Of course, it can be said that we meet with an approving opinion of Erigen and his system on the part of another Catholic scholar of the same time, to whom the above-mentioned works of Staudenmaier belong, namely, Schlyter, who taught philosophy in Münster, no less orthodox Catholic than Staudenmaier, if not so authoritative. Highly appreciating the philosophy of Erigena, Schlyter found it necessary to republish the philosopher's main work, On the Division of Nature (1838), since its first edition had already become rare, and he prefaced the book with a special preface. He knows what unfavorable judgments have sometimes been expressed about the teaching of Erigena. But in his opinion it may be asserted that, in view of his views as a whole, he did not deviate from the truth in any way; the contrary would not have been in accord with the special holiness of his life[19]. Unfavorable sentences on the teaching of Erigena, pronounced by the ecclesiastical authorities in former times, Schliter does not recognize as having sufficient certainty and binding. As for the judgments of private individuals, and especially of modern times, almost all who reproached or praised Erigena were not even able to comprehend the depth and force of his speculation, and therefore judged him unjustly; only a few who correctly understand his sublime mind are an exception. From the praise of those who proclaim him to be the predecessor of Spinoza and extol his pantheism and disagreement with the teaching of the Church, he himself would have refused, and quite rightly. After quoting sympathetic comments on Erigen and his doctrine by some authors (Iort, Staudenmaier, especially Creutzgage, and some others),[21] and expressing surprise at why Hegel, whose dialectical monism resembles that of Erigena, paid so little attention to Erigena, Schliter declares his disagreement in general with writers who arouse an "old prejudice" (inveteratum praejudicium) against Erigena and treat his views with condemnation, whether out of unwillingness to depart from traditional opinion, or because of a general disinclination to all kinds of speculative experiments, or, finally, out of fear of pantheism, in particular, he dwells his attention on the judgment of Görres, and in his own words Erigena tries to refute the accusations made by this author against Erigena of rationalism, of pantheism, in the absence of a correct dogmatic conception of the trinity of Persons in the Godhead. also an accusation of a misunderstanding of the nature of moral evil[22]. After all, Schlyter himself thinks that the pantheistic systems of modern thinkers would not have had the same success as they do if the system of Erigena had been better known. "Compare," he says to the reader, "the system proposed by Erigena 'on the division of nature' with the ethics of Spinoza and other pantheistic systems of modern thinkers, and you will notice how we at least believe that so many glorious minds could have been deceived by the mere sight of some true and genuine divine wisdom; this, of course, would not have happened if the system of Erigena and (also some) others, distinguished by much greater depth, content and power of thought, at the same time more in agreement with Christian teaching, had not remained unknown, through the envy (so to speak) of the times, to so many of his contemporaries (these thinkers). For otherwise Erigena would undoubtedly have conquered and eclipsed them with the brilliance of his genius." Offering to all those who aspire to the divine and eternal and who love true wisdom the work of Erigena, which he reprinted from the first edition, Schlieter in the preface and recommends it to readers in the most enthusiastic terms. "May this monument left over from Erigena serve you as a source of deep and peaceful delight, edification, and strong affirmation in holy faith and piety. Come and see how good the Lord is!" [23]. — Such a favorable attitude towards Erigen by such a faithful Catholic as Schlyter, and the very publication of his work "On the Division of Nature," in reality, however, was founded, according to the later admission of Schlyter himself, ignorance of the fact that this work, previously recognized as heretical in the Catholic Church, has been included in modern times, since 1685, in the index of forbidden books.

At the same time, other Catholic scholars reacted quite differently to the philosopher who was unorthodox from the ecclesiastical point of view: Hock, in a journal article on Erigen, written "with special attention to the expositions of Iort and Staudenmaier" (1835)[25], Nick. Möller, in his work "I. Sk. Erigen and His Errors" (1844, also Kuhn in a review of this work) and the Bonn anonymous, in "Discourse on John Scotus Erigen" (1845). With the task of proving the justice of the ecclesiastical court over the views of Erigena, in contrast to the writers who praise him, they accuse him of a completely unchristian way of thinking, namely, mainly of pantheism.

