J. Overton_Arguing Anselm's Argument

ARGUING ANSELM’SARGUMENT

JOHN OVERTON

Introduction

This paper seeks to challenge a major analytic line of interpretation surround-

ing Saint Anselm’s celebrated Proslogion.1 The line of reasoning proposed

herein sympathetically aligns with an alternative line of interpretation that

has demonstrated persistent interest in Anselm’s position, but which more

often emphasizes historical, phenomenological, devotional, and other com-

ponents of the argument, rather than the analytic components of the text

as it can be established. Such an alternative line of interpretation includes

positions as widely ranging as Bonaventure, Leibniz, Barth, Stolz, Evans, and

Marion.2 The resources of this paper emphasize analytical components of the

argument without emphasizing traditional philosophical tools of analysis.

This paper will attempt to demonstrate that these new tools for textual

analysis have direct bearing on both sides of interpretation, and thus

potentially applies to both groups of interests. More specifically, traditional

philosophico-deductive interpretations have implied a segmentation and

textual structure of the Proslogion, usually in terms of the logical argument(s)

contained in Chapters 2–3. By applying strict criteria of encompassing the

text in a theory of its poetic architecture, however, it is possible to see Anselm’s

purport as a structured communication that does not so much describe a

logical position, as provide a ritualized invocation of Christian joy, love, and

illumination. With this line of reasoning, I shall argue that the logical formu-

lations of Chapters 2–3 are subordinate to a larger, deliberate architecture

that is organized by three nested orders of global framing: Chapters 1–26

enclosing Chapters 2–25, in turn enclosing Chapters 2–4. Discovering these

frames indeed requires of us a shift in theoretical predisposition.

Modern Theology 17:1 January 2001ISSN 0266-7177

© Blackwell Publishers Ltd 2001. Published by Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK and 350 MainStreet, Malden, MA 02148, USA.

John OvertonThe Divinity School, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637, USA

Demonstrating this framing requires analysis based on some concepts new

to conventional theological and philosophical analysis. These concepts permit

us to analyze a variety of texts (not just philosophical and theological texts)

in a rigorous yet non-reductionist fashion, and to discuss them across a wide

variety of disciplines. Results and implications of this form of “semiotic

analysis” are far reaching, both specifically for reading Anselm’s Proslogion,

and more generally for approaching other texts. As a product of our analysis,

our first proposal is the discovery of a core architecture for the Proslogion.

Why and how can such a conclusion be so bold, 900 years after its original

distribution? Because, as we shall see, the text’s regularity reinforces a par-

ticular message through a repeated structure. Our more general proposal is

that, since this form of analysis provides tools which are not propositional

and not content-focused—but still analytic—it is applicable to reading other

kinds of texts.

Before approaching the proposal specifically, let us call attention to three

general considerations facing the introduction of any new position. First

of all, as we all may recognize, sometimes the necessary technical “break-

throughs” well-suited for one field may arise in a related but separate

field, or arise in an unanticipated way in an unrelated field. Similarly, one

discipline’s advances may align with another discipline’s advances, creating

important but initially unobvious possibilities. For example, theology has

benefited from interaction with research in history and several traditions of

philosophy. Philosophy has benefited from work in physics. Or consider the

impact of metaphors from science which have become self-sustaining in

the humanities. Discoveries from such interactions can provide new answers

to old questions, and new questions to old answers. In all cases, even when

moving rapidly, introducing discoveries, principles, and methods takes time

to travel through social space. That a discovery is fundamental both may

slow its initial progress precisely because it is obvious, and guarantee its

ultimate success precisely because it is useful.

Secondly, while generally educated persons would likely have read or

would likely be familiar with at least some of the foundational work sup-

porting this analysis, such as that of C.S. Peirce and of Roman Jakobson, few

scholars of religion would likely know about contemporary developments in

Semiotics, Linguistics, and Anthropology, and the important contemporary

figures advancing the issues of these disciplines. Fewer may realize the potential

contributions that these fields offer to work in philosophy and theology

specifically, and to work in the humanities generally. And still fewer of us

may realize how these disciplines can legitimately and tangibly advance our

own interests. Regardless, our initial unfamiliarity should not be sufficient

reason to reject the possibilities.

Thirdly, positions advocating change often involve some degrees of dif-

ficulty for the initiator. We need only recall the early difficulties in under-

standing Husserl’s phenomenology. Yet despite these difficulties, through

4 John Overton

© Blackwell Publishers Ltd 2001.

the years many communities of theology and the philosophy of religion

have come to see the importance and fruitfulness of the very same technical

innovations which were initially challenging. A position’s merit should rest

not on the first moment of contact, ultimately, but on its persistent adequacy

to reveal subtleties, introduce problems, clarify issues, resolve confusions,

structure conversations, etc. We must assess the burden of learning any new

position against the warrant of its contribution. New positions may require

certain initial industry, and only some are worth it. We must decide with

scrutiny and care which positions are worth their imposition into our time.

