Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Michael Bérubé reports that Benedict XVI took his name after Benedict XII-- interesting for a number of reasons, including the fact that XII "engaged in debate with William of Ockham". (Excommunicated Ockham is more accurate.) Just as one should never argue with someone who buys ink by the barrel, it is probably a bad plan to debate theology with a pope. I'm down with Ockham, but you don't see me writing to Rome about it: as I said in my post about disagreeing with the last pope, the principles of the Catholic religion are not subject to debate-- they are articles of faith, which we can accept or reject (because we have free will). Funny world we live in-- I thought Ratzinger had too much baggage, but my optimism got the better of me again. Can't wait for the Scalia Court to start applying some of that sort of thinking to American jurisprudence. There is an interesting essay to be written about the influence of Nino's religious beliefs on his legal thinking-- it is certainly there, but not in the simplistic way that people think. I would say that it is somewhat closer to what we have been talking about here: the intellectual model of Catholic theology frames his analysis of common law. Holmes would have it that the common law is an identifiable, nearly tangible thing that can be determined by the outlines of existing law and behavior. Holmes would also agree that it is an evolving thing: he was very much a modern thinker in that way. Scalia, in contrast, would argue that the law is what it is, and once we have said what it is there remains nothing more to be said. Benedict XII would recognize that argument, and he'd chase you to Bavaria if you disagreed.
// posted by Bill @ 10:07 AM 
Post a Comment