Achard of St. Victor (D. 1171) and The Eclipse of The Arithmetic Model of The Trinity

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ACHARD OF ST. VICTOR (D. 1171) AND THE ECLIPSE

OF THE ARITHMETIC MODEL OF THE TRINITY
By DAVID ALBERTSON
In the first book of De doctrina christiana, Augustine of Hippo famously

teaches that only the Trinity is to be enjoyed; all other things and even
people are to be used toward this singular end. The brevity of Augustines passing remarks on the Trinity gives no hint that he will later
devote many pages to the topic. He writes:
These three have the same eternal nature, the same unchangeableness,
the same majesty, the same power. In the Father there is unity, in the
Son equality, and in the Holy Spirit a harmony of unity and equality.
And the three are all one because of the Father, all equal because of the
Son, and all in harmony because of the Holy Spirit.1
These few lines comprise the lengthiest discussion of the Trinity in De

doctrina christiana. We can now trace Augustines triad of unitas, aequalitas, and concordia to a saying of the neo-Pythagorean Moderatus of Gades
(Cdiz) (fl. ca. 50 CE), as reported by Porphyry.2 Marius Victorinus had
already adopted a portion of the same passage on Moderatus (along with
others from Porphyry) when formulating his own Pythagorean analogy
of the Trinity.3 But Augustine, immediately after introducing his triad
in De doctrina christiana, repudiates the high-minded philosophical anal1
Eadem tribus aeternitas, eadem incommutabilitas, eadem maiestas, eadem

potestas. In patre unitas, in filio aequalitas, in spiritu sancto unitatis aequalitatisque
concordia, et tria haec unum omnia propter patrem, aequalia omnia propter filium,
conexa omnia propter spiritum sanctum (Augustine, De doctrina christiana, 1.12
[V.5], ed. R. P. H. Green [Oxford, 1995], 1617).
2
Moderatus had suggested that Pythagorean philosophers adverted to numbers as
a pedagogical device, since the primal forms of things, being invisible and difficult
to conceive, are best conveyed by definite numbers. The number three, he states,
represents the perfection of things, while the number one denotes unity [henots],
equality [isottos] or sameness, and the cause of harmony [sympnoia] and sympathy
(Porphyry, Vita Pythagorae 49, ed. August Nauck, Porphryrii philosophi Platonici
opuscula selecta [Leipzig, 1886; Hildesheim, 1963], 44:812; trans. in K. S. Guthrie,
The Pythagorean Sourcebook [Grand Rapids, 1987], 133).
3
Deus est monos, monadem ex se gignens, in se unum reflectens ardorem. . . .
Sic quidem etiam in multis: unaquaeque unitas proprium habet numerum quia super
diversum ab aliis reflectitur (Franoise Hudry, Le Livre des XXIV Philosophes:
rsurgence dun texte du IVe sicle [Paris, 2009], 150). For details on Victorinuss
sources, including Vita Pythagorae 5051, see ibid., 2429.
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ogy, calling it an example of the painful failure of language in the face of

Gods ineffability.4 Indeed, the bishop of Hippo disowned the idea altogether, never repeating it again. There is no trace of the triad in Augustines earlier works, despite his avowedly Pythagorean views of number
in De ordine, De musica, and De libero arbitrio, and despite the arithmological interests of his several commentaries on Genesis.5 Nor does Augustine so much as mention the triad in the fifteen books of De trinitate that
he wrote two decades later.
Despite such inauspicious origins, Augustines triad of unitas, aequalitas, and concordia in hindsight now belongs on any short list of classical
analogies of the Trinity. Medieval readers of Augustine found it a fruitful analogy of Trinitarian relations and considered its meaning alongside
other notable triads: Hilary of Poitierss aeternitas, species, usus, much
discussed by Augustine and then by early scholastics; Augustines own
more noteworthy memoria, notitia, amor from De trinitate; variations
on the Plotinian triad of One, Mind, and World Soul, such as survive
in Macrobius; later Neoplatonic triads conveyed from Ps.-Dionysiuss
Divine Names via John Scotus Eriugenas translations (mansio, processio, reditus; or less commonly, esse, vivere, intelligere); and finally, the
controversial potentia, sapientia, benignitas from Hugh of St. Victor and
Peter Abelard.6 Peter Lombard carried Augustines triad of unity, equality, and harmony into the Sentences, and Aquinas found a home for it in
the Summa.7 But where these authorities cited the analogy as a confirmation of standard accounts of intradivine relations, its most noteworthy
Augustine, De doctrina christiana, 1.1314 (VI.6), ed. Green, 1619.

See Christoph Horn, Augustins Philosophie der Zahlen, Revue des tudes
Augustiniennes 40 (1994): 389415.
6
The triad has long been viewed as an invention of Peter Abelard, but new
research by Dominique Poirel has raised the possibility of Hugh of St. Victors priority (Livre de la nature et dbat trinitaire au XIIe sicle: Le De tribus diebus de
Hugues de Saint-Victor [Turnhout, 2002], 345420). See further, however, Constant
J. Mews, The World as Text: The Bible and the Book of Nature in Twelfth-Century
Theology, in Scripture and Pluralism: Reading the Bible in the Religiously Plural
Worlds of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, ed. Thomas J. Heffernan and Thomas E.
Burman (Leiden, 2005), 95122; cf. comments by Boyd Taylor Coolman and Hugh
Feiss in Trinity and Creation, ed. Boyd Taylor Coolman and Dale M. Coulter, Victorine Texts in Translation 1 (Turnhout, 2010), 2835 and 5258, respectively. On the
prehistory of the triad in ancient Greek philosophy, see further P. L. Reynolds, The
Essence, Power and Presence of God: Fragments of the History of an Idea, From
Neopythagoreanism to Peter Abelard, in From Athens to Chartres: Neoplatonism and
Medieval Thought: Studies in Honour of douard Jeauneau, ed. Haijo Jan Westra
(Leiden, 1992), 35180.
7
On Peter Lombard, see below; cf. Summa theologiae I, q. 38, art. 8.
5
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achard of st. victor
103
defenders, Thierry of Chartres and Nicholas of Cusa, relished the deeper

mathematical mystery that the three words seemed to conceal.
In his boldly naturalistic hexaemeral commentary from the 1130s,
Thierry of Chartres (d. 1157) breathed new life into the Augustinian triad
by illuminating its connections with contemporary medieval science.8
Thierry sought to interpret the six days of creation secundum physicam,
and likewise the Creator, so to speak, secundum quadrivium. Unitas and
aequalitas were the grounding principles, respectively, of arithmetic and
harmonics (or music), the two pillars of the mathematical disciplines in
Boethiuss account.9 Thierry went on to pursue this arithmetical reconstruction of Augustines triad throughout his commentaries on Boethiuss De trinitate in the 1140s and 1150s.10 He adjusted Augustines third
term from concordia to conexio, a minor amendment but one that drew
attention to the implicit arithmetical link between unity and equality.
Numerical oneness, explained Thierry, can be multiplied by itself and
remain oneness. This perfect self-equality of unity is an analogy of the
Sons generation by the Father. But the oneness that results after the
self-generation stems both from unity and from unitys generated equality: it is their connection.11 Hence the intrinsic unity, equality, and con8
Thierry of Chartres, Tractatus de sex dierum operibus 3047, in Commentaries on
Boethius by Thierry of Chartres and His School, ed. Nikolaus M. Hring (Toronto,
1971), 56875.
9
Boethius, Institutio arithmetica 1.1.4, ed. Jean-Yves Guillaumin, Institution Arithmtique (Paris, 2002), 7. Without being able to explore this further, one should
note that in the late eleventh century a new office for the feast of the Trinity
was instituted at Cluny that included this antiphon: In patre manet aeternitas in
filio aequalitas in spiritu sancto aeternitatis aequalitatisque connexio. The office
was compiled by Stephen of Lige, who drew from Alcuins prayers and treatises,
which in turn borrowed especially from Marius Victorinuss theology of divine unity.
See Hugh Feiss, The Office for the Feast of the Trinity at Cluny in the Late
Eleventh Century, Liturgy O. C. S. O. 17.3 (1983): 3966; cf. Josef Andreas Jungmann,
Marius Victorinus in der karolingischen Gebetsliteratur und im rmischen Dreifaltigkeitsoffizium, in Kyriakon: Festschrift Johannes Quasten, ed. Patrick Granfield
and Josef A. Jungmann (Mnster, 1970), 69197 and Pierre Hadot, Marius Victorinus et Alcuin, Archives dhistoire doctrinale et littraire du moyen ge 29 (1954): 519,
at 7. I owe thanks to an anonymous reviewer for illuminating this connection.
10
See Thierry of Chartres, Commentum super Boethii librum de Trinitate 2.3038,
in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 7780; idem, Lectiones in Boethii librum de Trinitate
5.1619, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 21819; idem, Glosa super Boethii librum de
Trinitate 5.1729, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 29699.
11
Unitas ergo ex se per semel equalitatem gignit. Unitas enim semel unitas est.
Gignit ergo unitas equalitatem unitatis ita tamen ut res eadem sit unitas et unitatis
equalitas. Unitas ergo in eo quod gignit Pater est; in eo quod gignitur Filius est.
Unum igitur Pater est et Filius. . . . Amor autem hic et conexio nec gignitur nec
gignit sed ab unitate et ab unitatis equalitate procedit: non ab uno scilicet illorum
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104
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nection of number make a compelling analogy for the threefold unity of

God. Thierrys triad is often called Pythagorean because of its evident
basis in the mathematical arts of the quadrivium, which Augustines
usage lacked.12
Three centuries later, Nicholas of Cusa, searching for jewels in the
decaying body of scholastic thought,13 rediscovered the analogy. He first
celebrated Thierrys arithmetic Trinity in a sermon of 1440 and then
explored it at length in his magnum opus of the same year, De docta
ignorantia.14 He continued to experiment with the triad in ten different
works over the next twenty years.15 In his classic study of Cusanuss theology, Rudolf Haubst contended that such triadic images of the Trinity
in Nicholass writings chief among them Thierrys are the key to
understanding the whole, like a Sphinx in which all the secrets of his
philosophy are shrouded.16
sed ab utroque. Nec enim amor uel conexio unius tantum est. Hic amor igitur et
conexio ab unitate et ab unitatis equalite procedens Spiritus sanctus est ut quoniam
unitas Pater est, equalitas essendi Filius, a Patre et Filio procedat Spiritus sanctus
(Thierry, Commentum 30, 38, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 78, 80).
12
See M.-D. Chenu, Une dfinition pythagoricienne de la vrit au moyen ge,
Archives dhistoire doctrinale et littraire du moyen ge 28 (1961): 713; douard Jeauneau, Mathmatique et Trinit chez Thierry de Chartres, in Die Metaphysik im
Mittelalter, ed. Paul Wilpert (Berlin, 1963), 28995; Klaus Riesenhuber, Arithmetic
and the Metaphysics of Unity in Thierry of Chartres: On the Philosophy of Nature
and Theology in the Twelfth Century, in Nature in Medieval Thought Some
Approaches East and West, ed. Chumaru Koyama (Leiden, 2000), 4373; Bernard
McGinn, Does the Trinity Add Up? Transcendental Mathematics and Trinitarian
Speculation in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries, in Praise No Less Than Charity: Studies in Honor of M. Chrysogonus Waddell, ed. Rozanne Elder (Kalamazoo,
2002), 23764.
13
R. W. Southern, Scholastic Humanism and the Unification of Europe, vol. 2: The
Heroic Age (Oxford, 2001), 88.
14
Nicolaus Cusanus, Dies Sanctificatus (Sermo 22), 22, in Nicolai de Cusa opera
omnia, vol. 16.4, ed. Rudolf Haubst and Martin Bodewig (Hamburg, 1984), 346. Cf.
De docta ignorantia 1.710, 1829, in Nicolai de Cusa opera omnia, vol. 1, ed. Ernst
Hoffmann and Raymond Klibansky (Leipzig, 1932), 1421.
15
Cusanuss version of the arithmetic Trinity has been well explained elsewhere.
See Giovanni Santinello, Mittelalterliche Quellen der sthetischen Weltanschauung
des Nikolaus von Kues, in Die Metaphysik im Mittelalter, ed. Wilpert, 67985; Bernard McGinn, Unitrinum Seu Triunum: Nicholas of Cusas Trinitarian Mysticism, in
Mystics: Presence and Aporia, ed. Michael Kessler and Christian Sheppard (Chicago,
2003), 90117; Jan Bernd Elpert, Unitas-Aequalitas-Nexus: Eine textkommentierende Lektre zu De venatione sapientiae (Kap. XXIXXVI), in Nikolaus von Kues:
De venatione sapientiae, ed. Walter Andreas Euler, Mitteilungen und Forschungsbeitrge der Cusanus-Gesellschaft 32 (Trier, 2010), 12782.
16
Rudolf Haubst, Das Bild des Einen und Dreieinen Gottes in der Welt nach Nikolaus von Kues (Trier, 1952), 1.
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I mention Cusanus only because Thierrys triad is so often approached

through the lens of its reappearance in Cusan theology.17 In fact, it was
this concept that first linked the two authors in the minds of historians of
medieval philosophy.18 And it is true that until its reprise in the works of
the German cardinal, Thierrys arithmetic Trinity did not fare especially
well, either in the twelfth century or in the centuries that followed. But
this common comparison with Cusanus can also occlude a better understanding of the fate of Thierrys doctrine in the decades after its initial
debut and before its eclipse around 1160, when both political conditions
and theological distinctions shunted attention away from the Breton
masters radical rereading of Augustines triad and toward the conservative gloss favored by Peter Lombard and the tradition after him.
These circumstances convey at least three disadvantages. Students of
Thierry are left rightly wondering why the famed teacher failed to win
more support for his ingenious rereading of Augustine. Likewise, students of Cusanus, lacking evidence of any other significant engagements
with Thierrys ideas before 1440, may assume that the German cardinal
simply transcribed the triad into his texts, much like Thierrys students
auditing his Parisian lectures. This is, of course, false: Cusanus changes
the triad as it suits him and experiments with new applications within
the altered parameters of late medieval theology.19 Finally, this ahistorical comparison has encouraged some to classify Thierrys efforts vaguely
as number speculation, rather than as participation in a serious, protracted debate over the role of the arts in theological language or as a
provocative rereading of a major patristic authority.20
17
See, e.g., Werner Beierwaltes, Einheit und Gleichheit: Eine Fragestellung im
Platonismus von Chartres und ihre Rezeption durch Nicolaus Cusanus, in idem,
Denken des Einen: Studien zur neuplatonischen Philosophie und ihrer Wirkungsgeschichte (Frankfurt am Main, 1985), 36884. Cf. Christian Trottmanns comparison of
Alan of Lille and Nicholas of Cusa in Unitas, aequalitas, conexio: Alain de Lille dans
la tradition des analogies trinitaires arithmtiques, in Alain de Lille, Le Docteur
Universel: philosophie, thologie et littrature au XIIIe sicle, ed. Jean-Luc Solre,
Anca Vasiliu, and Alain Galonnier (Turnhout, 2005), 40127.
18
Pierre Duhem, Thierry de Chartres et Nicolas de Cues, Revue des sciences philosophiques et thologiques 3 (1909): 52531; cf. Chenu, Une dfinition Pythagoricienne.
19
See McGinns appendix in Unitrinum Seu Triunum, 1059. Nicholas invents,
for example, triads of absolute equality, equality of equality, and their nexus (De
aequalitate, 1459); the unity of love, the equality of love, the connection of love
(Cribratio Alkorani, 1461); and possibility, equality, and their union (Compendium
theologiae, 1464).
20
E.g., Michel Lemoine, Le Nombre dans lcole de Chartres, PRIS-MA 8
(1993): 6578. This may contribute to Lemoines misperception that although Thierrys mathematical speculation would return again with Meister Eckhart and Nich-
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The missing context that would dispel such misapprehensions cannot

