“Lovers of wisdom”. Etymology in the service of philosophy and christianity in Peter Abelard’s writings

My contribution investigates how Peter Abelard considers and uses etymology in his writings. I start with some general considerations about the notion of etymology in the early Middle Ages, while the following two parts concern Peter Abelard’s reflections on, and use of, etymologies in his logical and theological works respectively. Peter Abelard, while clearly recognising, as his logical texts show, the limits of etymological argumentation, nevertheless uses etymology at the very heart of his theology. In particular, he uses etymology as the key argument to explain the convergence of ancient philosophy and Christian revelation. Abelard’s extensive use of etymology in his theological writings is not a sign of an incoherence compared to his declarations about the limits of this kind of argumentation. On the contrary, it seems to be the consequence of an incontrovertible fact: the fact that in the domain of theology there is no place for definitions and for strong kinds of argumentation. In theology, as Abelard often asserts, words are used in an improper, transferred sense. Consequently, more than in any other domain, they need to be interpreted—even if interpretation, and etymology as a kind of interpretation, will never fully explain the signified thing.