1. R. W. Southern, The Making of the Middle Ages (London, 1953), p. 172.
2. See Enid McLeod, Héloïse (1938; reprinted, London, 1971), pp. 8–12, 253–5, and John O. Ward and N. Chiavaroli, ‘The Young Heloise and Latin Rhetoric’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Bonnie Wheeler (New York, 2000), pp. 60–62. Heloise’s birthdate is controversial: she may have been born in the 1090s rather than in 1100 or 1101: see M. T. Clanchy, Abelard: A Medieval Life (Oxford, 1997), pp. 173–4, and Constant J. Mews, The Lost Love Letters of Heloise and Abelard (New York, 1999), p. 32 and p. 302, note 11, and Mews in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, p. 37.
3. Radice is correct to say that no absolute legal bar stopped Abelard marrying, but he would not have been able to remain as master of the Paris school because his predecessor, William of Champeaux, had given it a reputation for celibacy and austerity. Abelard had to remain celibate, even if the other canons of Notre-Dame did not: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 188–9, 193–5.
4. J. T. Muckle, ‘Abelard’s Letter of Consolation to a Friend’, Mediaeval Studies 12 (1950), pp. 173–4.
5. See McLeod, Héloïse, frontispiece and pp. 86–91, 265–6, and Mews, Lost Love Letters, pp. 161–3, 358–9.
6. La Chronique de Morigny, ed. L. Mirot (Paris, 1909), p. 54, and see Clanchy, Abelard, p. 207.
7. John of Salisbury, Metalogicon, 2.10. The date is precisely given as the year after the death of King Henry I of England.
8. Mary M. McLaughlin, ‘Abelard as Autobiographer: The Motives and Meaning of his Story of Calamities’, Speculum 42 (1967), pp. 463–88.
9. See Letter 2, p. 53.
10. See Letters 7 and 8.
11. This record of ‘Our Institutions’ (Institutiones Nostrae) is printed in C. Waddell, The Paraclete Statutes: ‘Institutiones Nostrae’ (Gethsemani Abbey, Ken., 1987).
12. Abelard, Letter IX, Peter Abelard, Letters IX–XIV, ed. Edmé R. Smits (Groningen, 1983), p. 233, and comment, pp. 115–20, 203–4. Translated by Vera Morton and Jocelyn Wogan-Browne in Guidance for Women in Twelfth-Century Convents (Woodbridge, 2003).
13. Translated by Elizabeth M. McNamer, The Education of Heloise (Lewiston, New York, 1991), pp. 111–83.
14. Translated by Sister Jane Patricia, The Hymns of Abelard in English Verse (Lanham, 1986), pp. 31–4. For a bibliography on Abelard’s hymns, see David Luscombe, ‘Peter Abelard and the Poets’, in Poetry and Philosophy in the Middle Ages: A Festschrift for Peter Dronke (Leiden, 2001), p. 157, note 9, and Constant Mews, Peter Abelard (Aldershot, 1995), pp. 66–70.
15. Petri Abaelardi Opera Omnia, ed. J.-P. Migne, Patrologiae: Series Latina, Vol. 178 (Paris, 1855), pp. 379–80, and see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 259–60, 263.
16. For Bernard, see G. R. Evans, Bernard of Clairvaux (Oxford, 2000) and The Cistercian World, ed. Pauline Matarasso (Harmondsworth, 1993).
17. For letter no. 28, see C. H. Lawrence, Medieval Monasticism, 2nd edn. (London, 1989), pp. 194–6.
18. For the issue between Bernard and Abelard, see D. E. Luscombe, The School of Peter Abelard (Cambridge, 1969), chapter 4; Clanchy, Abelard, chapter 13; John Marenbon, The Philosophy of Peter Abelard (Cambridge, 1997), pp. 25–34; Peter Godman, The Silent Masters (Princeton, 2000), chapter 3; and Constant J. Mews, ‘The Council of Sens (1141): Abelard, Bernard and the Fear of Social Upheaval’, Speculum 77 (2002), pp. 342–82.
19. Letter 238, in B. S. James, The Letters of St Bernard of Clairvaux (London, 1953; reprinted 1998).
20. Letter X, Letters IX–XIV, ed. Smits, pp. 239–47.
21. For English translations, see Further Reading, p. lxxxv.
22. Letter 241, in James, Letters of St Bernard (1953), p. 321.
23. See Clanchy, Abelard, p. 309. The ‘Apologia’ of Berengar of Poitiers is edited by R. M. Thomson, ‘The Satirical Works of Berenger of Poitiers’, Mediaeval Studies 42 (1980), pp. 111–33.
24. This is the hypothesis of Dr J. Jeannin, ‘La dernière maladie d’Abelard’, in Mélanges St Bernard (Dijon, 1952), pp. 109–15.
25. Carmen ad Astralabium, ed. J. Rubingh-Bosscher (Groningen, 1987), and comment in Marenbon, Philosophy of Peter Abelard, pp. 315–16.
26. See the chronology by Mews, ‘The Council of Sens’, p. 381.
27. Peter the Venerable’s epitaph is translated in Elizabeth Hamilton, Heloise (New York, 1966), p. 156. The Latin text is in C. J. Mews and C. S. F. Burnett, ‘Peter the Venerable’s Epitaph for Abelard’, Studia Monastica 27 (1985), p. 65. See comment by Clanchy, Abelard, p. 324.
28. Details in McLeod, Héloïse, pp. 216–19, and Mary M. McLaughlin, ‘Heloise the Abbess’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, pp. 1–17.
29. John Milton, Samson Agonistes (1671), line 1758.
30. For the manuscripts of Abelard’s works, see Julia Barrow, Charles S. F. Burnett, David E. Luscombe, ‘A Checklist of the MSS Containing the Writings of Abelard and Heloise’, Révue d’histoire des textes 14–15 (1984–5), pp. 183–302.
31. Translated by Mews, Lost Love Letters, p. 38.
32. The text is in Peter Dronke, Abelard and Heloise in Medieval Testimonies (Glasgow, 1976), pp. 17–18, 36, and see Clanchy, Abelard, p. 146 and p. 365, note 103.
33. Dronke, Abelard and Heloise in Medieval Testimonies, pp. 50–51 and comment at p. 23. See McLeod, Héloïse, p. 290.
34. J. Monfrin, Abelard – Historia Calamitatum (Paris, 1959), p. 60, and R. W. Southern, ‘The Letters of Heloise and Abelard’, Medieval Humanism and Other Studies (Oxford, 1970), p. 103.
35. See below, ‘The Letters of Abelard and Heloise in Today’s Scholarship’, p. lxvii. Heloise probably did edit the letters; Peter the Venerable may well have known of her sensual longings. See also Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 155–60.
36. The principal editions of the letters are listed by Constant J. Mews, ‘Peter Abelard’, in Authors of the Middle Ages, ed. Patrick J. Geary (Aldershot, 1995), Vol. 2, pp. 50–51.
37. The passage comes near the end of the letter but there is nothing in the Radice text for comparison.
38. See C. Charrier, Héloïse dans l’histoire et la légende (Paris, 1933), pp. 470–71.
39. Compare pp. 52–3.
40. J. T. Muckle translated the Historia calamitatum by itself in 1962.
41. See Marenbon, The Philosophy of Peter Abelard.
42. Southern, Medieval Humanism (Oxford, 1970), p. 102.
1. I owe this reference to Professor Robert Stein of the State University of New York at Purchase.
2. D. W. Robertson, Jr, Abelard and Heloise (New York, 1972), pp. 216–17.
3. M. T. Clanchy, Abelard: A Medieval Life (Oxford, 1997), p. 329.
4. Radice, 1974 edition, p. 48, note 2.
5. G. Constable, Letters and Letter-Collections (Turnhout, 1976), p. 34.
6. J. T. Muckle, ‘The Personal Letters Between Abelard and Heloise’, Mediaeval Studies 15 (1953), p. 67.
7. John F. Benton, ‘Fraud, Fiction and Borrowing in the Correspondence of Abelard and Heloise’, in Pierre Abélard, Pierre le Vénérable (Paris, 1975), p. 501; reprinted in Culture, Power and Personality in Medieval France, ed. T. N. Bisson (London, 1991), p. 448.
8. Ibid. (1975), p. 501, (1991), p. 448.
9. Ibid. (1975), p. 501, (1991), p. 448.
10. Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 327–8.
11. Ibid., pp. 18–19, 132.
12. Ibid., pp. 133, 143.
13. Peter Dronke, Abelard and Heloise in Medieval Testimonies (Glasgow, 1976), pp. 22, 49.
14. Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 169–70, 277–9.
15. Benton’s arguments are set out in Culture, Power and Personality, chapters 24–5, pp. 475–512.
16. C. Waddell, The Paraclete Statutes: ‘Institutiones Nostrae’ (Gethsemani Abbey, Ken., 1987), pp. 41, 53.
17. P. von Moos, ‘Post Festum’, in Petrus Abaelardus: Person, Werk und Wirkung, ed. Rudolf Thomas (Trier, 1980), p. 84.
18. D. E. Luscombe, ‘The Correspondence of Abelard and Heloise’, Proceedings of the British Academy 74 (1988), p. 278.
19. The current state of the forgery question is discussed by John Marenbon, ‘Authenticity Revisited’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Bonnie Wheeler (New York, 2000), pp. 19–33.
20. Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 169–70, 277–80.
21. H. Silvestre, ‘L’idylle d’Abélard et Héloïse: la part du roman’, Bulletin de la classe des lettres et des sciences morales et politiques (Académie Royale de Belgique), 5th series, 71 (1985), pp. 157–200.
22. Ibid., p. 195 and note 96.
23. See Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 319–24.
24. St Bernard, Letters 166 and 168, in Sancti Bernardi Opera, ed. Jean Leclercq, C. H. Talbot, H. Rochais (Rome, 1975–7), Vol. 7, pp. 376–80, and see Clanchy, Abelard, p. 315.
25. Barbara Newman, ‘Authority, Authenticity and the Repression of Heloise’, Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 22 (1992), p. 151.
26. Radice, 1974 edition, p. 66.
27. My translation of Peter the Venerable, Letter 115, The Letters of Peter the Venerable, ed. G. Constable, 2 vols. (1967), Vol. 1, p. 303, and see John O. Ward and N. Chiavaroli, ‘The Young Heloise and Latin Rhetoric’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, p. 60.
28. David Wulstan’s translation of Peter the Venerable (‘The Music of Heloise and Abelard’, Plainsong and Medieval Music 11 (2002), p. 6), which is Letter 115, The Letters of Peter the Venerable, ed. Constable, Vol. 1, p. 304.
29. My translation of Hugh Metel, Letter 16, in Constant J. Mews (ed.), ‘Hugh Metel, Heloise and Peter Abelard’, Viator 32 (2001), p. 89.
30. Mews, ‘Hugh Metel’, pp. 67–8.
31. Enid McLeod, Héloïse (1938; reprinted, London, 1971), p. 184.
32. Ibid., p. 183.
33. Étienne Gilson, Heloise and Abelard, trans. L. K. Shook (Chicago, 1953), pp. 57, 58.
34. Henry Adams, From Mont-St-Michel to Chartres (1905; Harmondsworth, 1986), p. 270.
35. Bonnie Wheeler, Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, p. xx.
36. Mary M. McLaughlin, ‘Chronology’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, p. xi; Constant Mews queries this birthdate, ibid., p. 37.
37. The Oxford Book of Medieval Latin Verse (Oxford, 1959), no. 223, pp. 330–32. Raby’s comments are in A History of Secular Latin Poetry in the Middle Ages, 2nd edn. (Oxford, 1957), Vol. 2, pp. 274–5. I owe all this to Dr Juanita Ruys of the University of Sydney: ‘Hearing Medieval Voices: Heloise and Carmina Burana 126’, forthcoming in The Poetic and Musical Legacy of Heloise and Abelard, ed. Marc Stewart and David Wulstan.
38. David Wulstan, ‘Novi modulaminis melos: The Music of Heloise and Abelard’, Plainsong and Medieval Music 11 (2002), pp. 1–23, and see the articles in the same volume of this journal by Constant Mews and Juanita Ruys.
39. Jean Jolivet and Henri Habrias (eds.), Pierre Abélard, à l’aube des universités (Nantes, 2001).
40. Ewald Könsgen (ed.), Epistolae Duorum Amantium: Briefe Abaelards und Heloises? (Leiden, 1974).
41. Luscombe, ‘The Correspondence of Abelard and Heloise’, p. 278.
42. Constant J. Mews, The Lost Love Letters of Heloise and Abelard (New York, 1999), p. 6.
43. Ibid., pp. 124–8.
44. Ibid., pp. 129–30.
45. Ibid., p. 4, and Letter nos. 49 and 50.
46. Ibid., p. 114.
47. Ibid., p. 176.
48. Ibid., p. 143.
49. Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 112–13.