be found by turning yet again to Thierry or Nicholas, but by surveying
the territory between them. To redress this situation, what we require is
a richer account of the earliest reception of Thierrys arithmetic model
of the Trinity. Such an account should register what his students found
immediately stimulating about the doctrine and how they deployed it
before the decline of Thierrys bold interpretation. In a valuable article,
douard Jeauneau surveyed the legacy of the school of Chartres, but
his sketch needs to be fleshed out with reference to sources he did not
possess.21 Moreover, Jeauneau inclines toward the third mistake noted
above. In light of the triads popularity with Cusanus and his readers,
he remarks, Pythagorean speculations on the Trinity, dear to Thierry
of Chartres, have had a long history.22 In fact, a closer inspection of
the evidence shows that the fortunes of the doctrine were rather more
restricted before its accidental revival in the fifteenth century. Bernard
McGinn has recently filled in some of the details of Jeauneaus narrative,
including, crucially, the tension between two hermeneutics of Trinitarian theology that structured the discursive options in the mid-twelfth
century. But McGinn devotes his attention mostly to Meister Eckharts
henology and then to Cusanus.23 Marcia Colish situates Thierrys Trinitarian theology within contemporary debates over theological language
in the wake of Peter Abelard and Gilbert of Poitiers, but without considering the hermeneutical divide noted by McGinn.24 Moreover, none of
these studies consider the new details conveyed by several newly edited
texts from the decade between 1150 and 1160, including sources from
Thierrys earliest circle of students, from Alan of Lille, and most importantly, as we will see, from Achard of St. Victor.
In what follows, I explore these and other texts in order to build up a
picture of the reception of Thierry of Chartress arithmetic Trinity before
1160. All of them adopt (or are at least sympathetic towards) Thierrys
new reading of Augustine, despite their awareness of the mainstream
olas of Cusa, his theology was already in the twelfth century enjoying great success
and broad diffusion (ibid., 7374).
21
douard Jeauneau, Note sur lcole de Chartres, in idem, Lectio philosophorum: Recherches sur lEcole de Chartres (Amsterdam, 1973), 536. Jeauneau lists the
following sources: two shorter glosses from Thierrys circle, Clarembald of Arras, De
septem septenis, Helinand of Froidmonts Christmas sermon, Alan of Lilles Regulae,
and Achard of St. Victors De unitate, as well as a collection of others who cite the
Augustinian triad without giving it Thierrys meaning.
22
Ibid., 11.
23
McGinn proposes that Meister Eckhart may have mediated Thierrys arithmetic
Trinity to Cusanus. See McGinn, Does the Trinity Add Up? (n. 12 above), 25864.
24
Marcia L. Colish, Peter Lombard, vol. 1 (Leiden, 1994), 1015.
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Porretan or Lombardian alternative, that is, the scholastic unreading

of Thierrys arithmetic Trinity back toward Augustines simpler triadic
analogy. Given the paucity of evidence of Thierrys legacy between the
twelfth and fifteenth centuries, even this minor contribution can point us
toward a more capacious understanding of Thierrys Wirkungsgeschichte
before the Cusan restoration. It can also illuminate why defenders of
the arithmetic Trinity found the conceptual language of mathematics to
grant, as one of them put it, a refuge to theology in a stormy period of
intellectual life marked by profound institutional change.
Two Readings of Augustines Triad
Having moved from Chartres to Paris around 1124, Thierry was well
regarded by contemporaries from the 1120s on as an erudite educational
reformer and a brilliant if sometimes caustic teacher.25 Thierry seems to
have first explored the arithmetical triad in his Tractatus on Genesis in
the 1130s. He then revisited it in his Commentum on Boethiuss De trinitate in the late 1130s or early 1140s; his subsequent Lectiones and Glosa
in the next decade turn to other Boethian topics.26 Thierrys Commentum
gained him some fame, as enthusiastic citations by some of his students
testify. His renown reached its high point after he became chancellor of
the Chartres cathedral school in 1141, when Gilbert left for Paris. By
1155 he had retired to a Cistercian house, where he died two years later.27
These were not the best years to be proposing a new triad as an analogy of the Trinity.28 Thierry had been present at Soissons in 1121 when
25
Life and Works of Clarembald of Arras, ed. Nikolaus M. Hring (Toronto, 1965),
4. On what we know of Thierrys life and his standing in the schools, see J. O. Ward,
The Date of the Commentary on Ciceros De Inventione by Thierry of Chartres
(ca. 10951160?) and the Cornifician Attack on the Liberal Arts, Viator 3 (1972):
21973.
26
Commentaries, ed. Hring (n. 8 above), 47. Hring first dated Commentum to
1135, but subsequently revised it to 1148. Mews argues for the early 1120s (Constant J. Mews, In Search of a Name and Its Significance: A Twelfth-Century Anecdote about Thierry and Peter Abaelard, Traditio 44 [1988]: 171200, at 192). Mews
concurs (as do I) with Hrings sequence of Tractatus, Commentum, Lectiones, and
Glosa, pace Enzo Maccagnolo (see Maccagnolo, Rerum universitas: Saggio sulla filosofia di Teodorico di Chartres [Florence, 1976], 21115) and Peter Dronke (Thierry of
Chartres, in A History of Twelfth-Century Western Philosophy, ed. idem [Cambridge,
1988], 35885, at 360).
27
Karen M. Fredborg, Latin Rhetorical Commentaries by Thierry of Chartres
(Toronto, 1988), 89; Life and Works of Clarembald, ed. Hring, 2327.
28
On this tumultuous period in which the cathedral schools developed a new program for theological education, see Stephen C. Ferruolo, The Origins of the University: The Schools of Paris and Their Critics, 11001215 (Stanford, 1985); Heinrich
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Alberic of Rheims failed to secure Abelards condemnation. (Abelard

records that Thierry betrayed his sympathies during the proceedings
with an ironic remark mocking the papal legate.) But by 1141 Bernard of
Clairvaux had successfully sanctioned Abelard at the Council of Sens for
his interpretation of the triad of power, wisdom, and goodness.29 Gilbert
of Poitiers was nearly censured at Rheims in 1148, among other things
for his contention in counterpoint to Abelard that divine unity
was so supreme that Trinitarian persons could differ only by number.30
By 1160, however, the whole generation that had fought the battles over
new school curricula and their methodological consequences had passed
from William of St. Thierry (d. 1148) and Bernard of Clairvaux (d. 1153)
to Gilbert of Poitiers (d. 1154), William of Conches (d. 1154), and Thierry
himself (d. 1157). Not surprisingly, the decade of the 1160s witnessed a
flurry of consolidating activity among cadres of former students. Some
defended Gilberts legacy, some worked to abate the suspicions of Bernard and William about employing state-of-the-art dialectical analysis in
theology, and some sought to rebalance the weight of competing authorities, in the pattern of the Sentences of Peter Lombard (d. 1160).31
Historians of early scholasticism have unearthed a network of masters
around Paris influenced by Gilberts methods in similar ways during this
decade. A partial roster would include Alan of Lille, Simon of Tournai,
Fichtenau, Heretics and Scholars in the High Middle Ages, 10001200, trans. Denise
A. Kaiser (University Park, PA, 1998); and C. Stephen Jaeger, The Envy of Angels:
Cathedral Schools and Social Ideals in Medieval Europe, 9501200 (Philadelphia,
1994). Two fine surveys are Constant J. Mews, Philosophy and Theology 11001150:
The Search for Harmony, in Le XIIe sicle: Mutations et renouveau en France dans
le premire moiti du XIIe sicle, ed. Franois Gasparri (Paris, 1994), 159203 and
Peter Gemeinhardt, Logic, Tradition, and Ecumenics: Developments of Latin Trinitarian Theology between c. 1075 and c. 1160, in Trinitarian Theology in the Medieval West, ed. Pekka Krkkainen (Helsinki, 2007), 1068.
29
Constant J. Mews, The Council of Sens (1141): Abelard, Bernard, and the Fear
of Social Upheaval, Speculum 77 (2002): 34282. On Abelards possible connections
to Thierry and his similar interests in Plato and the Timaeus, see further D. E.
Luscombe, The School of Peter Abelard (Cambridge, 1970), 5758 and Tullio Gregory,
Ablard et Platon, Studi Medievali, ser. 3a, 13 (1972): 53962.
30
For an overview of Gilberts academic career, see Theresa Gross-Diaz, The
Psalms Commentary of Gilbert of Poitiers (Leiden, 1996), 124. A good introduction
to his doctrine of God is Michael E. Williams, The Teaching of Gilbert Porreta on the
Trinity, Analecta Gregoriana 56 (Rome, 1951); cf. Lauge Olaf Nielsen, Theology and
Philosophy in the Twelfth Century (Leiden, 1982), 14263.
31
Marcia Colish argues that Peter Lombards engagement with Gilberts views
in the wake of Rheims was both more substantive and more positive than is often
assumed; see Colish, Gilbert, the Early Porretans, and Peter Lombard: Semantics
and Theology, in Gilbert de Poitiers et ses contemporains, ed. Jean Jolivet and Alain
de Libera (Naples, 1987), 22950.
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and Peter of Poitiers, as well as others at one remove like Richard of St.
Victor or Gandulph of Bologna, in writings ranging between 1155 and
1175. Cognizant of Peter Lombards looming monument its final edition was taught in lectures in 1158, but had been underway since the
mid-1140s this group was, at the same time, not yet confined by its
architecture.32 But, like the Lombard, they analyzed the Augustinian
triad alongside Hilarys famous and Abelards notorious alternatives. Out
of a desire to avoid Abelards errors, but also to recover a sanitized version of his triad, all six men invoked the same distinction, one that they
saw as implied in the passage from De doctrina christiana cited above,
and that would survive well into the thirteenth century.33
The distinction they proposed is between proper triadic analogies
and appropriated or attributed analogies.34 Names assigned to the
Trinity fall into two categories. Some are proper names, whose nominal differences articulate real differences among the three divine persons;
others are appropriated or attributed names, whose differences are
a matter of custom or language only, since strictly speaking they each
name the same undifferentiated divine essence. Hence, paternity, filiation, and spiration is a clear instance of a proper Trinitarian name,
but the triad of power, wisdom, and goodness is only an appropriated
name. Abelards chief error, from this perspective, was to misconstrue
32
For this dating, see Colish, Peter Lombard, 2325. On the theologies of unitas
and forma in the Porretani and Chartrians, cf. Stephan Otto, Die Funktion des Bildbegriffes in der Theologie des 12. Jahrhunderts, Beitrge zur Geschichte der Philosophie und Theologie des Mittelalters (= BGPhThM) 40 (Mnster, 1963), 17699, 224
50. Otto notes (ibid., 185) that Gilbert never used the mathematical triad.
33
See, for example, Albertus Magnus, Commentarii in I Sententiarum, dist. 31,
art. 12, in Opera omnia, vol. 27, ed. S. C. A. Borgnet (Paris, 1893), 99101; Thomas
Aquinas, Commentum in Quatuor Libros Sententiarum, vol. 1, dist. 31, q. 1, art. 2, in
Opera omnia, vol. 6 (Parma, 1856, repr. New York, 1948), 250.
34
On the history of the theory of appropriated Trinitarian names, see Ludwig
Ott, Untersuchungen zur theologischen Briefliteratur der Frhscholastik, BGPhThM
34 (Mnster, 1937), 25466 and 58194 and Ludwig Hdl, Von der Wirklichkeit und
Wirksamkeit des dreieinen Gottes nach der appropriativen Trinittstheologie des 12.
Jahrhunderts, Mitteilungen des Grabmann-Instituts der Universitt Mnchen
(Munich, 1965), 514, and in more doctrinal perspective, 2859. Hdl argues that the
divisions of the twelfth century are ultimately the fruit of two responses to Arianism
after Nicaea: Der Unterschied zwischen der Trinittstheologie Augustins und des
Hilarius ist der Unterschied der abendlndischen und morgenlndischen Theologie,
der Unterschied einer an der Proprienspekulation orientierten Trinittslehre und der
appropriativen Trinittsbetrachtung (ibid., 50). This situation is then repeated in
the twelfth century and exacerbated by the divide between Peter Lombards almost
exclusive use of Augustine and Gilbert of Poitierss adoption of Boethius and Hilary
of Poitiers (cf. ibid., 26, 35, 52).
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Hughs appropriated triad as if it were a proper one.35 All six of the

