medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

Aristotle's ideas were percolating into Western Europe over the later 12th century, both in his own works and through Arabic and Jewish philosophers.  In 1210, Aristotle's ideas were condemned at the Council of Sens and in 1215, they were banned from study at Paris (unsuccessfully, since half a century later they had come to dominate much of the university's curriculum). So it doesn't surprise me at all that Alain of Lille would be familiar with them. They were much discussed and were essentially on the cutting edge of late 12th century thought.

One article that might help you is Gary Macy, "The Dogma of Transubstantiation in the Middle Ages" in Journal of Ecclesiastical History (1994) pp. 11-41. He discusses the various theories of transubstantiation and real presence in considerable detail.

Andrew E. Larsen

Marquette University

On Jul 24, 2012, at 12:16 PM, Rachel Ernst wrote:

medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture

I am in the process of working on one of Alain of Lille's lesser known works and I have encountered something that seems anachronistic and I was hoping for some guidance. In this work, Alain refers to transubstantiation in Aristotelian phraseology using words like 'accident' and so on. However, this pre-dates Aquinas's definition of transubstantiation in Aristotlian terms by a good 30-40 years. Moreover, it was also written at about the same time that Aristotle's works were being translated into Latin in Western Europe, so it is possible, but unlikely that Alain would have even been familar with his idea of physics.
Or is it?
My questions are: Were the ideas of Aristotle that were later incorporated into the doctrine of the Real Presence discussed in any other classical work that would have been accessible to a medieval audience?
Were there any ideas regarding how the bread and wine physically changed into the body and blood of Christ circulating around this time that may have pre-empted these ideas?
Any books/ articles that discuss 11th-12th century understandings of transubstantiation?
Thanks for the help!

**********************************************************************
To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME
to: [log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask]
To send a message to the list, address it to:
[log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask]
To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion
to: [log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask]
In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to:
[log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask]
For further information, visit our web site:
http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html

********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: join medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: leave medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask]');" target="_blank">[log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/medieval-religion.html