Monologium, on the Being of God

sant'Anselmo d'Aosta († 1109) · Monologion · 1075-1076

Traduzione inglese di Sidney Norton Deane (1878–1943), Chicago: Open Court, 1903. Testo originale: Migne, Patrologia Latina 158, 141-224.

Each chapter's argument is given as the chapter heading (the Latin rubrics are omitted from the Latin text). Chapters numbered as in Deane and Migne (79).

  1. pref Preface
  2. 1 Chapter I. There is a being which is best, and greatest, and highest of all existing beings.
  3. 2 Chapter II. The same subject continued.
  4. 3 Chapter III. There is a certain Nature through which whatever is exists, and which exists through itself, and is the highest of all existing beings.
  5. 4 Chapter IV. The same subject continued.
  6. 5 Chapter V. Just as this Nature exists through itself, and other beings through it, so it derives existence from itself, and other beings from it.
  7. 6 Chapter VI. This Nature was not brought into existence with the help of any external cause, yet it does not exist through nothing, or derive existence from nothing. — How existence through self, and derived from self, is conceivable.
  8. 7 Chapter VII. In what way all other beings exist through this Nature and derive existence from it.
  9. 8 Chapter VIII. How it is to be understood that this Nature created all things from nothing.
  10. 9 Chapter IX. Those things which were created from nothing had an existence before their creation in the thought of the Creator.
  11. 10 Chapter X. This thought is a kind of expression of the objects created (locution rerum), like the expression which an artisan forms in his mind for what he intends to make.
  12. 11 Chapter XI. The analogy, however, between the expression of the Creator and the expression of the artisan is very incomplete.
  13. 12 Chapter XII. This expression of the supreme Being is the supreme Being.
  14. 13 Chapter XIII. As all things were created through the supreme Being, so all live through it.
  15. 14 Chapter XIV. This Being is in all things, and throughout all; and all derive existence from it and exist through and in it.
  16. 15 Chapter XV. What can or cannot be stated concerning the substance of this Being.
  17. 16 Chapter XVI. For this Being it is the same to be just that it is to be justice; and so with regard to attributes that can be expressed in the same way: and none of these shows of what character, or how great, but what this Being is.
  18. 17 Chapter XVII. It is simple in such a way that all things that can be said of its essence are one and the same in it: and nothing can be said of its substance except in terms of what it is.
  19. 18 Chapter XVIII. It is without beginning and without end.
  20. 19 Chapter XIX. In what sense nothing existed before or will exist after this Being.
  21. 20 Chapter XX. It exists in every place and at every time.
  22. 21 Chapter XXI. It exists in no place or time.
  23. 22 Chapter XXII. How it exists in every place and time, and in none.
  24. 23 Chapter XXIII. How it is better conceived to exist everywhere than in every place.
  25. 24 Chapter XXIV. How it is better understood to exist always than at every time.
  26. 25 Chapter XXV. It cannot suffer change by any accidents [Accidents, as Anselm uses the term, are facts external to the essence of a being, which may yet be conceived to produce changes in a mutable being.]
  27. 26 Chapter XXVI. How this Being is said to be substance: it transcends all substance and is individually whatever it is.
  28. 27 Chapter XXVII. It is not included among substances as commonly treated, yet it is a substance and an indivisible spirit.
  29. 28 Chapter XXVIII. This Spirit exists simply, and created beings are not comparable with him.
  30. 29 Chapter XXIX. His expression is identical with himself, and consubstantial with him, since there are not two spirits, but one.
  31. 30 Chapter XXX. This expression does not consist of more words than one, but is one Word.
  32. 31 Chapter XXXI. This Word itself is not the likeness of created beings, but the reality of their being, while created beings are a kind of likeness of reality. — What natures are greater and more excellent than others.
  33. 32 Chapter XXXII. The supreme Spirit expresses himself by a coeternal Word.
  34. 33 Chapter XXXIII. He utters himself and what he creates by a single consubstantial Word.
  35. 34 Chapter XXXIV. How he can express the created world by his Word.
  36. 35 Chapter XXXV. Whatever has been created is in his Word and knowledge, life and truth.
  37. 36 Chapter XXXVI. In how incomprehensible a way he expresses or knows the objects created by him.
  38. 37 Chapter XXXVII. Whatever his relation to his creatures, this relation his Word also sustains: yet both do not simultaneously sustain this relation as more than one being.
  39. 38 Chapter XXXVIII. It cannot be explained why they are two, although they must be so.
  40. 39 Chapter XXXIX. This Word derives existence from the supreme Spirit by birth.
