Pico della Mirandola, Conclusiones (1486) SectionsThe thirteen condemnedScholarshipMethod

Theological, against the common mode · thesis 4>29 · condemned, Q7

Thesis 4>29

Latin

Rationabilius est credere Origenem esse saluum, quam credere ipsum esse damnatum.

Copy-text: Farmer 1998, line 22051

Copy-text Farmer 1998 (farmer1998:22051-22053); u/v as Farmer prints them. The inventory's text breaks off at 'ipsum' because of a line break in the OCR; the last two words are at farmer1998:22053. In the Apology Pico restates the claim as 'rationabilius sit credere, ipsum esse salvum, quam credere ipsum esse damnatum' (edelheit2008:17485-17487).

English

To believe Origen saved is more reasonable than to believe him damned.

'Rationabilius' is the comparative of 'rationabilis', 'in accord with reason': the thesis weighs two beliefs and asserts neither Origen's salvation nor his damnation as certain, which is how Pico's oral reply glossed it, as 'probable and pious' (farmer1998:22110-22112). The Apology grounds the comparison in the rule that in doubtful matters one should always side with the more favourable part (edelheit2008:17500-17503).

Translation: machine-drafted 2026-09-25 (agent WRITER-A2), checked against the sense of Farmer's English at farmer1998:22099; awaiting human check

Attribution: Pico's own opinion, the last of the theological conclusions 'rather opposed to the common mode of speaking of theologians' (farmer1998:21490-21494, 22051, 22132). · Pico's stance: endorses

Condemnation

Q7 in the order of the Apology: Salvation of Origen. Printed 7 December 1486; censured by the papal commission in February-March 1487; the work as a whole condemned by the bull of 4 August 1487.

'rash and savoring of heresy, since it is opposed to the determination of the universal church' (farmer1998:22112-22114); Blum's translation from Dorez and Thuasne 'Imprudent, to be refuted, smacks of heresy, being contrary to the declarations of the Church' (dougherty2008:2183, 2214-2215).

Doctrine

The thesis is a comparative judgement about the fate of one soul (farmer1998:22051-22053). In his oral response to the commission Pico argued that, since Origen, a third-century writer, was not known to have erred 'out of a pertinacity of will', it was probable and pious to believe him saved (farmer1998:22110-22112). Pertinacity (pertinacia) is obstinate persistence in error, which Pico treated as a kind of malice in the will (edelheit2008:17448-17450). The Apology builds on a distinction between error of the intellect and malice of the will, citing Augustine as saying 'Errare possum haereticus esse non possum' (edelheit2008:17353-17360, 17385). Heresy properly speaking, Pico argued, is an asserted dogma against the express truth of Scripture or the Church's determination, whereas Origen wrote 'neque dogmatice neque assertive, sed dubitative semper, et inquisitive' (edelheit2008:17286-17294, 17326). He conceded that Origen's opinion about the soul might be erroneous, but held that nothing about the soul had been determined by the Church in Origen's day or even in Augustine's (edelheit2008:17276-17284). Whether holding an opinion is a mortal sin is therefore relative to time: one may hold without obstinacy before a determination of the Church what one could not hold so after it (edelheit2008:17310-17317). Since no one can know another's final impenitence without a special revelation from God, it is rash to assert that anyone is damned, and the Church itself could not be certain of Origen's damnation without such a revelation (edelheit2008:17464-17467, 17491-17494, 17541-17543). The Church condemns doctrines, not souls, whose judgement belongs to the judge of the living and the dead (edelheit2008:17521-17530).

Context

Copenhaver sets Q7 apart from the other condemned theses: with Q5 it is detached from their scholastic philosophizing, its format is 'more like a polemic by Eusebius than a summa by Aquinas', and its content is philological (copenhaver2022:912-920). The Apology argues with Jerome over the book of Pamphilus in Origen's defence, imagining what Rufinus might have replied (edelheit2008:17218-17221, 17232-17237). It also argues that Origen's books had probably been corrupted (edelheit2008:17221). Pico drew on canon law, apparently from his early legal training at the University of Bologna (farmer1998:22114-22116). The Apology records a clash at the hearing: when Pico cited Greek histories, a commissioner who said he could not read Greek called for a Latin chronicle, the 'Bundle of Dates', whose reading showed that the Church did not certify Origen's damnation (copenhaver2022:568-613). Copenhaver identifies the chronicle as a Carthusian's, first printed in 1474, which praised Origen's learning (copenhaver2022:616-618, 653-654).

Reception

The commission declared the thesis 'rash and savoring of heresy, since it is opposed to the determination of the universal church' (farmer1998:22112-22114). Blum's translation of the record reads 'Imprudent, to be refuted, smacks of heresy, being contrary to the declarations of the Church' (dougherty2008:2212-2215). Pico answered in the Apology at length (farmer1998:22114-22115). He turned the commission's appeal to the Church's determination against it: if, as one opponent answered, saints who died holding condemned opinions were perhaps wrongly canonized, then it was his accusers who went against the determination of the universal Church (edelheit2008:17372-17376). Excerpted from the Apology, Pico's defence of Origen became popular in the sixteenth century, with classicists for its handling of textual attribution and with church reformers for the limits it set on ecclesiastical authority (farmer1998:22116-22118). Farmer and Copenhaver both refer readers to Crouzel's 1977 edition and translation of this part of the Apology (farmer1998:22120-22121; copenhaver2022:944).

Historiography

Copenhaver writes that if the whole Apology were like Q7, scholars would see it as foreshadowing Erasmus's patristic philology, but that Q7 and Q5 are unlike the eleven scholastic Questions (copenhaver2022:920-924). He disagrees with Edelheit's view that the Apology questions the basis of scholastic theology from a historical-critical perspective (copenhaver2022:947-953). Edelheit reads Pico's demand for a special revelation as a limit on the authority of the Church, which cannot decide the matter on its own (edelheit2008:17509-17516). Blum sees in the defence Pico's strategy of treating theology as inquiry, and calls Pico 'perhaps the first to rehabilitate Origen in the theological debate' (dougherty2008:2456-2462, 2484-2487). Farmer hears 'a personal ring' in Pico's claim that Origen was condemned not for heresy but for 'the glory of his eloquence and knowledge' (farmer1998:22118-22120). The case of Origen was Pico's own case in another's name: a writer who proposed and inquired, suspected of heresy by those who could not read his sources, and defended by the claim that where the will is not obstinate there is no heretic (editorial inference from edelheit2008:17249-17251, 17299-17309 and copenhaver2022:573-577).

Pico's sources

Quotations cited

Not established

Discussed in

Mention records in the corpus: 8 (deterministic harvest; see Method).

Farmer's cross-references

Related theses

4>18