Abstract
The notion of being is the most fundamental notion in medieval metaphysics, but in some ways also in medieval theology, logic and epistemology. Given its centrality, it would be impossible to provide here even a sketchy historical survey of the variety of ways in which medieval authors handled this notion. Therefore, this article will rather survey those paradigmatic characteristics of the medieval notion that make it most difficult for contemporary philosophers to approach it.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Aquinas, T. (1980). Opera Omnia. Bad-Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog.
Duns Scotus, J. (1950). Opera Omnia. Civitas Vaticana: Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis.
Henry of Ghent. (1520). Summae quaestionum ordinariarum. Vaenundatur in aedibus Iodoci Badii Ascensii, Parisiis. (Repr. (1953). The Franciscan Institute, St. Bonaventure; E. Nauwelaerts, Louvain; F. Schöningh, Paderborn).
Ockham, W. (1974). Summa Logicae. In P. H. Boehner et al. (Eds.), Opera Philosophica (Vol. I). St. Bonaventure: The Franciscan Institute.
Suarez, F. (1947). On the various kinds of distinctions (Disputationes metaphysicae, Disputatio VII, de variis distinctionum generibus), trans. intro. Vollert C. Marquette University Press, Milwaukee.
Secondary Sources
Adams, M. M. (1989) William Ockham (2 Vols, pp. 283–285). Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. 2nd rev. edn., 1987.
Dumont, S. (1998). Henry of Ghent and Duns Scotus. In J. Marenbon (Ed.), Medieval philosophy (pp. 291–328). London: Routledge.
Ebbesen, S. (1998). The Paris arts faculty: Siger of Brabant, Boethius of Dacia, Radulphus Brito. In J. Marenbon (Ed.), Medieval philosophy. The Routledge history of philosophy (Vol. III, pp. 269–290). London/New York: Routledge.
Goodman, N., & Quine, W. V. O. (1947). Steps toward a constructive nominalism. Journal of Symbolic Logic, 12, 105–122.
Henninger, M. (2006). Henry of Harclay on the univocal concept of being. Mediaeval Studies, 68, 205–237.
Hochschild, J. (2007). Cajetan on Scotus on univocity. Proceedings of the Society for Medieval Logic and Metaphysics, 7, 32–42. http://faculty.fordham.edu/klima/SMLM/PSMLM7/PSMLM7.pdf.
Jacobi, K. (1986). Peter Abelard’s investigations into the meaning and function of the speech sign “Est”. In S. Knuutila & J. Hintikka (Eds.), The logic of being (pp. 145–180). Dordrecht: Reidel.
King, P. (2008). Peter Abelard. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition). In E. N. Zalta (Ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/abelard/.
Klima, G. (1993). The changing role of Entia Rationis in medieval philosophy: A comparative study with a reconstruction. Synthese, 96, 25–59.
Klima, G. (1996). The semantic principles underlying Saint Thomas Aquinas’s metaphysics of being. Medieval Philosophy and Theology, 5, 87–141.
Klima, G. (1999). Ockham’s semantics and ontology of the categories. In P. V. Spade (Ed.), The Cambridge companion to Ockham (pp. 118–142). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Klima, G. (2001). Existence and reference in medieval logic. In A. Hieke & E. Morscher (Eds.), New essays in free logic (pp. 197–226). Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Klima, G. (2002a). Contemporary “Essentialism” vs. “Aristotelian Essentialism”. In J. Haldane (Ed.), Mind, metaphysics, and value in the Thomistic and analytic traditions (pp. 175–194). South Bend: University of Notre Dame Press.
Klima, G. (2002b). Aquinas’ theory of the copula and the analogy of being. Logical Analysis and History of Philosophy, 5, 159–176.
Klima, G. (2002c). Thomas Sutton and Henry of Ghent on the analogy of being. Proceedings of the Society for Medieval Logic and Metaphysics, 2, 34–44. http://www.fordham.edu/gsas/phil/klima/SMLM/PSMLM2/PSMLM2.pdf.
Klima, G. (2004). On Kenny on Aquinas on being: A critical review of Aquinas on being by Anthony Kenny. International Philosophical Quarterly, 44, 567–580.
Klima, G. (2006). Syncategoremata. In K. Brown (Ed.), Elsevier’s encyclopedia of language and linguistics (Vol. 12, 2nd ed., pp. 353–356). Oxford: Elsevier.
Klima, G. (2009). John Buridan, great medieval thinkers series. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lambertini, R. (2008). Giles of Rome. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition). In E. N. Zalta (Ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/giles/.
Marmo, C. (1999) The semantics of the Modistae. In S. Ebbesen, & R. L. Friedman (Eds.) Medieval analyses in language and cognition, Acts of the Symposium, “The Copenhagen School of Medieval Philosophy”, January 10–13, 1996. Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters. Reitzels, Copenhagen, pp. 83–104.
Moore, W. L. (1989). Via Moderna. In J. R. Strayer (Ed.), Dictionary of middle ages (Vol. 12, pp. 406–409). New York: Scribner.
Nuchelmans, G. (1973). Theories of the proposition: Ancient and medieval conceptions of the bearers of truth and falsity. Amsterdam: North Holland.
Nuchelmans, G. (1980). Late scholastic and humanist theories of the proposition. Amsterdam: North Holland.
Oberman, H. A. (1977). Werden und Wertung der Reformation: Vom Wegestreit zum Glaubenskampf. Tuebingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebect).
Porro, P. (2008). Henry of Ghent. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition). In: E. N. Zalta (Ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/henry-ghent/.
Read, S. (2008). Medieval theories: Properties of terms. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition). In E. N. Zalta (Ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/medieval-terms/.
Zupko, J. (2008). Thomas of Erfurt. The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition). In E. N. Zalta (Ed.). http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/erfurt/.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature B.V.
About this entry
Cite this entry
Klima, G. (2020). Being. In: Lagerlund, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Medieval Philosophy. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1665-7_80
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1665-7_80
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-024-1663-3
Online ISBN: 978-94-024-1665-7
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Humanities