authors cited above, not to mention their thirteenth-century successors,
read Augustines triad of unitas, aequalitas, and concordia as an appropriated analogy. As Ludwig Ott notes, if Abelards triad created the
problem of appropriative Trinitarian theology, it was Augustines triad
that put early scholastic theologians through their paces in exercising
their new appropriation theory, as we will examine below.36
Thierry of Chartres, in marked contrast to his contemporaries, quite
clearly viewed Augustines triad as a proper name for the Trinity.37 In
the Tractatus on Genesis where he introduces his doctrine of the arithmetical Trinity, Thierry states that of course unity and equality designate the same divine substance. But this does not of itself entail that
the arithmetic triad is merely an appropriated name. For the divine
philosophers assigned the term person . . . for the purpose of designating certain properties; and if to beget is the property of unity, to be
begotten is the property of equality.38 Therefore, he reasons, the essential properties to which the personal names refer are perfectly expressed
35
As Thodore de Rgnon remarked in 1892, le systme dAbailard est la thorie des appropriations, mais renverse (Ott, Untersuchungen, 256 n. 48). Abelards
deliberations begin when he asks whether diversity in the Trinity is real, nominal, or
somehow both; none of the answers is immediately satisfactory. Aut enim, inquiunt,
haec diuersitas personarum in solis uocabulis consistit, non in re, ut uidelicet uocabula tantum diuersa sint et nulla sint in Deo rei diuersitas, aut in re sola et non in
uocabulis; aut simul et in re et in uocabulis (Abelard, Theologia christiana 3.90, ed.
E. M. Buytaert, Petri Abaelardi Opera Theologica, CCM 12 [Turnhout, 1969], 230).
Peter of Poitiers begins his account of appropriative names with an allusion to this
passage: Fit autem personarum distinctio bipartito: tum appropriatione nominum et
rerum, tum appropriatione nominum, sed non rerum (Sententiae Petri Pictaviensis,
Lib. 1, cap. 22, ed. Philip S. Moore and Marthe Dulong, vol. 1 [Notre Dame, 1943],
183, lines 57).
36
Dieser Satz bereitete dem theologischen Denken der Frhscholastik, das sich
noch nicht allenthalben zur vollen Klarheit ber den Unterschied zwischen Proprietten und Appropriationen durchgerungen hatte, erhebliche Schwierigkeiten (Ott,
Untersuchungen, 569).
37
McGinn, Does the Trinity Add Up? (n. 12 above), 256 n. 53. McGinn cites
Lectiones 5.16, but in my opinion there are other passages that provide stronger evidence.
38
Quamuis autem unitas et eius equalitas sint una penitus substantia tamen
quoniam nichil se ipsum gignere potest et alia proprietas est genitorem esse que
proprietas est unitatis: alia uero proprietas est genitum esse que proprietas est
equalitatis idcirco ad designandum has proprietates que sunt unitatis et equalitatis
eterna identitate diuini philosophi uocabulum persone apposuerunt ita ut ipsa eterna
substan<t>ia dicatur persona genitoris secundum hoc quod ipsa est unitas: persona
uero geniti secundum hoc quod ipsa est equalitas (Thierry, Tractatus 41, in Commentaries, ed. Hring [n. 8 above], 572).
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111
by the arithmetic terms unitas and aequalitas. Hence the triad of unitas,
aequalitas, and conexio is not an arbitrary mathematical symbol (let alone
an instance of number speculation), but in fact a sturdy conceptual
basis for grasping just what a Trinity of persons might mean. Beneath
the traditional metaphor of generation lies the more solid foundation of
number.
Thierry seems to have left aside this concern in Commentum from the
1130s, but in Lectiones and Glosa of the next decade, he found it necessary to confront the issue, which must have been gaining publicity
throughout the 1140s, given the affairs at Sens and Rheims. In Commentum, Thierry had discussed the arithmetic Trinity in an excursus on
Boethiuss account of how divine form relates to the different disciplines
of theology, mathematics, and physics (De trinitate 2). But in Lectiones
and Glosa, he relocates his comments on the arithmetic Trinity to a passage in which Boethius, too, grappled with predicating Trinitarian relations (De trinitate 5). And even while Thierry simply recycles past formulations of the arithmetic Trinity from Tractatus and Commentum in these
lines, he also adds a new emphasis: the validity of the names unitas and
aequalitas arises from the fact, he says, that they express divine properties. God is named Son because of the property of equality that
Son designates.39 The members of the triad are not discrete things
but rather distinct properties, he now maintains, and for this reason,
one cannot simply identify conexio and aequalitas, as one might if they
were appropriated names.40 Thierrys certainty about his position even
emboldens him to venture another triad. The divine Trinity of unitas,
aequalitas, and conexio, he writes, is the eternal foundation of the quadrivium itself: numerus (i.e., arithmetic), proportio (harmonics), and proportionalitas (geometry).41
Thus we find two interpretive options for approaching Augustines
triad, represented by Peter Lombard but mainly the Porretani on the
one hand, and Thierry of Chartres and some sympathetic students on
39
Equalitas uero diuine substantie ascribitur per hoc quod est Filius quia in
Uerbo i.e. in Filio genito a Patre cuncta creauit. . . . Et per talem proprietatem
hoc uocabulum filius refertur ad deum (Thierry, Lectiones 7.7, in Commentaries, ed.
Hring, 225).
40
Istud amborum relatiuum est ad proprietates has quas dixi equalitatem et unitatem: non ad res discretas. Non enim est nisi sola unitas: trina tamen in proprietate. Conexio enim unitas est. . . . Tamen non concedimus quod conexio equalitas
sit: propter personales proprietates (ibid.; cf. ibid., 7.6, in Commentaries, ed. Hring,
225; idem, Glosa 5.2229, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 29798).
41
Ibid. On the distinction of proportio and proportionalitas and their significance
for the broader study of the quadrivium, see Boethius, Institutio arithmetica 2.40.1
3, ed. Guillaumin (n. 9 above), 140.
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the other. I will call these, for short, the weak (or nominalist) versus
the strong (or realist) readings.42 In the weak reading, the triad does not
define the different persons, but only the one divine substance; it does
not add any new information about intratrinitarian difference. Nevertheless, one can still parse out the triad provisionally, associating a given
term with a given divine person, since it may seem more fitting to call
the Spirit connection than the Father. But in truth, the Father is as
much connection as the Son or Spirit. But in Thierrys strong reading
Augustines triad actually defines the proper names of Father, Son, and
Spirit in their differentiation. This is plausible because of the universality, eternity, and stability of the arithmetical names unitas, aequalitas,
and conexio (in Thierrys amended version). Hence the arithmetic Trinity in the strong reading actually does deliver new knowledge about
God; equality specifies what filiation essentially means. On this view
Augustines triad provides a supplementary conceptual basis to help further determine the fundamental metaphors of generation and procession.
Strong Readings by Thierrys Students
All of the twelfth-century authors whom we can most easily identify as Thierrys students embraced his strong reading.43 Hring has
identified two short anonymous works on the Trinity that echo several of
Thierrys doctrines, including the arithmetic Trinity, which he designates
as Tractatus de Trinitate and Commentarius Victorinus.44 Hring dates
42
In this way I hope to distinguish this limited case of reading Augustines triad
from the larger debate on the logic of universals between nominalists and realists. For a survey of old and new scholarship on twelfth-century nominalism, see
the special issue of Vivarium 30.1 (1992) edited by William J. Courtenay.
43
The Cistercian Helinand of Froidmont (11621237), another important witness of Thierrys views, is too late to be considered here. Helinands Sermon 2 (PL
212:486A498C) seems to draw on Thierrys Commentum or Tractatus his most
well-circulated texts, particularly among Cistercian monasteries in its references
(sometimes verbatim) to the Son as aequalitas and veritas and to God as forma
essendi. At the same time, some passages of the sermon resemble the Johannine exegesis of De septem septenis; see, e.g., PL 212:491C on John 14:6. For background on
Helinands sermons, see Beverly M. Kienzle, Hlinand de Froidmont et la prdication cistercienne dans le Midi (11451229), in La prdication en Pays dOc (XIIe
dbut XVe sicle), Cahiers de Fanjeaux 32 (Toulouse, 1997), 3767.
44
Both texts follow the sole exemplar of Thierrys Lectiones in MS Paris BN Lat
14489, fols. 62r66r (Tractatus de Trinitate) and fols. 67r95v (Commentarius Victorinus, formerly called In titulo and attributed to Ps.-Bede). On Commentarius Victorinus, see the general account in Ermenegildo Bertola, Il De Trinitate dello Pseudo
Beda, Rivista di Filosofia Neoscolastica 48 (1956): 31633. Nikolaus M. Hring (A
Short Treatise on the Trinity from the School of Chartres, Mediaeval Studies 18
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the former to the early 1140s and the latter to the early 1150s. There
are signs that these are derivative works by close students rather than
drafts for another Boethian commentary by Thierry himself, and if
so, they may represent the first moment of the reception history of
Thierrys theology. The treatises closely resemble each other and assume
a familiarity with Thierrys other Boethian commentaries. Both treatises
add corroborating details to clarify Thierrys ideas, but stand at one
remove from the originality of the masters undisputed works, spelling
out what remains implicit in his lectures, and at times weighing their
theological consequences.
Both student treatises are enthusiastic about Thierrys arithmetic
Trinity. They display a palpable eagerness both to apply the quadrivium
within theology and to articulate the sources that authorize this strategem in greater detail than one finds in Thierrys works themselves. In
Lectiones and Glosa, Thierry simply cites Augustine as the source of the
terms.45 The students go further, describing how, armed with this verbal formula, Augustine could confront the ineffability of the Trinity
described in De doctrina christiana and, in response, take refuge in mathematical learning.46 The turn to mathematics, according to Thierrys
students, is the path Augustine charted forward in response to the inef-
[1956]: 12534) notes several reasons for dating the two works after Thierrys Glosa,
whether they were written by an aging Thierry or by one of his students: Especially the manner of handling the mathematical explanation of the Trinity, based
on the Augustinian dictum cited above, offers impressive evidence to the effect that
both works belong to the school of Thierry of Chartres (ibid., 128). Hring would
later argue, however, that Commentarius Victorinus could well have been written by
Thierry himself, noting very striking points of contact with the anonymous Tractatus de Trinitate (Commentaries on Boethius, 4045); cf. Ott, Untersuchungen, 571.
45
Thierry, Lectiones 7.5, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 22425; Glosa 5.17, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 29697.
46
Procedat igitur Augustinus in medium qui trium personarum distinctionem sub
hac forma uerborum diligens ueritatis speculator assignat: In Patre inquit unitas in
Filio equalitas in Spiritu sancto unitatis equalitatis conexio. Sancte Trinitatis statum
non de facie ad faciem intuens ad mathematicam ut ex forma uerborum datur intelligi disciplinam confugit ut saltem sic aliquam distinctionis personarum insinuaret
noticiam. Arimetici namque unitatem primum omnium constituunt numerorum principium (Tractatus de Trinitate 12, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 306). Ad hanc enim
pro modulo capacitatis nostre declarandam dicit Augustinus: In Patre unitas in Filio
equalitas in Spiritu sancto unitatis equalitatisque conexio uel concordia. Sed sicut
ex formula uerborum haberi potest uolens Augustinus quoquo modo insinuare quod
ineffabile erat et incomprehensibile confugit ad mathematicam. Arithmetici unitatem
principium numerorum constituunt (Commentarius Victorinus 81, in Commentaries,
ed. Hring, 498).
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fability and incomprehensibility of Gods names.47 In their view, Augustine does not despair of his Trinitarian formula in the passage but rather
celebrates the foothold won by the arithmeticians; namely, that unity,
as the source of number, is not a number itself.48 Compared to Thierry,
the student treatises also display a more literal appeal to Boethiuss
quadrivial terminology. Tractatus de Trinitate conspicuously claims the
authority of arithmetica and arithmetici for doctrines that Thierry simply asserts in his text in accordance with arismethica ratione.49 Likewise
Commentarius Victorinus informs readers that Thierrys notion of unity
stems from what Boethius says in the Musica.50
The two authors are equally committed to connecting Thierrys mathematical trinity to past authorities in Trinitarian theology. They frequently cite Augustine and Hilary of Poitiers by name on the Trinity,
as well as Ps.-Dionysius on the theology of negation, but they shy
away from the Hermetic Asclepius.51 Thierry, on the other hand, names
Hermes as often as he does Augustine. Both student treatises cite from
Johns Gospel frequently. They also feel a special burden to refute theological heresies. Tractatus de Trinitate, for instance, finds that Thierrys
mathematical triad cures two mistakes: that the generation of the Son is
a second God (rather than the perfect equality of unity), or that the
Spirit is generated (rather than proceeding as a connection).52
Commentarius Victorinus wishes to revive the theology of aequalitas
that Thierry aired in Commentum.53 The author is also fascinated by one
of Thierrys more unusual suggestions in Commentum, when Thierry calls
the divine Son the eternal square. Thierry refers here to a prophetic fragment known as the Spanish Sibyl that circulated shortly before the Sec-
47
This suggestion by the two student treatises that mathematical symbols can
work hand in hand with negative theology is a striking anticipation of Nicholas
of Cusas entire theological project.
48
Tractatus de Trinitate 12, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 306; Commentarius Victorinus 81, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 498.
49
Tractatus de Trinitate 12, 13, 17, 18, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 3067. See,
for example, Thierry, Commentum 2.34 and 4.4, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 78,
96; Tractatus 30, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 568; but cf. Thierry, Lectiones 3.5, in
Commentaries, ed. Hring, 178.
50
Commentarius Victorinus 87, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 499.
51
Tractatus de Trinitate 26, 28, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 30910; citations of
both authors in Commentarius Victorinus are numerous.
52
Tractatus de Trinitate 1318, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 3067.
53
Thierry, Commentum 2.3136, 2.4649, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 7879,
8284; Commentarius Victorinus 8688, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 499.
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ond Crusade.54 Thierry cites a fragment of the oracle that states: When
you reach the side of the eternal sitting square and the side of the eternal standing squares.55 After adducing supplementary rationes from
Boethiuss Institutio arithmetica, Thierry interprets the Sibyl to show that
this eternal square is in truth the divine Son. We know by arithmetic
reason, he explains, that two taken twice makes a square; but unity
multiplied by itself is the first square. This squaring is an instance of
generation, and the first and eternal generation is that of the divine Son,
the equality of unity.56 Thierry draws his conclusion:
And because the first squaring is the generation of the Son, also the Son
is the first square. But such squaring is a figure. Therefore rightly is the
Son named the figure of the substance of the Father (Heb. 1:3). . . . The
square was thus well attributed to the Son since this figure is judged as
more perfect than the others on account of the equality of its sides.57
In Thierrys gloss, when the apostle calls the Son the perfect figura of
the Father (Heb. 1:3), he is literally referring to an arithmetical concept
or geometrical shape.58 The fact that Commentarius Victorinus focuses on
this particular doctrine reveals his enthusiasm for Thierrys agenda to
54
The texts from MSS Munich (clm) 5254 and 9516 are transcribed as two independent versions in Wilhelm von Giesebrecht, Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit, vol.
4 (Leipzig, 1877), 5026. The original sense of the Sibyl concerns German nobles
traveling first to Constantinople, where the Greek emperor sits eternally and the
nobility stand eternally, and thence toward Jerusalem (Giesebrecht, Geschichte, 502).
On the Sibyls generally in medieval literature, see Peter Dronke, Hermes and the
Sibyls: Continuations and Creations, in idem, Intellectuals and Poets in Medieval
Europe (Rome, 1992), 21944.
55
Cum perueneris ad costam Tetragoni sedentis eterni et ad costam tetragonorum stantium eternorum (Thierry, Commentum 2.34, in Commentaries, ed. Hring,
79). Thierry cites only a fragment of the Sibyl but must have used the version from
MS Munich (clm) 5254, viz. from Otto of Freisings Gesta Friderici Imperatoris, which
continues et ad multiplicationem beati numeri per actualem primum cubum (Giesebrecht, Geschichte, 505).
56
Thierry, Commentum 2.34, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 7879.
57
Et quoniam tetragonatura prima generatio Filii est, et Filius tetragonus primus est. Tetragonatio uero figura est. Merito ergo Filium figuram substantie Patris
appellat. . . . Bene autem tetragonus Filio attribuitur quoniam figura hec perfectior
ceteris propter laterum equalitatem iudicatur (Thierry, Commentum II.34, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 79). Cf. Thierry, Tractatus 41, in Commentaries, ed. Hring,
572: Est igitur ipsa unitatis equalitas eiusdem unitatis quasi quedam figura et
splendor. Figura quidem quia est modus secundum quem ipsa unitas operatur in
rebus. Splendor uero quia est id per quod omnia discernuntur a se inuicem. Fine
enim modoque proprio cuncta inuicem a se discreta sunt.
58
Commentarius Victorinus 95, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 501; cf. Thierry,
Commentum 2.3334, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 7879.
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approach theology through the language of the quadrivium. These two

early receptions, therefore, champion Thierrys strong reading of Augustine.
A second example to consider is Clarembald of Arras (d. ca. 1187),
who proudly counted himself as a student of both Thierry and Hugh of
St. Victor. 59 Clarembald of Arras studied under Hugh before the Victorines death in 1141 and under Thierry between 1136 and 1146 in Paris.
By 1152, Clarembald was the provost of the cathedral school at Arras,
but by 1156, he was promoted to the archdeaconate, a transfer from academic to church affairs. Before his death in 1187, however, it seems that
Clarembald enjoyed two leaves from his administrative work to lecture
at the famed school of Laon. During his first stay (115759) he wrote
two commentaries on Boethius, and during his second (116568) he wrote
a commentary on Genesis. All were intended as tributes to Thierrys similar works. Clarembald discusses Thierrys arithmetic Trinity in his commentary on Boethiuss De trinitate.
Clarembald states his objective in a prefatory letter to his friend Odo
of Ourscamp, the noted Cistercian abbot and student of Peter Lombard.60
Clarembald wrote his commentary in order to provide a clearer guide
to Boethian theology than Gilbert of Poitiers notoriously abstruse one;
in particular, he wanted to expose the falsehood of Gilberts contention
that persons of the Trinity differ according to number.61 To this end, he
explains his plan to imitate the lectures of his teachers Thierry and
Hugh.62 But Clarembald believed that Thierrys Trinitarian doctrine was,
even more, an antidote to the Abelardian error as well.63 Sifting through
Thierrys different works as a guide, Clarembald opts for Commentum
over Lectiones for presenting the arithmetic Trinity and simply repeats
Thierrys formulae verbatim. Given his project of correcting both Abelard
and Gilbert with Thierrys theology, there is no question that Clarembald
desired to reinforce his masters strong reading of the Augustinian triad.
59
On Clarembalds life, see Life and Works of Clarembald, ed. Hring (n. 25
above), 423 and John R. Fortin, Clarembald of Arras as a Boethian Commentator
(Kirksville, MO, 1995).
60
Ibid., 17.
61
See Clarembald, Tractatus super librum Boetii De Trinitate 1.2428, in Life and
Works, ed. Hring, 9597; 1.5253, in Life and Works, ed. Hring, 105; 2.4850, in
Life and Works, ed. Hring, 12627; and 3.3639, in Life and Works, ed. Hring,
14546.
62
Clarembald, Epistola ad Odonem 23, 78, in Life and Works, ed. Hring, 6365.
63
Hring discusses Clarembalds critique of Abelard and Gilbert of Poitiers in Life
and Works, 3845; cf. Ott, Untersuchungen (n. 34 above), 264; Fortin, Clarembald of
Arras, 4448.
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Clarembalds own theological interests seem to echo the two student