Möller's work is of a harsh condemnatory character, written by him, as he himself says in the preface, with the express purpose of counteracting as far as possible the favorable judgments of Erigen by persons who are universally respected for their intelligence, knowledge, and Catholic way of thinking (katholische Gesinnung), whose opinion can therefore easily be disseminated to the detriment of respect for the authority of the Church and its wisdom. These persons are Staudenmayer and Schlyter, of whom the latter in particular did a disservice to the Church of Rome by publishing a book rejected and condemned to destruction. Möller directly points out what makes him dislike Erigena. It is "the circumstance that the book of Erigena was condemned by the Church, both in France and even in Rome. If Erigena had been a great Catholic teacher, as has recently been asserted, it would follow that the Church either did not understand the profound scholar, or was immersed in the so-called darkness of the ninth century, and consigned to the flames the work of one of its greatest minds, which would not have accorded well with the infallibility promised to it. Rome, according to Möller, cannot be mistaken; "It is known that no remarkable work is condemned in Rome before it has been carefully studied for a long time by the most learned theologians"; "That any pope should persecute and burn an innocent book simply because it has been misunderstood by limited minds, the whole history of the Church does not provide even a single example of this"[27]. Whoever among the Catholics is stricken with incurable blindness when he continues, in spite of all arguments, to recognize the teaching of Erigena as agreeable with the teaching of the Church, "as a Catholic, he should, at least, open his eyes to the condemnation that has befallen the work of Erigena on the part of the highest ecclesiastical authority"[28]. Among the Catholics, however, on the question of Erigen, there should be no question of the need to justify the judgment of the Church about it. The result of scientific research, therefore, is already predetermined in advance by the bulls that came from the height of the "apostolic see"[30]. At the beginning of his book, after quoting the opinions of some modern scholars on Erigena's system, and pointing out its alleged origin in the pagan philosophy of Neoplatonism, Möller further examines from the Catholic point of view Erigena's doctrine of predestination, his "heresy" concerning the Eucharist, and in particular dwells on his rationalism and pantheism, and finds in him a multitude of errors on various particular questions. Not wishing, however, to boast that he has already exhausted all the anti-Catholic assertions of the philosopher contained in his main work, in conclusion he speaks of the pernicious fruits of his teaching[35]. The Catholic scholar admits of no excuse for the author of a "sophistic and anti-Catholic book" condemned by Rome. Möller, according to him, does not want to belittle the speculative genius of Erigena: without a doubt, he belonged to the most gifted and intelligent (geistreichsten und scharfsinnigsten) writers of his time; but exalting him with his spiritual gifts was, according to Möller, the very basis of all his deviations from the truth, "for faith requires a humble spirit"[36]. He had before him the writings of the Fathers, and in them all the speculative side of the Catholic faith, "though not in the form which it later received in the hands of the so-called scholastic philosophers"; but instead of drawing from them and systematizing the ideas contained in them, he delved [?] into the systems of Plotinus, Proclus, assimilated their errors, and expressed them in a book on nature; References to Sts. He deliberately uses the Fathers, quotations from the Scriptures, Christian terminology and theological reasoning only to cover up his non-Christian teaching, in order to pave the way for it among Christian readers, although sometimes he expresses his views quite openly[37]. Erigena knew very well the opposition of his teaching to church dogma, but he did not want to renounce his opinions, even in spite of their solemn condemnation at several councils (on the question of predestination)[38].

