A Love Story, Part 1

In a letter Abelard sent to his Heloïse near the year 1141 we solemnly read:

"WRITE no more to me, Heloise, write no more to me; ’tis time to end communications which make our penances of nought avail. We retired from the world to purify ourselves, and, by a conduct directly contrary to Christian morality, we became odious to Jesus Christ. Let us no more deceive ourselves with remembrance of our past pleasures; we but make our lives troubled and spoil the sweets of solitude. Let us make good use of our austerities and no longer preserve the memories of our crimes amongst the severities of penance. Let a mortification of body and mind, a strict fasting, continual solitude, profound and holy meditations, and a sincere love of God succeed our former irregularities."

       In the 12th century, one could not utter "theology" without holding Paris in the confines of thought. Bustling with religious and educational fervor, the universities in and around the left bank and l'Isle-de-la-cité were becoming over-run with the newest fashion: students. With the likes of Notre-Dame de Paris crowning the triumph of a new school based or 'scholastic' learning, students from the far reaches of eastern Europe, to the shores of Greece came flocking in to listen in on the newest lectures and disputations of renowned faculty. Rejecting the cloistered learning of the Monks and eschewing vows of chastity or abstinence in matters of the flesh, these scholastics brought with them eagerness which would proliferate from the bars to the bedrooms, from the abbeys to classrooms. One among these excitable new schoolboys was the clever, insightful, romantic, and slightly sinful Peirre Abélard. 

        Abelard, born in 1079 of the name Pierre le Pallet, quickly changed his name to Petrus Abaelardus--for reasons the reader should see as obvious. His father was a wealthy merchant and young Peter grew up without want. Showing signs of intellectual promise at an early age, he was sent to the best schools of learning, taking fondly to the classics and his bible. In anecdotal evidence from his childhood, he was said to "entertain with his quick wit and fine poetry". Moving quickly up the intellectual hierarchy, Young Peter set his eyes on Paris and to a career in 'the fine art of dialectic'.

       Peter was accepted into the finest institution of learning Notre-Dame de Paris and studied under its rector William of Champeaux (of whom I know little). For reasons unbeknownst to a contemporary reader, Peter was staunchly opposed to the view of realism and its insistence on the existence of universals. (Though one can assume that a youngster such as peter would have been worried about the reality of 'badness' especially on choice sunday morning's before mass). All this being said, he was wildly successful in his public disputes on the matter and quickly made a name for himself among his fellow colleagues. With his new-found success, Peter opened up a school outside of Paris and started teaching his own pupils. Though noted as a modest man, in a letter sent to his mother around the time of his success, he writes, "I come to think of myself as the only undefeated philosopher in the world". His luck, however, would soon change.