50. Mews, Lost Love Letters, p. 143.
51. Peter Dronke, Medieval Latin and the Rise of the European Love-Lyric, 2nd edn. (Oxford, 1968), pp. 424, 426, and see C. Stephen Jaeger, Ennobling Love (Philadelphia, 1999), pp. 74–8.
52. Clanchy, Abelard, p. 18.
53. The prologue to Sic et Non, in Medieval Literary Theory and Criticism, trans. by A. J. Minnis and A. B. Scott (Oxford, 1988), pp. 87–100.
54. Alison I. Beach, ‘Voices from a Distant Land: Fragments of a Twelfth-Century Nuns’ Letter Collection’, Speculum 77 (2002), p. 52.
55. Prologue to Sic et Non, p. 99.
56. While this introduction was in the press, Peter von Moos published ‘Die Epistolae duorum amantium und die säkulare Religion der Liebe’, Studi Medievali, 3rd series, i (June 2003), pp. 1–115. He argues that the letters excerpted by Johannes de Vepria derive from the teaching of letter-writing in the schools and not from Abelard and Heloise. I am grateful to Professor von Moos for sending me a copy of this article.
1. Historia calamitatum … to bear: The traditional title of Historia calamitatum and the third-person chapter-headings (omitted in this translation) were well known by Petrarch’s time, though the best of the early manuscripts read Abaelardi ad amicum suum consolatoria <epistula> (‘Abelard’s letter of consolation to his friend’; the word in pointed brackets is lacking in the Latin). This version of the title and the opening paragraph indicate that however personal in content, this letter falls into one of the categories recognized by the art of rhetoric. The ‘friend’ who reappears as a fellow-monk in the closing paragraphs may be wholly imaginary, as part of the convention.
2. Le Pallet: Situated south of the river Loire, on the border between Brittany and Poitou, and on the road from Nantes to Poitiers (see the map at pp. 246–7). The remains of the castle there may date from Abelard’s time. The Latin name Palatium for Le Pallet means ‘the Palace’, and this pun gave rise to Abelard’s nickname of Palatinus: he was ‘the man from the Palace’, implying that he was a ‘Palatine’ or courtly nobleman. See M. T. Clanchy, Abelard: A Medieval Life (Oxford, 1997), pp. 130, 146–7.
3. I was his first-born: Abelard was probably born in 1079. His father, Berengar, was a Poitevin and not a Breton. His mother, Lucia, was presumably the heiress of the castle of Le Pallet which Berengar then acquired by marrying her. As the eldest son, Abelard stood to inherit this military position. Abelard had a sister and three brothers: for a tentative genealogy see: Brenda M. Cook, ‘Abelard and Heloise’, Genealogists’ Magazine 26 (1999), pp. 205–11.
4. Mars … Minerva: The Roman gods of war and of learning. Abelard uses them as literary metaphors.
5. peripatetic philosopher … the art of dialectic: Abelard understood the Greek Peripatetics (the followers of Aristotle) to have been wandering scholars like himself, whereas in fact they took their name from the arcade (peripatos) where they ‘walked about’ while teaching. Abelard was nicknamed the Peripateticus Palatinus (the ‘Palatine Peripatetic’) because he was admired as the medieval Aristotle. ‘Dialectic’ meant training in argument through logic. Abelard had been taught by Roscelin, whom he does not mention here, presumably because he had been tried for heresy and he had attacked Abelard: see Introduction, p. xvi, and Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 292–5.
6. William of Champeaux: (c. 1070–c. 1120), archdeacon of Paris, head of the Cloister School of Notre-Dame, and then at the abbey of St Victor; in 1112 or 1113 bishop of Châlons-sur-Marne. He installed Bernard as abbot of Clairvaux and became a close friend. For Abelard’s struggles with William, see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 68–71, 83–4, and John Marenbon, The Philosophy of Peter Abelard (Cambridge, 1997), pp. 9–12, 110–14. See also note 9.
7. Melun: One of the residences of Philip I. None of Abelard’s dates is precise; his school may have been set up as early as 1102. Corbeil was also a royal fief.
8. For some years, being remote from France: Abelard spent three or four years (c. 1105–c. 1108) at home; nothing further is known about this critical period in his life. He describes himself as ‘remote from France’ because ‘France’ in his time meant the area centred on Paris which was directly governed by the king.
9. Canons Regular: Their rule was based on that drawn up by St Augustine for secular clergy. It was intended to reform the cathedral clergy and to bridge the gap between scholars and monks (see also note 96). In c. 1105 William of Champeaux withdrew to the abbey of St Victor, just outside the walls of Paris, where he founded the very successful school of St Victor. The theologian Hugh of St Victor taught there 1115–41 and continued the school’s opposition to Abelard.
10. essence … non-difference: See Introduction, p. xvi, and Marenbon, Philosophy of Peter Abelard, p. 113.
11. Isagoge: (Meaning ‘Introduction’) by Porphyry, a Greek NeoPlatonist of the third century AD and pupil of Plotinus, was the elementary textbook which was used in Abelard’s time as a way into Aristotle’s logic. It defined the basic terms in the Aristotelian system: things are categorized by ‘genus’, ‘species’ and ‘properties’ for example. See Marenbon, Philosophy of Peter Abelard, pp. 105ff.
12. William’s successor: Not identified.
13. Envy seeks … the summits: Ovid, De remedio amoris, 1. 369.
14. Mont-Sainte-Geneviève: The site of the future university of Paris, it was on the outskirts of the city in Abelard’s time (see point F on the map of Paris at p. 248). He was protected there by Stephen de Garlande, who was dean of the abbey of Sainte-Geneviève (see note 79). Abelard describes a three-cornered fight between himself at Mont-Sainte-Geneviève, William of Champeaux at St Victor (point H) and William’s nominee at Notre-Dame (point A).
15. Priscian: Latin grammarian of the early sixth century AD, whose eighteen-book treatise on grammar (Institutiones grammaticae) was widely used in the Middle Ages.
16. If you demand … my enemy: Ovid, Metamorphoses, 13. 89–90. The meaning of this quotation is ambiguous, as Ajax killed himself in despair: see Clanchy, Abelard, p. 145.
17. Anselm of Laon: (c. 1055–c. 1117) was the master of the cathedral school at Laon from 1090 or earlier until his death. He was assisted by his brother, Ralph. Anselm (who should not be confused with his contemporary, the philosopher St Anselm, abbot of Bec and archbishop of Canterbury) was the most influential teacher of Christian doctrine and Scripture of his day. He was also very powerful in the city of Laon itself, as he was dean of the cathedral and chancellor. Abelard’s account of him is prejudiced and misleading, as Anselm was at the height of his power in 1113 when Abelard arrived in Laon. Abelard may have been sent there by his patron, Stephen de Garlande, in order to topple Anselm (see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 71–4).
18. the fig tree which the Lord cursed … field of corn: See Matthew 21:18–22; Lucan, Pharsalia, 1. 135–6.
19. a session of Sentences: ‘Sentences’ were written summaries or quotations giving the ‘sense’ of a master’s teaching. Students might be permitted to copy these out and discuss them with the master. In his lectures a master like Anselm of Laon did a textual commentary on the Scriptures and also raised general questions arising from them. In ‘a session of Sentences’ the master might answer further questions concerning his lectures and permit the students to make notes. In his own commentaries on Scripture Abelard used the techniques which he had learned from Anselm.
20. Alberic of Rheims and Lotulf of Lombardy: Very little is known of Lotulf, who came from Novara. Alberic became archdeacon of Rheims in 1113 and ran the school there with Lotulf; in 1137 he was elected archbishop of Bourges. They were two of Abelard’s main opponents at the Council of Soissons: see p. 20.
21. forbade me to continue … in the place where he taught: Anselm had the authority to expel Abelard from Laon because he held the offices of dean, chancellor and archdeacon. He was correct to argue that anything which Abelard taught at Laon might be attributed to him.
22. the school … offered to me: Abelard’s official status at the cathedral school of Notre-Dame is obscure. He was not allocated a house in the precinct and neither is he recorded witnessing any documents as a canon. Possibly his teaching post was only provisional. This might explain why he says later ‘I remained in possession’ instead of categorically stating that he was the master of the school.
23. ‘Knowledge breeds conceit’ … the burning of the book: 1 Corinthians 8:1. Abelard and Heloise both quote from the Bible very freely. Their own words have been translated when they are only approximate to the Latin of the Vulgate; otherwise the New English Bible, Knox or the Jerusalem Bible has been used. For the burning of Abelard’s book, see p. 24.
24. Heloise: Heloise was probably illegitimate, as her father is never named. Possibly Fulbert was her father, but no medieval source says that. Why he wanted her to be so highly educated is unexplained; perhaps she was able to insist on this because she was so clever. What age she was when she met Abelard in c. 1115 is controversial: see Introduction, note 2 and ‘The Letters of Abelard and Heloise in Today’s Scholarship’, p. lxxiv. The best biography is Enid McLeod, Héloïse: A Biography (1938; reprinted, London, 1971).
25. songs … still popular and sung in many places: Abelard’s songs were almost certainly in Latin (rather than French); some of them may have found their way anonymously into the great thirteenth-century collection of secular Latin songs, the Carmina Burana: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 53, 133, 174, and David Wulstan, ‘Novi modulaminis melos: The Music of Heloise and Abelard’, Plainsong and Medieval Music 11 (2002), p. 8.
26. ‘We are … our ears’: Jerome, Epistulae, 147. 10.
27. happened to Mars and Venus: They were found in bed together by her husband, Vulcan. The story was well known to Abelard through the versions by Ovid in Ars amatoria, 2. 561ff. and Metamorphoses, 4. 169ff.
28. removed her secretly … whom she called Astralabe: In Letter 5, p. 80, Abelard adds the detail that Heloise was disguised as a nun. The sister was probably the Denise or Dionysia who appears in the necrology of the Paraclete, as does Peter Astralabe or Astrolabe. Why Heloise named her son ‘Astralabe’ remains a mystery. The use of astralabes in the teaching of astronomy was coming into vogue, so this was the equivalent of naming a boy ‘Computer’ today. As astronomy combined with astrology, he was to be a child of destiny. The name may have been intended to echo Abelard’s: the boy was ‘Peter Astralabe’ and his father was ‘Peter Abelard’. Both ‘Abelard’ and ‘Astralabe’ were peculiar names.
29. not to damage my reputation: Abelard had to protect his reputation for celibacy because this was the standard which his predecessor, William of Champeaux, had established at the Notre-Dame cathedral school. Other canons were married and Abelard was not legally barred from marrying Heloise, as he was not a priest, but if he did so, the good name of his school would be damaged. Churches throughout Christendom funded students to go to the Paris schools to get an intellectual training in a rigorous religious setting. Masters and students were expected to live like monks: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 187–91.
30. ‘Has your marriage … from anxious care’: 1 Corinthians 7:27–8, 32.
31. St Jerome … study of philosophy’: Contra Jovinianum, 1. 47.
32. ‘Philosophy is … reject them’: Seneca, Epistulae ad Lucilium, 72. 3.
33. the name of monks: Monachus (‘monk’) originally denotes one who chooses a solitary life. See also Letter 8, p. 138.
34. Nazirites: Their rule of life is described in Numbers 6. See also Judges 16:17 (Samson).
35. the sons of the prophets … as St Jerome bears witness: See 2 Kings 4:1, 6:1; Jerome, Epistulae, 125. 7.
36. Antiquities, the Pharisees, Sadducees and Essenes: Josephus, Antiquities, 18. 1. 11; these Jewish ascetic or learned elites existed in the time of Christ.
37. The Italian school … a sage: Augustine, De civitate Dei, 7. 2.
38. Charybdis: The legendary whirlpool in the straits of Messina which engulfed ships.
39. ‘One day … lead to rain”’: Jerome, Contra Jovinianum, 1. 48. These arguments appear in the same words in Abelard’s Christian Theology, written in c. 1123. This suggests either that he borrowed them from Heloise’s letter and reused them in his book, or that he found them for himself and added them to his version of her letter in Historia calamitatum.
40. Argenteuil … put it on: The convent of Argenteuil had been endowed by royalty from Charlemagne onwards. By vesting Heloise as a nun, even without the veil signifying final vows, Abelard was signalling that he was divorcing her. Presumably he thought that Fulbert and her family were too weak to take reprisals against him.
41. humiliation: Fulk, prior of Deuil, gives another account of Abelard’s castration: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 198–9.
42. ‘Ye shall not … the Lord’: Leviticus 22:24; Deuteronomy 23:1.