With these considerations in mind, we will see that our position provokes

a discernible shift in perspective—a shift in theoretical predisposition. The

tools simply formalize procedures that can analyze linguistic and semiotic

patterns in ways that duplicate the interpretative intuitions we already ex-

perience, but which we normally do not consider explicitly and in sufficiently

systematized fashion. Each reader must him or herself assess overtly and

consciously this methodological proposal’s assistance for clarifying inter-

pretation of the Proslogion.

Methods

To understand the overall architecture of the Proslogion we need to introduce

two concepts—cotextuality and textual metricality,3 that allow us to provide a

working model of poetic structure.4

Cotextuality and MetricalityNow we will examine each core concept in turn, and then provide a brief

conclusion outlining their combined significance for discovering poetic

structure in the Proslogion. Though achieving an interpretation of a text is

a trial and error process, in effect we reconstruct this achievement as the

equivalent of imposing a structure onto a text—cotextual relations subsumed

by an architecture—in which the architecture’s form is metrical in nature.

Cotextuality: Following Jakobson’s (and others’) usage, “poetic” in our sense

of the term will mean a heightened dependence on and effect of how textual

form is constituted out of mutually-“placed” signs, which are by implication

also mutually-cooccurrent within an architecture. In technical terminology,

such relations would be analytically expressible as “indexicality”. Thus, in

a structure of textual forms, cotextuality is the property of particular signs

pointing at (or “indexing”) one another, each pointing at others from a deter-

minate placement one with respect to determinate others within a framework

of form. Heuristically, cotextuality leads us to interpretation by guiding

our ability to focus on the selection and combination of given signals one

with another, in turn leading us toward new patterns which lead us to new

meanings. Thus, though often difficult properly to achieve, the task facing

Arguing Anselm’s Argument 5


interpretation is at least conceptually specifiable: to align a set of signals into

a maximally descriptive order of coherence, under an interpretation work-

ing from the same set of signals. More plainly stated, we select and combine

elements of a text in our process of understanding that text. Minima of

cotextuality guide us, sometime intuitively, to significant segmentations of

the textual architecture. Such “order”, in this plane of understanding a text,

we commonly experience as structured “coherence”.

Metricality: In order to recognize textual relations and structure and to see

cotextuality at play—beyond each interpreter with his or her “intertextual”

biography—it is necessary to project poetic metricality. By poetic metricality,

we mean the multiple arrangement of signs in different orders of recurrent

multiples. The property of poetic metricality implies our analytic ability to

divide (subdivide, subsubdivide, etc.) signal and textual segmentation, on

the basis of knowing the grammar, the “literal” values of words and expres-

sions, and of being able to figure out the recurrences of tropic usages of them

with respect to the overall metricality. Of course, this is nothing we do

not already do in communicating, interpreting, and understanding. Thus, in

introducing these tools, we are merely formalizing a familiar process—just

with greater exactitude.

This means, then, that to establish a poetic metricality, one must “segment”

the text into manageable units, of which there can be as many kinds as

contribute to the various potential overall interpretations. For example, unit

propositions in a text, word repetitions, line order or rhyme scheme in poetry,

sentence order, and/or chapter relations, could all be guides to principles of

“segmentation” of a text; the overriding criterion is the return on a metrical

organization of coherent patterns. Indeed, there may be many laminated

layers in the constructed segmentation. Moreover, this metricality is, in effect,

heuristically reconstructed by any interpreter.

Segmenting the Proslogion: Applied to Anselm’s Proslogion, we will dis-

cover the text’s poetic structure, through our awareness of cotextuality and

metricality. In specific terms we will segment (“meter”) units of cotextual

signaling by the beginning and ending of chapters, to show how these meters

clarify and amplify the text’s message. The additional discipline required to

peruse the cotextual “threading”, arranged by orderly metering of the text,

will allow us to see a heretofore undiscovered internal regularity of the

Proslogion. This orderliness can be precisely analyzed, and yet it does not

depend upon the description or propositional evaluation of layering as such.

Indeed, our position locates the Proslogion not only within its celebrated

philosophical importance, reading certain sections as propositional language

use, but proposes why and how it could become a centerpiece of Christian

theology of a different sort. We can show why and how the philosophical

arguments are compatible and yet also subordinate to numerous classical

6 John Overton


Christian claims, which in turn are harmoniously congruent with Anselm’s

allegiance to Christian traditions and his Benedictine heritage. While rigorous

philosophical readings may struggle to accomplish these conclusions with-

out lessening their analyticity or sensitivity (possibly both), our position can

provide a bridge between normative divisions of interpretation—and it can

do so without compromising the spirit and integrity of these positions.

With such a position we move from prescriptive theorizing of how Anselm

“could have” done this or that better, to what Anselm actually did do better.

Construed in terms of poetic structure, we will highlight textual features of

the Proslogion architecture which were seemingly included by design at its

writing, but which have been unreceived during the subsequent 900 years of

interpretation.

Argument

Having briefly introduced cotextuality, metricality, and poetic structure, now

let us apply these new tools. Our results will illustrate a striking regularityand repetition of a deliberate structure, exactly conforming to the assumptions

and concepts that we have introduced.