treatises considered above. First, he accentuated Thierrys attention to
aequalitas as the Son.64 To Thierrys account Clarembald adds that the
Sons equality is also the power that effects any scriptural figuration,
by rendering the two signs semantically equivalent. This is why spiritual
exegesis of the Old Testament requires attention to exact numerical analogues in order to decipher the Christological code of a story. You must
strive to distinguish singular elements, writes Clarembald, that is, similar details and ceremonial accompaniments known in the case of Abraham and Isaac, so far as possible, also in the figures themselves, under
the same number and the same quantity. Otherwise you will not very
well represent what you wish through figures.65 Second, much like the
student treatises, Clarembald is fascinated by the passage in Commentum
where Thierry names the Son the primal square. He reproduces it in
his own text and tries to clarify a few of his masters terms.66
A third testimony to Thierrys arithmetic Trinity is found in the anonymous treatise De septem septenis. The author indirectly claims Thierry
as a master and, like Clarembald, evinces signs of Victorine influence
as well. While the exact date and author of this Hermetic fragment
remain unknown,67 the author attributes several of Thierrys ideas to
an unnamed magister and repeats phrases found in the Commentarius
Victorinus from the 1150s.68 While it is conceivable that the text was
written after 1160, the authors implicit reference to Thierry assumes a
64
Of the nine paragraphs on the arithmetic Trinity in Clarembalds Tractatus, six

concern aequalitas. During this discussion of the Son as equality, Clarembald cites
verbatim from every paragraph of Thierrys text on the arithmetic Trinity in Commentum: cf. Thierry, Commentum 2.3038, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 7780; cf.
Tractatus 2.3440, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 12023.
65
Necesse est ut singula membra i.e. consimilia et officialia quae in Abraham
et Ysaac fuisse cognovisti in figuris ipsis sub eodem numero et eadem si fieri potest
insignire studeas. Alioquin non bene quod volueras per figuras representabis (Clarembald, Tractatus 2.36, in Life and Works, ed. Hring, 121).
66
Ibid., 2.38, in Life and Works, ed. Hring, 122.
67
PL 199:945D964D. The sole known manuscript is in the British Museum, London, MS Harley 3969, fols. 206v215v. The final page seems to be missing, since
the authors conclusion is broken off in midsentence. The treatise was formerly
attributed to John of Salisbury, but Peter Dronke rightly refers to the anonymous
twelfth-century author of the De septem septenis, whose precise date and milieu are
still uncertain (Fabula: Explorations into the Uses of Myth in Medieval Platonism
[Leiden, 1974], 35; cf. Carl Schaarschmidt, Johannes Saresbariensis nach Leben und
Studien, Schriften und Philosophie [Leipzig, 1862], 27881; Hans Daniels, Die Wissenschaftslehre des Johannes von Salisbury [Kaldenkirchen, 1932], 9194).
68
Haec, magistrum nostrum sequentes, pro viribus succincte diximus (Septem,
PL 199:960A).
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degree of fame established at Paris since the 1130s, making a date in the
1150s or early 1160s likely. Unlike the two student treatises, however,
which retained Thierrys orientation to Boethiuss De trinitate, the author
of Septem combines Thierrys concepts with a stew of other influences,
appropriating them as it suits his objective. Amidst the controversy over
the new arts curriculum in the mid-twelfth century, and its place vis-vis traditional monastic education, Septem seeks to delimit the role
played by the liberal arts within a life of contemplation.
In the seventh of the eponymous septets, the author revives the theological critique of the liberal arts found in the Hermetic Asclepius.69
Hermes Mercurius taught that even the learned, despite their studies,
can remain ignorant of the ultimate principles grounding their disciplines.70 Accordingly, the author of Septem compiles seven fundamental
principles of things, or primordial causes. The first four can be traced
to ideas from Thierry of Chartres, and the first of these is the arithmetic
Trinity. The author collates the prologue to John with fragments attributed to Heraclitus, Hermes, Boethius, and the Sibyl, all borrowed from a
Ps.-Augustinian apologetic sermon. All have perceived and hinted, sometimes in cryptic utterances, that Gods Son is co-eternal with God.71 To
clarify and correct such prophecies, Septem adverts to Thierrys doctrine:
Again [Parmenides] says: God is unity: from unity is born the equality
of unity. But the connection proceeds from unity and the equality of
unity. Whence, therefore, Augustine says: To all those who perceive
rightly, it is clear why from sacred scripture the doctors assign unity
to the Father, equality to the Son, connection to the Holy Spirit. And
although from unity is born equality, connection proceeds from both; yet
69
See Paolo Lucentini, LAsclepius Hermetico nel Secolo XII, in From Athens
to Chartres: Neoplatonism and Christian Thought, Studies in Honour of douard
Jeauneau, ed. Haijo Jan Westra (Leiden, 1992), 397420. Lucentini notes that while
Asclepius had been known to Christian thought since Lactantius and Augustine, its
influence was greatest during the twelfth century, including such anonymous Hermetic texts as Liber de VI rerum principiis, and is discussed in works by Abelard,
Hermann of Carinthia, Bernardus Silvestris, Alan of Lille, and Thierry of Chartres
(in Tractatus and Commentum). Lucentini mentions De septem septenis only briefly as
a fragment by John of Salisbury, noting that John mentions Hermes Trismegistus once by name in Policraticus. See Policraticus 2.28, ed. Clement C. J. Webb,
vol. 1 (Oxford, 1909), 163.
70
Septem, PL 199:960BC, 962D; cf. Asclepius 8, in Hermetica, ed. and trans. Walter Scott, vol. 1 (London, 1968), 3013.
71
The citations from Hermes, the Sibyl, the Gospel of John, and Ps.-Augustine in
Septem, PL 199:960D961B stem from Quodvultdeus, Adversus quinque haereses, PL
42:11023 (Ex Hermete et Sibylla adversus Paganos).
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they are one and the same. This is that unity of three, as Pythagoras
taught, which alone deserves to be adored.72
For the author of Septem, the arithmetic Trinity was bequeathed from
Pythagoras to Parmenides to Augustine, and thence in turn passed to
his master Thierry. Septems repetition of Thierrys arithmetic Trinity is obviously unconcerned with the theory of appropriative names,
but clearly endorses a strong reading. This sacred triad, in his opinion,
already worshiped by the ancients, is the mystical foundation of the
quadrivial sciences of number, and thus legitimates their existence within
the spiritual life of contemplation.
To summarize: all four of these minor examples of Thierrys earliest
students championed the masters strong reading of Augustine without
question. All found the arithmetic Trinity fruitful for further theological uses of their own devising, including warding off heresies, and they
shared in common a special attention to the second person of aequalitas. Several of them focused in particular on the image of Gods Son
as an eternal square. But unlike Thierry himself, none of them reflects
any awareness of the alternative weak reading of Augustines triad in
accord with the theory of appropriated Trinitarian names. This makes
the evidence of two further students of Thierry of Chartres all the more
valuable. The writings of Alan of Lille and Achard of St. Victor both
expressly weigh the Breton masters strong reading in light of the weak
reading. Their deliberations in response to the controversy greatly enrich
72
Parmenides quoque dicit: Deus est cui esse quidlibet quod est esse omne id
quod est. Item idem: Deus est unitas: ab unitate gignitur unitatis aequalitas. Connexio vero ab unitate et unitatis aequalitate procedit. Hinc igitur Augustinus: Omni
recte intuenti perspicuum est, quare a sanctae Scripturae doctoribus Patri assignatur
unitas, Filio aequalitas, Spiritui sancto connexio; et licet ab unitate gignitur aequalitas, ab utroque connexio procedat: unum tamen et idem sunt. Haec est illa trium
unitas: quam solam adorandam esse docuit Pythagoras. . . . Opinor ideo cum qui
illam veram unitatem considerare desiderat, mathematica consideratione praetermissa, necesse est ad intelligentiae simplicitatem animus sese erigat (Septem, PL
199:961BC). It is difficult to determine the precise relationship between this passage
and known texts of Thierrys circle. One good conjecture for a mediating source is
the Commentarius Victorinus, which includes the first sentence quoted by Parmenides
but does not attribute the triad to him: Et secundum theologicam affirmationis
data est illa descriptio de deo a Parmenide philosopho quam utinam dedisset aliquis
sanctorum: deus inquit est cui quodlibet esse quod est est esse omne id quod est
(Commentarius Victorinus 99, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 502). Septems summary
of Thierrys arithmetic Trinity resembles the account at Commentarius Victorinus
8385, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 49899, in the pages preceding the Parmenides
passage; but cf. also Thierry, Commentum 2.38, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 80.
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our understanding of the reception of Thierrys arithmetic Trinity in the

middle decades of the twelfth century.
The Ambivalence of Alan of Lille
Paradoxically, the writings of Alan of Lille preserve perhaps the clearest defense of the rationale for the appropriation theory, but at the same
time perpetuate one of the most renowned traditions of the arithmetic Trinity. Alan represents, therefore, an ambivalent testimony to the
debates over Augustines triad in these decades. His complex, evolving
views were no doubt shaped by virtue of his education. By the 1160s, it
was especially students of Gilbert of Poitiers such as Alan who tended
to advocate the weak reading.73 But the loyal Porretaner seems to have
been impressed by Thierry as well, having studied in Paris during the
late 1140s and early 1150s, at the height of the Bretons fame.74 As we
will see, this leads to a somewhat conflicted approach to Augustines
triad across Alans works; it is quite conceivable that this tension was
felt by other contemporaries as well.
Alan and the Weak Reading
Alans first theological work was the Summa Quoniam homines, written between 1155 and 1165 and probably right around 1160.75 As Glorieux points out, Alans Summa is neither a commentary on Lombards
Sentences, nor a treatise against heresies (as he would later write), nor
a scriptural commentary, nor yet one of Alans later poetic works, but
rather a comprehensive systematic theology.76 The second half of the
73
P. Glorieux, La Somme Quoniam Homines dAlain de Lille, Archives

dhistoire doctrinale et littraire du moyen ge 20 (1953): 116.
74
For a general comparison, see Michel Lemoine, Alain de Lille et lcole de
Chartres, in Alain de Lille, ed. Solre, Vasiliu, and Galonnier (n. 17 above), 4758.
For further evidence of Alans Chartrian influences and his mediation of Thierrys
ideas beyond France, see Lucy Pick, Conflict and Coexistence: Archbishop Rodrigo
and the Muslims and Jews of Medieval Spain (Ann Arbor, 2004), 8890 and 12225.
75
On Alans biography generally, see G. R. Evans, Alan of Lille: The Frontiers of
Theology in the Later Twelfth Century (Cambridge, 1983); Franoise Hudry, Rgles de
thologie (Paris, 1995), 747; eadem, Mais qui tait donc Alain de Lille? in Alain
de Lille, ed. Solre, Vasiliu, and Galonnier, 10724.
76
Glorieux, La Somme, 114. For an overview of the contents and the method,
respectively, of the Summa Quoniam Homines (hereafter SQH), see P. Glorieux,
Lauteur de la Somme Quoniam homines, Recherches de thologie ancienne et
mdivale 17 (1950): 2945 and Alain de Libera, Logique et thologie dans la Summa
Quoniam Homines dAlain de Lille, in Gilbert de Poitiers, ed. Jolivet and de Libera
(n. 31 above), 43769.
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Summas first book is devoted to Trinitarian theology, and there Alan