Similar in tendency to Möller's work is the Discourse on Erigen, His Life and Teachings, which appeared in Bonn by an anonymous author (1845). The purpose of this work is also to show that the work of the philosopher, which was published again and praised by the Catholic Schliter, was justly condemned to destruction by the "Roman high priest." "In our time," says the author, "the number of persons who praise Erigena has increased enormously, not without the participation of those who possess the faculty of understanding, whereas in the memory of our fathers it was very insignificant." But, according to him, "there were so many who reproached him that a day would not have been enough to enumerate them." For him, it is important that Erigena was opposed by persons "sitting at the helm of the church government[39]. The author does not show the Catholic tendency in such a naïve, so to speak, form as Möller, who does not want to know anything more than Thomas Aquinas and the papal bulls, his exposition is furnished with more erudition, but his judgments about Erigen are even harsher in form of expression than those of Möller. He does not want to deny the profound and outstanding scholarship for the time of Erigena's life, even in the theological respect,[40] but with all the more harshness, one might say intolerance, he attacks the philosopher, looking for expressions in the spirit of the bull of Honorius III to characterize his teaching[41]. In expounding this doctrine in Erigena's own words, in order to show with his own eyes that the "horrendum pantheismi monstrum" is concealed in it, he directs his analysis precisely against Schlyter's praise of it. According to his emphatic statement, "in the books on the division of nature absolutely nothing (nihil omnino) can be found that could serve to justify them from the accusation of emanative pantheism[44]. In passages which seem to have a theistic meaning, the philosopher only applies himself to the ordinary mode of expression, and they seem to be quite capable of being explained from his pantheistic point of view. "Very many passages of the Holy Scriptures. In the author's words, he distorted, curtailed, and disfigured in such a pitiful way that we think that hardly anyone can endure one form of all this. The general conclusion about the philosopher's work, in complete contrast to Schlyter, is that "if we have in mind its content, its teaching, and its peculiarities as a whole, it does not agree in any way with either sound reason or Christian teaching, and therefore is quite justly condemned by Pope Honorius III as scatens vermibus haereticae pravitatis. For everywhere, both opportunely and inopportunely, it most clearly preaches emanative pantheism and, moreover, distorts many and most important sections of Christian doctrine in relation to pantheistic propositions, so that it is very dangerous from a practical point of view.

This, so to speak, is the first moment when the disagreement among Catholic scientists on the question of Erigena's views is revealed. It is clear to which side the general opinion should have leaned. Floss, a Catholic, who published his works in Volume 122 of Migne's Patrology (1852-1853), declaring in the preface to the edition his personal interest in Erigena as a writer, does not, however, wish to share the "folly", as he put it, of some Catholic scholars who extol and preach his theories, while everyone knows that his main work was once doomed by Pope Honorius III to be burned, And later it was included in the index. And since, as he says, John Scotus, with all his merits, "is in any case a writer of such a kind that it is hardly desirable to place his works in the full course of ecclesiastical writers," he uses all possible measures to make his enterprise plausible from the Catholic point of view, or at least to make it excusable: he prefaces his edition with the above-mentioned work of an anonymous person (but also with Schlyter's preface). in the pre-notices (monita) to the main works of Erigena he places documents expressing the judgment of the Western Church about his views, accompanies the text itself in places with appropriate notes, declaring all this in advance in the preface[48]. Be that as it may, the fact remains that the first complete and more or less correct edition of Erigena's works has been given in the present century by Catholic scholars, and moreover in the course of patrology, in spite of the extremely harsh judgments expressed shortly before about the heresy of Erigena, and in spite of the reminder that enterprises of this kind, such as the publication of heretical works, are strictly forbidden by the Church.