43. the Abbey of St Denis: Like the convent of Argenteuil, the abbey was a royal foundation close to Paris. It enshrined the tomb of St Denis, the first bishop of Paris, who had been martyred by the Romans. By Abelard’s time St Denis had become the patron saint of France and the abbey was the site of royal burials and coronations. Abelard was therefore entering the most prestigious abbey in France. The greatness of the abbey is described in detail by its abbot Suger, who was Abelard’s contemporary: see Lindy Grant, Abbot Suger of St Denis (London, 1998).
44. O noble husband … gladly pay: Lucan, Pharsalia, 8. 94.
45. talent entrusted … with interest: See Matthew 25:15–30.
46. retired to a cell: This unidentified ‘cell’ of the abbey of St Denis was close either to Paris or to Nogent-sur-Seine: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 229–30.
47. History of the Christian Church: Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiae, 6. 8ff. For Origen’s castration, see Peter Brown, The Body and Society (London, 1988), p. 168.
48. two of them: Presumably Alberic and Lotulf.
49. occupying myself with secular literature: This refers to the controversy in Abelard’s time about whether monks should be contemplative or active. Monks should withdraw from the world; it was the business of the secular clergy and canons to deal with the laity. Hugh of St Victor argued that Abelard should be devoted to prayer and not to teaching, now that he had become a monk (see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 229–30).
50. a theological treatise on divine unity and trinity: The title that Abelard gave to this book was Theologia (Theology), meaning in Greek ‘discussion’ (logos) about the nature of ‘God’ (theos). He did not know Greek, but giving the book a Greek title made it look impressive. The book discusses the doctrine of the Trinity and whether non-Christians share this belief. (The revised edition was titled Theologia Christiana.)
51. ‘blind guides of blind men’: Matthew 15:14.
52. Palestrina … convene an assembly: Praeneste in central Italy. Almost all that is known about Abelard’s trial at Soissons sometime around 1121 is what he tells us here: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 295–305.
53. ‘Our enemies are judges’: Deuteronomy 32:31.
54. “Here he is, speaking openly”: John 7:26.
55. ‘Whoever supposes … beget itself’: Augustine, De Trinitate, 1. 1.
56. Geoffrey, bishop of Chartres: Geoffrey of Lèves, Bishop of Chartres, 1115–49.
57. his vine has spread … to sea: Cf. Psalm 80:8–12. The same phrase is applied to Abelard in the letter sent to Innocent II by the Council of Sens in 1140 or 1141.
58. ‘Courage which … mountain-peaks’: Cf. Horace, Odes, II. 10. 11–12.
59. ‘A false rumour … his past’: Jerome, Epistulae, 54. 13.
60. ‘Does our … the facts’: John 7:51.
61. Nicodemus: The Pharisee who counselled that Jesus should be given a fair hearing (John 7:51). He was a secret supporter of Jesus (John 3:1–10) and assisted with his burial (John 19:39).
62. approved by the authority of the Pope: The argument that Abelard should have got his book approved probably refers to the precedent of St Anselm of Canterbury getting the approval of Pope Urban II in 1095 for his book against Roscelin, who had been Abelard’s master: see M. T. Clanchy, ‘Abelard’s Mockery of St Anselm’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History 41 (1990), pp. 15–16.
63. Thierry by name: This may have been the famous master Thierry of Chartres, who is associated with Abelard by Otto of Freising: see Clanchy, Abelard, p. 75. For his career see Peter Dronke, ‘Thierry of Chartres’, A History of Twelfth-Century Western Philosophy (Cambridge, 1988), pp. 358ff.
64. not three Almighties, but one Almighty: Thierry was quoting from the Athanasian Creed (see note 66). Abelard was probably charged at Soissons with teaching that only God the Father was omnipotent: see Constant J. Mews, ‘The council of Sens (1141)’, Speculum 77 (2002), pp. 359–60. For the doctrine of the Trinity, see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 269–72.
65. ‘“Are you such fools … Re-open the trial”’: Daniel 13:48–9 (Vulgate). This is the story of Susanna, who was falsely accused of fornication by the elders, because they lusted after her.
66. the Athanasian Creed: Abelard was made to recite this particular creed because it defined the doctrine of the Trinity in detail. This creed was believed to have been written by St Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, who died in 373; but it may not have been composed until the fifth century.
67. the abbot of St Médard: The abbey of St Médard specialized in disciplining monks. Abelard was handed over to the prior, St Goswin, who remembered him as ‘that rhinoceros’: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 147, 305, and Marenbon, Philosophy of Peter Abelard, p. 18.
68. the lament of St Antony: The Life of St Antony of Egypt (251?–356) by St Athanasius was well known because he was believed to be the first monk. The life describes how Antony was driven close to despair, even though he had withdrawn to the desert to live as a hermit, when he was assaulted by demons in the form of wild beasts.
69. Bede, in his Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles: Ch. 25. The English monk the Venerable Bede (673?–735), who is now famed for his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, was best known to medieval churchmen for his biblical commentaries. In this case, however, Bede’s assertion about Dionysius the Areopagite (see following notes) is mistaken. Bede’s evidence is therefore irrelevant to Abelard’s argument, but he purports here not to know this.
70. the famous Areopagite: The monks of the abbey of St Denis believed that their patron saint was Dionysius (or Denis in French) the Areopagite, the Athenian philosopher who had been converted by Paul himself, as described in Acts 17:19, 34. The monks believed that Dionysius had been bishop of Athens and had then gone to convert the Gauls, where he was martyred in Paris after becoming the first bishop there. Dionysius the Areopagite or St Denis was therefore the apostle of France.
71. abbot Hilduin: Hilduin (d. 840) established the fame of the abbey of St Denis. He knew enough Greek to make an outline in Latin of the theological works of Pseudo-Dionysius, a Christian NeoPlatonist who lived in Syria c. 500. Hilduin believed that in Pseudo-Dionysius he had discovered the philosophical works of Dionysius the Areopagite. Hilduin wrote the authoritative life of St Denis, which made one and the same person out of Dionysius the Areopagite (converted by Paul), Pseudo-Dionysius (who lived c. 500) and Denis the apostle of the Gauls (who lived c. 250).
72. the authority of Bede … carried more weight with me: Abelard was right to argue that Bede was generally a more reliable historian than Hilduin and that there was something suspicious about the accepted history of St Denis, but he was out of his depth because he did not know Greek. Abelard could not demonstrate (and probably he did not know) that Hilduin had conflated three saints named Dionysius/Denis from different centuries. Hilduin was correct, however, in refuting Bede’s assertion that Dionysius the Areopagite had been bishop of Corinth.
73. a traitor to the whole country: Abelard was accused of being a traitor because St Denis was the patron of the French kingdom, whereas Abelard was not even a Frenchman but a Breton who had been accorded hospitality at St Denis. For example, in The Song of Roland (trans. Dorothy L. Sayers (Penguin Classics, 1957), chs 83–4, pp. 92–3), which dates from this time, Roland fights for Christendom, for France and for St Denis, and in 1124 King Louis VI headed his army with the banner of St Denis and saved France from a German invasion.
74. nor did it much matter whether he was the Areopagite: On the contrary, this mattered crucially to the monks of St Denis because their relics of the saint had to be authentic in order to work miracles. The shrine of St Denis was the source of the abbey’s prestige and revenues from pilgrims. In The Song of Roland, Roland’s sword Durendal is so strong because of the relics in its hilt, which include some of St Denis’s hair (ch. 173, trans. Sayers, p. 141).
75. He was … delighted to seize the opportunity to destroy me: Abbot Adam had in fact shown generosity to Abelard, first by accepting him as a monk after his castration and then by allowing him to return and continue his studies after he had been condemned as a heretic at the Council of Soissons in about 1121. Subsequently Abelard wrote Adam and the monks of St Denis a conciliatory letter, which concludes that Bede may have been mistaken: Letter XI, Peter Abelard, Letters IX–XIV, ed. Edmé R. Smits (Groningen, 1983), pp. 249–55.
76. Count Theobald: By gaining the protection of Count Theobald, Abelard had won the support of the most powerful ruler in France apart from the king. Theobald was the Count Palatine, and count of Blois, Chartres, Champagne, Provins and Meaux; in 1125 he acquired Troyes as well. He became the heir to the English crown and the duchy of Normandy on the death of Henry I in 1135, but conceded his claim to his younger brother, Stephen, King of England (1135–54). Theobald was also the patron of St Bernard and he attended Abelard’s second trial for heresy at Sens in 1140 or 1141, but he is not recorded to have given him protection then.
77. Count Theobald … Provins: Abelard was now a runaway monk subject to excommunication. Count Theobald may have protected him because he was frequently in dispute with the king of France. The priory in Provins where Abelard lived was probably the priory of St Ayoul.
78. When his successor was appointed: Abbot Adam of St Denis died in 1122 and was succeeded by the dynamic Abbot Suger: see Grant, Abbot Suger of St Denis, pp. 108ff.
79. A certain Stephen: Stephen de Garlande, King Louis VI’s steward, chancellor and chief minister, 1108–27 and 1133–7. He was also archdeacon of the cathedral of Notre-Dame and dean of the church of Mont-Sainte-Geneviève, where Abelard had his school in Paris. The French historian Robert Bautier has plausibly argued that Stephen became Abelard’s patron from the time when Abelard first arrived in Paris in c. 1100. By insulting the abbey of St Denis and fleeing to Count Theobald in about 1121, Abelard forfeited the longstanding royal protection which Stephen’s patronage had given him. Stephen therefore brokered the deal described here whereby Abelard transferred from France to Champagne. (For Stephen’s career, see Clanchy, Abelard, indexed references at p. 414.)
80. built a sort of oratory: Abelard’s oratory or hermitage was on the banks of the river Ardusson, four miles south-east of Nogent-sur-Seine, in the parish of Quincey. The bishop was Hato of Troyes, friend and correspondent of both St Bernard and Peter the Venerable. See Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 237–40.
81. ‘Lo, I … the wilderness’: Psalm 55:7.
82. ‘Death has … our windows’: Jeremiah 9:21.
83. Plato himself … muddy feet: Diogenes Laertius, Vitae philosophorum, 6. 26. Diogenes the Cynic said that in doing so he trampled on Plato’s pride, and Plato retorted that he showed pride of a different sort.
84. The senses are like windows … their studies: Jerome, Contra Jovinianum, 2. 8ff.
85. ‘The sons … wild herbs’: Jerome, Epistulae, 125. 7.
86. ‘Remote as … my retreat’: Jerome, Quaestiones in Genesim, 3. For ‘as Quintilian says’, see Declamationes, 13. 2.
87. “Why, all … after him”: John 12:19.
88. ‘not strong … to beg’: Luke 16:3.
89. my pupils provided all I needed unasked: In fact Abelard faced rebellion from his students, as described by Hilary of Orléans: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 240–41.
90. I named it the Paraclete: There were no precedents in the Latin Church for dedications to the Paraclete. By ‘Paraclete’ (Paraclitus in Latin transliterated from the Greek) is meant the ‘Comforter’ promised in John 14:16. Abelard’s ‘Confession of Faith’ (p. 211) identifies the Paraclete with the generator of the Incarnation and hence with the doctrine of the Trinity. (For a fuller explanation, see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 242–4.)
91. ‘Praise be … your Comforter”’: 2 Corinthians 1:3–4; John 14:16.
92. feast of Pentecost: Acts 2:1ff.
93. ‘But he … to yourselves’: 1 Corinthians 6:17, 19.
94. Echo … no substance: Ovid, Metamorphoses, 2. 359.
95. new apostles in whom the world had great faith: Abelard is using here the rhetorical device recommended by Cicero of not naming his adversaries in order to draw the reader’s attention to them. He calls them ‘apostles’ satirically because monastic reformers claimed to be reviving the life of the apostolic Church. Heloise calls them ‘pseudo-apostles’ (p. 47). To whom were Abelard and Heloise referring? The answer is almost certainly St Norbert and St Bernard (see also the following two notes). When Abelard was writing in 1132 or 1133, the world did indeed have great faith in Norbert and Bernard, as they were the churchmen who established Lothar III as Emperor and Innocent II as pope. Norbert was the imperial chancellor, responsible for Innocent II’s crowning of Lothar III in Rome in 1133, and Bernard’s preaching had been crucial in getting Innocent II recognized as pope. Possibly Abelard was frightened to name such powerful people and this is why he refers to them so obliquely. He had good reason to be frightened, as it was Bernard and Innocent II who condemned him as a heretic in 1140 or 1141 (Norbert had died in 1134).
96. One of these boasted that he had reformed the life of the Canons Regular: In 1115 Norbert, who had been the chaplain of the Emperor Henry V in 1110, challenged the clerical ownership of property and became an itinerant preacher. He regularized his position by founding the order of Premonstratensian Canons in 1121. They claimed to live by the ‘rule’ (Latin regula) of St Augustine and this is why Abelard describes them as ‘Canons Regular’. In a sermon (no. 33) in c. 1125, Abelard accused Norbert and a ‘co-apostle’ of boasting that they could raise people from the dead. This makes it likely that Norbert is one of the two ‘new apostles’ whom Abelard refuses to name in this letter. In 1126 Norbert left France to become archbishop of Magdeburg with a mission to convert the pagans on Germany’s eastern frontier. (For a fuller explanation of the difference between Canons Regular and monks, see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 211–15, and for Norbert see Marenbon, The Philosophy of Peter Abelard, p. 20.)