distinguishes three categories of divine names: essential names (such
as Deus, deitas, essentia, substantia; but also implied co-essentials like
principium or origo); personal names designating personal properties
(Father, Son, Spirit, but also paternitas, filiatio, processio); and finally,
appropriated names.77 Whereas personal names are directly assigned
to the person on account of the personality itself (nomine et re), Alan
explains, appropriated names are only indirectly assigned on account of
the name (nomine et non re), that is, because the name designates the
divine unity and therefore the persons in common.78
Alan approaches the arithmetic Trinity from two different directions in
these passages of his Summa. First, he brings up Augustines triad as the
point of departure for his entire section on Trinitarian theology, treating
it as a case study in divine names generally.79 Alluding to Romans 1:20,
Alan describes how the philosophers name God through their perception of the natural world: Seeing that unity is the beginning and origin
of all numbers, [the philosophers] have likewise conjectured that in the
creation of things there is one Creator from which all alterity (i.e., everything changeable) proceeds, as if from the original and supreme unity.80
This insight leads the philosophers to reflect on how unity generates only
itself, and that this mind or wisdom sprung from divine unity must
be equal to unity and indeed connected by love. Such philosophers thus
appear to have discovered Augustines triad from natural reason alone,
and indeed they not only speak of God and his mind and the world soul
77
The second part begins at SQH 1.31, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 167.
Alan distinguishes the first two kinds of names summarily at SQH 1.55 (ed.
Glorieux, La Somme, 19899), but the third at 1.80 (ed. Glorieux, La Somme,
226): Pertractatis hiis que de nominibus personalibus dicenda erant que personis
appropriantur nomine et re; agendum est de illis que appropriantur nomine et non
re, ut hoc nomen potentia, sapientia, bonitas.
79
Christian Trottmann (Unitas, aequalitas, conexio: Alain de Lille dans la tradition des analogies trinitaires arithmtiques, in Alain de Lille, ed. Solre, Vasiliu,
and Galonnier, 40127) considers this first instance of the triad in SQH 1.31 as well
as the Regula, but not the second instance in SQH 1.114 nor De fide catholica.
80
Unde videntes unitatem esse principium et origo omnium numerorum, simile
coniectaverunt in creatione rerum ut unum esset creator a quo, tamquam a principali et suprema unitate procederet omnis alteritas, id est omne mutabile (SQH 1.31,
ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 167). See further Andreas Niederberger, Naturphilosophische Prinzipienlehre und Theologie in der Summa Quoniam Homines des Alain
von Lille, in Metaphysics in the Twelfth Century: On the Relationship among Philosophy, Science and Theology, ed. Matthias Lutz-Bachmann, Alexander Fidora, and
Andreas Niederberger (Turnhout, 2004), 18599.
78
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but even attempt to identify the Holy Spirit and the anima mundi!81
(Here Alan alludes to Abelard or William of Conches, if not Thierry himself.82) But in fact, Alan continues, they have apparently discovered a
certain trace of the Trinity, but only as if in a dream, not distinctly, in
a catholic way.83 For although the philosophers believe they are naming the Trinity through triads like power, wisdom, and goodness, in fact
they have no such knowledge of the three persons that would allow
them to distinguish such notions.84 Alan points to Hermes Trismegistus,
the Sibyl, the Liber XXIV philosophorum, and Macrobius as examples of
murky philosophical conjectures about the second divine person all
sources dear to Thierry of Chartres.
So for Alan, in the first place, the strong reading of the arithmetic
Trinity is not a fruitful path forward for catholic theology. Instead, it is
the paradigmatic instance of authentic, but ultimately inadequate, anticipations of the revealed Word among philosophers, much as Augustine
had said of the Platonists. Because these nascent intuitions of the Trinity are real but incomplete, Alans Summa must properly distinguish
Trinitarian naming in detail, as he then proceeds to do. But it is difficult
to decide how much this prologue, which coordinates the mathematical
Trinity, number, and alterity in a way so reminiscent of Thierry, tells
us about Alans views of the Breton master. It is important to note that
the foolish philosophers in Alans account start off well enough with
Thierrys reasoning and only become culpable when they make Abelards
mistake. Alan certainly never targets Thierry for explicit critique as he
does Abelard; indeed Alans examples of pagan wisdom especially recall
Thierrys lectures. And Alans implication that the strong reading of the
triad finds its roots in late antique Platonic sources is remarkably astute
and belies a degree of familiarity with Thierrys doctrine.
81
Tamen multa dixerunt de Deo et mente eius et anima mundi, que ad tres
personas referri possunt. Et ideo dicuntur habuisse noticiam [sic] de Trinitate. . . .
Nonne et plura dixerunt de anima mundi que possunt ad Spiritum Sanctum referri?
(SQH 1.31, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 168).
82
See further Bernard McGinn, The Role of the Anima Mundi as Mediator
between the Divine and Created Realms in the Twelfth Century, in Death, Ecstasy,
and Other Worldly Journeys, ed. John J. Collins and Michael Fishbane (Albany,
1995), 289319.
83
Et ita videntur invenisse quedam vestigia Trinitatis; sed quasi per sompnium;
nec ita distincte ut catholici (SQH 1.31, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 168).
84
Sed quasi quedam in divinitate considerabant quorum nominibus persone
solent distingui, ut potentia, sapientia, benignitas. . . . Sed non habuerunt notitiam
de tribus personis ut scirent eas distinguere suis notionibus (ibid., 1.31, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 168).
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Alans second meditation on the arithmetic Trinity comes when, precisely in order to solve the problem his prologue raises, he applies the
theory of appropriated names to the triads of Abelard, Augustine, and
Hilary of Poitiers. In the cases of Abelard and Hilary, Alan could not be
clearer. On Abelard: For although there is one power of the three persons, one wisdom and one goodness, nevertheless the name of power, but
not the thing named, is appropriated to the Father; likewise the name
of wisdom is appropriated to the Son and the name of goodness to the
Holy Spirit.85 Alan lists the familiar scriptural citations that associate
power with the Father. On Hilary: Some names are appropriated as associated terms but not as strict significations (appropriantur voce et non
significatione). For example, the Father is called eternity because he
is the beginning without beginning, and the term image is more specially appropriated (specialiter appropriatur) to the Son than the Spirit
because of the Sons likeness (the Augustinian similitudo).86 In both
cases Alan uses appropriation repeatedly and confidently.
In between the triads of Abelard and Hilary, Alan addresses the one
favored by Thierry. It must be more than a coincidence that here Alan
prefers the milder potius dicitur to the formal term appropriatur.87 He
writes: unity, indeed, is rather said to be [potius dicitur] in the Father
than in the Son, for just as unity depends on nothing for existence, but
every number depends on unity, so the Father is from nothing and all
things are from the Father.88 Here Alans reasoning follows from the
natural theology of the philosophers in his prologue, not from scriptural images or theological tradition, as it did with Abelard and Hilary.
Equality is rather said of the Son not only because of the priority of
the Sons similitudo, as in Hilarys triad, but also to underscore that the
Son, though other than the Father, is not lesser.89 The Spirit is simply said to be the community or connection of unity and equality.90
85
Quamvis enim una sit potentia trium personarum, una sapientia, una bonitas,
tamen nomen potentie appropriatur Patri et non res nominis; similiter nomen sapientie Filio, nomen bonitatis Spiritui Sancto (SQH 1.80, ed. Glorieux, La Somme,
226).
86
Ibid., 1.122, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 255.
87
On the broad range of possible terms for appropriation, see Ott, Untersuchungen
(n. 34 above), 580.
88
Unitas ideo potius dicitur esse in Patre quam in Filio quia sicut unitas a nullo
est et omnis numerus ab unitate, sic Pater a nullo et omnia a Patre (SQH 1.114,
ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 248).
89
In Filio autem dicitur equalitas non alteritas esse; quia si diceretur alteritas esse
in Filio videretur esse minor Patre (ibid., 1.114, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 248).
90
Spiritus autem Sanctus ideo communitas dicitur unitatis et equalitatis sive
connexio (ibid.).
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Thus after explaining the necessity for the property-appropriation distinction in his prologue, particularly in light of the triad of unity, equality and connection, Alan pulls his punch, so to speak, when it comes to
the arithmetic Trinity favored by Thierry. Abelards potentia led Alan
into a dissertation on divine omnipotence, and Hilarys aeternitas into a
discussion of time and space. Only the case of Augustines triad inspires
him to plunge further into issues of Trinitarian predication. Alan weighs
the tensions between Augustines and Boethiuss views on number in the
Trinity the subject of Thierrys own Boethian commentaries and
even sketches an account of what he calls theological number in contrast to merely logical number. Alluding to the Boethian distinction
between two kinds of number, Alan contends that the number of the
Trinity is not a quantitative number, but a number sui generis, namely
theological number.91 What could such a theological number be, if not
precisely the triple unitas defined in the arithmetic Trinity? Ultimately,
Alan appears uncertain about applying appropriation theory to the arithmetic Trinity as forcefully as he had originally planned. He seems well
aware that his theological preceptors Augustine, Boethius, and John of
Damascus put the mystery of number at the center of their Trinitarian meditations.92 Here is a reader of Thierrys works uncertain whether
to walk one mile with the controversial master or two.
Alan and the Strong Reading
In this light it is unsurprising to find Alan still preoccupied with Thierrys arithmetic Trinity in two other works, preserving the ambivalence
on display in the Summa.93 In his better-known Regulae theologiae, writ91
Nec nos numerum theologicum quantitatem dicimus, sed potius pluralitatem
personarum quam faciunt distinctiones que attenduntur secundum paternitatem,
filiationem, spirationem. . . . Non concedimus ergo quod ibi predicatur numerus sed
numerus sui generis, scilicet numerus theologicus. Nec inde sequitur quod quantitas predicatur, quid de numero theologico non potest inferri numerus logicus, id est
numerus qualis apud logicum consideratur (ibid., 1.115, ed. Glorieux, La Somme,
250). Cf. Boethius, De sancta trinitate 3, in Boethius: De Consolatione Philosophiae,
Opuscula Theologica, ed. Claudio Moreschini (Munich, 2005), 171:13234: Numerus
enim duplex est, unus quidem quo numeramus, alter vero qui in rebus numerabilibus
constat.
92
John of Damascuss De fide orthodoxa was translated around 1150 and cited frequently by Peter Lombard. See M.-D. Chenu, La thologie au douzime sicle (Paris,
1957), 28384. Although he does not discuss the case of Alan in particular, see further Nikolaus M. Hring, The Porretans and the Greek Fathers, Mediaeval Studies
24 (1962): 181209.
93
Glorieux rightly notes that the Summa (for Glorieux, as yet anonymous) closely
resembles passages in Alans Regulae and Contra haereticos; but he assumes that the
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ten several years after the Summa, Alan constructs his entire axiomatic
system on the foundation of the mathematical triad, echoing some of his
own formulations from the Summa.94 Hring has emphasized that Alans
rules must have been compiled over time in collaboration with Gilberts
other students, such as Peter of Poitiers, and possibly with the support
of Gilbert himself. Like Thierry, Gilbert had lectured on Boethiuss De
hebdomadibus, where the axiomatic ideal is first modeled in Christian theology.95 Nevertheless, they belong to a later period after Alan has left
Paris for the Languedoc.96
Since the quadrivium, trivium, and physics all begin with axiomatic
rules, Alan reasons, so too should theology. The first rule is that God is
not only one (unus) but unity (unitas or monas): unity begets unity from
itself; from itself it brings forth equality.97 The second rule states that
Gods unity is sui generis, the unique transnumeric source of all numbers
(unitas singularitatis).98 In the third rule, Alan once again though now
at greater length than in the Summa decodes the cryptic first lemma
of the Liber XXIV philosophorum as a figure of the mathematical Trinity.99 Finally, Alan reveals the fourth rule the arithmetic Trinity itself
as the culmination of the first three: in the Father is unity, in the
Son equality, in the Holy Spirit the connection of unity and equality.100
Does Alans fourth rule represent a weak or a strong reading of Thierrys triad? On the one hand, Alan again presents it from the perspective
of appropriative theology (unity is specially said to be in the Father,
and equality in the Son) and repeats his reasoning from the Summa.101
arithmetic Trinity has the same meaning in each text regardless of context; see Glorieux, Lauteur (n. 76 above), 3334, 3738.
94
The work is also known as Regulae caelestis iuris or De maximis theologicis. Comparing these two texts on the mathematical triad encourages one to suppose that
Alan wrote the Summa first and then adapted portions of it within his ongoing project of the Regulae.
95
Nikolaus Hring, Magister Alanus de Insulis: Regulae Caelestis Iuris, Archives
dhistoire doctrinale et littraire du moyen ge 48 (1981): 97226, at 99, 118.
96
Hudry dates the Summa to 115567, the Regulae to 119294, and De fide catholica (see below) to 11901200; see Rgles de thologie (n. 75 above), 8589.
97
Vnitas de se gignit unitatem, de se profert equalitatem (Regulae 1.5, ed.
Hring, Magister Alanus, 125).
98
Ibid., 2.3, ed. Hring, Magister Alanus, 126.
99
Ibid., 3.14, ed. Hring, Magister Alanus, 12728. Cf. SQH 1.31, ed. Glorieux,
La Somme, 168.
100
In Patre unitas, in Filio equalitas, in Spiritu Sancto unitatis equalitatisque
connexio (Regulae 4 [regula], ed. Hring, Magister Alanus, 128).
101
In Patre specialiter dicitur esse unitas, in Filio equalitas (ibid., 4.2, ed.
Hring Magister Alanus, 128). Cf. SQH 1.114, ed. Glorieux, La Somme, 248.
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On the other hand, Alan again avoids the formal term appropriated,
and more importantly, the context of the Summa is quite different
from that of the Regulae. In the Summa, Alan sought to outline all of
Christian theology as part of a coherent whole and to weigh competing
authorities, just like Peter Lombard. But in the Regulae Alan is up to
something quite original among his twelfth-century peers.102 Following
Boethiuss example in De hebdomadibus, Alan seeks common conceptions of the mind, that is, self-evident truths that anyone will accept
immediately upon hearing, because they are known in themselves. These
are the highest truths of reason, he writes in his prologue, because they
are the most general truths, commonly owned by every rational mind.103
To that end, Alan first tries to establish that the Trinity is the primary
instance of such universal common conceptions when grasped in terms
of the mathematical triad. But for this to work, Alan must consider
unity, equality, and connection as linguistic equivalents of the Father,
Son, and Spirit and not simply provisional qualities associated with the
different persons, such as power, eternity, beauty, or goodness. If the
mathematical triad were anything less, then Alan would not have proved
that the divine Trinity was a self-evident common conception, but only
that certain other divine attributes like eternity or goodness were. In
order for the triad to function as Alans rationalist project in the Regulae requires, the three terms need to be strictly nomina personales, not
nomina appropriativae.
Given this peculiar context of the arithmetic Trinitys reappearance
in the Regulae, Alan should be understood as a de facto proponent of
the strong reading. Much the same can be said about his later apolo102
Mechthild Dreyer (More mathematicorum: Rezeption und Transformation der

antiken Gestalten wissenschaftlichen Wissens im 12. Jahrhundert, BGPhThM 47 [Mnster, 1996], 10661) notes that the most important context for Alans axiomatic
method in the Regulae are the commentaries on Boethiuss De hebdomadibus by Gilbert of Poitiers, Thierry of Chartres, and Clarembald of Arras. See further G. R.
Evans, Boethian and Euclidean Axiomatic Method in the Theology of the Later
Twelfth Century, Archives internationale dhistoire des sciences 30 (1980): 3652;
Charles H. Lohr, The Pseudo-Aristotelian Liber de causis and Latin Theories of
Science in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries, in Pseudo-Aristotle in the Middle
Ages: The Theology and Other Texts, ed. Jill Kraye, Charles B. Schmitt, and W. F.
Ryan (London, 1986), 5362; Franoise Hudry, Mtaphysique et Thologie dans les
Regulae Theologiae dAlain de Lille 1202), in Metaphysics in the Twelfth Century,
ed. Lutz-Bachmann, Fidora, and Niederberger (n. 80 above), 20115.
103
Communis animi conceptio est enuntiatio quam quisque intelligens probat
auditam. Hec omnes maximas, cuiuscumque sint facultatis, sua generalitate conplectitur. . . . Vnde indemonstrabilis, per se nota et maxima nuncupatur (Regulae,
Prologus, 10, ed. Hring, Magister Alanus, 123). Cf. Boethius, Quomodo substantiae
[De hebdomadibus] 1, ed. Moreschini, Opuscula (n. 91 above), 187:1718.
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getic work De fide catholica contra haereticos sui temporis.104 In the third
book Contra Iudaeos, Alan defends the Christian belief in the Trinity.
He introduces the distinction between essence and persons and then lists
scriptural texts that support his views. The only non-scriptural authority
cited is the Hermetic Asclepius, the same source Alan had used in both
Summa and Regulae to introduce the arithmetic Trinity.105 But now in
addition Alan promises to prove the same with reasons.106 His rational
proof in De fide catholica is none other than the triad of unity, equality,
and connection, and here there is not a trace of the weak appropriative
reading. Quite to the contrary: in order to purify divine sonship and
generation from the whiff of polytheism, Alan adverts to the clarity
the apologetic refuge, we might say of mathematics:
For just as all divisible plurality proceeds from all indivisible unity, so
does everything variable proceed from the invariable Creator, since he,
remaining still, gives motion to all [Boethius]. And just as an image of
Creator and creature arises in unity and number, so too a likeness of the
Trinity: for in the property of unity there arises a trace of the Trinity,
since, as arithmetic teaches, unity generates itself. Between generated
unity and generating unity one discovers an equality. But in what existing thing could we possibly encounter this, unless in God? God generates God and by generating nothing other than God from God indeed
brings forth one who is the same God as the one generating. And there
is the perfect equality, or meeting-point or connection, of generating and
generated, which is called the Holy Spirit, in whom the Father and Son
meet. Thus the philosopher said: Monad generates monad, and in itself
reflects its passion. Therefore you will not discover in any existing thing
what is said of unity; it is only discovered in divine unity and trinity.107
104
De fide catholica contra haereticos sui temporis, PL 210:306430. See Nikolaus M.
Hring, Alain of Lilles De fide catholica or Contra haereticos, Analecta Cisterciensia
32 (1976): 216327.
105
De fide catholica 3.3, PL 210:404B405A; cf. SQH 1.31, ed. Glorieux, La
Somme, 168.
106
Idem rationibus potest probari (De fide catholica 3.4, PL 210:405BC).
107
Quia sicut ab unitate indivisibili omnis procedit pluralitas quae divisibilis est,
ita a Creatore invariabili omne procedit variabile, quia Ipse manens stabilis dat
cuncta moveri. Et sicut in unitate et numero resultant Creatoris et creaturae imago,
ita et Trinitatis similitudo: in proprietate enim unitatis quodam modo resultat vestigium Trinitatis, quia, ut apud arithmeticum legitur, unitas gignit se ipsam. Inter
unitatem autem genitam et gignentem quaedam invenitur aequalitas. In quo ergo
subsistente autem hoc poterimus invenire, nisi in Deo? Deus autem gignit Deum, et
non alium Deum a Deo gignente, imo genuit illum qui est idem Deus cum gignente;
et est ibi perfecta aequalitas gignentis et geniti, sive convenientia, seu connexus,
qui dicitur Spiritus sanctus, in quo Pater et Filius conveniunt. Unde et philosophus
ait: Monas gignit monadem, et in se suum reflexit ardorem. Ergo aut in nullo subsistente invenies quod de unitate dicitur, aut in unitate et trinitate divina reperitur (ibid., 3.4, PL 210:405C). Alan quotes from Boethiuss hymn O qui perpetua
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traditio
Unlike the Regulae cited above, this is a passage that Thierry of Chartres
himself could have written! Here the arithmetic Trinity is no mere distribution of common divine traits; rather, the divine persons gain their
definition precisely through the triads three arithmetical terms. Since
Alans project is a rational proof of divine plurality against the Jews,
the meaning of the arithmetic Trinity must be taken in a realist manner.
For if these names were only appropriations of divine unity, they could
not express plurality intrinsically (and thus rationally), but would only
indicate attributes common to one God.
For the sake of his proof, then, Alan finally concurred with the strong
reading of the arithmetic Trinity. Thus we have seen that in each of
the four loci that we examined, the Doctor Universalis took another step
closer toward Thierrys reading of Augustine. The destination that Alan
reached in De fide catholica bears comparison with the point of departure
of another possible student of Thierry, Achard of St. Victor.
Achard of St. Victors Strong Reading
When Hugh of St. Victor died in 1141, the Victorine school was beginning to take its mature shape as Andrew and Richard began writing. The
evidence suggests that Achard of St. Victor, born in England, was most
likely studying in Paris during the 1140s, making his career roughly contemporary with Clarembald of Arras.108 Achard was elected abbot of St.
Victor in 1155, became bishop of Avranches in 1161, and died in 1171.109
Like Clarembald, Achard most likely had both Hugh and Thierry among
his masters. Unlike his younger and more celebrated confrre Richard,
however, Achard is less well known than he deserves to be. As abbot,
Achard undoubtedly wrote many sermons (fifteen survive) and letters
(three survive), but he also authored two theological treatises and several as yet undiscovered quaestiones.110 While the sermons are classically
(De consolatione philosophiae 3.9, ed. Moreschini, Opuscula 79:103) and from Liber
XXIV philosophorum 1 (ed. Franoise Hudry, Liber Viginti Quattuor Philosophorum,
Hermes Latinus III/1, CCM 143A [Turnhout, 1997], 5).
108
Achard is named as present with Robert of Melun at a disputation over Peter
Lombards theology. Unfortunately this event is difficult to date, but must have
occurred after Robert succeeded Abelard around 1137 and before Achards abbacy
beginning in 1155. See Jean Chtillon, Thologie, spiritualit et mtaphysique dans
loeuvre oratoire dAchard de Saint Victor (Paris, 1969), 7475.
109
Hugh Feiss, Achard of Saint Victor: Works (Kalamazoo, 2001), 2024.
110
Achards other known treatise, De discretione animae, spiritus et mentis, is concerned with ideas associated with Gilbert of Poitiers rather than Thierry of Chartres. In fact Hring attributes the treatise to Gilbert, but Chtillon follows Germain
Morins attribution to Achard; see Chtillon, Thologie, 13133.
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Victorine in their imaginative, complex scriptural meditations, his major