IntroductionOur analysis of the text’s poetic structure will show that the tradition’s

isolation and grouping of Proslogion 2–3 is wrong. Chapters 2–4 are the cor-

rect framing for the initial “philosophical argument”, which itself is nested

in a still larger global argument. Specifically, the Proslogion consists of two

strongly marked architectures:

• A Global Architecture that shows three nested organizing structures

traversing the entire Proslogion (Chapters 1–26, 2–25, 2–4).

• An Argument Architecture that shows a specifically theological argument

(Chapters 4–15–26).

The global architecture reveals a tripartite global argument, and the argu-

ment architecture reveals a tripartite theological argument. The argument

architecture cannot be considered without first understanding the global

architecture, since the argument architecture represents a subset of issues

subsumed by the global architecture.

In the current investigation, we will analyze the poetic structure that is

uncovered by the global architecture. Indeed, our efforts will disclose a very

different argument than traditionally presumed.

Global ArchitectureLet us now approach the three global frames specifically, which segment the

Proslogion’s global poetic structure: Chapters 1–26, 2–25, and 2–4.



IntroductionIn using our principle of textual metricality previously introduced, chapter

divisions provide an obvious metering to approach the Proslogion, since

Anselm himself provided these divisions. Further derivative of textual

metricality, we will find it helpful to consider hierarchical relations among

chapters. Still further considering chapters by sentence, and then sentence

location within chapters (e.g., beginning, middle, end), we shall find additional

architecture relations within and among chapters. Finally, in combining

frame relations, we in turn will see a dense poetic structure.

Each move is obvious, given our tools, focus, and expectations, but let us illus-

trate these moves concretely. Specific use of our tools make them quite tangible.

Frame 1: Chapters 1–26In the first sentence of Chapter 1 which addresses God, the narrator requests

God’s help to “teach my heart”:

Eai nunc ergo tu, domine deus meus, doce cor meum ubi et quomodo te

quærat, ubi et quomodo te inveniat.5

In the first sentence of Chapter 26, the last chapter, what the narrator asked

for in Chapter 1 has been given—and more. The narrator’s complete faculties

are filled with joy:

Deus meus et dominus meus, spes mea et gaudium cordis mei, dic animæ

mæ, si hoc est gaudium de quo nobis dicis per filium tuum: »petite et

accipietis, ut gaudium vestrum sit plenum« [John 16:24]. Inveni namque

gaudium quoddam plenum, et plus quam plenum. Pleno quippe corde,

plena mente, plena anima, pleno toto homine gaudio illo: adhuc supra

modum supererit gaudium.6

By the last chapter “teaching of the heart” has been fulfilled. Specifically,

multiple human capacities—heart, mind, soul, and person—are filled with joy.

Frame 2: Chapters 2–25Rather than to “teach the heart” as in Frame 1, the first sentence of Chapter 2

begins by a request that God give the narrator understanding to faith:

Ergo, domine, qui das fidei intellectum, da mihi, ut quantum scis expedire

intelligam, quia es sicut credimus, et hoc es quod credimus.7

In the last two sentences of Chapter 25, the second to last chapter, the

narrator closes Chapter 25 by describing what it means for God to give

understanding to faith. The believer’s heart will experience a surfeit of love,

leading to a fullness of joy:

Et utique quoniam quantum quisque diligit aliquem, tantum de bono

eius gaudet: sicut in illa perfecta felicitate unusquisque plus amabit sine

8 John Overton


compartatione deum quam se et omnes alios secum, ita plus gaudebit

absque existimatione de felicitate dei quam de sua et omnium aliorum

secum. Sed si deum sic diligent toto corde, tota mente, tota anima, ut tamen

totum cor, tota mens, tota anima non sufficiat dignitati dilectionis: pro-

fecto sic gaudebunt toto corde, tota mente, tota anima, ut totum cor, tota

mens, tota anima non sufficiat plenitudini gaudii.8

The believer will experience pure love of angels and holy men, love of God

more than love of self, which, as powerful as these experiences are, are not

as powerful as the greater joy God gives. And joy, we have seen, with which

Chapter 26 concludes, closes Frame 1.

Frame 1 organizes “teaching the heart” which God may fulfill in joy, while

Frame 2 organizes the believer’s experience of faith, which God may fulfill

in love.

Frame 3: Chapters 2–4As we have seen in the opening of Frame 2, the narrator asks God to give

understanding to faith. While descriptions of God’s rewards end Frames 1

and 2, no such description ends Chapter 3, as we would expect according to

the tradition’s philosophical grouping of Chapters 2 and 3. In fact, Chapter 3

ends with a rhetorical question the topic of which Chapter 4 immediately

resumes, making it clear that Chapter 3 requires Chapter 4.

But still more striking, Chapter 4 ends by explicitly thanking God for the

understanding requested in Chapter 2, specifically grouping Chapters 2–4,

not Chapters 2–3 (as traditional philosophical interpretations have done).

For ease of comparison, we repeat the first sentence in Chapter 2:

Ergo, domine, qui das fidei intellectum, da mihi, ut quantum scis expedire

intelligam, quia es sicut credimus, et hoc es quod credimus.

Now consider the last sentence of Chapter 4 which answers the first sentence’s

request of Chapter 2. Understanding to faith is given through illumination:

Gratias tibi, bone domine, gratias tibi, quia quod prius credidi te donante,

iam sic intelligo te illuminante, ut si te esse nolim credere, non possim

non intelligere.9

God is thanked for the gift of illumination.

