A Brief Overview of the Life of St. Anselm
By Keven Newsome
In partial fulfillment for the course HIST 5200 History of Christianity: Early and Medieval
Instructor: Dr. Rex Butler
The millennium drew near, and the Christianized world waited with bated breath for the return of Jesus. When the year 1000 came and passed, disappointed theologians across France assembled to recalculate their apocalyptic expectation, declaring that Jesus would return at the millennium of his crucifixion, the year A.D. 1033. There were calls for peace and mass pilgrimages to Jerusalem to await the expected King as this newly decreed apocalypse approached.[1] Beneath this hope of the Lord’s second coming, a woman named Ermenberga conceived a child. Then, as the realization that Jesus would not return settled through the land like dense fog, Anselm uttered his first infant’s cry.
The world was changing. The once great Byzantium Empire, glorious at the beginning of the millennium, began to fade beneath the shadows of greater empires.[2] The Vikings enjoyed tyranny in the Arctic Seas.[3] The papacy saw the election of seven popes from 1045 to 1049.[4] The church would split in 1054 into the Roman Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodoxy.[5] William conquered England in 1066,[6] and in 1095 the Crusades would begin[7].
The Middle Ages thrived. It was a time that would breathe life into the great mythologies of King Arthur, Beowulf, and Robin Hood… a time characterized by jousting and court bards, adventures and legends, nobility and peasants, knighthood and chivalry, castles and hamlets.
Throughout all of this, Anselm would become known as one of the “greatest men in Europe”.[8] His courage beneath the oppression of nobility, would assert the church’s authority, and his apologetic insights have impacted theologians to this very day.
In the little town of Aosta, Burgundy, in the year 1033, Anselm was born to parents Ermenberga and Gundulf. Though it is not known for sure, circumstantial evidence about his extended family and the origin of his name, lead historians to believe that Anselm was of noble birth.[9] Even so, what nobility he had quickly diminished when King Conrad II of Germany conquered his homeland. Little else is known about the early years of young Anselm. At home he had a sister named Richeza, and he often quarreled with his overly critical father. Later in life, he demonstrated little love for his alpine hometown or its traditions; however, he often spoke fondly of the mountains. Mannerisms in his early writings seem to indicate a classical education, but he showed no passion for its use.[10] He also had ambitions to become a monk and scholar[11], ambitions his father most likely quelled.
Tensions with Gundulf came to a head in 1056 when, not long after the death of his mother, Anselm left Aosta forever. At only twenty-three, Anselm crossed the dangerous Alps to France, where the family of his mother resided, choosing not to take the easier road to the south toward the family of his father. According to Eadmer, he spent three years partly in Burgundy and partly in France, searching for his place in the world.[12] He found that place at the monastery of Bec in Normandy in 1059, and there his life would truly begin.
The theological world smoldered with the debates of Lanfranc, the abbot of Bec, and Berengar of Tours, the archbishop of Angers. Though the subject of their debates is of some significance, it was their style of debate that attracted Anslem. Both men utilized calculated logic to present their arguments, a practice most theologians of the time did not follow. Berengar had revived classic dialectic, and Lanfranc, though not using dialectic, demonstrated a deep understanding of dialectic framework in his counterarguments.[13] This fusion of logic and theology excited the young Anslem, and he joined the monastery of Bec, submitting to Lanfranc as an intellectual pupil only with no intention of adopting monastic life. It is likely that Anselm learned a good deal about dialectic and the use thereof in theology from Lanfranc. Though Anselm was originally a neo-Platonist, Lanfranc taught him how to apply an Aristotelian argument to theological issues.[14] This, combined with evidence of a classical education, gave Anselm a foundation from which to build his philosophical and academic career. In contrast, neither Lanfranc nor Berengar were philosophers, only theologians.
News of the death of his father caused Anselm to take a hard look at the direction of his life. The childhood idea of monasticism returned, and he decided to become a monk. After resolving to this life change, it was still left to be decided where he would take up his new residence. Though study under Lanfranc invigorated him, as a monk under Lanfranc all hopes of becoming a teacher would be eclipsed. There simply was not room for two philosophical theologians at the same abbey. Another monastery in Cluny was a consideration, but the vigorous monastic routines practiced there would not give Anselm the scholastic opportunities that he sought. In the end, he appealed to the archbishop of Rouen, Maurilius, to make the decision, and Maurilius assigned him as a monk of Bec in 1060. For the next ten years the new monk of Bec would be silent in teaching and writing, devoting himself solely to study and prayer in his new monastic life.
In 1066, William the Conqueror extended his conquest to include England. In an effort to assert his rule, he began a campaign to import leaders from his native land and establish them in the newly conquered land. Thus Lanfranc was summoned by William to leave Bec and was appointed to the Abbacy of St. Stephen’s at Caen[15] and later as archbishop in Canterbury in 1070. This had a tremendous impact on the philosophically minded Anslem, because at age thirty-three he found himself in the position of fulfilling Lanfranc’s duties, first as prior and then as abbot.
Anselm breaks his silence in 1070 and begins to write. It is during this time of his life that he produces some of his most influential scholarly works, establishing himself as a major contender in both philosophy and theology. What at first seems like works of astounding revelation, are in fact the product of years of careful study and contemplation. It was during this time that he wrote DeGrammatico, Prayers and Meditations, numerous correspondence, and just before becoming abbot he produced Monologion & Proslogion.
