St. Anselm

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses one of the influential Christian leaders and thinkers of the medieval era - St. Anselm of Canterbury. It begins by describing his background and his life and then discusses how he helped to shape philosophical thought during his era and develop the intellectual life of England in the twelfth century. The paper provides examples of his contributions.

From the Paper:

"It is difficult to imagine that one could go to Anselm in doubt about God, be subjected to this often-circular set of self-definitions, and come away in a more clear spiritual state, believing in God and one's relationship with God. To the contrary, it is easier to imagine that a person's reasoning powers would be beaten down by such a philosophy to the point that faith seems a simple respite from thought. We find the same problem when Anselm sets out to discover the relationship among foreknowledge, predestination, and free choice. With respect to foreknowledge and free choice, Anselm writes that it does not seem that God's foreknowledge of what a man is going to do and man's free choices are incompatible. He says that the two can somehow coexist, though, and he sets out to discover if this thesis is correct. Even before he begins his line of inquiry, though, the reader should see that Anselm simply cannot know what God knows or when he knows it. What he is doing is trying to use words to create a place of possibility wherein an individual can imagine that God's foreknowledge and man's free will are not incompatible. The fact is that they very well might be compatible in some divine sense to which human beings can have no access, even through reason."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Anselm. Anselm of Canterbury: Volume 2. Toronto: Edward Mellen, 1976.
• "Anselm's Ontological Argument." 2007. July 22, 23007. http://www.princeton.edu/~grosen/puc/phi203/ontological.html.
• Hartshorne, Charles. Anselm's Discovery: A Re-Examination of the Ontological Proof for God's Existence. La Salle, Illinois: Open Court, 1965.
• Kent, W.H. "St. Anselm." New Advent (2007). July 23, 2007. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01546a.htm.
• Rogers, Katherin A. "Anselm on Grace and Free Will." The Saint Anselm Journal 2.2 (Spring 2005), 66-72.

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• Analytical Essay # 115626 : "St. Anselm: Proving God's Existence"

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