Rather than receive joy (Frame 1) or love (Frame 2), Chapter 4 gives thanks

for illumination. Frame 3 organizes another experience of understanding to

faith, in addition to love (Frame 2), illumination of the mind.

Frame RelationsFrame Summaries: We may summarize three global frames that reveal the

denotational text’s largest poetic structure, noting the cotextuality of “fideiintellectum”. That is, although occurring a single time, ‘fidei intellectum’ is used



twice; once in Frame 2 and once in Frame 3. Through cotextuality, a single

print expression provides two simultaneous signals. Consider the following

summaries:

Frame 1 (Chs. 1–26) is marked by a request in Chapter 1 for “teaching

of the heart” (instruction in faith), which God fulfills by Chapter 26.

Beyond human capacity, God may fill the person with joy.

Frame 2 (Chs. 2–25) is marked by a request in Chapter 2 for understand-

ing to faith, which God fulfills by Chapter 25. Through understanding to

faith God may give the believer love.

Frame 3 (Chs. 2–4) is marked by a request in Chapter 2 for under-

standing to faith, which God fulfills by Chapter 4, for which thanks is

given. Through “understanding to faith”, in addition to love, God may

give illumination.

Hierarchy: Further examining these preliminary conclusions (¶Frame Sum-

maries) reveals a poetic structure of hierarchically related relations between

the three global frames. Consider Table 1:

A pattern of request–fulfillment is propagated across all three frames in

a structure of hierarchical nesting, with the asymmetrical variant “thanks”

of Frame 3. Inner nests (“layers”) presuppose outer nests. So 2–25 (love)

presupposes 1–26 (joy), and 2–4 (illumination) presupposes 2–25 (love) and

1–26 (joy).

In other words, having the experience of joy, one may (or may not) descend

to the next level (love), and only then one may descend to the next level

(illumination); and having illumination, one may reascend to new levels of

love, and then joy. This framing device thus “meters” the Proslogion.

Let us be explicit on the relations we are proposing. God’s action, not

Anselm’s writing, brings about for the reader changes of human reality. The

definitive clue is tucked away in the “deepest” nest (Frame 3), marked by its

slight asymmetry, which thanks God for providing (the gift of) illumination.

By hierarchical implication, thus, the deeper the religious experience, the

more complete God’s gift. This clue is repeated and developed through the

argument frames, which I elsewhere develop. Reciprocally, as God’s action

may descend the hierarchy, so God’s action may ascend the hierarchy as

10 John Overton


Table 1 Poetic Structure Hierarchy

1. Request for teaching of the heart2. Request for understanding to faith

2. Request for understanding to faith4. Thanks for illumination of the mind

25. Fulfillment by love in the heart26. Fulfillment by joy in the person

well. So one may request teaching (Frame 1), understanding (Frame 2),

understanding (Frame 3), but only God gives joy (Frame 1), love (Frame 2),

and illumination (Frame 3). With deeper devotion comes deeper recognition

of God’s gift, deeper integration of reason and faith, and from these still

deeper love and joy. (We will develop these relations even more explicitly in

a moment, visually depicting the relations in Table 2 Poetic Structure Focus,

page 11.)

This means, then, rather than developing a proof for God’s existence, Anselm

is developing a thanksgiving; devotional exercise; or possibly a prayer in-

volving the whole human capacity (heart, mind, and person). In any case,

only a small portion of this exercise is designed for rational signification.

This is no surprise, of course, if we recall Anselm’s monastic heritage and

commitment.10 Moreover, our reading no longer faces possible conflicts

between reason and devotion. They are intertwined in illumination: more

devout is more rational; and likewise, more rational is more devout. At the

deepest level of illumination, both reason and devotion are required. Anselm

saw no soul-wrenching conflict here. But we still may question how, in which

capacities, and by which faculties, are the frames that we have proposed

different from one another? Why do Frames 2 and 3 both open with the same

request: “understanding to faith”? Why the duplication? This cooccurrence

provides no insignificant clue, brought to our attention by our expectations

of cotextuality and metricality, according to our model of poetic structure.

Focus: Table 2 Poetic Structure Focus provides another view of the poetic

structure that helps answer the questions we have raised. As we have seen,

through increasing understanding the believer moves toward illumination,

based on a hierarchy of presuppositions (the nested relations). To receive

illumination already assumes a superseding/preceding relationship to the

previous frame (i.e., Frame 1 > Frame 2 > Frame 3). So before the believer

may have illumination of the mind, the believer must have experienced joyand love. And similarly, understanding in faith hierarchically first occurs

through love, and then through illumination; or otherwise stated, illumination

is a subset of love, and both love and illumination are modalities of under-

standing in faith.

Table 2 below shows the tropic focus of the matrical relations more clearly,

delineated by and characterizable through vertical, horizontal, diagonal, and

frame movement relations. These relations create structures in which, through

selection and combination, any number of interactional texts can be created.