In 1093, amidst controversy and political intrigue, Anselm was elected archbishop of Canterbury. The previous archbishop, Lanfranc, had died four years earlier and the post had remained vacant while others bickered over who should fill it. Anselm, now 56, wielded the post with all the shrewdness of a politician and the wit of a philosopher. He slowly extended the primacy of Canterbury much further than his predecessor. Much of this expansion was due to the weak authority that the distant pope could exhibit in England. Having declared the Crusades in 1095, the pope’s attention was often to the Holy Land. Thus, in the matters of feudality and land disputes, it often fell to Anselm to make such judgments, strengthening the authority of the church in England. Under Anselm, the jurisdiction of Canterbury extended into Wales and Ireland.
It was under King William Rufus that Anselm began his archbishopric, and immediately conflict began. Though already elected, Anselm would not be officially recognized as the new archbishop until he had received the symbolic pallium from the pope, an event that had to be approved by Rufus since the pope resided in an opposing country. An additional problem here lies in the fact that there were two rival popes at the time. Clement III claimed the papacy in Germany, but it was Urban II of France whom Anselm recognized. The question remained, however, who Rufus would recognize as the pope. To allow Urban II to send the pallium to Anselm would be equitable to recognizing Urban II. As a result, Rufus tarried as long as possible, testing the political waters and not wishing to make a hasty alignment. Rufus eventually relented and recognized Urban II, allowing him to send the pallium to Anselm. In this, Anselm won his one and only victory with Rufus.
On three separate occasions Anselm and Rufus clashed concerning the state’s authority with church property and finances. Rufus sought to make use of the church’s estates, but Anselm resisted. At the root of these conflicts was a basic disagreement about the separation of church and state. Did the state have ultimate authority over the property of the church? Anselm fought to maintain the church at Canterbury as autonomous from the state, struggling to keep the church’s properties in tact from the iron grip of Rufus. He could not defeat Rufus, and so his authority diminished to the ordinary routines of his Episcopal duty, and the church’s assets were slowly confiscated. Anselm desired to council with the pope in regards to this, but again he was at the mercy of Rufus’s permission to leave the country. Many times he was denied leave, but the persistent Anselm eventually won his journey to Rome in 1097, effectively sending himself into exile. It was during his first two years of exile that Anselm produced his most influential work, Cur Deus Homo.
In 1100, news came to Anselm that Rufus had died, and the new king Henry I sent an invitation for Anselm to return. According to Southern, “Anselm came without delay.”[16] Anselm received a hero’s welcome from the people, and Henry greeted him with the utmost respect. With rival nobility strong enough to take Henry’s throne, it was Anselm’s support for him and popularity with the people that solidified Henry’s rule. Yet when Anselm arrived in England, Henry expected homage to which Anselm would not give. The papal decree of 1099 had forbidden any clergy from paying homage to any lay person, thus ascribing the church’s supremacy over the state. Henry could not afford to antagonize Anselm because of his precarious political position, so he relented for a time. Negotiations ensued between Anselm and the pope in regards to the king, but instead of recanting the pope only continued to underscore the decree of 1099. Tensions between Henry and Anselm tightened. As Henry’s political strength grew, he applied more pressure to Anselm for homage.
Once again, Anselm left England in order to seek direction from the pope in 1103, and again he would enter into exile. Canterbury’s lands and assets were immediately seized by the king. The decree of 1099 had also condemned lay people from exercising authority in the church, and this, in addition to the seizure, brought Anselm to seek the king’s excommunication. The pope would not approve the action, though, and when a new pope took office, the decree of 1099 was recanted and King Henry I pardoned.
Anselm returned to England in 1106, and the king restored all of Canterbury’s land and assets. Animosities were resolved and all was forgiven. With no conflict, Anselm lived his last few years is peace, enjoying the duties of his archbishopric. He died in 1109.
[1] “Eschatology,” Encyclopedia Britannica Online, http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/192308/eschatology (accessed October 27, 2009).
[2] R. W. Southern, Saint Anselm and His Biographer (1963; repr., London: Cambridge University Press, 1966), 1.
[3] Anna Ritchie, “Loot: Why the Vikings Came to Britain,” BBC, http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/trail/conquest/viking/loot_01.shtml (accessed October 27, 2009).
[4] The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911), s.v. “The List of Popes,” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12272b.htm (accessed October 27, 2009).
[5] Justo Gonzalez, The Story of Christianity: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation, Prince Press edition, Peabody, Massachusetts: Prince Press, 1984, 251.
[6] Gonzalez, 313
[7] Gonzalez, 293
[8] Southern, 4.
[9] Southern, 8-9.
[10] Southern, 5.
[11] Southern,11.
[12] Eadmer, The Life of St Anselm: Archbishop of Canterbury, ed. R. W. Southern (London: Thomas Nelson and Sons LTD, 1962), 8.
[13] Southern, 17.
[14] Southern, 22.
[15] Henry Birt, The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1910), s.v. “Lanfranc,” http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08784c.htm (accessed October 27, 2009).
[16] Southern, 163.
