The Philosophy of John Scottus Eriugena: A Study of Idealism in the Middle Ages

This work is a substantial contribution to the history of philosophy. Its subject, the ninth-century philosopher John Scottus Eriugena, developed a form of idealism that owed as much to the Greek Neoplatonic tradition as to the Latin fathers and anticipated the priority of the subject in its modern, most radical statement: German idealism. Moran has written the most comprehensive study yet of Eriugena’s philosophy, tracing the sources of his thinking and analyzing his most important text, the Periphyseon. This volume will be of special interest to historians of mediaeval philosophy, history, and theology.

Preface; Acknowledgments; Chronology; List of abbreviations; 1. European intellectual culture in the ninth century; 2. The predestination debate; 3. Eriugena’s life and early writings; 4. The Greek awakening; 5. The Periphyseon; 6. Eriugena as philosopher; 7. Eriugena’s sources; 8. Dialectic, philosophy, and the life of the mind; 9. The meaning of human nature; 10. Self-knowledge and self-definition: the nature of human knowing; 11. The meaning of non-being; 12. The meaning of nature; 13. Eriugena’s influence on later mediaeval philosophy; 14. Conclusion; Bibliography; Index nominum; Index rerum.