Albertus Magnus

Agora

Albertus Magnus

c. 1200–1280

A first way ina deliberate simplification – the portrait says more

Faith and the study of nature do not conflict, so Christians should learn everything Aristotle and his Arabic commentators discovered.

Placement

Medieval & Scholastic · Western Europe · Science, Metaphysics, Religion

“Doctor universalis”: made the entire work of Aristotle, along with its Arabic commentaries, accessible to the Latin West.

Key ideas

Reception of Aristotle
Natural science

Students: Thomas Aquinas

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Influence

Influenced by 4

Aristotle

influenced by
Albert set out to make the whole of Aristotle intelligible to Latin readers in paraphrases of logic, physics, metaphysics, ethics and the life sciences, using Arabic commentators. Albertus Magnus, Physica I tr. 1 c. 1 (programme); SEP “Albert the Great”
Evidence: also in InPhO · InPhO
Aristotle › 384–322 BCE
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite

influenced by
Albert commented on the whole Dionysian corpus around 1248–50, partly in Cologne with Thomas Aquinas as his student, and took up its negative theology. Albertus Magnus, Super Dionysium De divinis nominibus; Super Dionysii Mysticam theologiam; SEP “Albert the Great”
Evidence: AI draft
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite › c. 480–530
Ibn Sina (Avicenna)

influenced by ✓
Albert drew on Avicenna’s paraphrases of Aristotle, especially his account of the inner senses and the intellect, throughout his commentaries such as De anima. Albertus Magnus, De anima; De homine; SEP “Albert the Great”; SEP “Ibn Sina [Avicenna]”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata · InPhO
Ibn Sina (Avicenna) › 980–1037
Ibn Rushd (Averroes)

influenced by
Albert used Averroes’ commentaries throughout his Aristotle paraphrases, while rejecting his single intellect for all humans (De unitate intellectus contra Averroem, 1256). Albertus Magnus, De unitate intellectus contra Averroem (1256); SEP “Albert the Great”
Evidence: AI draft
Ibn Rushd (Averroes) › 1126–1198

Influenced 2

Thomas Aquinas taught

taught ✓
Attested by Thomas’s own hand – a manuscript of Albert’s commentary on Dionysius’ Divine Names in his handwriting survives in Naples – and by biographers who knew him; anecdotes such as the ‘dumb ox’ come from William of Tocco’s later Life. G. Théry, “L’autographe de S. Thomas conservé à la Biblioteca Nazionale de Naples”, Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 1 (1931); William of Tocco, Ystoria sancti Thome; J.-P. Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas I, ch. 2
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata · InPhO
Thomas Aquinas › c. 1225–1274
Meister Eckhart

influenced
Eckhart’s thought shows the influence of Albert’s Neoplatonic Aristotelianism; he cited Albert in an Easter sermon of 1294, but whether he studied under him in Cologne is uncertain. Meister Eckhart, Sermo Paschalis (Paris, 1294); SEP “Meister Eckhart”; SEP “Albert the Great”
Evidence: AI draft
Meister Eckhart › c. 1260–1328

Position

Albert set out to make the whole of Aristotle intelligible to Latin Christians – logic, physics, metaphysics, ethics and the life sciences – drawing heavily on Arabic commentators such as Avicenna and Averroes. He defended the relative autonomy of natural philosophy: in questions about nature one should reason from causes and experience rather than from miracles. His own observations of plants, animals and minerals made him one of the great naturalists of the Middle Ages. By showing that Aristotle could be studied without endangering faith, he prepared the ground for the synthesis of his student Thomas and for the Neoplatonic mysticism of the German Dominicans.

Life & context

Born around 1200 in Lauingen in Swabia, Albert joined the Dominican order and taught at Paris and Cologne, where Thomas Aquinas was his pupil. He served briefly as bishop of Regensburg (1260–1262) and spent his last decades in Cologne. Contemporaries already called him “the Great” and “Doctor universalis” for the sheer range of his learning.