97. the other the life of the monks: St Bernard fits this description because he claimed to reform monks of every sort and not only his own monks of the abbey of Clairvaux or his own order of Cistercians. In c. 1125 he published his ‘Apologia for Abbot William’, which is an attack on the alleged ostentation and luxury of non-Cistercian monks. Bernard was thought to be attacking the Cluniac order in particular, but Abelard may have understood this work as a personal attack on himself (see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 244–5). Abelard must have been hostile to Bernard as soon as he became abbot of Clairvaux in 1115 because his patron was Abelard’s former master, William of Champeaux. Furthermore, the ‘Abbot William’ to whom Bernard addressed his ‘Apologia’ was William of St Thierry, who participated in Abelard’s trial for heresy at Soissons and initiated his second trial at Sens. (Extracts from the ‘Apologia for Abbot William’ are translated by Pauline Matarasso, The Cistercian World (Harmondsworth, 1993), pp. 44–58.)
98. the heathen: Abelard probably means the Moslems of Spain, who tolerated Christians: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 245–6.
99. the lord of the district: Conan III, duke of Brittany 1112–42, was the patron of the abbey of St Gildas. This abbey housed the shrine of the Celtic saint and scholar Gildas of Strathclyde. Abelard is named as abbot in a charter of 1128: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 242, 246–9, and Marenbon, Philosophy of Peter Abelard, pp. 21–2.
100. the Romans … drove St Jerome East: St Jerome (c. 342–420) was secretary for a time to Pope Damasus the First who encouraged his revision of the Latin New Testament, but the hostility of the Romans after the pope’s death in 385 made him leave for Bethlehem along with Paula, Eustochium and other Roman ladies who wished to live a studious, simple life under his direction.
101. the language unknown to me: The area around St Gildas was Breton speaking, whereas Abelard’s birthplace Le Pallet was south of the Loire and French-Occitan speaking: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 52–3, 247.
102. ‘From the … in anguish’: Psalm 61:2.
103. very powerful tyrant … Jews subject to tribute: This ‘tyrant’ was probably not Duke Conan III but some local lord. Conan’s authority was weak in the remoter parts of Brittany: see Clanchy, Abelard, p. 249. ‘Jews subject to tribute’ is used figuratively; Abelard would have seen Jews in Paris, but not in the Breton countryside.
104. ‘Quarrels all … our heart’: 2 Corinthians 7:5.
105. ‘There is … not finish’: Luke 14:30.
106. belonged to his monastery by ancient right: In 1129 Abbot Suger used forged charters to get possession of Argenteuil: see T. Waldman, ‘Abbot Suger and the Nuns of Argenteuil’, Traditio 45 (1985), pp. 239–72; McLeod, Héloïse, pp. 93–104; Grant, Abbot Suger, pp. 190–93; Constant Mews, The Lost Love Letters of Heloise and Abelard (New York, 1999), pp. 154–5.
107. gathered there: This was the first meeting of Abelard and Heloise after a separation of ten years.
108. by charter: Dated 28 November 1131: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 249–50, and Mary M. McLaughlin, ‘Heloise the Abbess’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, pp. 3, 12, note 16.
109. ‘Before I … of heaven’: Jerome, Epistulae, 45. 2.
110. concubines of King Ahasuerus: See Esther 2:3.
111. a eunuch of the Ethiopian Queen Candace … baptize: Acts 8:26ff. More accurately, the NEB translates ‘the Kandake, or Queen, of Ethiopia …’ See also Letter 5, p. 88.
112. Origen laid violent hands … History of the Church relates: Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiae, 6.8, and see note 47 above.
113. ‘A good name … great riches’: Proverbs 22:1.
114. “For our aims … eyes of men”: 2 Corinthians 8:21.
115. In his sermon … your neighbour’: Augustine, Sermon 355.
116. To this end … own resources’: Augustine, De Opere Monachorum, 4. 5. ‘After this he went journeying … own resources’ is Luke 8:1–3.
117. Leo the Ninth … intercourse with them: Pope Leo IX (1048–54) started enforcing celibacy among the higher clergy. Abelard probably found this quotation in the treatise on canon law entitled Panormia (3, 15), which had been written in the 1090s by Ivo, bishop of Chartres. Abelard’s reference to ‘Parmenian’ may be a confusion with the book title Panormia: see Historia calamitatum, ed. J. Monfrin (Paris, 1959), p. 103. ‘Have I no right … Cephas’ is 1 Corinthians 9:5.
118. ‘If this … a sinner’: Luke 7:39.
119. the Lord’s mother entrusted … conversation of widows: John 19:27 (see also Letter 8, p. 154); 3 Kings 17:10 (Apocrypha).
120. Malchus … with his wife: Malchus was taken captive by the Saracens and forced to marry a woman who also wished to remain celibate.
121. look after the women: Acts 6:1–3.
122. her head covered: 1 Corinthians 11:5.
123. abbesses and nuns ruling the clergy: Abelard is referring to the great aristocratic nunneries, like Argenteuil and La Ronceray in Anjou, where the abbess acted as a territorial lord. By contrast, the new reformers’ model was the Cluniac convent of Marcigny-sur-Loire, where the post of abbess was left vacant and the convent was administered by monks of Cluny.
124. ‘Nothing is more intolerable than a rich woman’: Juvenal, Satires, 6. 460. This quotation shows that Abelard was opposed to Heloise having much responsibility as an abbess: see Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 253–4.
125. the curse of Cain: Genesis 4:14.
126. poison me – as happened to St Benedict: The episode is told in the Dialogues of Gregory the Great, 2.3. Benedict was asked to leave his solitary life at Subiaco, east of Rome, to be abbot of a small monastery at Vicovaro, where the monks rebelled against his high standards and tried to poison him.
127. during the very sacrifice of the altar: Abelard must have been an ordained priest at this time, as he was celebrating Mass.
128. special legate: Probably Geoffrey, Bishop of Chartres.
129. sword suspended by a thread over his own head: The sword of Damocles; see Cicero, Tusculanae Disputationes, V. 20–21. Note the present tense; Abelard is still at the abbey of St Gildas.
130. ‘As they … its own’: John 15:20, 18–19.
131. ‘Persecution will come … servant of Christ’: 2 Timothy 3:12; Galatians 1:10.
132. ‘They are … rejected them’: Perhaps an echo of Psalm 52, but the wording is very inexact.
133. ‘“If I still … servant of Christ’: Jerome, Epistulae, 52. 13.
134. ‘Thank God I have deserved … with the rich”’: Jerome, Epistulae, 45. 6, 14. 4; ‘like a roaring lion … to devour’ is 1 Peter 5:8; and cf. ‘He sits in ambush with the rich’ to Psalm 10:8.
135. ‘Thy will be done’: Matthew 10 (the Lord’s Prayer).
136. ‘As we … love God’: Romans 8:28.
137. ‘Whatever befalls the righteous man it shall not sadden him’: Proverbs 12:21: Vulgate version, reading contristabit. The NEB translates: ‘No mischief shall befall the righteous.’
1. Thank you … absent friend: Seneca, Epistulae ad Lucilium, 40. 1.
2. cry out: Cf. Cicero, In Catalinam, 1. 8.
3. built … upon another man’s foundation: Cf. Romans 15:20.
4. ‘I planted … made it grow’: 1 Corinthians 3:6.
5. turned to bitterness against you: Cf. Jeremiah 2:21.
6. cast pearls … before swine: Matthew 7:6.
7. And so in the precarious … when we had parted: This sentence, often mistranslated as if it refers to the present and so suggesting that Abelard has never visited nor written to her at the Paraclete, has been used as evidence that the letters are a forgery because it contradicts what he says in the Historia calamitatum (p. 36). But the tense (movit) is past, translated here as ‘I was troubled’, and Heloise must be referring to his failure to help her by word before they separated and by letter after she had entered the convent. See McLeod, Héloïse, pp. 248–50.
8. Aeschines Socraticus … of husbands’: He was a pupil of Socrates, and wrote several dialogues of which fragments survive. This is, however, no proof that Heloise knew Greek, as the passage was well known in the Middle Ages from Cicero’s translation of it in De inventione, 1.31.
9. the gift of composing and the gift of singing: This passage about Abelard’s poetic and musical gifts needs to be read in the original Latin because it uses technical terms. For example, ‘the gift of composing’ translates the Latin dictandi gratia, which literally means ‘the grace of dictating’; the ‘art of dictation’ (ars dictaminis) was the usual way of describing the composition of prose or poetry. A good edition of Heloise’s letter is that by Eric Hicks, La vie et les epistres Pierres Abaelart et Heloys sa fame (Paris, 1991), where this passage is at p. 51, lines 188–96. See also the translation by L. Weinrich, ‘Peter Abelard as a Musician’, Musical Quarterly 55 (1969), pp. 296–7.
10. It is not the deed … but the spirit in which it is done: Cf. Introduction, p. xxii. This is the ‘ethic of pure intention’ held by Heloise and Abelard and set out in his Ethica or Scito te ipsum (Know yourself): our actions must be judged good or bad solely through the spirit in which they are performed. See Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 84, 129, 278–81; Marenton, Philosophy of Peter Abelard, ch. 11; and Paul V. Spade, Peter Abelard, Ethical Writings (Indianapolis, 1995), pp. 12–14, 20–25.
11. Why … have I been so neglected … in absence: This is not to be taken as contradicting Abelard’s statement on p. 36 that he often visited the Paraclete, and had invited Heloise and her nuns to go there (either by letter or interview). Her complaint is that he never writes her a personal letter nor offers her help in her personal problems. In Letter 5, p. 79, he refers to her ‘old perpetual complaint’ to him, but he evidently will not be drawn into discussion.
12. Lot’s wife turned back: See Genesis 19:26.
13. Hell: The Latin is Vulcania loca, Vulcan’s regions, or Tartarus, and illustrates how Heloise’s natural manner of expressing herself is classical.
14. grace in return for grace: John 1:16.
1. Psalter you earnestly begged from me: Psalterium, the Book of Psalms. This must have been some special type of Psalter, as the Latin Psalter was the commonest of all prayer books. Sister Benedicta Ward has suggested that it may have been in Hebrew or Greek. Or perhaps it may have been in French, like the Eadwine Psalter’s translation. Possibly too, it was exceptionally illuminated, like Christina of Markyate’s Psalter.
2. pray continually: 1 Thessalonians 5:17.
3. ‘Let me alone … my path’: Exodus 32:10; Jeremiah 7:16, loosely quoted.
4. ‘Let me alone and … threatened them’: Exodus 32:10, Jeremiah 7:16; Exodus 32:14.
5. ‘He spoke, and it was’: Psalm 33:9.
6. ‘In thy wrath remember mercy’: Habbakuk 3:2.
7. Jephtha … killed his only daughter: Judges 11:30–39. See also Letter 7, p. 119. Abelard composed a lament for Jephtha’s daughter (one of a set of six Laments), see Mary M. McLaughlin, ‘Peter Abelard and the Dignity of Women’, in Pierre Abélard, Pierre le Vénérable (Paris, 1975), p. 312, note 84.
8. ‘member of his body … unto thee, O Lord’: Cf. Ephesians 5:30; Psalm 101:1.
9. ‘In that … no mercy’: James 2:13.
10. Psalmist himself considered … destruction of his house: 1 Samuel 25:32ff.: the meeting of David and Abigail.
11. ‘When two or three … my Father’: Matthew 18:20, 19.
12. ‘A good … and effective’: James 5:16.
13. homily of St Gregory: The Homilies on the Gospels of Pope Gregory the Great (died 604) are sermons he preached to encourage monks.
14. women have even received back their dead raised to life: Hebrews 11:35 (Abelard quotes this a few sentences later). See also Letter 7, p. 122.
15. by Elijah and his disciple Elisha … at her father’s petition: 1 Kings 17:17–23 and 2 Kings 4:32–5; Luke 7:11–15 (widow from Nain); John 11:1ff. (Lazarus); Mark 5:22ff.
16. ‘A capable wife … gift from the Lord’: Proverbs 12:4, 18:22, 19:14.
17. ‘A good wife makes … a good life’: Ecclesiasticus 26:1, 31.
18. ‘the unbelieving … his wife’: 1 Corinthians 7:14.