treatise on the Trinity, De unitate Dei et pluralitate creaturarum, bears all
the signs of Thierrys influence.111
Nevertheless, Achards De unitate is strikingly original.112 The English
canon tries to demonstrate by reason alone but also out of wonder
at its infinite beauty the paradox of a plurality within God. He then
proceeds to contemplate such plurality both as the divine Trinity and as
the ramified cosmos. Others have justly compared De unitate to Anselms
Monologion and Proslogion, but the ambitious treatise also recalls Platos
Philebus, Augustines De ordine, and the Liber de causis, not to mention
111
As Chtillon aptly writes: Cet important trait, dont lexistence est pourtant
plus assure, na pas t beaucoup mieux prserv de loubli ni dfendu contre les
rigeurs du temps que les Quaestiones de thologie (Thologie, 119). Achards treatise
is cited by John of Cornwall in the late twelfth century and alluded to by John
Leland again in the early sixteenth, but had been considered lost until recently.
In 1944, Andr Combes (Un indit de saint Anselme? Le trait De unitate divinae
essentiae et pluralitate creaturarum daprs Jean de Ripa, tudes de Philosophie
Mdivale 34 [Paris, 1944]) showed that Jean de Ripa cited long extracts from treatise De unitate in his Sentence commentary and attributed them to Anselm of Canterbury; this has since proved to be Achards work. Ten years later, Marie-Thrse
dAlverny discovered a manuscript at the Monastery of St. Anthony in Padua (Scaf
fale V, 89, fols. 17788) that she believed to be Achards book, but only published
extracts sufficient to prove its authenticity (M.-T. dAlverny, Achard de Saint-Victor, De Trinitate De unitate et pluralitate creaturarum, Recherches de thologie
ancienne et mdivale 21 [1954]: 299306). Emmanuel Martineau finally transcribed
the manuscript in its entirety along with a French translation and analysis in
LUnit de Dieu et la pluralit de cratures (Saint-Lambert des Bois, 1987). Chtillon
points out (Thologie, 121 n. 33) that strictly speaking, the two parts of the treatise
have different names: De unitate et Trinitate (Treatise I) and De unitate et pluralitate
creaturarum (the partially preserved Treatise II). For this reason I will refer to the
work as De unitate for short. I will use Hugh Feisss translation of De unitate and the
sermons, noting any modifications that I find necessary.
112
Chtillon (Thologie, 277) notes Achards unusual, idiosyncratic philosophical vocabulary. Mohammad Ilkhani (La philosophie de la cration chez Achard de
Saint-Victor [Brussels, 1999]) likewise contends that once De unitate is understood
in context something he finds lacking in Martineaus analysis the book will
be judged as sans doute lune des plus importantes [oeuvres] du XIIe sicle (26;
cf. discussion 2223). Une telle dmarche tait trs audacieuse, parce quelle
saccordait mal avec lorthodoxie de lpoque. lpoque o la tendance gnrale
de la thologie essayait de prouver lunit et la simplicit en Dieu, noublions
pas les difficults encourues par Ablard et Gilbert de la Porre , Achard a voulu
montrer quil y a non seulement une pluralit en Dieu, mais en plus que cette pluralit est la vraie pluralit et quelle est le fondement de la pluralit des cratures
(ibid., 107).
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the works of Eriugena or Cusanus.113 Achard is clearly inspired by Thierrys reading of Boethius, but seems to have returned to the latters opuscula and discovered his own set of questions to pursue.114
In De unitate Achard takes up Thierrys triad, yet with a noteworthy
amendment: rather than use conexio, Achard prefers either communio or
a second-order aequalitas.115 His triad thus becomes Unity (the Father),
that which is the Equal of unity (the Son), and the Equality itself (the
Spirit or Communion).116 Achards priorities resemble Thierrys. He
explicitly endorses Thierrys strong reading of the arithmetic Trinity,
and like Thierry he wants to reconnect the triad with the quadrivium.
But given the currency of Augustines triad during these decades, one
can legitimately question whether Achards decision to deploy it in
De unitate is in fact due to Thierrys influence. This concern can be at
least assuaged, if not entirely put to rest, by noting a telltale passage in
Achards Sermon 13.
Christ as the Square
Much like Achards meditation on the mystical desert in Sermon 15,
Sermon 13 is better approached as a short treatise, given its length and
organization.117 Given on the festal anniversary of St. Victors founding,
Achards sermon urges the gathered monks to be wise builders like Solomon as they construct the house of God. Achard compares Christs power,
anointing, and wisdom to three houses.118 The first house of power
113
See the discussion in Chtillon, Thologie, 12326. As Ilkhani puts it, Achards
method may be Anselmian, but his results are a syncrtisme audacieux of Seneca,
Augustine, Boethius, Chalcidius, Eriugena, and Thierry of Chartres (Philosophie,
357).
114
See Ilkhanis fine analysis in Philosophie, 1018, 11617. DAlverny compares
Achards discussion of the Trinity to those of Thierry of Chartres and Clarembald
of Arras, as well as to the Regulae of Alan of Lille (dAlverny, Achard de SaintVictor, 3034).
115
But he is capable of comparing the Holy Spirit to conexio: see De unitate 2.3,
ed. Martineau, 14446; trans. Feiss, Achard, 439. Achard also uses conexio in a more
philosophical context at 2.10 (ed. Martineau, 166; trans. Feiss, Achard, 45556). On
Achards independence from Thierry, see Jean Ribaillier, Richard de Saint-Victor:
Opuscules thologiques (Paris, 1967), 178.
116
Achard, De unitate 1.36, ed. Martineau, 104.
117
On the image of the desert in Sermon 15, see Chtillon, Thologie, 23352 and
Bernard McGinn, The Growth of Mysticism (New York, 1994), 39598. Chtillon
(Thologie, 14247) dates Sermons 1315 together to the post-abbatial period from
1155 to 1161.
118
As Feiss notes (Achard, 2023), Achards triad resembles the Abelardian triad
of potentia, sapientia, and benignitas that Robert of Melun and Richard of St. Victor,
despite Bernards attacks, would finally embrace.
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contains a rich Christological section before the briefer exhortations on

the houses of anointing and wisdom. It is here that Achard echoes one of
Thierrys distinctive ideas. As we have seen, in Commentum Thierry calls
Christ the primordial square. This unusual but emblematic doctrine of
the Breton master fascinated several of his earliest students, as we saw
above. Achard certainly has his own take on the idea and prefers his own
terminology. On the other hand, Achard does not simply mention the
doctrine in passing, as Thierrys other students do, but rather uses it as
the fulcrum of his Christological meditation at the heart of Sermon 13.119
Solomon built his temple out of stone from Lebanon, but Lebanon
means brightening (candidatio) according to Jerome. 120 Achard states
that Christ is the true brightness that enlightens the world, and then
he converts this biblical imagery into the Platonic descent of form (light)
to matter (darkness).121 Solely out of kindness, writes Achard, did
such a beautiful form unite itself to such unformed material, which was
not just unformed but even deformed.122 Gods expressed form, the
form of Christ, is received by humanity as an impressed form that
restores its lost beauty.123 But what is the form of Christ? Thierry had
played off the ambiguity in the term figura (figura substantiae Patris,
Heb. 1:3) in order to link the vocabularies of Trinity and quadrivium;
the term can denote a true representation or a geometric polygon. Here
too Achard exploits the even greater ambiguity of forma to connote
existence, beauty, or shape:
This form is a square because it is stable and firm. . . . Christ is our
form as the apostle formed by him shows, Christ became a spiritual
square [spiritualis quadratura] for us according to the apostles word,
Christ became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption [1 Cor. 1:30]. See there a vital, heavenly square!
Approach and receive it, you stones, or rather you who without it are
dead and earthly. You have been hewn into this square form [in ea quad-
119
On this passage see Chatllon, Thologie, 21821.

Sermon 13, para. 1114, ed. Jean Chtillon, Achard de Saint-Victor: Sermons
indits, Textes philosophiques du moyen ge 17 (Paris, 1970), 14549; trans. Feiss,
Achard, 221.
121
Sermon 13, para. 1516, ed. Chtillon, Achard, 14950.
122
Forma tam formosa ex pietate sola se univit materie tam informi, nec modo
informi sed et deformi (Sermon 13, para. 16, ed. Chtillon, Achard, 150; trans.
Feiss, Achard, 228).
123
Forma autem ista et Dei est et nostra: Dei est quia a Deo est, nostra est quia
in nobis est; a Deo est expressa, et ab ipso nobis est impressa (Sermon 13, para. 16,
ed. Chtillon, Achard, 150; trans. Feiss, Achard, 229).
120
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ramini], and thus you have been transformed from dead to living, from
earthly to heavenly.124
Christ expresses divine form by taking on the dimensions of a square,

and monks receive Christ when they are thus squared (quadramini).
Achards square also suggests an architectural instrument that ensures
the uniformity of stones to optimize house construction. He plainly
intends this less as a metaphysical statement (as Thierry conceived it)
than as a concrete image to impress in the minds of his fellow brothers.
Achard also identifies further squares or fourfold virtues found
throughout scripture. Only in the love of God is the square proposed
and imposed as something we must receive, he writes, and only when
we become square can we cleave both to the cornerstone, Christ, and
to adjacent stones, our neighbors.125 Whoever accepts squares of this
kind will come through them to that superior square, namely, Christ.126
On the basis of this passage from Sermon 13, we can be relatively sure
that Achard was familiar with Thierrys ideas, or at least his well-known
Commentum. One senses, however, that the abbot of St. Victor valued
Thierrys vivid concepts more as practical resources for contemplation
and preaching than for their theoretical import at least in his sermons.
Against the Weak Reading
We can now return to De unitate. Achard was certainly active in the
schools of Paris by at least 1151, so De unitate could be dated anywhere
from then until 1171.127 But given how seriously he took his responsibilities as abbot starting in 1155, and the paucity of comparable theological
undertakings attributed to him, a date in the late 1140s or early 1150s
124
Quadratura quedam est hec forma, quia stabilis est et firma. . . . Christus
forma nostra est, qui, ut ostendit Apostolus ab eo formatus, spiritualis quadratura
nobis est factus: Christus namque, juxta verbum Apostoli, factus est sapientia nobis
a Deo, et justitia, et sanctificatio, et redemptio. Ecce quadratura vitalis atque celestis.
Accedite et eam suscipite, lapides vivi, immo sine ea mortui atque terreni; in ea
quadramini, et sic ex mortuis vere vivi et ex terrenis celestes efficiemini (Sermon
13, para. 17, ed. Chtillon, Achard, 15051; trans. Feiss, Achard, 229 [trans. modified]). On the image of the square, see Chtillon, Thologie, 219. In viewing Christ
as form and in his preference for architectural metaphors, Achard no doubt follows
his master Hugh of St. Victor: see Boyd Taylor Coolman, The Theology of Hugh of
St. Victor (Cambridge, 2010), 83102.
125
In sola etiam dilectione dei quadratura proponitur et suscipienda nobis imponitur (Sermon 13, para. 21, ed. Chtillon, Achard, 153; trans. Feiss, Achard, 232).
126
Qui quadraturas hujusmodi acceperit, per eas ad superiorem quamdam perveniet quadraturam (Sermon 13, para. 22, ed. Chtillon, Achard, 154; trans. Feiss,
Achard, 234).
127
See Feiss, Achard, 22.
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133
seems more likely.128 This would, moreover, conform better with the arc
of Thierrys teaching career and fame.129 In order to appreciate Achards
distinctive elaboration of the triad and its centrality, I will first sketch
an outline of the treatises argument as a whole and then demonstrate
how Achard develops Thierrys arithmetic analogy.130
In a prologue (1.112) Achard explores the concept of a perfect plurality and contends that it cannot originate in the world alone. Such
pure multiplicity is inseparable from pure unity, and so both must exist
together in God. This harmony of unity and plurality would not only be
a beauty without measure (pulchritudo immensa), but would also far
exceed the beauty of unity alone.131 Thus Achard sets out the treatises
goal: to think the perfect plurality that can only exist when equal to
divine unity. This requires, as he notes, a deeper understanding of equality (1.1012). The first half of the treatise unfolds Achards Trinitarian
theology, first addressing the divine plurality of persons (1.1316) before
taking up his amended triad of unity, equality to unity, and the equality
of unity and equality (1.1723). Achard then restates the triad in terms
of early scholastic categories of names versus properties (1.2436).132 At
this point Achard abruptly shifts to the second task of his treatise.133
Having located the origin of plurality in Gods unity that is, in God
as the mathematical Trinity he now investigates how created pluralities in the cosmos relate to Gods unity. In his prologue (1.3742) to this
128
On Achards rigorist conception of the abbots role, see Chtillon, Thologie,
7678.
129
Furthermore, Ribaillier (Richard [n. 115 above], 17778) contends that Richard
of St. Victor knew Achards De unitate when he wrote his letter De tribus personis,
and the terminus a quo of that letter is 116062.
130
On the organization of De unitate, see Martineaus astute discussion (LUnit
[n. 111 above], 5261), which, however, lacks a comprehensive outline. Ilkhani (Philosophie [n. 112 above], 1213) construes the textss organization in terms of philosophical topoi: (1) unity and plurality, 1.136; (2) creation and eternal reasons, 1.37
42; (3) intellectual forms, 1.4350; (4) formal reasons, 2.117; (5) causal-final reasons,
2.1721. While helpful, this outline ignores the authors evident Trinitarian concerns.
131
Achard, De unitate 1.56, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 7274.
132
Nunc enim personae discernendae sunt proprietatibus et secundum proprietates distinguendae nominibus; cujus tamen distinctionis sive in proprietatibus sive
in nominibus postea, Dei largiente gratia, manifestior exponetur ratio (De unitate
1.24, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 96). Chtillon (Thologie, 22427) notes that Achard
would be familiar with the technical terms surrounding the controversies over Abelard and Gilbert.
133
When I refer to the first part or second part, I intend to designate the
major division of Achards argument outlined here (i.e., before and after 1.37), not
books 1 and 2 of De unitate. On Achards ratio explicatrix and its resemblance to
Thierry of Chartress explicatio, see Ilkhani, Philosophie, 29596.
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second part, Achard proposes his own triad to order the ontology that
follows: formal or exemplary reasons, also simply called forms; final
reasons or causes; and unfolding reasons (rationes explicatrices), also
called modes.134 Beginning with forms, Achard investigates how number
might mediate the degrees of form descending from the Word to created beings (1.432.16).135 Shortly after the next section on causes begins
(2.1721), however, the text of De unitate suddenly ends. It is unclear
whether Achard simply abandoned the project or whether the remainder
of the text has been lost in transmission.
As I showed above, Thierry insinuated that his arithmetic triad
defined the property of each divine person and did not merely appropriate a provisional name. Achard agrees, and his opinion on the matter is
even more clearly and forcefully expressed. We know from a remark in
Sermon 13 that Achard is well aware of the theoretical value of appropriative naming.136 Nevertheless, in De unitate he makes it clear that his
triad denotes the unique property of each divine person. Three pieces of
evidence can be considered.
134
Achard, De unitate 1.39, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 108. Achard repeats the triad
in similar terms at De unitate 1.42 (ed. Martineau, LUnit, 112) and 2.19 (ed. Martineau, LUnit, 192). Martineau (LUnit, 109 n. 2) contends that the third term
should be translated cause dployante, in contrast to Feisss explanatory cause, and
proposes that it refers to efficient causality. Chtillon (Thologie, 28287) speculates
that William of Conchess Glosae on Boethiuss Consolatio and on the Timaeus may
have been the source of Achards exemplar doctrine.
135
This difficult section, which exceeds the purview of this essay, merits much
greater attention than it has received. See the excellent analysis in the second half
of Ilkhanis Philosophie, as well as Pascal Massie, The Metaphysics of Primary Plurality in Achard of Saint Victor, Saint Anselm Journal 5.2 (2008): 118, at 1518.
136
Si namque et opera Trinitatis, licet sint indivisa, quaedam tamen specialiter
solent Patri attribui, quedam specialiter Filio, quedam specialiter Spiritui sancto
(Sermon 13, para. 3, ed. Chtillon, Achard, 136). Chtillon notes (136 n. 14): Les
positions dAchard, sur ce point, sont donc beaucoup moin affirmatives que elles de
son illustre confrre [viz. Richard of Saint Victor]. Lintention de labb de SaintVictor nest dailleurs pas de prendre parti dans ce dbat, mais seulement dinvoquer
la thorie des appropriations trinitaires pour montrer quil est lgitime dtablir une
certaine distinction entre les attributs divins. Ilkhani similarly reads Achard as
making a conciliatory effort to bridge the methods of Gilbert and Thierry: Avec
sa science des nombres Achard rejoint Boce et, par lui, les nopythagoriciens. Gilbert de la Porre navait pas appliqu les mathmatiques la Trinit, il avait essay
de rsoudre le problme de lunit et de la pluralit divine par le raissonement,
autrement dit par les sciences physique et thologique. Cest surtout chez Thierry de
Chartres que les mathmatiques dominent car cest par elles quil essaie de concevoir
la pluralit divine. Achard tablit en fait un pont entre les deux et applique le raissonement et les lois de mathmatiques la Trinit (Philosophie, 36162).
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135
First of all, the organization of De unitate as a whole reinforces the