  41. 40 Chapter XL. He is most truly a parent, and that Word his offspring.
  42. 41 Chapter XLI. He most truly begets, and it is most truly begotten.
  43. 42 Chapter XLII. It is the property of the one to be most truly progenitor and Father, and of the other to be the begotten and Son.
  44. 43 Chapter XLIII. Consideration of the common attributes of both and the individual properties of each.
  45. 44 Chapter XLIV. How one is the essence of the other.
  46. 45 Chapter XLV. The Son may more appropriately be called the essence of the Father, than the Father the essence of the Son: and in like manner the Son is the virtue, wisdom, etc., of the Father.
  47. 46 Chapter XLVI. How some of these truths which are thus expounded may also be conceived of in another way.
  48. 47 Chapter XLVII. The Son is the intelligence of intelligence and the Truth of truth.
  49. 48 Chapter XLVIII. How the Son is the intelligence or wisdom of memory or the memory of the Father and of memory.
  50. 49 Chapter XLIX. The supreme Spirit loves himself.
  51. 50 Chapter L. The same love proceeds equally from Father and Son.
  52. 51 Chapter LI. Each loves himself and the other with equal love.
  53. 52 Chapter LII. This love is as great as the supreme Spirit himself.
  54. 53 Chapter LIII. This love is identical with the supreme Spirit, and yet it is itself with the Father and the Son one spirit.
  55. 54 Chapter LIV. It proceeds as a whole from the Father, and as a whole from the Son, and yet does not exist except as one love.
  56. 55 Chapter LV. This love is not their Son.
  57. 56 Chapter LVI. Only the Father begets and is unbegotten; only the son is begotten; only love neither begotten nor unbegotten.
  58. 57 Chapter LVII. This love is uncreated and creator, as are Father and Son; and yet it is with them not three, but one uncreated and creative being. And it may be called the Spirit of Father and Son.
  59. 58 Chapter LVIII. As the Son is the essence or wisdom of the Father in the sense that he has the same essence or wisdom that the Father has: so likewise the Spirit is the essence and wisdom etc. of Father and Son.
  60. 59 Chapter LIX. The Father and the Son and their Spirit exist equally the one in the other.
  61. 60 Chapter LX. To none of these is another necessary that he may remember, conceive, or love: since each taken by himself is memory and intelligence and love and all that is necessarily inherent in the supreme Being.
  62. 61 Chapter LXI. Yet there are not three, but one Father and one Son and one Spirit.
  63. 62 Chapter LXII. How it seems that of these three more sons than one are born.
  64. 63 Chapter LXIII. How among them there is only one Son of one Father, that is, one Word, and that from the Father alone.
  65. 64 Chapter LXIV. Though this truth is inexplicable, it demands belief.
  66. 65 Chapter LXV. How real truth may be reached in the discussion of an ineffable subject.
  67. 66 Chapter LXVI. Through the rational mind is the nearest approach to the supreme Being.
  68. 67 Chapter LXVII. The mind itself is the mirror and image of that Being.
  69. 68 Chapter LXVIII. The rational creature was created in order that it might love this Being.
  70. 69 Chapter LXIX. The soul that ever loves this Essence lives at some time in true blessedness.
  71. 70 Chapter LXX. This Being gives itself in return to the creature that loves it, that that creature may be eternally blessed.
  72. 71 Chapter LXXI. The soul that despises this being will be eternally miserable.
  73. 72 Chapter LXXII. Every human soul is immortal. And it is either forever miserable, or at some time truly blessed.
  74. 73 Chapter LXXIII. No soul is unjustly deprived of the supreme good, and every effort must be directed toward that good.
  75. 74 Chapter LXXIV. The supreme Being is to be hoped for.
  76. 75 Chapter LXXV. We must believe in this Being, that is, by believing we must reach out for it.
  77. 76 Chapter LXXVI. We should believe in Father and Son and in their Spirit equally, and in each separately, and in the three at once.
  78. 77 Chapter LXXVII. What is living, and what dead faith.
  79. 78 Chapter LXXVIII. The supreme Being may in some sort be called Three.
  80. 79 Chapter LXXIX. This Essence itself is God, who alone is lord and ruler of all.

Citato nell'enciclopedia

ANSELMO D'AOSTA · CLUNY · FRATI MINORI FRANCESCANI

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Enciclopedia Cattolica 1948–1954 citata in 3 voci

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Sidney Norton Deane (1878–1943), Chicago: Open Court, 1903. Fonte del testo digitale: English Wikisource transcription of the 1903 edition (each chapter checked against the OCR of the Internet Archive scan stanselmeproslog00anseuoft). Testo originale: Corpus Corporum (University of Zurich) TEI of the Patrologia Latina, via the CatholicCorpus mirror. Public domain in the US and Canada: published 1903; translator died 1943. Latin: Migne, PL 158 (1853), public domain.

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