19. when Clovis the king was converted … preaching of holy men: Clovis (481–511), founder of the Merovingian House of France, was converted to Christianity after his victory over the Alamanni in 496; his wife Clotild, a princess of Burgundy, was already a Catholic and had long begged him to renounce his pagan ways. The story was well known from Gregory of Tours, History of the Franks, II. 29–31.
20. ‘If the … he needs’: Luke 11:8.
21. Forsake me not … reach thee: Psalms 38:21, 70:1 (‘Make haste’), 102:1 (‘hear my prayer … reach thee’).
22. O Lord, Father … my enemy gloats: Cf. Ecclesiasticus 23:3; Psalm 35:2.
23. bringing precious ointments: See Mark 16:1.
24. ‘The women … the Lord’: Not in the Gospels. It is the antiphon for the Benedictus in the Roman Breviary for Holy Saturday. See also Letter 5, p. 85.
1. deaconess: It is not clear what Heloise means here by ‘deaconess’. See Letter 7, p. 117: ‘Those whom we now call abbesses they called deaconesses in former times.’
2. precedence in order of address follows precedence in rank: Heloise shows her knowledge of the rules for composing formal letters (Dictamen or Ars dictandi) which are found in several treatises from the eleventh century onwards: see Three Medieval Rhetorical Arts, ed. James J. Murphy (Berkeley, 1971).
3. ‘Each day … its own’: Matthew 6:34.
4. ‘Why is … summon evil’: Seneca, Epistulae ad Lucilium, 24. 1.
5. May it be … his fears: Lucan, Pharsalia 2. 14–15.
6. ‘But now … of death’: Proverbs 7:24–7.
7. ‘I put … her captive’: Ecclesiastes 7:25–6.
8. the Nazarite whose conception was announced by an angel: Samson, in Judges 13:3.
9. Solomon, wisest … and writing: 1 Kings 11:1–8.
10. Job … curse God: Job 2:9–10.
11. ‘I will speak out … of soul’: Cf. Job 10:1.
12. ‘There are some … accuses him’: Gregory, Moralia, 9. 43.
13. ‘I have … known repentance’: Ambrose, De paenitentia, 2.10.
14. ‘Miserable creature … this death’: Romans 7:24.
15. God … searches our hearts and loins: Psalm 7:10 (Vulgate).
16. ‘Turn from evil and do good’: Psalm 37:27.
17. ‘O my people … should take’: Isaiah 3:12 (Vulgate).
18. ‘Woe to … catch souls’: Ezekiel 13:18. This warns unscrupulous preachers not to make people feel comfortable in order to gain converts.
19. ‘The sayings … driven home’: Ecclesiastes 12:11.
20. ‘The heart of man … to death’: Jeremiah 17:9; Proverbs 14:12, 16:25.
21. ‘Do not … his lifetime’: Ecclesiasticus 11:28.
22. ‘Power comes to its full … the rules’: 2 Corinthians 12:9; 2 Timothy 2:5.
23. ‘I confess … pursue uncertainty’: Jerome, Contra Vigilantium, 16. This letter breaks off without a valediction.
1. ‘This is my reason … my Lord’: Jerome, Epistulae, 22. 2. ‘Lady’ in Latin is domina. See also Letter 7, p. 117.
2. ‘On your right stands the queen’: Psalm 45:9.
3. an Ethiopian … discoloured me’: Numbers 12:1; Song of Solomon 1:5, 4, 6.
4. truly widowed … charged to support: 1 Timothy 5:16.
5. ‘The women … the Lord’: Not in the Gospels. See Letter 3, note 24.
6. ‘his teeth whiter than milk’: Genesis 49:12.
7. ‘Persecution will … as Christians’: 2 Timothy 3:12.
8. ‘All the … is within’: Psalm 44:14 (Vulgate).
9. the foolish virgins … shut against them: Matthew 25:1ff.
10. ‘Night after … true love’: Song of Solomon 3:1, but not a very apt quotation, as the context makes it clear that the ‘bride’ is longing for her lover on her solitary bed. (Radice’s comment shows that she was unaware of the mystical interpretation of the Song of Solomon: see A. W. Astell, The Song of Songs in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, 1991).)
11. the monastic life … beginning from Paul: Jerome, Vita Pauli primi eremitae, 5.
12. ‘No one adorns … can be seen’: Homilia in Lucam, 40. 16. (In his copy Petrarch noted in the margin that Seneca said the same thing.)
13. ‘But when … to your Father’: Matthew 6:6.
14. St Augustine … ‘I am truth’: Augustine, De baptismo, 3. 6. 9; cf. John 14:6.
15. ‘But anyone … with him’: 1 Corinthians 6:17.
16. ‘And so in … or removed’: See Letter 2, p. 48.
17. rejoicing without weeping with those who weep: Cf. Romans 12:15.
18. ‘He who … be exalted’: Proverbs 18:17; Luke 18:14.
19. ‘We are … own praise’: Jerome, Epistulae, 22. 24.
20. She flees … be seen: Virgil, Eclogues, 3. 65.
21. unwary: Latin imprudentes. The alternative reading is impudentes (wanton).
22. your old perpetual complaint: see Letter 2, note 11.
23. God … has clearly shown himself kinder: See Letter 4, p. 69.
24. ‘The Lord takes thought for me’: Vulgate only, the last verse of Psalm 39:18.
25. lust … the greater sacraments: Intercourse even between married couples was forbidden by the Church during Lent. See James A. Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society (Chicago, 1987), p. 162.
26. besought the Lord … not heard: 2 Corinthians 12:7–8.
27. castrated themselves … throw them away: Matthew 19:12, 18:8.
28. ‘The eunuchs … not perish’: Isaiah 56:4–5.
29. an ill-informed zeal: Cf. Romans 10:2.
30. declare how much … my soul: Cf. Psalm 66:16.
31. he named you Heloise, after his own name, Elohim: The Old Testament uses the Hebrew word ‘Elohim’ to describe both the God of Israel and pagan gods. Abelard did not know Hebrew, but he would have known of ‘Elohim’ from glosses on the Latin Vulgate text. In fact the name ‘Heloise’ or ‘Eloise’ is of Old German origin in the form Helewise, where hele means ‘hale’ or ‘well’ and wise means ‘wide’ or ‘strong’.
32. ‘Women make … their faith’: Ecclesiasticus 19:2.
33. proved in the case … Solomon: 1 Kings 11:1ff.
34. to strike and convert Paul: See Acts 9:3ff.
35. ‘Whom the Lord … hates his son’: Proverbs 3:12, Hebrews 12:6; Proverbs 13:24.
36. ‘The Lord … shall arise’: Cf. Nahum 1:9.
37. ‘By your … your souls’: Luke 21:19 (Vulgate).
38. ‘Better be … a city’: Proverbs 16:32.
39. ‘A great crowd of people … is dry’: Luke 23:27–31. Cf. this passage with Abelard’s hymn translated on p. 235.
40. ‘All you … my sorrow’: Lamentations 1:12 (Vulgate).
41. ‘They shall … first-born son’: Zachariah 12:10.
42. ‘God forbid … the world’: Galatians 6:14.
43. ‘There is … his friends’: John 15:13.
44. Pompey’s reproach … And loved: Lucan, Pharsalia, 8. 84–5. This is the nearest Abelard comes to a direct rebuke to Heloise for indulging in her memories.
45. win his crown … kept to the rules: Cf. 2 Timothy 2:5.
46. ‘The beasts have rotted in their dung’: Joel 1:17 (Vulgate).
47. that blessed eunuch … his conversion: Acts 8:26ff. See Letter 1, note 111. The passage the eunuch was reading was Isaiah 53:7–8.
48. Prove us, Lord, and test us: Psalm 26:2.
49. ‘God keeps … sustain it’: 1 Corinthians 10:13.
1. To him who … singularly his: The manuscripts open with alternative readings: either Suo specialiter or Domino specialiter. Either reading could be correct, as the Latin Domino was abbreviated to Dno and might then be mistaken for Suo. Heloise might well have written Domino (‘To the lord’), as the word was fascinatingly ambiguous. Was she dedicating her letter to Abelard as her ‘lord’ (as in the address of Letter 2), or ‘to the Lord’ (meaning that she now acknowledged her own dedication to God)? This ambiguity was subsequently exploited by Heloise in her final question (no. 42) in her Problemata. See Peter Dronke, Women Writers of the Middle Ages (Cambridge, 1984), p. 137; Linda Georgianna, ‘Heloise’s Critique of Monastic Life’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, pp. 197, 212–13; Constant J. Mews, ‘Les lettres d’amour perdues d’Héloïse’, in Pierre Abélard, à l’aube des universités, ed. Jean Jolivet and Henri Habrias (Nantes, 2001), pp. 165–6.
2. ‘A man’s words … the heart’: Matthew 12:34.
3. As one nail drives out another hammered in: Cicero, Tusculanae disputationes, IV. 35. 75.
4. At present the one Rule of St Benedict: The Rule ascribed to St Benedict, who founded the abbey of Monte Cassino in c. 530, had been adapted over the centuries to all sorts of local needs, including those of nuns. But in the early 1100s reforming monks, headed by the Cistercians, insisted that only the original Rule of St Benedict was valid and there should be no local accretions or modifications. This is the context in which Heloise sets out here to demonstrate the inadequacy of the Rule alone as a guide for the conduct of nuns. (In general see C. H. Lawrence, Medieval Monasticism, 2nd edn. (London 1989), and the texts assembled by Matarasso, The Cistercian World.)
5. cowls, drawers or scapulars: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 55. For a good modern translation, see The Rule of St Benedict in Latin and English, ed. Justin McCann (London, 1952).
6. ruling … start the hymn: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 11.
7. drunkenness are … to lechery: Cf. Ephesians 5:18 (Vulgate).
8. ‘It is difficult … at table’: Jerome, Epistulae, 117. 6.
9. When wine … to fire: Ovid, Ars amatoria 1. 233–4, 239–40, 243–4.
10. to avoid contact with women of the world: Jerome, Epistulae, 22. 16.
11. ‘For if a man keeps … the same’: James 2:10, 11.
12. three readings of the Rule: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 58.
13. virtues which exceed … among vices: Jerome, Epistulae, 130. 11.
14. Pastoral Rule: Pope Gregory the Great’s Pastoral Rule, written in the 590s, was the most influential set of regulations and advice for the secular clergy.
15. done in moderation: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 48.
16. he will accommodate … shrink from: The Rule of St Benedict, chapters 2, 64. For the bruised reed see Isaiah 42:3. ‘If I drive … single day’ is Genesis 33:13.
17. modification of regulations … before the rest: The Rule of St Benedict, chapters 35–41, 36.
18. ‘Everyone will … teacher’s level’: Luke 6:40.
19. ‘My strength … in weakness’: 2 Corinthians 12:9.
20. Chrysostom reminds us: St John Chrysostom’s (c. 347–407) sermons and homilies, originally written in Greek for audiences in Antioch and Constantinople, begin to be quoted in the Latin West in the twelfth century because there was rich material in them for monastic reformers.
21. ‘Be watchful in all … bodily appetites’: Cf. Ephesians 6:18; Romans 13:14.
22. marriage be honourable: See Hebrews 13:4.
23. ‘Because law can bring … multiply law-breaking’: Romans 4:15; 5:20.
24. ‘It is … for slander’: 1 Timothy 5:14.
25. ‘But if those … of hell’: Jerome, Epistulae, 22. 6. See also Letter 8, p. 173.
26. ‘Let her … from Christ’: Augustine, De bono viduitatis, 9. 12.
27. Aristotle says that women … wrinkled skin: Macrobius Theodosius, Saturnalia, VII, 6. 16–17; 18. See also Letter 8, p. 178.
28. ‘When you … our duty”’: Luke 17:10.
29. ‘But if … my return’: Luke 10:35.
30. love itself has grown cold: Cf. Matthew 24:12. This pagan commonplace, a nostalgia for a Golden Age, would be known to Heloise through her classical reading, but it is equally common in the Middle Ages.
31. ‘We have written down this Rule … protection of God’: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 73.
32. whereas we read that the holy Fathers … clergy are: Ibid., chapter 18.
33. Wine is reckless … wine again: Proverbs 20:1, 23:29–35. See also Letter 8, p. 174.
34. Do not give … their sons: Proverbs 31:4–5. See also Letter 8, p. 175.
35. ‘Wine and women … good sense’: Ecclesiasticus 19:2. See also Letter 8, p. 175.
36. Never smell of wine … like wine: Jerome, Epistulae, 52. 11. The philosopher is not identifiable. For the Apostle condemning priests who drink and ‘Those who serve … strong drink’, cf.1 Timothy 3:3 and Leviticus 10:9, respectively. See also Letter 8, p. 176.
37. ‘Although … of this etc.’: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 40. See also Letter 8, p. 177.