Table 2 Poetic Structure Focus

1. (heart) teaching [1–26] joy (person)2. (faith) understanding [2–25] love (heart)3. (faith) understanding [2–4] illumination (mind)

Now let us evaluate the specific forms of relations: vertical, horizontal, diagonal,

and frame relations.

Vertical. Note vertical relations by reading from top to bottom of each

column. The heart holds faith, and the person holds the heart and mind.

Similarly, teaching leads to understanding of the heart, which leads to

understanding of the mind. Joy leads to love, which leads to illumination.

Horizontal. Reading from left to right, horizontal relations index Frames

1–3:

• Frame 1: Teaching occurs in the heart (note, not the [Enlightenment]

mind), and joy occurs in the person.

• Frame 2: Understanding occurs in faith, one type of faith of which occurs

in the heart. Love occurs in the heart.

• Frame 3: Understanding occurs in faith, another type of faith of which

occurs in the mind. Illumination occurs in the mind.

Diagonal. In a diagonal direction, reading from left to right and right to left,

three relations traverse the middle brackets of Table 2 (e.g., across ‘[2–25]’).

The interactant (e.g., believer) moves:

• Relation 1: From teaching in the heart to love in the heart, and from

understanding in faith to illumination in the mind. We may summarize

this relation as movement from teaching to love, and from understanding

to illumination.

• Relation 2: From joy in the person to understanding in faith, and from love

in the heart to understanding in faith. We may summarize this relation as

movement from joy to understanding, and from love to understanding.

• Relation 3: From teaching in the heart to illumination in the mind, and

from joy in the person to understanding in faith. We may summarize this

relation as movement from teaching to illumination, and from joy to

understanding.

Frame Movement. Frame 1 moves from the most general, to Frame 3 the

most specific. Frame 1 (i.e., the whole Proslogion) is addressed to the believer

capable of joy (agent: “person”). Frame 2 is addressed to the believer capable

of love (agent: “heart”). Frame 3 is addressed to the believer capable of

illumination (agent: “mind”). Or imprecisely one might say that Frame 1 is

for “beginners”, Frame 2 for “intermediates”, and Frame 3 for the “advanced”

believers. Frames 1–3 provide spiritual “exercises”.

Conclusion: Let us make several implications more explicit. This poetic

structure reticulates relationships across triads of traditional theological

categories: (1) faith, teaching, understanding, (2) joy, love, illumination, and

(3) person, heart, and mind. The combinations alone permit 27 (33) major

categories of relations, thus providing in specific structural terms, flexible

but traditionally acceptable boundaries for devotional experience. It is

12 John Overton


beautiful and not less remarkable than one would expect from one of the

core theological and philosophical texts of history. Indeed, we propose that

precisely this structure has facilitated the text’s transmission through history

by providing (a) the frame and context in and through which to propose the

logical exercises of Chapters 2–3, and (b) diverse but traditional connections

to a wide set of Christian themes. The remarkable density and diversity

produced by such a strategy is now easily seen.

ConclusionThe “metrical” structure of the global architecture reveals a textual and mental

“coordinate system” that provides mnemonic access to the entire Proslogion,

through three simple global frames: 1–26 (joy), 2–25 (love), 2–4 (illumination).

But we may still ask why such a structure would be used? And we may ask

how this is related to the adequacy or inadequacy of the philosophical

parsing of the Proslogion, and its focus on Chapters 2–3?

Conclusion

Let us review what our analysis has revealed about the denotational and in-

teractional texts, the role of propositionality in the argument, and Anselm’s

strategy, message, and contribution.

Denotational & Interactional Texts: The denotational text of the Proslogionprovides for a variety of interactional texts. In a given moment any number

of relations can be selected and combined to construct coherent interactional

texts. In Table 2 Poetic Structure Focus (page 14), we illustrated the formal

possibilities of engaging the Proslogion architecture: through a vertical,

horizontal, or diagonal relation; subsets of these; or through combinations of

relations. Not seeing the structure of the various components and frames

does not eliminate the participatory possibilities of the Proslogion’s poetic

structure, of course: cognitive apprehension is not required for social coherence

to exist for a given use of the text. The more poetic structure available, the

more potential exists for greater social, religious, theological, and intellectual

engagement of the text; with better poetic structure comes more versatile

coherence. This is not a general claim: our analysis demonstrates how the

Proslogion’s poetic structure organizes its interactional possibilities. The reader

can become involved in, through, and with the text, for greater potential

contact with joy, love, and illumination. The text analytically and concretely

facilitates richer and deeper experience. By better understanding the possi-

bilities of the text’s structure the reader is lead to richer and more profound

engagement and interaction with the text—to increasing Christian joy, love,

and illumination.

An interactional text is determined more specifically by selecting “seg-

mentations” that organize textual structures, and still more specifically by



selecting a coherent collection from the Proslogion’s poetic structure. Such

possibilities occur right here and now: in disclosing the structure we engage

it; and in engaging it, we make it tangible. Any part of the structure can

generate its own interactional text and coherence, but the overall possi-

bilities expand through the complexity of possible ways in which to engage

the text. We easily can extrapolate that the greatest possible relations, thus,

will be supplied by the greatest possible interaction among the component

parts of the Proslogion’s poetic structure. The more well structured, diverse,

and flexible the denotational components, the more comprehensive can

become the interactional possibilities. Construed this way, the restrictions

and limitations of traditional propositional (“philosophical”) construals of

textuality in general, and of the Proslogion in specific, become rapidly

apparent. Let us support and illustrate these claims recalling our analysis

more specifically.

