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Doctor Subtilis
—Blessed John Duns Scotus (1265–1308)
A proud and canny Scot from Duns am I,
an infant when Franciscans reached our coast.
These friars gave me tools to weigh the why
of doctrines puzzling theologians most.
Northhampton brothers shaped my childish mind.
My tutors sent me then to Oxford’s halls
where I embraced the academic grind,
mastered the skill of philosophic brawls.
At Paris—nonpareil prestige—I taught.
Adept in Lombard’s Sentences, my role,
aiding each lad to learn attested thought,
espouse our one true faith to save his soul.
French Philip sought to tax the papal land.
My loyalty stayed ever with the Church.
Against his royal law I took a stand:
I was soon severed from my lofty perch.
The King restored my rank within a year,
a brisk reversal of his regal stance.
I flourished in that intellectual sphere,
performed an erudite Scholastic dance.
Thereafter, my superiors humbled me.
consigned me to Cologne, a modest berth,
a post to chasten my celebrity,
a ploy to hurl my hubris down to earth.
At forty-one, Death claimed me for his own.
A Latin verse adorns my German tomb.
It tells of Scotland, England, France, Cologne—
priories where my priest’s vocation bloomed.
Always, I wrote: profound, the feel of quill
in hand, of fluid iron-gall ink, the play
of logic’s labyrinth, a thinker’s thrill
at bringing covert knotty points to bay.
I advocate the “this-ness” of each thing
(Aquinas contra, on this point we’re split).
God’s Being is the same as our own being
but we are finite, He is infinite.
By atheist pedants, I am misconstrued:
they think I ushered in modernity.
Not so! Re-read me! When correctly viewed,
my work fits us for blest eternity.
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Mary Jane Myers resides in Springfield, Illinois. She is a retired JD/CPA tax specialist. Her debut short story collection Curious Affairs was published by Paul Dry Books in 2018.
This is an erudite etude on an eminence echoing down through the years who wrote essays on the ephemeral and eternal that continue to elicit praise as you have done in your excellent poem.
Dear Roy
Thank you for your positive comments. I’m fascinated by Duns Scotus.
Of course, Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote a gorgeous poem in which he describes how the spirit of Duns Scotus still permeates Oxford. Here is his two line description of Scotus:
Of realty the rarest-veinèd unraveller; a not
Rivalled insight, be rival Italy or Greece;….
An impossible dream, to match Hopkins’s virtuosity!
Most sincerely
Mary Jane
This is an interesting combination of a dramatic monologue, narrative, and a philosophic exposition. And for something of this nature, the choice of ABAB quatrains was wise. It separated the various pieces of information, whether personal history or philosophic comment, into manageable segments for the reader.
Scotus didn’t differ from Aquinas solely on the issue of haeccitas. There were other things like Divine will and the Immaculate Conception (the Church eventually went with Scotus on this point rather that with Aquinas). It’s also well to note that rivalry between the two orders of friars (Dominican and Franciscan) frequently played a role in the theological debates of that time, and even later on.
As for a medieval Catholic theologian who may have helped usher in modernism, that award should probably go to William of Occam. Read the book “Ideas Have Consequences” (1948) by a American southern scholar whose name I believe was Richard Weaver.
Dear Joseph
Thank you for your positive comments. I wrote several quatrains about Duns Scotus’s philosophy, but I winnowed the discussion down to one quatrain. Two practical reasons: 1) I have a very tenuous grasp of medieval philosophy, and was afraid of making a “howler” mistake! and 2) I thought further discussion might “swamp” the rest of the poem, and cause reader disinterest.
Modern scholars have been preoccupied in sorting through the documents attributed to Duns Scotus. Some of this material turns out to have been written most probably by others. For example, the Grammatica Speculativa, an important text that influenced Heidegger, was written by Thomas of Erfurt, and not by Duns Scotus. H’s mistake might make a delicious poem subject! How the “history of ideas” is riddled with misunderstandings.
Thank you for your reference to Weaver’s book. I’ve been aware of this book for some time, and it’s in my “reading queue.” Perhaps I should definitely read it soon.
Most sincerely
Mary Jane
The swaying lines of this “Scholastic dance” reveal a character with a genuine, permanent exultation in the intellect. That’s no easy ballet, Mary Jane! Nonetheless, you portray Duns Scotus as a man thrilled by the subtle joys of the mind from early childhood to eternal blessedness. The portrait also indicates how he overcame the scholar’s vice of pride through the ups and downs of a stellar career, especially because his superiors were wise in their direction of him, and Scotus himself obedient enough to accept their assignments. The poem rather subtly goes on to display his saintliness in fierce fidelity to his Franciscan and priestly vocations. Both of these are above all concerned (as is his scholarship, and his longing even in heaven for his work to be rightly understood) with the central purpose of a churchman, the salvation of souls.
Clear and wonderful work of history and characterization, particularly as a man of this temperament is not where our world today naturally looks for inspiration.
Margaret
I am so blessed to have you as a reader. A poet often wonders: who in the world is interested in my particular preoccupations? So, we poets do our best to clarify our throughts—write a poem—then with trepidation send the poem out—and voila! sensitive and appreciate readers appear as through some wondrous spiritual synchronicity!
As you note, Duns Scotus (and many great and saintly Scholastics) did phenomenal intellectual work. They were trained rigorously in dialectic, and yet they were also obedient to their superiors. The overarching goal was holiness. In contrast, look at the Marxist carnage in our contemporary educational institutions. The atheist/agnostic “tenured radicals” have had no training in careful logic, and weak administrators have allowed them to “run wild.”
Most sincerely
Mary Jane