Thanks in part to Floss's edition, which opened up the possibility of a closer and more thorough acquaintance with Erigena's views and with the nature of his scientific activity in general, in the sixties attention was again drawn to Erigena in the Catholic scientific world, and the disagreement in opinions about him was again revealed. a free-thinking spirit whose spirit was not satisfied with the new scholastic philosophy of Catholicism, and who later became one of the prominent figures during the Old Catholic movement (T, 1879)[50]. The fruit of this study was his monograph "I. Sk. Erigen" (1861). His "Philosophy of the Church Fathers" (1859), which had appeared somewhat earlier, was in fact only the result of studies that were supposed to serve as an introduction to the study of the Erigena system. In 1857 and 1860 the author gave lectures on Erigen himself and studied his views, according to his own testimony, to such an extent that, being well acquainted with the existing literature on Erigen, he does not consider it necessary, however, to make references to other authors or to enter into disputes with them, since he hopes to sufficiently substantiate his understanding of his teaching by quoting passages from his own works. Wishing to stand in his exposition of Erigena's system solely on the "scientific" historical point of view, which excludes apologetic or polemical aims, declaring that Erigena's system is not yet his (Huber's) own system, and often accompanying its exposition with critical remarks, Huber nevertheless understands it in such a way that he finds it quite possible to assimilate its basic ideas without fear of being accused of pantheism or semi-pantheism. He did not hesitate to express his sympathy for Erigena directly, preparing himself to console himself with the memory of the fate of Erigena himself, "of all the philosophers of the Christian West, who was the first of all the philosophers of the Christian West to be condemned by the Church." Recognizing himself as belonging to the trend in philosophy that explains the world as a moment of Divine life, and understands the Deity itself as an absolute person, Guber considers Erigena to be the predecessor of this point of view, which he himself adopts. The well-known propositions of Erigena are pantheistic in nature; but in this case, according to Huber, we are dealing with a very peculiar form of pantheism, since the Deity, which contains the world and transcends it, is here recognized as a self-conscious subject. In fact, such a view, according to which there is only a single being, and precisely the divine, but it exists in the form of a spirit, should not be called pantheism; it is the true knowledge of the Absolute, philosophical theism, by which pantheism in the more precise sense of the word (pancosmism, the doctrine of the immanence of the Deity to the world) is included as a moment. As for the particulars of Erigena's system, one can find in it, according to Huber, many ambiguities and contradictions, for "no matter how much he rises above other thinkers of his age, he nevertheless pays in many respects a tribute to the level of spiritual development of that time. Contradictions arise in him, perhaps, partly because he often comes to philosophical conclusions that do not agree with theological teachings, and as soon as he notices such disharmony, he softens his philosophical assertions. Part of the reason for this may have been that he, overwhelmed by the greatness of his philosophical thoughts, could not define and clarify them for himself with precision, in order to be able to see at once their agreement or disagreement with each other and with other assertions. This defect, however, is common in Erigena with any philosopher who, like him, thinks more intuitively than discursively, an example of which can be seen in Plato. The basic tone of the Erigena system, according to Huber, is Neoplatonic, although Erigena does not adhere directly to Neoplatonism, but assimilated Neoplatonic ideas through the Greek Church Fathers. However, if he accepted along with these ideas "some echoes of the emanatistic construction of the universe," he was concerned, like Dionysius and Maximus, to preserve the absolute significance of Christian dogma, to weaken Neoplatonism through its closest penetration by Christianity, "an attempt which, of course, he did not fully succeed." For most of his ideas, predecessors can be indicated; but his own business is the unification of the data he found in his predecessors, although this is not always an internal reconciliation of them, but sometimes simply an external comparison, the contradiction of which Erigena himself sees.

"Of course," the author adds, "one can still complain that the freedom and spirit of his thinking did not take root in the scientific aspirations of the Middle Ages." Huber's monograph, no matter how one looks at his personal views, is still the best work on Erigen in Western literature.