Questioning Propositional Primacy: In such a scenario of increasing

denotational and interactional complexity, anchored to and disclosed by the

Proslogion’s poetic structure, the philosophical “arguments” of Chapters 2–3

have roles to play—and have played roles. But the philosophical arguments

also play subordinate roles to the larger textual possibilities, we have seen,

since their propositional content represents a subset of the denotational and

interactional complexity available to the Proslogion’s poetic structure.

Case-in-point, Table 2 (page 11) illustrates such subset restrictions. A

“philosophical” parsing organizes Frame 3 relationships between (1) under-

standing to illumination, implying (2) the relationship of faith to mind.

However, such a philosophical construal that attends only to the “logical

argument”, also omits Frame 1 teaching to joy (implying the relationship of

heart to person), and Frame 2 understanding to love (implying the relationship

of faith to love). Except through textual implication of the poetic structure—

in which case the relation is no longer strictly propositional, since it includes

non-propositional components—a traditional philosophical construal omits

attention to heart, person, teaching, joy, and love. Such philosophical con-

strual reduces the forms of possible relations, since only horizontal relations

are possible, and only a single Frame (Frame 3)—thereby omitting the diagonal,

vertical, and cross-combinations of relations illustrated in Table 2. Such a

philosophical construal restricts the text’s message by insufficiently attending

to its channels and clarity of communication: cited benefits of propositionally-

based analysis. The philosophical-propositional construal is important, of

course, but textually, denotationally, and interactionally incomprehensive. It

is not exclusively important to Anselm’s primary intention, and specifically

is a sub-component of Anselm’s overarching argument, which is a Christianargument. Our analysis shows this textually, specifically, and in structural

repetition.

14 John Overton


Considering Propositional Adequacy: Not only is the primacy of propositional

construal in question, but our results would suggest that the adequacy of such

an interpretive disposition should be reconsidered as well. Unless the tradition

decides that what Anselm did do, and what Anselm did intend to do, is less

important than the tradition’s commitment to propositional reasoning, our

results strongly suggest that the predominant line of reasoning surrounding

the Proslogion has been missing important claims, with provocative possibilities,

for quite some time.

As the poetic structure exhibits repeatedly, in a tight, indexical structure,

Anselm would never have imagined interpretation to pivot around Proslogion2–3, as a major line of interpretation has insisted. We must recall that Chapter 4concludes the “argument”, not Chapter 3. Moreover, the poetic structure

shows that Chapters 2–4 never intended to provide an abstracted rational

proof of God’s existence, but in fact offered a highly contextualized sub-

ordinate relation, hierarchically nested within a larger poetic structure for a

Christian understanding.11 This structure relates human faculties and modal-

ities of relations such as love and joy, in addition to illumination. Thus, and

rather, Chapters 2–4 were intended to provide, for those most capable, a

devotional exercise in the process of religious illumination, which must lead

to deeper love and joy of the divine, through a textual and religious “coordinate

system” in and through which to negotiate the Proslogion. So carefully

wrought, indeed designed to traverse history, it is unfortunate that the

Proslogion architecture has been forced to travel through time in isolated and

disjoint form, through implication. But so carefully wrought, it has survived

passage. Our account suggests how and why.

Anselm’s Strategy: Why would Anselm create such a construction? And

why would we not have seen it until now? First of all, the text may have

dropped out of wide circulation, or circulation in the monastery system, for

a generation or two following Anselm’s death.12 Since the poetic structure

relied on oral propagation, sufficient time would have passed to lose the oral

tradition that would have made the text clear to Anselm’s audience. Or the

mechanism of propagation could have been weakened, with the text not

being circulated through the Benedictine monastery system, in which the oral

tradition would have been originally clear. In any case, when the Proslogionhas resurfaced more centrally, in many periods it has been the Chapter 2

philosophical argument which suited that time’s contemporary needs, and

which has been emphasized.13

Secondly, even as a visionary of his time, Anselm would not likely have

envisioned the innovation of the printing press, and with it wide and easy

transmission of texts. In such a social and technological environment, the

Proslogion poetic structure provided an ingenious solution to a challenge

of conceptual and textual availability for Anselm’s position. He created a

mechanism for readers personally to carry along the primary elements of the



entire Proslogion, in content and through devotion, through the coordinate

system of the frame relations, using the very components of the argument to

assert numerous classical Christian claims: teaching, faith, understanding,

joy, love, illumination, person, heart, and mind. In such a construction form

and content, mechanism and message, channel and signal, are mutually

reinforcing. It is difficult to imagine a more elegant strategy to transmit

Anselm’s Proslogion message—through a Benedictine community into a

Christian civilization—than a simple three-part coordinate system of joy,

love, and illumination, in a time when personal copies of the text would have

been unlikely. Neither would Anselm have been ignorant of the possibilities

that such a coordinate system could plausibly facilitate: the Proslogion to

travel through the Benedictines into western civilization.

