Peter Lombard, trans. Giulio Silano, The Sentences: Book One—The Mystery of the Trinity

Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2010, 278 pgs.

Summary: Peter Lombard (1100-1160) or the Master of the Sentences wrote the basic theological compendium of the Middle Ages. He was a student of Abelard (1079-1142/3)—the founder of “understanding seeking faith.” Peter’s essential task was to harmonize the church authorities—the fathers and the Bible—with each other over and against heterodoxy.

The Sentences are a review of past theological debates, organized as lecture notes, for the purpose of assisting priests, canon lawyers, and theologians in developing current applications and to maintain orthodoxy. Silano, the translator, argues that The Sentences need to be read as a theological “casebook.”

In The Mystery of the Trinity, the first book of four, Peter Lombard presents a clear defense and review of the early church’s position on the Trinity. He generally follows Augustine on the issue of God’s grace, predestination, and foreknowledge in salvation and within the being of God.

Exemplar quotes:

And so the property by which the Father is Father is that he always begot; and this same property is called fatherhood or generation. And the property by which the Son is always the Son is that he is always begotten by the Father; and this same property is called sonship, or geniture, or birth, or origin, or ability to be born. Similarly, the property by which the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit or Gift is that he proceeds from both; and this property is called procession (1.27.3, pg. 147).

Augustine, Against Julian: “He has mercy according to freely given grace, but he hardens according to judgment which is rendered for merits. And so it is given to be understood that, as God’s reprobation is to not will mercy, so for God to make obdurate is not to have mercy; not that anything is inflicted by him which man is made worse, but only that is not granted by which he may become better” (1.41.1.1, pg. 224).

Benefits/Detriments: A very dense but clear defense and explanation of the doctrine of the Trinity. Peter Lombard gathers together the best of Augustine’s work and the other church fathers. I am fully convinced by his arguments on the Trinity about the importance of maintaining the language and distinctions of begotten, and procession (contra Grudem).

Peter Lombard seems to be making room for declining from Augustine’s view of salvation, but he does not take this step in his material about God.