strong reading. Initially, Achard merely identifies divine unity with
abstract plurality (1.1316). Next, he discerns that this plurality is a
Trinity of persons, precisely by introducing at this juncture the arithmetic triad (1.1723). Only after the arithmetic triad has distinguished the
persons of the Trinity does he proceed to assign the names Father, Son,
and Communion (1.2436).137 Achard recapitulates this deliberate method
at the end of the first part of De unitate: By all the reasons given thus
far regarding the Trinity, a distinction seems to have been shown to
exist in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. The causes of their
properties and names have been found in unity, and in what is equal to
unity, and in equality itself.138 Hence, behind the names Father and Son
lies the cause of these distinct properties namely, unity and unitys
equal.
A second reason to attribute the strong reading to Achard is his habit
of treating the terms of the arithmetic triad as distinct divine persons,
not as attributes of one divine substance. He expressly distinguishes
unity from what is equal to unity on the grounds that both of them
must exist as separate divine persons.139 Similarly, the name communio is
specially attributed or specially adopted to the Spirit, he writes, not
because it is common to the three persons, but because it is the unique
property of the third person.140
But perhaps the strongest evidence for Achards realist reading comes
from his method of argument in the long prologue (1.112). Achard calls
his treatise a disputatio, that is, a formal defense of his claims that relies
principally on reason according to its capacity.141 Like Anselm, Achard
seeks fitting and necessary reasons that will produce not only logical
but also beautiful truths.142 But the objective of Achards rational proof
is not to demonstrate simply that God or the Trinity exists, but rather
137

Rationibus omnibus praetermissis Trinitatis ostensa videtur distinctio in Patre
et Filio et Spiritu sancto, quorum proprietatum et nominum causae in unitate, et eo
quod unitati est aequale, et in aequalitate ipsa sunt inventae (ibid., 1.37, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 106; trans. Feiss, Achard [n. 109 above], 406).
139
Unde et quod unitati est aequale, persona necessitate dicetur alia, constat
ergo ex superioribus, quia nec ipsum potest non esse persona[m]. Eadem etiam ratione et in ipsa earum aequalitate persona reperietur tertia (Achard, De unitate 1.16,
ed. Martineau, LUnit, 90).
140
Ibid., 1.36, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 104.
141
Ibid., 1.12, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 80; trans. Feiss, Achard, 387.
142
Achard, De unitate 1.5, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 74. On the diverse meanings
of ratio in Anselm of Canterbury, none of which accord well with the Aristotelian
or Boethian senses, see Stephen Gersh, Anselm of Canterbury, in A History of
138
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136
traditio
that divine unity is necessarily also a perfect plurality. The reasoning

he pursues toward this end is precisely to define the necessity of the
arithmetic triad (in his version of it): unity, unitys necessary self-equal,
and the necessarily distinct equality that makes such a unity possible.
Hence the three terms he distinguishes in the arithmetic triad cannot be
common properties of the divine substance that may be appropriated
to one person or another, like goodness or wisdom. If Achards proof of
the Trinity is to succeed, the three terms must rather designate the distinct persons of the Trinity. Were they only common properties of divine
unity, they would prove nothing about the plurality of God, which is the
very desideratum of his rational proof.
Achards argument runs as follows. True plurality cannot exist in creatures, because they lack the perfect unity that is God. In other words, a
plurality becomes perfect only when its members are unified with each
other by becoming equal in some way. The harmony (congruentia plurium) that would result from such equality would be so beautiful that it
must be divine beauty itself (summa pulchritudo).143
The beauty of each would of itself coalesce into the complete unity of
the other, and somehow fuse with its beauty. . . . It is clear then that
nothing can be or can be thought which is more beautiful or greater than
the beauty of the aforesaid unity and of its supreme fittingness. It is
therefore necessary that it be in God in fact, that it be God.144
Here Achard alludes to Anselms quo maius cogitari nequit but transposes
it into an aesthetic key. Divine unity, so to speak, is that than which
nothing more equalizing (or beautifully harmonious) can be conceived.
But such equality can only be equal to divine unity if it has the power
to remain itself in the process, and this is something only God can do.145
Hence, God is a plurality; namely, the kind of plurality that is at once
unity and equality.146 Only after having rationally demonstrated his triad
by various and necessary arguments does Achard promise to show how
the ground [natura] of the persons names is to be determined according
Twelfth-Century Western Philosophy, ed. Peter Dronke (Cambridge, 1988), 25578,

here 26061.
143
144
Utriusque enim pulchritudo secundum se totam in unitatem illam alterius
concurrit et quodammodo confluit pulchritudini. . . . Liquet igitur quia pulchritudine unitatis praefatae et summae illius convenientiae pulchrius nihil vel majus esse,
sed nec excogitari potest. Ipsam itaque in Deo esse, sed et Deum esse est necesse
(ibid., 1.5, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 74; trans. Feiss, Achard, 382).
145
146
Ibid., 1.10, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 78.
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137
to the properties of each.147 In the end, the persons of Father, Son, and
Communion are simply names laid atop the framework of the arithmetic
triad. This radical position distinguishes Achard as the greatest medieval advocate of Thierrys strong reading, and one of the few who state
that advocacy within the terms of the scholastic theory of appropriative
names.
Achard as Student of Thierry
One can also find secondary evidence of Achards enthusiasm for Thierrys theological agenda in his attempts, however awkward, to follow the
Breton master in making use of mathematical vocabulary. Later in De
unitate, Achard explains the mathematical Trinity by means of the rudiments of the quadrivium. The first three numbers express divine unity
with an odd number (1), then the first even number (2), and finally an
indivisible prime number (3). Likewise, Achard compares the Trinity to
the triangle, since it is the geometrical figure that underlies every other
polygon.148 These two remarks resemble statements Thierry makes in
Commentum on the gender of even and odd numbers, and on the divine
Son as the primary figure, although for Thierry this is primarily the
square, and then by extension the triangle.149
Achard also attempts to summarize Thierrys most distinctive argument for the arithmetical Trinity namely, the identity preserved by
unity throughout its self-multiplication (1 x 1 = 1). The results are surprisingly awkward:
The number in the power of which stands the force and the form of
all things is the equality that comes from unity. It is taught that from
equality proceed all species of inequality. . . . But reason shows that,
since equality cannot consist except among several, the first equality of
all is that which existed between two things, especially if it were the first
of all things, so that very equality will be third from them, and will be
three with them.150
147
Hac igitur ibi variis jam et necessariis inventa assertionibus, sequitur quod
nunc propositum est, cujusmodi natura scilicet ipsa sit, et an personalis esse monstrari possit (ibid., 1.12, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 80; trans. Feiss, Achard, 387).
148
149
See respectively Thierry, Commentum 4.4, in Commentaries, ed. Hring (n. 8
above), 96; Commentum 2.3235, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 7879.
150
Numerus quoque penes quem vis et forma consistit omnium rerum ab unitate
aequalitatis: ab aequalitate species omnes docetur procedere inaequalitatis. . . . Sed
ratio monstrat, cum aequalitas non possit nisi inter plura consistere, primam illam
aequalitatem esse omnium quae inter duo constiterat, praesertim si et illa omnium
fuerit prima, ut sit et aequalitas ipsa ab eis tertia et cum eis erit tria (Achard, De
unitate 1.20, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 92; trans. Feiss, Achard, 395).
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138
traditio
What is missing in Achards retelling is the critical notion of multiplication or the language of number generating itself. This is the arithmetic basis of Thierrys revival of the Augustinian triad. Instead, Achard
substitutes a principle associated more with Boethiuss harmonic principles than with arithmetic: the derivation of inequality from pure equality.151 Then in the second part of De unitate, when Achard again returns
to mathematical concepts, he directs his readers to Augustines lengthy
discussion of number in De musica and is delighted that the bishop of
Hippo even calls God the number without number in De Genesi ad litteram.152 According to Boethius, God contains the numbers of things.
If this is so, writes Achard, God must also contain the proportions of
things, which are simply connections of numbers.153
Such references are precisely the sort of authorities that Thierry of
Chartres must have favored in his lectures, further suggesting that he
had contact with Achard in the schools around 1150. But we can also
detect a pattern of divergence, or perhaps development, from Thierry to
his Victorine student. In short, Achard appears to substitute harmonics
for arithmetic as the quadrivial basis for the arithmetic Trinity. Where
Thierry uses unity, equality, and connection, Achard puts equality, a
harmonic principle, at the center of this proof.154 In place of the autonomic flow of numbers, Achard installs the beautiful harmonies of proportions, the form of Christ as square that restores beauty to raw matter. Although Thierry returns again and again to the self-multiplication
of unity as the ground of numerical series, Achard has trouble articulating this central point, which makes sense if Achards model of the Trinity is ultimately harmonic rather than arithmetic.
Achards views on the Trinity are echoed in an anonymous (Ps.-Hugh
of St. Victor) scriptural commentary written either by Achard or by
151
Boethius, Institutio arithmetica 1.32.12, ed. Guillaumin (n. 9 above), 6667.

This is also a major principle of Boethian harmonics: see Boethius, De institutione
musica 2.7, ed. Gottfried Friedlein (Leipzig, 1867, repr. Frankfurt am Main, 1966),
232. Thierry repeats the doctrine in the same passage of Commentum, but also in
his Tractatus on Genesis; the author of Commentarius Victorinus follows closely. Cf.
Commentum 2.36, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 79; Tractatus 39, 43, and 44, in Commentaries, ed. Hring, 57174; Commentarius Victorinus 8788, in Commentaries, ed.
Hring, 499.
152
153
Ibid., ed. Martineau, LUnit, 152; cf. ibid., 2.12, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 170.
154
Achard turns to conexio only in the second part of De unitate, where it serves
epistemological rather than theological ends. See De unitate 2.3, 2.4, and 2.10, ed.
Martineau, LUnit, 14449, 16667.
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139
a student of his around 115565, the Quaestiones in epistolas Pauli.155

Although the author refers once to Achard by name, Chtillon points out
that this could be the voice of a student recording lectures.156 When he
reaches Romans 11:36 (Quoniam ex ipso, et per ipsum, et in ipso sunt
omnia: ipsi gloria in saecula), the author uses the arithmetic Trinity to
explain how all things are from God, through God, and in God.157 The
author first notes that the Pauline prepositions ex, per, and in imply a
double origin. Although the Trinity is the principium omnium creaturarum as a unity, the Father is also the principium of the Son and the
Spirit. These difficult relations are better glossed, he continues, in terms
of divine beauty, as origo, pulchritudo, and delectatio, a triad from Augustines De trinitate.158 But then he offers a second Augustinian model for
grasping the Trinitys unity, and this is the arithmetic triad. He clearly
does not classify the arithmetic Trinity as so many appropriated names,
but rather inclines toward the strong reading. The Father is unity because
it is the principium numerorum, the Son is equality as the secunda unitas
or prima pluralitas, and the Spirit is the equality of them both.159 The
author frames his exposition of the arithmetic Trinity with the admonition that the very words of the triad conceal a saving mystery.160
But the author does not stop here, and his next step again resembles
Achards theology in De unitate. He takes Augustines second sentence
from the key passage in De doctrina christiana not simply as a statement of Nicene orthodoxy, but as a theorem about the created order: all
things gain their unity, equality, and (he now says) connection from the
155
PL 175:431634. On the question of attribution, compare Ott, Untersuchungen

(n. 34 above), 576; Chtillon, Thologie (n. 108 above), 11518; and especially P. Glorieux, Essai sur les Quaestiones in epistolas Pauli du Ps.-Hugues de Saint-Victor,
Recherches de thologie ancienne et mdivale 19 (1952): 4859. This text could represent one of two lost quaestiones linked to Achard; another candidate treatise has
since been attributed to Odo of Ourscamp, the correspondent of Clarembald of Arras.
As to dating, the Quaestiones have been shown to rely on Robert of Melun. See Artur
M. Landgraf, Introduction lhistoire de la littrature thologique de la scholastique
naissante, trans. Louis B. Geiger, Publications de lInstitut dtudes mdivales 22
(Montreal, 1973), 92.
156
Quod a magistro Acardo accepimus (Quaestiones in epistolas Pauli, q. 93, PL
175:531).
157
Ibid., qq. 28087, PL 175:500502.
158
Ibid., q. 282, PL 175:500501.
159
Ibid., q. 283, PL 175:501.
160
Salva secretorum reverentia dicimus, quod in Patre ideo dicitur unitas . . .
hoc dico salva fide catholica, quorum verborum occultam intelligentiam mallem ab
alio audire, quam aliquid de tenuitate mea super his dicere (ibid.).
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Trinity.161 Here he applies yet another Augustinian triad unitas, species, and ordo, which appears variously in De trinitate, De Genesi ad litteram, and elsewhere. The unitas of the Trinity, then, is reflected in creatures through the unitas of beauty. But this beauty of harmonic order is
itself communicated in terms of number, expressed in Wisdom 11:21 as
numerus, mensura, and pondus, a verse constantly cited by Augustine.162
Thus, within a compact series of questions, by superimposing four different Augustinian triads upon each other, the author finds time to convey
an Achardian principle not once but twice. The mystery of the Trinity
is communicated within the plurality of creation in two ways simultaneously: through beauty and through number.
Achards De unitate is without a doubt the most unequivocal and
sophisticated restatement of Thierrys strong reading of the Augustinian triad that we possess before Nicholas of Cusa. Yet his efforts fit well
within the context of other repetitions of Thierrys teachings. As we have
seen, Achards notion of Christ as eternal square reflects the contemporary interests of the anonymous student treatises and of Clarembald of
Arras, as does his proclivity for Johannine Logos-theology.163 And despite
their differences, Achard and Alan both apply Thierrys arithmetic model
toward an end the Breton master never envisioned: a rigorous proof that
provides universal, necessary arguments on behalf of the Christian Trinity whether for apologetic purposes, as Alan ventures in De fide catholica; or as an homage to the great Boethius, as in his Regulae; or simply
out of wonder at the sheer beauty such reasons radiate, as Achard suggests in De unitate.
161
In patre unitas, in filio aequalitas, in spiritu sancto unitatis aequalitatisque

concordia, et tria haec unum omnia propter patrem, aequalia omnia propter filium,
conexa omnia propter spiritum sanctum (Augustine, De doctrina christiana, 1.12
[V.5], ed. Green [n. 1 above], 1617). This immediately recalls Thierry of Chartress
doctrine of a trinity of perpetuals (materia, forma, spiritus) that reflect the arithmetic Trinity within the natural order. See Thierry, Commentum 2.3942, in Commentaries, ed. Hring (n. 8 above), 8082.
162
In creaturis praelucet vestigium Trinitatis, quia ostendunt in se unitatem, et
speciem, et ordinem tenere, quia unumquodque et unum aliquid est, et aliqua specie formatur, et aliquem ordinem tenet, unde dictum est: Omnia fecit in numero,
et pondere, et mensura. Numerus enim ad unitatem, pondus ad ordinem, mensura
ad speciem pertinet. De quolibet enim verum est, quod ex quo incipit esse, statim
cadit sub numerum quia vel unum est, vel plura. Pondus ad ordinem ideo dicitur
pertinere; quia singula ordinem tenent secundum naturam ponderis. . . . species vero
rerum, quod quidam modus est earum, et mensura (Quaestiones in epistolas Pauli,
q. 284, PL 175:5012).
163
On the latter point, see Ilkhani, Philosophie (n. 112 above), 25254.
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The Success of the Weak Reading