38. Certain people told abba Pastor … be much’: Vitae patrum, V, 4. 31, 36, 37 (see also Letter 8, p. 177). The Lives of the Fathers is an anthology of biographies of the Desert Fathers, including St Antony of Egypt (see Letter 1, note 68). ‘The Lives of the Fathers were second only to the Bible and the Rule of St Benedict in their influence on monasticism in the eleventh and twelfth centuries’ (Giles Constable, The Reformation in the Twelfth Century (Cambridge, 1996), p. 160).
39. damned and elect … to the religious: Cf. Letter 4, p. 70.
40. the sum of the law and the object of what is commanded: Cf. Romans 13:10; 1 Timothy 1:5.
41. What room then is left … gracious plan: Romans 3:27–8, 4:2–3, 5.
42. ‘The Kingdom of God … your brother’: Romans 14:17, 20–21.
43. Peter was also trying to avoid giving such offence … Galatians: Galatians 2:11ff.
44. ‘Certainly food does not commend … in it’: 1 Corinthians 8:8, 10:25–6.
45. ‘Allow no one therefore … of men’: Colossians 2:16, 20–22.
46. to eat any kind of food … in the house: See Luke 10:7.
47. The Spirit says expressly … have followed: 1 Timothy 4:1–6.
48. ‘Why is … are not’: Mark 2:18, referring to John the Baptist.
49. Job’s testing: Job 1:8.
50. ‘For John came neither … own children’: Matthew 11:18–19.
51. perpetuate his race in Israel … he had it: Deuteronomy 25:5–10: Augustine means that a man could have the habit of continence though the Law forbade him to show it in practice. But the text quoted refers only to the brother-in-law of a widow.
52. ‘the term was … who can’: Galatians 4:4; Matthew 19:12, during a discussion of celibacy.
53. Continence is a virtue not of the body … it untruthfully: Augustine, De Bono Conjugali, chapters 25–7.
54. apostles … pick the ears of corn: Matthew 12:1ff.
55. ‘To eat without first … adultery, murder’: Matthew 15:19–20.
56. ‘If a man looks … of God’: Matthew 5:28; see 1 John 3:15 for ‘Everyone who hates … of Christ and of God’.
57. ‘who will judge … my gospel’: Romans 2:16.
58. modest offering of the widow … farthing: See Mark 12:42–4.
59. ‘The Lord … with favour’: Genesis 4:4.
60. ‘Keep yourself … to come’: 1 Timothy 4:7–8.
61. Jacob to provide … with Esau: Genesis 27:6ff.
62. ‘I have … thank-offerings’: Psalm 56:12.
63. ‘Do not look outside yourself’: Persius, Satires, 1. 7.
64. the insupportable yoke … Peter calls it: see Acts 15:10. See also note 66 below.
65. ‘Come to … is heavy’: Matthew 11:28, 30.
66. ‘My brothers … are they’: Acts 15:7, 10–11.
67. ‘If I am hungry … honour me’: Psalm 50:12–15.
68. ‘If any … full sense’: 1 Timothy 5:16.
69. the Lord provided his mother … to minister to devout women: John 19:26–7; Acts 6:5 (see also Letter 1, p. 39).
70. ‘A man who will not work … purpose of preventing idleness: 2 Thessalonians 3:10; The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 48.
71. But was not Mary sitting idle … day alone: See Luke 10:39. See also Letter 8, p. 209. For ‘burden and heat of the day’, cf. Matthew 20:12.
72. if they have to make material provision … the spirit: Cf. 1 Corinthians 9:11.
73. the tribe of Levi should have no patrimony … labour of others: See Numbers 18:20–21.
74. order the psalms differently, if it seemed better to do so: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 18. See also p. 101.
75. reading the Gospel in the Night Office: Cf. The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 11.
76. after God you are the founder … of our community: See Letter 2, p. 49, where the sentence appears in much the same form.
1. summary … quotations from Abelard: The complete text is translated by C. K. Scott-Moncrieff in The Letters of Abelard and Heloise (London, 1925), and by Vera Morton and Jocelyn Wogan-Browne in Guidance for Women in Twelfth-Century Convents (Woodbridge, 2003). Abelard’s letter is the most substantial and original contribution made in the Middle Ages to the debate about the ordination of women. But his arguments evoked no reactions, perhaps because they were too radical even for Heloise (she rarely called herself a ‘deaconess’, as he had wished). As so often, Abelard was on the losing side at a critical time; the canon lawyers of the twelfth century reaffirmed the rule of the Roman Church that women can have no holy orders like male priests.
2. The widow Anna … in St Luke’s Gospel: Luke 2:36, and see Alcuin Blamires, The Case for Women in Medieval Culture (Oxford, 1997), pp. 204–5, and Alcuin Blamires, ‘Gender Polemic in Abelard’s Letter “On the Authority and Dignity of the Nun’s Profession”’, in The Tongue of the Fathers, ed. Andrew Taylor and David Townsend (Philadelphia, 1998), pp. 138–9.
3. “She has wrought … on me”: Mark 14:6, and see Blamires, The Case for Women, pp. 206–7.
4. “My kingdom … this world”: John 18:36.
5. as a memorial of her: Mark 14:9.
6. “There stood … Mary Magdalene”: John 19:25.
7. prophesied long before by Job: Job 19:20. Abelard’s exegesis of this passage is explained by Blamires, ‘Gender Polemic’, pp. 147–8.
8. ‘Go to my brethren … my father’: John 20:17. For female apostles (Latin apostolae), see Blamires, The Case for Women, pp. 110–12, 191–2; McLaughlin, ‘Peter Abelard and the Dignity of Women’, p. 296; and Katherine L. Jansen, The Making of the Magdalen (Princeton, 2000), pp. 62–3.
9. “These all … of Jesus”: Acts 1:14.
10. Paul ‘seems openly … Lord himself’: Cf. 1 Corinthians 9:5, cited by Augustine, De Opere Monachorum, chapters 5–6, and see Blamires, The Case for Women, pp. 190–91.
11. ‘And it came … their substance’: Luke 8:1–3, and see Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 30.
12. multiplied among women … St Jerome: Abelard depends here on the authority of St Jerome and Cassiodorus (c. 485–c. 580), who attest that the Jewish writer Philo of Alexandria (c. 20 BC–c.AD 50) described the piety of men and elderly women who lived like monks in Egypt.
13. Miriam … spiritual chant in monastic congregations: For Miriam and monastic chant, see Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 204.
14. “Levitesses”: See Blamires, ‘Gender Polemic’, p. 142 and notes 49, 50.
15. ‘A widow … one man’: 1 Timothy 5:9, and see note 19 below. See also Letter 8, p. 145.
16. And Jerome explains … a good’: The commentary on Paul, which Abelard cites here, was probably not in fact by Jerome.
17. ‘The Son of Man … to minister’: Matthew 20:28. For deaconesses, see McLaughlin, ‘Peter Abelard and the Dignity of Women’, pp. 298–301.
18. Phebe of the church of Cenchrea … the Romans: Romans 16:1.
19. ‘Honour widows … widows indeed’: 1 Timothy 5:3, and see Juanita F. Ruys, ‘The Rhetorical Struggle over the Meaning of Motherhood in the Writings of Heloise and Abelard’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Bonnie Wheeler (New York, 2000), pp. 329–30.
20. ‘Salute Rufus … and mine’: Romans 16:13.
21. ‘Unto the elect lady … one another’: 2 John 1:1, 5.
22. ‘After her … the king’: Psalm 44:15–16 (Vulgate).
23. Although women are the weaker sex … more perfect: See Blamires, The Case for Women, pp. 134–6. Women as the ‘weaker vessel’ is 1 Peter 3:7.
24. “The last … be last”: Matthew 20:16.
25. she was created in paradise … made outside: See Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 104.
26. the paradox … made outside: Ambrose, De Paradisis, 4. 24.
27. the courage of Deborah, Judith and Esther: The stories of these three heroines are described in the Old Testament: in Judges 5, the Apocryphal Book of Judith and in Esther, respectively.
28. the wicked king … the Law: 2 Maccabees 7.
29. ‘I know him not’: Luke 22:57.
30. the Lord has sanctified the female genitals … by circumcision: See Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 107.
31. Elizabeth, who prophesied … miraculous conception: Luke 1:40–42.
32. extend the gift of prophecy to the Gentiles as well, then the Sibyl should take centre stage: By the ‘Gentiles’ Abelard means pagans. The predictions of the ancient Greek and Roman female oracles, collectively known as the Sibyl, were treated as equivalents of the biblical prophecies because early Christian authorities such as Augustine interpreted them in this way, as Abelard describes here. He is, however, unique in arguing that the Sibyl was a greater prophet even than Isaiah.
33. under Augustus Caesar in the time of Pollio’s consulate: The Emperor Augustus reigned from 27 BC to AD 14. The year of Pollio’s consulate was believed to accord with the year of Christ’s birth.
34. ‘I know … all things’: John 4:25. On the Samaritan woman, see John 4:6 ff., see also Blamires, The Case for Women, pp. 195–7, and Blamires, ‘Gender Polemic’, pp. 142–5.
35. St Luke recalled … just man: See Luke 23:27; Matthew 27:19.
36. ‘Yea rather … keep it’: Luke 11:28.
37. “Now Jesus … and Lazarus”: John 11:5, and see Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 203.
38. Mary the Egyptian: St Mary the Egyptian, who lived in the fifth century, was an actress and courtesan in Alexandria, who did penance and died as a hermit in Palestine.
39. ‘I say … before you’: Matthew 21:31.
40. “the Lamb … he goeth”: Revelation 14:4.
41. Elijah’s mantle … dry land: See 2 Kings 2:8.
42. “flamens”: Roman priests dedicated to particular deities.
43. ‘uni-virae’ … other pagan deities: Jerome, Commentarium ad Galatas, 3.6.
44. ‘What am I … of divination’: Jerome, Contra Jovinianum, 1. 41, and see Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 206, note 24.
45. Vespasian is said to have healed the sick and St Gregory prayed for the soul of the emperor Trajan: See Suetonius, Lives of the Caesars, chapter 7, and Paul the Deacon, Life of Gregory the Great, chapter 27.
46. ‘because they … first faith’: 1 Timothy 5:12, and see note 19 above.
47. Jerome … such a great man as Augustine: For Abelard’s attitude to Jerome and Augustine, see Blamires, The Case for Women, p. 203, and Alcuin Blamires, ‘No Outlet for Incontinence’, in Listening to Heloise, ed. Wheeler, p. 296.
48. ‘If all … venerable Paula’: Jerome, Epistulae, 108. For Jerome’s correspondence with women, see J. N. D. Kelly, Jerome (London, 1975), chapters 10, 11, 23.
49. ‘There is … deserted me’: Jerome, Epistulae, 45. Abelard cites this with reference to himself in Letter 1, p. 36, when describing how he was vilified for rescuing Heloise from the closure of the convent of Argenteuil.
50. ‘This man … touches him’: Luke 7:39.
51. catechumen: Person being instructed in Christianity who had not yet been received into the Church.
1. spiritual temple of God which you are: Cf. 2 Corinthians 6:16.
2. Tully records in his Rhetoric: Cicero, De inventione rhetorica, 11. 1.
3. Greetings: Valete. The valediction is suprising here, and has suggested to some that it marks the end of a separate short letter; but it may be intended to round off the formal introductory passage.
4. to be ready with belts fastened, to forsake everything and to avoid idle talk: Luke 12:35, 14:33 (see also note 8); Matthew 12:36.
5. ‘The unmarried … in spirit’: 1 Corinthians 7:34.
6. ‘Whoever listens … rejects me’: Luke 10:16.
7. ‘What they … their practices’: Matthew 23:3.
8. ‘Unless a man … disciple of mine’: Luke 14:33, 26.
9. ‘If anyone … with me’: Luke 9:23.
10. ‘I have … sent me’: John 6:38.
11. takes it up himself … to the world: Cf. Galatians 6:14.
12. The other Jesus … your enemies’: Ecclesiasticus 18:30–31. The lesser Jesus is Jesus son of Sirach, the author of Ecclesiasticus named in its preface.
13. ‘The whole … his need’: Acts 4:32, 35.
14. ‘Far be … may be’: Augustine, Retractiones, 1, preface.
15. ‘Where men … is wise’: Proverbs 10:19 (Vulgate).
16. ‘At all times … practise silence’: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 42.
17. ‘All of us often … deadly venom’: James 3:2, 7, 5, 8.
18. ‘A man … is futile’: James 1:26.
19. ‘Like a city … in speech’: Proverbs 25:28.
20. reply to Antony … the ass’: Vitae patrum, V, 4. 1.
21. ‘A woman … be quiet’: 1 Timothy 2:11–12.
22. women are gossips and speak when they should not: 1 Timothy 5:13.
23. When we are careless … softens anger’: Gregory, Moralia, 7. 37. ‘Letting out water starts quarrels’ is Proverbs 17:14; ‘Man’s utterance … runs deep’ is Proverbs 18:4. ‘He who … softens anger’ is Proverbs 26:10.
