robert Benson, and Dr. Mary Rouse, for their insightful and challenging criticisms and suggestions. The author is also grateful to the anonymous reader for the present journal for numerous helpful comments.