Teaching Materials on Medieval Philosophy

John Kilcullen


For my homepage, go to Politics, Philosophy and Medieval Studies.

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Courses (no longer offered)

Course description, Medieval Philosophy

Course description, Later Medieval Philosophy

Website for Sydney University Course The Medieval Intellectual Tradition

Reading Guides

These courses were taught using audio cassette tapes and printed reading books. The reading books contained photocopied extracts from translations of medieval philosophers. The idea was that the student would play the cassette, pressing the pause button from time to time to read another segment of text from the reading book. The cassettes give a detailed commentary on the text.

The web pages listed below are (mostly) transcripts of the audio cassettes. Anyone wishing to use them will need to have at hand, open on the desk, the text on which the cassette comments (or some equivalent translation). The commentary is not likely to make much sense without the translations. (Some of the pages do "stand alone", but most refer to a text.)

Medieval Philosophy: An Introduction
Greek Philosophical Background | Aristotle on the Web | Macquarie Library books on Aristotle
Reading Guide to Boethius, Consolation  (The Consolation of Philosophy, tr. V.E. Watts (Penguin, 1969).)
Boethius on Porphyry (Richard McKeon (ed.), Selections from Medieval Philosophers (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons).)|
Reading Guide to "The Essential Augustine" (ed. V.J. Bourke, Hackett, 1974)
Anselm's Monologion(J. Hopkins and H.W. Richardson, Anselm of Canterbury (New York: Edwin Mellen Press, 1974).)
Anselm's Proslogion and Cur deus homo ( E.R. Fairweather, A Scholastic Miscellany: Anselm to Ockham (London: SCM Press, 1956).)
Reading guide to Anselm's De concordia  (Anselm of Canterbury, The Major Works, ed. B. Davies and G.R. Evans (Oxford University Press, 1998), or Hopkins and Richardson.)
Peter Abelard (Peter Abelard's Ethics, tr. D.E. Luscombe (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971), and Abelard's "Glosses on Porphyry", in A. Hyman and J.J. Walsh (eds.), Philosophy in the Middle Ages (Indianapolis: Hackett).)
Abelard (cont.); Abbreviatio montana ( N. Kratzmann and E. Stump (eds.), Logic and the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).)
Al Ghazali and Averroes (Averroes, Tahafut al-Tahafut, translated S. van den Bergh (London: Luzac), and Hyman and Walsh, Philosophy in the Middle Ages.)
Averroes, The Incoherence, thirteenth discussion (Averroes, Tahafut al-Tahafut, translated S. van den Bergh (London: Luzac)
Thomas Aquinas on God (Summa theologiae)
Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (cont.)
The Eternity of the World St. Thomas, Siger de Brabant, St. Bonaventure: On the Eternity of the World
Cyril Vollert, S.J., Lottie Kendzierski, and Paul Byrne, Tr. (Marquette UP).)
Scotus on univocal concepts of God ( Hyman and Walsh, Philosophy in the Middle Ages.)
Scotus's proof of the existence of an infinite being ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Scotus on the primary object of the intellect ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Scotus on the primary object of the intellect (continued) ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Scotus on the primary object of the intellect (concluded); the Formal Distinction ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Scotus on Universals ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Scotus and Ockham on free will ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Ockham on Universals (William of Ockham, Philosophical Writings, ed. P. Boehner (Edinburgh: Nelson, 1957).)
Ockham on Relations. ( Hyman and Walsh.)
Ockham's Theory of Knowledge ( Hyman and Walsh, William of Ockham, Philosophical Writings (ed. Boehner), pp.22-4, and William of Ockham Quodlibetal Questions (ed. Freddoso), pp.413-7, 506-8. )
Medieval elements in Descartes (Descartes, Meditations)
Medieval elements in Berkeley, Locke and Hume

 

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