24. Abba Macharius … down alone: Vitae patrum, V, 4. 27.
25. ‘The harvest … learn to keep silence: Isaiah 32:17; Vitae patrum, V, 4. 7.
26. the sons of the prophets … the Jordan: Jerome, Epistulae, 58. 5. Cf. Letter 1, p. 30.
27. his forty days’ fasting … hidden places: Matthew 4:2, 5:1, 17:1, 28:16; Acts 1:9.
28. ‘Who has … anything green’: Job 39:5–8.
29. ‘Consider the meaning … a solitary’: Jerome, Epistulae, 14.5.
30. If you want to perform … before the Lord: Jerome, Epistulae, 58. 5. On the sons of Rechab, see Jeremiah 35:1ff.
31. When abba Arsenius … away dismayed: Vitae patrum, V, 2. 3ff.
32. ‘God knows … with God’: Vitae patrum, V, 17. 5.
33. abba Simon … started eating: Vitae patrum, V, 8. 18.
34. the hermit who, when he saw people … he replied: Vitae patrum, V, 12. 7.
35. abba Moses … a heretic’: Vitae patrum, V, 8. 10.
36. abba Pastor, who even refused … her plea: Vitae patrum, V, 8. 13.
37. In the Life of St Martin … with joy: Not traced.
38. ‘I have … defile them’: Song of Solomon 5:3.
39. Obedientaries: Small conventual establishments under the rule of a larger monastery.
40. ‘Whoever sits … the heart’: Vitae patrum, V, 2. 3.
41. ‘O desert … the world’: Jerome, Epistulae, 4. 10.
42. provision should be made … straying outside: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 66.
43. ‘For its … many rulers’: Proverbs 28:2.
44. You, Rome, have been … a partner: Lucan, Pharsalia, 1. 84–6, 89–93.
45. abbot St Frontonius … were born’: Vita Frontonii, in Vitae patrum, I.
46. ‘My brothers … greater severity’: James 3:1.
47. No skill is learned … your fellows: Jerome, Epistulae, 125. 15.
48. deaconess … abbess: Abelard often refers to the deaconess as a woman serving in the early Church; cf. Letter 7. He means here that an abbess (‘mother’) must perform the same duties in the convent. He continues to use the term diaconessa, here translated as ‘abbess’ throughout.
49. ‘Man’s life on earth … regimented army’: Job 7:1; Song of Solomon 6:9 (Vulgate).
50. A widow should not … widows, etc.: 1 Timothy 5:9–11. See also p. 163.
51. ‘Their wives … every way’: 1 Timothy 3:11.
52. ‘Woe betide the land … brings understanding’: Ecclesiastes 10:16 (Vulgate); Job 12:12.
53. ‘Grey hair is a crown … the Lord: Proverbs 16:31; Ecclesiasticus 25:4–6.
54. Speak, if you … your elders: Ecclesiasticus 32:4, 7–9.
55. Lives of the Saints … abbas or Fathers: Some of the early books of the Vitae patrum are called Verba seniorum.
56. the advice of the Apostle: 1 Timothy 5.
57. ‘set out to do and teach’: Acts 1:1.
58. ‘He is … by words’: Vitae patrum, V, 10. 75.
59. the argument of St Antony … of letters’: Vitae patrum, I, 45.
60. ‘Has not God … his presence’: 1 Corinthians 1:20, 27–9.
61. accepted public correction from his fellow-apostle Paul: Galatians 2:11.
62. Lord often reveals … the lesser man: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 3, reading minori. The alternative reading is iuniori, ‘younger’.
63. ‘A prophet … native place’: Matthew 13:57.
64. ‘The conclusion of these … a sin’: Jerome, Epistulae, 14. 7.
65. ‘Rob not … the truth’: Psalm 119:43.
66. ‘God’s word … am speaking’: Psalm 50:16–17.
67. ‘I punish … myself rejected’: 1 Corinthians 9:27.
68. ‘Physician, heal yourself’: Luke 4:23.
69. ‘If any man … of Heaven’: Matthew 5:19.
70. It is the Lord … the mighty: Wisdom 6:4–7.
71. ‘My son … eyelids slumber’: Proverbs 6:1–4.
72. like a roaring lion … to devour: See 1 Peter 5:8 (quoted p. 151).
73. ‘Have you daughters … be defiled’: Ecclesiasticus 7:24, 42:9.
74. ‘Death comes … our windows’: Jeremiah 9:21.
75. ‘Do not … the soul’: Matthew 10:28.
76. ‘A lying … the soul’: Wisdom 1:11.
77. ‘enjoy rich fare’: Cf. Habakkuk 1:16.
78. ‘The flooded … his mouth’: Job 40:18 (Vulgate).
79. struck … the four corners … daughters: See Job 1:19.
80. ‘Those who … and robbers’: John 10:8.
81. ‘Nobody … Aaron was’: Hebrews 5:4.
82. ‘No one should … rooted out’: Gregory, Moralia, 24. 25.
83. ‘The just … accuse himself’: See Letter 5, note 18, and p. 166.
84. ‘A foolish … a friend’: Cf. Proverbs 17:18.
85. concerned about pilgrims and guests … entertain them: The Rule of St Benedict, chapters 53, 56.
86. ‘when the people … were satisfied’: Cf. Lucan, Pharsalia, 9. 498ff.
87. ‘Do not … and man’: Ecclesiasticus 4:35, 10:7.
88. ‘The Lord … of themselves’: Ecclesiasticus 10:17, 32:1.
89. ‘Never be … your sisters’: 1 Timothy 5:1–2.
90. ‘You did not … chose you’: John 15:16.
91. ‘You know … with you’: Luke 22:25–6.
92. ‘places of honour at feasts … be humbled’: Matthew 23:6–7, 8–9, 12.
93. ‘If a great … his invitation’: Ecclesiasticus 13:9.
94. lay monks: Conversi, in a Benedictine house monks who had come late to monastic life and were not brought up in the cloister.
95. Joseph was bidden … sleep with her: See Matthew 1:20ff.
96. ‘Woman’s head … is God’: 1 Corinthians 11:3.
97. Shall the brother who presides … kept brief: Cf. Patrologia Latina, ed. J.-P. Migne (Paris, 1855), Vol. 103, p. 551. ‘Let all be done … order’ is 1 Corinthians 14:40; ‘Is my freedom … man’s conscience’ is 1 Corinthians 10:29; ‘But I have … gospel of Christ’ is 1 Corinthians 9:12.
98. By common consent … their protection: Article 11, Concilia, Vol. 10, ed. G. D. Mansi, p. 560.
99. ‘there will … one shepherd’: John 10:16.
100. if she happens … take her place: T. P. McLaughlin’s text, adding infirmaria from the single manuscript containing this letter in full (‘Abelard’s Rule for Religious Women’, Mediaeval Studies 18 (1956), pp. 241–92). The alternative reading means, ‘if the abbess happens to be busy … the Chantress shall take her place’.
101. ‘My son … all sin’: Ecclesiasticus 39:9–10.
102. For the anointing of the sick … James the apostle: James 5:14.
103. ‘I was … visited me’: Matthew 25:36.
104. ‘It is better to visit … is joy’: Ecclesiastes 7:2, 4.
105. ‘She seeks wool … her blessed’: Proverbs 31:13, 19, 21, 27–8. See also p. 193.
106. ‘For God loves a cheerful giver’: 2 Corinthians 9:7.
107. Judas abused … keeping money back: John 13:29; Acts 5:1–10.
108. ‘A soft answer … soothe enemies’: Proverbs 15:1; Ecclesiasticus 6:5.
109. ‘For you … brothers’ feet’: Vitae patrum, VII, 4. 8.
110. ‘I was … me in’: Matthew 25:35.
111. ‘Through thy … of thee’: Cf. Psalm 5:7.
112. rise at midnight … laid down: I.e. the Night Office and the seven offices of the day, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, Nones, Vespers and Compline. The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 16. The prophet is David, in Psalm 119:62.
113. a need to meditate … also says: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 8. Note that the nuns must not follow the usual contemporary practice of reading aloud.
114. However strict the discipline … angels fell: Augustine, Epistulae, 78. 8. On ‘Noah’s Ark … holy mildness of his father’, see Genesis 9:22 (Ham); Genesis 21:10 (Hagar and Ishmael); Malachi 1:3; Genesis 35:22 (Reuben and Bilhar, Jacob’s concubine); 2 Samuel 13:1ff. (Amnon and his half-sister Tamar); 2 Samuel 15:1ff. (Absalom and David). ‘Quarrels all … forebodings within’ is 2 Corinthians 7:5; ‘There is no one here … own ends’ is Philippians 2:20–21.
115. ‘Let the … his filth’: Cf. Revelation 22:11.
116. ‘My son, do not spurn … grieve you’: Proverbs 3:11–12, 13:24, 19:25, 21:11, 26:23, 28:23; Hebrews 12:11; Ecclesiasticus 22:3, 30:1–2, 8–9.
117. ‘He who … commanded him’: This is not in existing texts of the Confessions.
118. ‘Whoever despises truth and presumes … before custom’: Augustine, De baptismo, 3. 5, 6, 7; 4. 5.
119. ‘And certainly … be abolished’: Ivo of Chartres, Decretum, 4. 213.
120. ‘Do not be ashamed to speak … every deed’: Ecclesiasticus 4:24, 30; 37:16.
121. ‘The number of fools … are chosen’: Ecclesiastes 1:15; Matthew 22:14.
122. Even from … to learn: Ovid, Metamorphoses, 4. 428. See also p. 219.
123. ‘The people fares ill … no regrets’: Proverbs 11:14, 12:15; Ecclesiasticus 32:24 (Vulgate).
124. It follows that … at all: 1 Corinthians 11:27–31.
125. Collation: The daily reading from the Conferences of John Cassian before Compline, instituted by Benedict: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 42.
126. ‘As long … rest content’: 1 Timothy 6:8.
127. The man who eats … brother’s downfall: Romans 14:3ff. In the next sentence, ‘Happy is the man … is sin’ is Romans 14:22–3.
128. ‘Dear friends … he approves’: 1 John 3:21–2.
129. ‘And therefore … an apostle’: 1 Corinthians 8:13, 9:1.
130. ‘Eating and … they have’: Luke 10:7.
131. There are no … of God: 1 Corinthians 10:23–9, 32.
132. ‘When you … to pay’: Ecclesiastes 5:4–5.
133. ‘It is … the devil’: 1 Timothy 5:14–15.
134. ‘If anyone was circumcised … seek one’: 1 Corinthians 7:18, 27.
135. ‘A woman … another man’: Romans 7:3.
136. ‘To the unmarried … my advice’: 1 Corinthians 7:8–9, 39–40.
137. Do not give … their sons: Cf. Proverbs 31:4–5.
138. ‘A drunken … good sense’: Ecclesiasticus 19:1–2.
139. ‘Shame on you … of drinks’: Isaiah 5:11–12, 22.
140. These too … and understand: Isaiah 28:7–9.
141. ‘Wake up … you drink’: Joel 1:5.
142. ‘for the frequent ailments of your stomach’: 1 Timothy 5:23. See also p. 179.
143. Noah was the first … wished for it: Genesis 9:20 (Noah); Genesis 19:33–4 (Lot); Judith 12–13 (Holofernes); Genesis 18:1ff. (angels and Abraham (see also p. 186)); 1 Kings 17:1ff. (Elijah); Exodus 16:4ff. (Israelites fed in desert).
144. repasts of loaves and fishes … promotes sensuality: Matthew 15:32ff.; John 2:1ff.
145. law of the Nazarites … strong drink: See Numbers 6:3.
146. Rule of St Pachomius … the sickroom: St Pachomius (c. 286–c. 346) was the first monk to organize the hermits of the Egyptian desert into a community with a written Rule. Abelard would know the text of this from the Latin translation by Jerome. The original version is lost.
147. And so, if there … burning body: Jerome, Epistulae, 22.8.
148. ‘Does anyone … fitting penance’: Ambrose, De paenitentia, 2. 10.
149. ‘Only on … take wine’: From the fifth-century Ordo monasterii, the attribution of which to Augustine is doubtful.
150. ‘They stay … in heaven’: Patrologia Latina, ed. Migne, Vol. 23, p. 444.
151. ‘How good … live together’: Psalm 133:1.
152. Lord forbids … dissipation and drunkenness: See Luke 21:34.
153. ‘Subdue your … health permits’: Augustine, Epistulae, 211. 8.
154. ‘Let there … solemnly observed’: This work is thought to be spurious.
155. ‘He regards … in everything’: Author unknown.
156. ‘He grew … and unruly’: Deuteronomy 32:15. The NEB gives ‘and unruly’ as the meaning of recalcitravit (‘kicked’).