A different attitude towards Erigene almost at the same time is again encountered on the part of other representatives of Catholic science, namely on the part of the historians of scholastic philosophy Kaulich and Stöckl. The first, even before the publication of his (unfinished) History of Scholastic Philosophy (1863), dedicated to Erigene a special treatise "The Speculative System of I. Sk. Erigen" (1860), which was included in almost the whole form in the "History", does not want to be unfair to the philosopher, despite his Catholic point of view, and expresses his judgment of him not in a particularly harsh form, accompanied by characteristic reservations, but the judgment is essentially unfavorable. The formal principles of the Erigena system, its relation to the authority of the Holy Scriptures. The Scriptures and the Church Fathers incline the author in his favor; one can agree, according to him, with the judgment of Gael, the first publisher of the work "On the Division of Nature", that Erigena did not want to be a heretic at all; but from the material point of view it is impossible to completely acquit him from the accusation of heresy[62]. In general, his teaching is a reproduction of the basic ideas of Neoplatonism with some borrowings from Aristotle; To this basis are added the individual teachings of the Church and the Holy Fathers. Since Neoplatonism forms the basis of the entire system of the philosopher, eclectic in character, although not without internal consistency, Erigena also has all the shortcomings inherent in Neoplatonic thinkers, although he also has some advantages over them, since Christianity is for him a living source of his profound views and knowledge. In particular, for example, in his system there is no place at all for the doctrine of free will and in general for the basic concepts of morality and imputation; but he is constantly led to recognize them when he turns to religion. Kaulich, however, does not refuse to recognize the "greatest importance" of Erigena as the forerunner of medieval mysticism and the founder of scholasticism, noting that he possesses a depth of understanding that is often overlooked in later scholastics.

Much more sharply, in the tone of Möller and the Bonn anonymous, Stöckl pronounces his verdict on Erigen and his views in his History of the Philosophy of the Middle Ages (1864). In contrast to Kaulich's opinion on the historical position and significance of Erigena, Stöckl does not even consider it possible, because of the non-Christian character of his system, to introduce it into the general history of "Christian Science of the Middle Ages," and therefore finds it necessary to consider it separately. The hostile attitude of an orthodox Catholic towards a philosopher recognized by the Catholic Church as unorthodox is reflected in Stöckl's work on almost every page. Even in what should be put in praise of Erigena, he sees bad sides[66]. The non-Christian character of his system for him is determined by the fact that none of the scholastics refers to him, not to mention the fact that the "Christian consciousness" directly rebelled against him (condemnation under Leo IX and Honorius III). The author clearly does not like the fact that Erigena "politely dismisses the Latin Fathers" (weist hOflich ab), usually referring to the Greeks: in the Latin Fathers he found less reprehensible Neoplatonic elements from the Christian point of view and therefore less appreciated them. The allegorical way of interpreting the Holy Scriptures. The writings of Erigena and his rationalistic attitude towards ecclesiastical authorities represent, according to Stöckl, a complete restoration of the point of view and method of the ancient Gnostics; thanks to mysticism, his system acquires the colour of a Christian-pious spirit, but this mysticism is false[69]. The Neoplatonic ideas that enslaved him always lead him to results that contradict the teaching of the Church. Erigena himself seems to be clearly aware of this; hence his attempts to soften too harsh statements. But if this is evidence in favor of the "Christian consciousness" (Sinn) of Erigena, the system itself becomes only "a strange mixture of Neoplatonic and Christian ideas, which in no way want to be reconciled with each other and everywhere reveal an internal contradiction." The whole system is therefore "strangely cohesive (zusammengekoppelt) of true and false elements." The elements explained by the "Christian consciousness" of Erigena do not, of course, need to be justified; but it is hardly possible to defend his own philosophical views without resorting to a violent interpretation of his expressions. We think, says the author in conclusion, that we have sufficiently proved that Erigena's system is "essentially not Christian." He stands entirely on the ground of Neoplatonic pantheism with the idea of emanation and the cosmic-theogonic process, although he assimilated Neoplatonic ideas through the intermediary of well-known ecclesiastical writers (Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, Dionysius). In his teaching, "all the disparate Neoplatonic elements that existed separately in the patriotic era were united (zusammengeflosst), and in this unification mutually complemented each other into an integral idealist-pantheistic theory. Such is the meaning of his system"[71].

