Anselm of Canterbury

Life

Anselm was born into a noble family in Aosta, south of the Alps. As a young man he left his homeland and traveled through France, and around 1060 he entered the Abbey of Bec in Normandy, where he became a Benedictine monk. There he succeeded his teacher Lanfranc, becoming prior in 1063 and abbot in 1078.

In 1093 he became Archbishop of Canterbury. He subsequently clashed repeatedly with the English kings William II and Henry I over the question of who had the authority to appoint church officials, and as a result he was twice forced into exile. He died at Canterbury in 1109. The Catholic Church venerates him as a saint, and in 1720 Pope Clement XI declared him a Doctor of the Church.

Work and Contributions

Anselm sought to understand the content of the faith by examining it through reason. His method is commonly summarized in the phrase "faith seeking understanding" (Latin fides quaerens intellectum). The idea is not that one understands in order to believe, but that because one believes, one seeks to understand more deeply. This approach is regarded as an inheritance from Augustine, and it became the starting point of medieval Scholastic theology, which systematized theology by means of reason.

• Ontological argument: In the Proslogion, Anselm defined God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived" and argued that such a being cannot exist only in the mind but must exist in reality. The name "ontological argument" was given later by the philosopher Kant.
• Satisfaction theory: In Cur Deus Homo (Why God Became Man, completed c. 1098), Anselm argued that because sin violates God's honor, it must be compensated for (that is, satisfaction must be made); this is a debt that humanity owes, yet only God is able to pay it, and therefore God became man. This explanation, which set out in logical terms the reasons for the Incarnation and the cross, became an important framework for Western doctrines of the atonement.
• At the Council of Bari in 1098, he defended the Western Church's position that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.

Influence on the Korean Church

Although Anselm was a medieval Catholic figure, his satisfaction theory became the foundation for Protestant doctrines of the atonement after the Reformation. The Reformers, including John Calvin, adopted it and developed it into the doctrine of penal substitution, which holds that Christ bore in the place of sinners the punishment due to them.

In Korea, this understanding is widespread in Protestant preaching and theological education, including within the Reformed tradition. In courses on the history of doctrine and systematic theology at Korean seminaries, Anselm is usually presented as a key figure in the history of atonement theology, and the ontological argument is frequently discussed in Christian apologetics and the philosophy of religion. Korean theologians are also familiar with the book that the twentieth-century theologian Karl Barth wrote on Anselm's theological method.

Assessment

Anselm is called the "Father of Scholasticism" and is regarded as a figure who clarified the relationship between faith and reason. He has also been the subject of criticism.

• The ontological argument was rebutted in Anselm's own day by the monk Gaunilo, who offered the example of "the most perfect island that can be conceived"; later, Thomas Aquinas and Kant also rejected it.
• In response to the satisfaction theory, Anselm's contemporary Abelard put forward a view emphasizing the moral influence of the love displayed on the cross. In modern times, some critics have argued that the concepts of God's honor and reparation reflect the ideas of medieval feudal society, while others, drawing on the view that emphasizes Christ's victory over the powers of evil, have raised further objections. Eastern Orthodox theologians have likewise long contended that Western atonement theology leans too heavily on legal concepts.
• Reformed theologians, by contrast, value the satisfaction theory highly for clearly displaying God's justice and the gravity of sin, and they hold that the doctrine of penal substitution remedied its limitations.