Guido Terreni on The Errors of Marsilius

Abstract

This article examines the reaction of the Carmelite theologian Guido Terreni to the teachings of Marsilius of Padua. It centers on a  work by Guido that has not been closely examined before, a response to Marsilius of Padua composed at the request of Pope John  XXII that is now known as the “Confutatio errorum quorundam magistrorum”. Guido’s polemical technique in the “Confutatio  errorum” is very similar to that used by Sibert of Beek in a similar response to Marsilius. Both chose the historical and contextual  arguments commonly identified by modern commentators as novel in the “Defensor pacis”. Their ready use of these methods to  respond to a work they had not seen????they were replying to a brief summary of Marsilius’s errors collated by a curial committee????indicates that these techniques were rooted in earlier disputes and were thus an established polemical option by the  time the responses were composed. Further, comparison of Guido’s approach in the “Confutatio errorum” with his treatment of  Marsilius in his later “Concordia evangelica” suggests that the “Confutatio” was key to the formation of the themes that would dominate his influential later works.