Опять не трудно понять, какая сторона должна была получить решительный перевес. Скорее, конечно, можно встретить ссылку на оценку воззрений Эригены, авторитетного составителя «Истории философии средних веков» Штёкля, нежели на оценку Губера, хотя бы монография последнего и признавалась и была в действительности лучшим из всех доселе явившихся исследований об Эригене[72].

История вопроса о смысле системы Эригены в католической науке, с характерными для католиков колебаниями в его решении, не кончилась, однако, и после этого вторичного обнаружения разногласия католических ученых. Возможность более благосклонного отношения к Эригене оставалась открытой и на будущее время для католиков уже ввиду указанных прецедентов. Стоило, по–видимому, взглянуть на предмет с иной несколько точки зрения, чем обыкновенно, подойти к нему с другой стороны, в особенности же позабыть o папской булле и индексе, или взглянуть и на них с исторической точки зрения, чтобы установился и более благоприятный взгляд на философа с его сомнительной репутацией.

Пример этого и видим у Баха, вполне благонамеренного католика, в его «Истории догматов в средние века» (1873)[73]. В целом его отношение к Эригене и его системе должно быть признано самым благоприятным для последнего. Усматривая в его системе «глубокую, живую христианскую веру, соединенную с неоплатонической точкой зрения и облеченную в одежду латинского языка», Бах видит, правда, в этом соединении основание не только силы, но и слабости, не только величия, но вместе и сомнительности в догматическом отношении некоторых ее мыслей[74], даже прямо говорит о «противоречии некоторым важным догматам христианства»[75] (указывается, однако, лишь в одном месте, как противоречащий церковной доктрине, «чистый онтологизм» Эригены в учении о предопределении, хотя этому учению в то же время отдается решительное предпочтение перед учением Готтшалка)[76], об идеалистической и в отдельных местах гностической окраске его системы[77]; но сам он в действительности, при изложении его учения, всюду лишь берет его под свою защиту против протестантских и частью католических ученых[78]. Справедливым отношением к его учению, именно об искуплении, он считает то отношение, когда не предпринимают и оправдания его перед догмой церкви, но и не навязывают этому учению, через неправильное сопоставление глубоко верующего философа IX века с неверующими мыслителями XIX, характера пантеизма[79]. Разумеется, трудно ожидать, чтобы пример Баха нашел многих подражателей в католичестве, хотя его более чем снисходительное отношение к философу во всяком случае должно пролагать путь к более благоприятной его оценке в сравнении с предлагаемой, например, Штёклем.

Итак, католическими учеными на вопрос об основном смысле воззрений Эригены даются ответы частью прямо противоположные один другому. Наряду с заявлением, что Эригена, если иметь в виду воззрения его в целом, «ни в чем не отступил от истины» (Шлитер), встречается заявление, что напротив, если иметь в виду его учение в целом, оно «ни в чем не согласно ни с здравым разумом, ни с учением христианским» (боннский аноним); одни находят в его системе истинный «философский теизм» (Губер), «глубокую, живую христианскую веру» (Бах), по другим — его система «по существу не христианская» (Штёкль).

Для неблагоприятных отзывов об Эригене католиков можно бы, по–видимому, усматривать внешнее основание — в факте осуждения его воззрений церковной властью. Однако на самом деле несправедливо было бы видеть у них одно только пристрастное отношение к Эригене. Сами защитники Эригены должны признаться, что в самой же системе его находятся основания для обвинений против него, и лишь пытаются так или иначе оправдать его от этих обвинений. И если мы обратимся к протестантской литературе об Эригене, мы и здесь встретим факт разногласия в суждениях о нем и его воззрениях. И в то же время, что важно в данном случае, голос большинства протестантских ученых, при оценке системы Эригены, склоняется далеко не в его пользу, так что приведенное, например, выше суждение Штёкля представляет в сущности не что иное, как воспроизведение наиболее распространенного у протестантов мнения.