What is it about?
God knows everything, including facts about the future—for example, what you're going to eat tomorrow for breakfast. And what's known must be the case. Does it then follow that the future is determined—that what you'll eat for breakfast tomorrow is fixed? No, says Alberic of Paris: when the things God knows change, God's knowledge changes with them. It then falls to Alberic to show why this does not entail a change in God.
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Why is it important?
Alberic of Paris was one of the greatest philosophers of the 12th century, and a fierce opponent of the famous Peter Abelard. His philosophical views and arguments provide an important window into this intense period in the history of philosophy, and his reasoning is often brilliant. No wonder, then, that Alberic is receiving renewed research interest in recent years. Sadly, nothing Alberic wrote survives. But there are several documents associated with his school that cite him regularly. Most of these sit in unedited manuscripts, usually only in one copy. A few of them are edited. But the present article contains, for the first time ever, a new Latin edition and English translation of key sources presenting Alberic's views and criticisms of Abelard on the question of God's knowledge and future contingents.
Perspectives
Alberic's views are novel and often quite surprising. My hope is that this paper and the attached edition/translation will inspire more research into his work, and more broadly in philosophy in the 12th century. What makes this century so exciting is, in large part, that they have some of Aristotle, but by no means most or even all of his work. As a result, they are more free to try out ideas—atomism, Zeno's paradoxes, etc—that later were taken to be decisively refuted once Aristotle was fully translated and absorbed by thinkers writing in Latin. So there are many philosophical niches available to them that were later closed off—niches which they very often filled. Among the lot, Abelard and Alberic stand out as some of the most brilliant and original thinkers.
Boaz Schuman
Associatie KU Leuven
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Can Divine Foreknowledge Change? A Characteristic Theo-Logical Doctrine of Alberic and His School, December 2025, De Gruyter,
DOI: 10.1163/9789004747944_010.
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