FILIPPO il CANCELLIERE. — Theologian, born in Paris ca. 1760–85, died there on 25 December 1236. He is not to be identified, as was long assumed, with the poet Filippo de Grève. From ca. 1206 he was magister theologiae and, from 1218 until his death, chancellor of the University of Paris. He was involved in the scholastic crisis of 1229–31, which ended with a statute of Gregory IX that constitutes the true magna charta of the University of Paris. F., together with Guglielmo di Auxerre, Guglielmo di Poitiers, and Guglielmo di Auvergne, is to be regarded as the most important representative of the period of transition from early scholasticism to mature scholasticism.
He is the author of a Summa de bono (unpublished), oriented principally toward an Augustinianism of Neoplatonic tendency, but already displaying a considerable knowledge of the new Aristotle; in it the entire theological doctrine is developed from the standpoint of the good, both of the bonum naturae (creation of the angels, the corporeal world, and man) and of the bonum Gratiae (the theological and cardinal virtues, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, Grace). This Summa exerted a considerable influence especially on the doctrine of the virtues and of sin, particularly within the ancient Franciscan school, and earned F. the reputation of being one of the major precursors of the great scholasticism. Among other things, he is regarded as the author of the treatise De syndoresi. Recent studies (Glorieux, V. BIBLICA.) have, however, demonstrated that F. transcribed his Summa almost literally from another, the so-called Summa Duocensis, which is older and has survived only in fragments (in ms. Douai 434). Consequently, the importance of this thinker cannot yet be assessed with certainty. Synthetic studies of his doctrine do not yet exist.
M. De Wulf, Histoire de la philosophie médiévale, II, 6e ed., Lovanio e Parigi 1936, pp. 72–74; Italian translation by V. Milano, Firenze 1943, pp. 65–68; O. Engelhardt, s. V. in LThK, VIII, cols. 220–230 (with bibl.); M. Grabmann, Storia della teologia cattolica, 2e ed., Milano 1939, pp. 85, 435 (with bibl.). Anneliese Maier