157. ‘The righteous … are bewildered’: Ecclesiastes 7:15–16.
158. ‘When you … to do”’: Luke 17:10.
159. ‘The Law … killed me’: Romans 4:15, 7:8–11.
160. ‘By being … deceived me’: Augustine, Ad Simplicianum, 1. 1.
161. Always we … is denied: Ovid, Amores, III. 4. 17.
162. ‘There are … Father’s house’: John 14:2.
163. ‘If a virgin marries … without distraction: 1 Corinthians 7:28, 34–5.
164. ‘The Law … to perfection’: Hebrews 7:19.
165. ‘Men and … are they’: Cf. Acts 15:10–11.
166. ‘Come to me … is light’: Matthew 11:28–30.
167. ‘For if Abraham … on works’: Romans 4:2, 9:30–32.
168. ‘I am … of thee’: Psalm 56:12.
169. ‘John came … a drinker”’: Matthew 11:18–19.
170. ‘The children of the bridegroom … defile him’: Cf. Matthew 9:15; Matthew 15:11, 18, 20.
171. ‘Guard your … all life’: Proverbs 4:23.
172. ‘For everything … have followed’: 1 Timothy 4:4–6.
173. ‘I know … suffer need’: Philippians 4:12.
174. Our motto … I approve: Seneca, Epistulae ad Lucilium, 5. 4.
175. Esau lost the birthright … eating meat: Genesis 25:17ff.; 1 Kings 17:4 (Elijah).
176. tempted the second … with bread: The temptation of Jesus by the devil: Matthew 4:1–4.
177. ‘It is … his master’: Cf. Matthew 10:24.
178. ‘Nothing is … a wife’: Chrysostom, Homilia VII, in Epistolam ad Hebraeos.
179. ‘As though … of monks’: Jerome, Epistulae, 54.
180. St Benedict does not forbid … all different’: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 39, where the flesh of four-footed animals is allowed only to the sick and weak; 1 Corinthians 15:39.
181. eating of meat … times a week: For the question of meat-eating at the Paraclete, see Introduction, p. xxxiv and McLeod, Héloïse, pp. 220–23.
182. ‘This is our feast-day … its demands’: Cf. Patrologia Graeca, Vol. 36, pp. 358, 430: the works Abelard loosely names and quotes are Orationes, 39 and 46. ‘Books’ must refer to the folios he used.
183. ‘Thus we … his fasting’: Jerome, Epistulae, 31.
184. ‘Anything you … for me’: Matthew 25:40.
185. ‘Those who … in palaces’: Matthew 11:8. See also p. 192.
186. In the same … of God: 1 Peter 3:1–4.
187. ‘A man’s … his character’: Ecclesiasticus 19:30.
188. ‘The Son of Man … spacious roofs’: Matthew 8:20; Jerome, Epistulae, 14.
189. ‘Alas for … as yourselves’: Matthew 23:15.
190. ‘Have I … a devil’: John 6:70.
191. Nicholas … sentence of death: Acts 6:5, 5:1ff.
192. road which leads to life … to death is wide: Matthew 7:13.
193. ‘Many are invited … cannot be counted’: Matthew 22:14; cf. Ecclesiastes 1:15 (Vulgate).
194. ‘You increased … of it’: Isaiah 9:3 (Vulgate: the negative is in doubt).
195. detract from his glory: Cf. 1 Corinthians 9:14–15.
196. ‘As fish … is within’: Vitae patrum, V, 2. 1.
197. what follows it: I.e. the Lesser Litany and Collect.
198. And when he rules … with the rest: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 56.
199. ‘They make up … to you’: Matthew 23:4, 7:15.
200. ‘I have … soil them’: Song of Solomon 5:3.
201. ‘one will … other left’: Luke 17:34.
202. ‘By night … soul loves’: Song of Solomon 3:1.
203. Dinah went out … was defiled: See Genesis 34:1–2.
204. ‘The man … turn away’: John 6:37.
205. ‘Master, I … have holes’: Matthew 8:19, 20.
206. ‘Would any … not finish”’: Luke 14:28–30.
207. ‘For all the ancient … spiritual songs’: Romans 15:4; Ephesians 5:18–19.
208. ‘Until I arrive … any kind: 1 Timothy 4:13; 2 Timothy 3:14–17.
209. Make love your aim … your thinking: 1 Corinthians 14:1–2, 4, 13–20.
210. ‘Let us … in harmony’: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 19.
211. ‘Sing hymns with understanding … man’s flute’: Psalms 47:7, 119:103, 147:10. Non in tibiis viri beneplacitum erit ei. This is usually interpreted as ‘takes no pleasure in a runner’s legs’, as the first half-verse refers to the strength of a horse. Tibia can mean both leg-bone and flute or pipe.
212. that we lose not things eternal … that we lose things eternal … that we admit not things eternal: I.e. instead of saying ut non amittamus aeterna some say ut nos amittamus aeterna, others ut non admittamus aeterna.
213. ‘in his mouth … for them’: Ezekiel 3:3: Lamentations 4:4.
214. ‘I will … the Lord’: Amos 8:11.
215. ‘How sweet are thy words … against thee’: Psalm 119:103–4, 11.
216. ‘The prophets wrote books … it knows’: Vitae patrum, V, 10. 114; V, 10. 67. Fenestrae, ‘shelves’, or rather alcoves like blind windows in walls. A twelfth-century example from an Augustinian abbey of Lilleshall, Shropshire, is shown in C. Brooke, The Twelfth Century Renaissance (London, 1969), fig. 14.
217. ‘Be always … and hope’: 1 Peter 3:15.
218. ‘We have not ceased … and wisdom’: Colossians 1:9, 3:16.
219. ‘Happy is the man … and night’: Psalm 1:1; Joshua 1:8.
220. ‘they are … Jesus Christ’: Philippians 2:21.
221. instructions about reading … manual work: The Rule of St Benedict, chapters 48 and 55.
222. ‘To read without understanding … ass sitting before a lyre: Cato, whose apocryphal sayings were widely quoted in the Middle Ages. The Greek proverb about the ass and the lyre is quoted by Jerome.
223. All prophetic vision … be lost’: Isaiah 29:11–14.
224. ‘Love knowledge … the flesh’: Jerome, Epistulae, 125. 11.
225. When I was … second Nicodemus: Jerome, Epistulae, 84. 3.
226. ‘My son … find wisdom’: Ecclesiasticus 6:18.
227. ‘As for … sacred wisdom’: Rufinus, Historia monachorum, 21.
228. ‘From then … my delight’: Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, 5. 24.
229. ‘A discerning … on folly’: Proverbs 15:14.
230. Philistines who persecuted Isaac … water from him: See Genesis 26:15.
231. ‘Go away … my God’: Psalm 119:115.
232. ‘The Almighty … heaped up’: Job 22:25.
233. ‘Drink water … yours alone’: Proverbs 5:15, 17.
234. ‘Hurt the … it sensitive’: Ecclesiasticus 22:19.
235. ‘Alas for … to enter’: Luke 11:52.
236. ‘produce from … and new’: Matthew 13:52.
237. ‘Man and … O Lord’: Psalm 36:7.
238. ‘The law of the Lord … a watercourse’: Psalm 1:2–3.
239. ‘Rivers of living water … flooding streams’: John 7:38; Song of Solomon 5:12.
240. ‘But Mary … her heart’: Luke 2:19.
241. ‘If you … have sinned’: Cf. Genesis 4:7.
242. ‘Anyone who … I say’: John 14:23.
243. ‘If you … then hear’: Matthew 11:15. The woman is Mary (see Letter 6 and note 71).
244. Church: The letter breaks off abruptly without the formal ending of Letter 7.
1. ‘You shall … by steps’: Cf. Exodus 20:26.
2. deadly songs: Once more Abelard uses classical symbols, here as a means of expressing dilemmas and temptations. Cf. Letter 5, p. 81.
3. firm: This confession, moving in its simplicity and the fact that it is addressed to Heloise, is preserved only in an open letter by one of Abelard’s pupils, Berengar of Poitiers, violently attacking Bernard and all Abelard’s detractors at the Council of Sens. It is not known whether it was written shortly before or immediately after the Council, nor how Berengar came by it. He says it is a fragment, but it appears to be complete. Berengar’s ‘Apologia’ is edited by R. M. Thomson, ‘The Satirical Works of Berenger of Poitiers’, Mediaeval Studies 42 (1980), pp. 111–33, and the ‘Confession of Faith’ in C. S. F. Burnett, ‘Confessio Fidei ad Heloisam’, Mittellateinisches Jahrbuch 21 (1986), pp. 152–3.
1. Letter (98) to Pope Innocent II: Radice’s translation; this and the following three letters are numbered according to Giles Constable’s The Letters of Peter the Venerable, 2 vols. (Cambridge, Mass., 1967).
2. the home the sparrow has reached … have found: Cf. Psalm 84:3.
3. him: This letter was written probably in July 1140 or 1141, after Abelard’s condemnation by the Council of Sens, but before the papal sentence of 16 July had reached France. It is the only evidence we have for the reconciliation between Abelard and Bernard of Clairvaux, and suggests that Peter the Venerable supported the overtures made by Abbot Rainald of Cîteaux rather than made the first move himself. The request was granted, as the next letter shows.
1. sent me recently: This letter does not survive.
2. carry out my intention: Abelard died on 21 April 1142, but as Peter the Venerable is known to have been travelling to Spain at the time, his reply must have been written in 1143 at the earliest.
3. ‘It pleased … his grace’: Galatians 1:15.
4. With Miriam you sang … the waves: See Exodus 15:19–20.
5. ‘the King of the sons of pride’: Cf. Job 41:34.
6. ‘No cedar … its boughs’: Ezekiel 31:8.
7. one of those animals … glow like a lamp: See Ezekiel 1:13.
8. Even from … to learn: Ovid, Metamorphoses, 4. 428. See also Letter 8, p. 169.
9. Penthesilea … Amazons: Probably known to Peter from Virgil’s Aeneid.
10. the prophetess Deborah … against the heathen: See Judges 4:9ff.
11. ‘the mountains … with milk’: Joel 3:18.
12. Marcigny: Famous Cluniac nunnery in the diocese of Autun near Semur-en-Brionnais, which Peter’s mother Raingard had entered after her husband’s death about 1117. Cf. his Letter 53.
13. enriched her … gold and topaz: Cf. Psalm 119:127.
14. Chalon … Burgundy: This was the Cluniac priory of St Marcel (Marcellus) at Chalon-sur-Saône: See Clanchy, Abelard, pp. 262–3, 322.
15. writing or composing: In fact none of Abelard’s known works can be dated to the eighteen months he spent at Cluny and St Marcel. See Introduction, p. xliii.
16. ‘Learn from … humble-hearted’: Matthew 11:29.
1. November of the past year: I.e. November 1143. See Letter 115, p. 217, and note 2.
2. trental of masses: Series of thirty masses for the repose of a soul.
3. Astralabe and yours: Astralabe was born about 1118 and would now be twenty-six or twenty-seven. What the suggested connection was between him and Peter the Venerable is not clear, but see p. 227 and note 4.
1. ‘a stranger and a foreigner … God’s household’: Genesis 23:4; Ephesians 2:19.
2. ‘Let Christ … their persons’: The Rule of St Benedict, chapter 53.
3. ‘Whoever listens … to me’: Luke 10:16.
4. for your Astralabe … as I can: It is not known whether Peter the Venerable was successful on behalf of Astralabe, nor what became of him. He is never mentioned by Heloise in her letters to Abelard, and Abelard’s only reference to him (outside Letter 1) is in the verses of advice addressed to him and thought to have been written about 1135. His death-day is recorded in the necrology of the Paraclete as 29 or 30 October, and he is named there as Petrus Astralabius magistri nostri Petri filius, but no year is given. An Astralabe is on record as a canon of the Cathedral of Nantes in the year 1150, and another as abbot of a Cistercian abbey at Hauterive in the Swiss canton of Fribourg, but it is uncertain if either refers to him. See McLeod, Héloïse, pp. 253, 283–4.
1. The Absolution for Peter Abelard: The text is printed by Victor Cousin, Petri Abaelardi opera, 2 vols (Paris, 1849), Vol. 1, p. 717, who took it from the notes written by André Duchesne to the edition of the letters of Peter the Venerable published in Paris in 1614, but it cannot be traced in the records of the Paraclete.
1. Vespers: Saturday Evening: Translated by Helen Waddell, Mediaeval Latin Lyrics, 4th edn. (London, 1952), pp. 175–7. For J. M. Neale’s version, see The English Hymnal, No. 465.
1. Good Friday: The Third Nocturn: Translation by Waddell, Mediaeval Latin Lyrics, p. 179. This hymn was sung in the night office (Nocturns) of prayers on the evening of Good Friday.