Anselm’s Contribution: Finally, we must recognize, and now in explicit

terms, that only the final stage of religious illumination required activity

of the mind—and this was necessary only after having passed through the

spirituality of heart and person. By necessity, religious illumination required

faith, understanding, person, heart, and (and then) mind. Religious illuminationrequired full human capacity, not simply—or merely—human rationality.

Confusing this move toward illumination with the construction of the so-

called “proofs” plainly misapprehends the Proslogion poetic structure, and in

compelling likelihood, Anselm’s argument for Christian joy, love, illumination,

and their harmonious relationships. Time is long past due again to argue

Anselm’s argument, for his text—and for ours.

NOTES

I wish to thank David Tracy and Michael Silverstein for their persistent support in bringing theargument and concepts of this work into responsible convergence.

Many thanks also go to Adam Rose for important early discussions about the global framing.Mike Locher helpfully reviewed an early form of the argument, and Douglas Glick helpfullyreviewed several drafts. Jeff Hayes provided a helpful sounding board for ideas and presentationat various times. Paul Dehart provided crucial comments on matters of final presentation. Andnot least, I wish to thank my Latin teacher, Susanne Degenring.

1 Consider positions such as A. Beckaert, “Une justification platonicienne de l’argument apriori”, in Spicilegium Beccense (Paris: J. Vrin, 1959), pp. 185–190; Bertrand Russell, “GeneralPropositions and Existence”, Logic and Knowledge, edited by Robert Charles Marsh (London:George Allen and Unwin, Ltd., 1956 [1918]), pp. ???-???; Gilbert Ryle, “Back to the Onto-logical Argument”, Mind, Vol. XLVI no. 181 (January 1937), pp. 53–57; Norman Malcolm,‘Anselm’s ontological arguments’, The Philosophical Review Vol. LXIX no. 1 (January 1960),pp. 41–62; and Charles Hartshorne, Anselm’s Discovery: A Re-examination of the OntologicalProof for God’s Existence (LaSalle, IL: Open Court, 1965). John Hick provides a helpfulintroduction to the “philosophical” traditions of interpretation. See the “Introduction” tochapter 9 in Hick’s The Many Faced Argument (New York, NY: Macmillan, 1967), pp. 209–212, in addition to other excerpted positions from The Many-faced Argument: Recent Studieson the Ontological Argument for the Existence of God, edited by John Hick and Arthur McGill,(New York, NY: Macmillan, 1967). See also the collection of philosophical essays, TheOntological Argument, edited by Alvin Plantinga (New York, NY: Doubleday, 1965). Finally,

16 John Overton


see Graham Oppy’s recent work, including bibliography: Ontological Arguments and Beliefin God (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).

2 See especially G. R. Evans, Anselm and Talking about God (Oxford: Clarendon, 1978); G. R. Evans, Anselm and A New Generation, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1980); Benedicta Ward,“Inward feeling and deep thinking: The Prayers and Meditations of St. Anselm Revisited”,in Signs and Wonder: Saints, Miracles and Prayers from the 4th Century to the 14th, CollectedStudies Series CS361 (Hampshire, UK: Variorum 1992 [1983]), pp. 177–183; Benedicta Ward,“Anselm of Canterbury: A Monastic Scholar”, in Signs and Wonder: Saints, Miracles and Prayersfrom the 4th Century to the 14th, Collected Studies Series CS361 (Hampshire, UK: Variorum,1992 [1973]), pp. 2–20; and Benedicta Ward, “The Place of St. Anselm in the Developmentof Christian Prayer”, in Signs and Wonder: Saints, Miracles and Prayers from the 4th Century tothe 14th, Collected Studies Series CS361 (Hampshire, UK: Variorum, 1992 [1973]), pp. 72–81.Note also the proceedings of the Castelli conference on the ontological argument inL’Argomento Ontologico, Vol. LVIII (1–3), edited by Marco M. Olivetti, (Rome: Cedam, 1990).Among the key essays are: Paul Ricoeur, “Fides Quaerens Intellectum: AntécédentsBibliques”, pp. 19–42; Jean-Luc Marion, “L’Argument Relève-t-il de L’Ontologie?”, pp. 43–69;Adriaan Theodoor Peperzak, “Le Proslogion D’Anselme Aprés Hegel”, pp. 335–352; XavierTilliette, “Quelques Défenseurs De L’Argument Ontologique”, pp. 405–420; Michel Henry,“Acheminement vers la Question de Dieu: Preuve de L’Être ou Épreuve de la Vie”, pp. 521–531; and Jan Sperna Weiland, “La Fascination par Les Preuves”, pp. 733–743. Other examplesof this line of interpretation include Beckaert, “Une justification platonicienne de l’argumenta priori”; Russell, “General Propositions and Existence”; Ryle, “Back to the OntologicalArgument”; Malcolm, “Anselm’s Ontological Arguments”; and Jean-Luc Marion, “Is theontologial argument ontological? The argument according to Anselm and its metaphysicalinterpretation according to Kant”, Journal of the History of Philosophy, Vol. 30 (1992), pp 201–218.