Thierrys strong reading was quickly eclipsed by the weak reading in
the 1160s and 1170s. The Sentences of Peter Lombard and those of the
Porretani gradually constructed what became the traditional reading of
Augustines triad namely, one directly opposed to an arithmetical
interpretation. We have already seen how Alan of Lille addressed the
topic in his Summa in the very years when Peter Lombard was completing the final edition of the Sentences. In the next decade their two
examples helped to consolidate, despite the direction taken by Alans
later works, the judgment of the burgeoning scholastic tradition against
Thierrys arithmetical Trinity.
Peter Lombards Trinitarian theology was primarily motivated by his
desire to lift the one divine essence above the triadic analogies suggested
by reason and thus to preserve its transcendence not only from transgressions like Abelards but from the confident philosophizing of Gilbert,
Thierry, or William of Conches.164 His Sentences teach that the Trinity
as Trinity (and not only as unity) is unknowable; their proper names are
exclusively bound to the intradivine relationships, which are ipso facto
beyond reasons inspection. Names given in the Augustinian or Hilarian
triads only become meaningful as provisional appropriations to one or
another divine person, but, it bears repeating, such illustrations do not
alter the fact that all divine activities are joint operations of the mysterious unity. With respect to Abelards (or, for that matter, Thierrys
or Alans) preoccupation with Platonic forerunners of Trinitarian distinctions, the Lombard will have none of it: natural reason can know only
the one essence, and not the three persons.
Therefore, when Peter addresses Augustines triad in Distinction 31,
he passes over in silence not only the Abelardian triad so frequently discussed by contemporaries, but also any trace of Thierrys arithmetical
reading of Augustines terms.165 For the Lombard, aequalitas is a useful
paraphrase of the Sons relation to the Father, but by the same token it
only reinforces the primacy of their unitary essence.166 Indeed, the term
does not even possess a positive meaning but is only an instrument for
164
My account here draws on Colishs survey in Peter Lombard (n. 24 above), 245
63.
165
Peter Lombard, Sententiae in IV Libris Distinctae, lib. 1, dist. 31, ed. Ignatius C. Brady (Grottaferrata, 1971), 22332. Es zeigt sich keinerlei Berhrung mit
der Erklrung der Schule von Chartres. In der Hilflosigkeit, mit der der Lombarde
der Augustinussentenz gegenbersteht, macht sich der Mangel einer Vorlage deutlich
bemerkbar. . . . Am unsichersten fhlt sich der Lombarde in der Appropriation der
Gleichheit an den Sohn (Ott, Untersuchungen, 57172).
166
Peter Lombard, Sententiae, dist. 31, cap. 1.1, ed. Brady, 22324.
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142
traditio
negating any diversity between Son and Father and indicating their indisparitas.167 Then Peter deliberately conflates Augustines triad with that
of Hilary of Poitiers. What does Augustine mean when he appropriates
unitas to the Father but aequalitas to the Son? The Lombard answers:
nothing more than what Hilary meant when he assigned aeternitas to the
Father and imago to the Son.168 The entire question concerning the role
of mathematical vocabulary in grasping the Trinity is thereby effaced.
Simon of Tournai penned a commentary on Peter Lombards Sentences
between 1160 and 1170, in which he borrows from Alans Summa and
from Gilbert himself.169 Like the Lombard, Simon airs no references to
Hermetic or Platonic philosophers but rather treats the triad as one possible analogy of the Trinity among others. He follows Alans progress
through Abelard, Augustine, and Hilary, adopting Alans reasoning but
explaining the matter in his own terms. Just as unity is free of alterity,
so the Fathers distinction is to precede every alterity. Indeed, Simon continues, the Son could well be called Alteritas, but equality is a more
fitting name without connotations of minority.170 Simon also submits
an inventive new approach to the third term.171 Some time in the decade after 1165, Peter of Poitiers, another student from Gilberts circle,
composed his own modest Sentences.172 On the mathematical triad, Peter
follows the Lombard as well as Gandulph of Bologna in lumping Augustines and Hilarys triads together.173 He notifies the reader that there is
167
Ibid., dist. 31, cap. 1.2, 1.4, ed. Brady, 22425.

Ibid., dist. 31, cap. 3, ed. Brady, 229.
169
Hdl, Von der Wirklichkeit (n. 34 above), 1924; cf. Nicholas M. Hring,
Simon of Tournai and Gilbert of Poitiers, Mediaeval Studies 27 (1965): 32530.
170
Simon of Tournai, Glossa Sententiarum, dist. 8, cap. 5, ed. Hdl, Von der
Wirklichkeit, 1519, at 18 (o).
171
The point of appropriation theory, he reasons, is to maintain that the sharp distinction of unity and equality and is ultimately arbitrary and reversible, since both
are common attributes of the one divine essence. But this very nominal opposition
introduces potential discord that must be overcome: hence concordia is the true, unique
name of the third person (et nomine et re appropriata), unlike unitas and aequalitas,
which are merely appropriated in relative terms (non res nominis appropriata). Spiritui
sancto vero et nomine et re appropriata dicitur unitatis aequalitatisque concordia. . .
. Cum enim nomen unitatis Patri approprietur contra Filium, aequalitatis nomen Filio
contra Patrem, sic appropriationum causa in eis sunt unitas et aequalitas discorditer.
Sed cum Spiritus sanctus et unum dicatur cum eis et aequalis eis nec dictio unitas et
aequalitas contra aliquem eorum (ibid., ed. Hdl, Von der Wirklichkeit, 19 [o]).
172
Peter of Poitierss account of appropriation theory, more systematic than original, was particularly influential in later scholastic tradition. See Ott, Untersuchungen, 59394.
173
Gandulph of Bologna, Sententiarum libri quatuor 1.47, ed. Johannes von Walter
(Vienna, 1924), 35; cf. Peter of Poitiers, Sententiae 1.21, ed. Moore and Dulong (n. 35
above), 179:8299. On Gandulph, see Ott, Untersuchungen, 57273.
168
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143
a twofold distinction of persons: one by appropriation of name and thing,

another by appropriation of name, but not thing.174 On Abelards triad,
he cites Alans Regulae,175 but for Augustines triad Peter copies Simons
Sententiae.176
A last example is Richard of St. Victor, the younger contemporary of
Achard. Richard also maintains the weak reading of the mathematical
Trinity in his letter De tribus personis appropriatis in Trinitate from the
early 1160s.177 The letter is addressed to a friend who requested Richards guidance regarding the triads of Abelard and Augustine. As Ribaillier notes, Richard follows Robert of Meluns rehabilitation of Abelard
following the cloture of the affair at the Council of Sens (1148).178 Richard rethought the matter for himself, but concluded along with Robert
that any rehabilitation of Abelard would require an acknowledgment
of appropriation theory as the correct rubric for understanding all such
triads, even Augustines. The letter demonstrates that Augustines triad
remained a topic of habitual concern in learned circles, and that the
weak reading was not confined to Porretanist students of logic.
Richard appears to be aware of Achards De unitate, since he enlists
some of its reasoning toward his own ends. God is the unity without
plurality, but where there is no plurality whatsoever, there can be no
true unity, no likeness or equality. Achard begins with this premise on
his way to demonstrating that plurality in God can only rationally be
thought as Trinity. But Richard sees it as the reason why unity ought to
be specially attributed to the Father, and equality to the Son.179 Just
as Achard designates the Spirit as aequalitas, Richard poses the question
of why, indeed, Augustine could not have penned the triad unity, equality, and equality. His answer is that in order to preserve the property,
concordia in the sense of identity would be more prudent.180 Equality
174
Peter of Poitiers, Sententiae 1.22, ed. Moore and Dulong, 183:57.

Ibid., ed. Moore and Dulong, 184:2343.
176
As Peter explains (ibid., ed. Moore and Dulong, 189:14972), Simon provided
three reasons for the Spirit being named concordia. His point is that the second reason yields an appropriation by name alone, but the first and third yield an appropriation by name and thing: Ecce alia iterum personarum distinctio appropriatione
nominum non rerum partim, ut cum de Patre dicitur unitas, de Filio equalitas, partim appropriatione nominis et rei, ut cum de Spiritu dicitur concordia primo et tertio
modo (ibid., ed. Moore and Dulong, 190:17376).
177
Richard of St. Victor, De tribus personis appropriatis in Trinitate, in Ribaillier,
Richard (n. 115 above), 16987. For commentary see Ott, Untersuchungen, 57380.
178
Ribaillier, Richard, 173. Lexpos de Richard se situe un moment o se
produit dans lEcole une raction en faveur dAblard (ibid., 179).
179
Richard, De tribus personis, fol. 153c153d, ed. Ribaillier, Richard, 18283.
180
Ibid., fol. 154a, ed. Ribaillier, Richard, 183.
175
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traditio
is the copresence (consistentium) of plurality, writes Richard, but concord

is the copresence of trinity; hence if the Father is the origin of unity,
the Son is the inception of plurality and the Spirit the completion of the
Trinity.181 For Richard, the triads of Abelard and Augustine each gain
their validity only once they are interpreted as appropriations.
History, at least in the short term, was not kind to Thierrys arithmetical model of the Trinity. It was embraced early on by anonymous
or little-known students, then taken up belatedly by Alan only after the
Summa influenced his peers in the opposite direction. Achards impressive
book, its one great champion, had entirely disappeared from the scene by
1200 and was only rediscovered a few decades ago; and in a final turn of
the screw, Achards confrre Richard, a neutral observer detached from
the network of Porretani, turned Achards ideas against Thierry. Richards language in his letter would go on to influence thirteenth-century
Sentence commentaries.182 But by this time, the question was no longer
whether Augustines triad should be interpreted in accordance with the
theory of appropriated names, but simply by what particular reasoning one best justified that restriction.183 Nevertheless, as a testament to
what Thierrys alternative might have afforded the thirteenth century,
Achards De unitate provides contemporary readers an important platform for scrutinizing the particularities of the Cusan repetition anew.
University of Southern California
181
Sicut equalitas nulla est sine consistentium pluralitate, sic nec quid tertium
ponitur concordia duorum sine consistentium Trinitate. In Patre origo unitatis, in
Filio inchoatio pluralitatis, in Spiritu sancto completio Trinitatis (ibid., fol. 154a,
ed. Ribaillier, Richard, 18384).
182
Ribaillier, Richard, 179.
183
Albert and Thomas explore the triad in some detail; see, respectively, Commentarii, dist. 31, art. 911, 11114; Commentum, dist. 31, q. 3, art. 12, 25253.
Bonaventure mentions it only in passing with the comment that while the appropriation of Hilary explicates the origin of the Trinity, the appropriation of Augustine explicates its order. See Commentaria in quatuor libros Sententiarum, dist. 31,
para. 2, art. 2, q. 3 in Opera omnia, vol. I/2 (Quaracchi, 1883), 54859. Duns Scotus
does not discuss the triad per se but rather the question of whether identity, similitude, and equality are real relations in God. See Quaestiones in primum librum
Sententiarum, dist. 31, q. 1, in Opera omnia, vol. 10 (Paris, 1893), 48999.
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Achard of St. Victor (D. 1171) and The Eclipse of The Arithmetic Model of The Trinity

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ACHARD OF ST. VICTOR (D. 1171) AND THE ECLIPSE

In the first book of De doctrina christiana, Augustine of Hippo famously

These few lines comprise the lengthiest discussion of the Trinity in De

Eadem tribus aeternitas, eadem incommutabilitas, eadem maiestas, eadem

ogy, calling it an example of the painful failure of language in the face of

Augustine, De doctrina christiana, 1.1314 (VI.6), ed. Green, 1619.

achard of st. victor

defenders, Thierry of Chartres and Nicholas of Cusa, relished the deeper

nection of number make a compelling analogy for the threefold unity of

achard of st. victor

I mention Cusanus only because Thierrys triad is so often approached

The missing context that would dispel such misapprehensions cannot

achard of st. victor

Porretan or Lombardian alternative, that is, the scholastic unreading

Alberic of Rheims failed to secure Abelards condemnation. (Abelard

achard of st. victor

Hughs appropriated triad as if it were a proper one.35 All six of the

achard of st. victor

achard of st. victor

achard of st. victor

approach theology through the language of the quadrivium. These two

achard of st. victor

Clarembalds own theological interests seem to echo the two student

Of the nine paragraphs on the arithmetic Trinity in Clarembalds Tractatus, six

achard of st. victor

our understanding of the reception of Thierrys arithmetic Trinity in the

P. Glorieux, La Somme Quoniam Homines dAlain de Lille, Archives

achard of st. victor

Summas first book is devoted to Trinitarian theology, and there Alan

achard of st. victor

achard of st. victor

Mechthild Dreyer (More mathematicorum: Rezeption und Transformation der

achard of st. victor

achard of st. victor

Victorine in their imaginative, complex scriptural meditations, his major

achard of st. victor

contains a rich Christological section before the briefer exhortations on

On this passage see Chatllon, Thologie, 21821.

Christ expresses divine form by taking on the dimensions of a square,

achard of st. victor

achard of st. victor

First of all, the organization of De unitate as a whole reinforces the

Achard, De unitate 1.24, ed. Martineau, LUnit, 96.

that divine unity is necessarily also a perfect plurality. The reasoning

Twelfth-Century Western Philosophy, ed. Peter Dronke (Cambridge, 1988), 25578,

achard of st. victor

Boethius, Institutio arithmetica 1.32.12, ed. Guillaumin (n. 9 above), 6667.

achard of st. victor

a student of his around 115565, the Quaestiones in epistolas Pauli.155

PL 175:431634. On the question of attribution, compare Ott, Untersuchungen

In patre unitas, in filio aequalitas, in spiritu sancto unitatis aequalitatisque

achard of st. victor

The Success of the Weak Reading

Ibid., dist. 31, cap. 1.2, 1.4, ed. Brady, 22425.

achard of st. victor

a twofold distinction of persons: one by appropriation of name and thing,

Peter of Poitiers, Sententiae 1.22, ed. Moore and Dulong, 183:57.

is the copresence (consistentium) of plurality, writes Richard, but concord

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