3 See also John Overton, “See(k)ing God through the icon: A semiotic analysis of Jean-LucMarion’s Dieu sans l’Être”, in Semiotica, Vol. 110(1/2) (1996), pp. 87–126, 98–99 for otherrelated terminology in the analytic proposal I am developing. There, one can find discus-sions of interactional texts, denotational texts, indexical, and agent, among other terms. For thepurposes of this argument, we provide approximate glosses of assumed terms used by thisanalysis. By interactional text, we will mean communicative events characterized by a par-ticular, inhabitable set of rules—for example a two party dispute. By denotational text, wewill mean a text characterized by traditionally recognized mechanisms of textual coherence,such as meanings of words and of phrases, sentences, and paragraphs built up of them bygrammar. By indexical, we will mean a relationship of one occurring thing to another. Andby agent, we will mean the intentionality inhabiting a textual (or other) role.

4 Jakobson developed “poetic function”, from which we develop “poetic structure” as amixture of cotextuality and metricality. Roman Jakobson, “Closing Statement: Linguisticsand Poetics”, in Style in Language, edited by Thomas A. Sebeok (Cambridge, MA: MITPress, 1964 [1960]), pp. 350–377. See also various developments of this point of view in thecollection edited by Michael Silverstein and Greg Urban, Natural Histories of Discourse,(Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996), such as Michael Silverstein’s and GregUrban’s, “The Natural History of Discourse”; Michael Silverstein’s, “The Secret Life ofTexts”; Vincent Crapanzano’s, “Self-Centering Narratives”; and Judith Irvine’s “ShadowConversations: The Indeterminacy of Participant Roles”. See also Michael Silverstein, “TheImprovisational Performance of Culture in Realtime Discursive Practice”, in Creativity inPerformance, edited by R. Keith Sawyer (Greenwich, CT: Ablex Publishing, 1998). Thesepositions apply tools similar to those employed in this essay’s argument.

5 Saint Anselm, “Proslogion”, in Opera Omnia Vol. 1, edited by Franciscus Salesius Schmitt,(Graz: Austria, 1938), p. 98. “Therefore now you, O lord, my god, teach my heart where andhow to seek you, where and how it may find you.” Italics added. Of the English texts, onemay wish to consult Charlesworth’s translation, St. Anselm’s Proslogion, edited by M. J.Charlesworth (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1979 [1978]), but thefollowing translations are mine.

6 Anselm, Proslogion, pp. 120–121. “My god and my lord, my hope and joy of my heart, tell(my) soul if this is the joy of which you speak to us through your son: ‘ask and you willreceive, so that your joy may be full’ [John. 16:24]. Indeed I found that joy complete, and morethan complete. Of course (I have found that when) the heart is full, the mind is full, the soul is



full, the whole person is full with that joy: yet beyond measure joy will (still) exceed.” Italicsadded.

7 Ibid., p. 101. “Therefore, O Lord, you who gives understanding to faith, give to me, in orderthat I may understand as much as you know to be advantageous, because you are just aswe believe, and you are this what we believe.” Italics added.

8 Ibid., p. 120. “And by all means since as much as everybody loves another, so he will rejoiceabout his good: just as every single one in that perfect happiness will love god withoutcomparison more than himself and all others with him, so he will rejoice more without his (own) estimate about the happiness of god than over his own (happiness) and (thehappiness) of all others with him. But if they will love god thus with (their) whole heart,whole mind, whole soul, yet (their) whole heart, whole mind, whole soul is not sufficientfor the grandeur of (this) love: thus they assuredly will rejoice with (their) whole heart, wholemind, whole soul, so that (their) whole heart, whole mind, whole soul is not sufficient forthe fullness of (their) joy.” Italics added.

9 Ibid., p. 104. “Thanks to you, good Lord, thanks to you, because what before I believedthrough your gift, now thus I understand through your illumination, so that if I did not wantto believe that you exist, I should (still) not (fail) to understand (that You exist).” Italicsadded.

10 Indeed, scholars such as Evans, Ward, Anselm Stolz, “Anselm’s Theology in the Proslogion”,in The Many-faced Argument: Recent Studies on the Ontological Argument for the Existence ofGod, edited by John Hick and Arthur McGill (New York, NY: Macmillan, 1967 [1933]), pp. 183–208; Karl Barth, Anselm, Fides Quœrens Intellectum: Anselm’s Proof of the Existence ofGod in the Context of his Theological Scheme, Pittsburgh Reprint Series, No. 2. (London, SCM,second edition, 1985 [1958]); Barth, “Fides Quærens Intellectum: Anselms Beweis der ExistenzGottes im Zusammenhang seines theologischen Programms”, Vol. 4 (Munchen: TheologischerVerlag Zürich, second edition, 1981 [(1931]); and R. W. Southern, Saint Anselm: A Portrait ina Landscape (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991 [c1990]); R. W. Southern, St.Anselm and His Biographer: A Study of Monastic Life And Thought, 1059–1130 (Cambridge:Cambridge University, 1963), have drawn agreeable conclusions, but conclusions notanalytically grounded. For example, Evans argues that Anselm did present an “argument”,but one which was a theological practicum designed to lead to contact with the divine ratherthan to logical proof of God’s existence. Ward asserts still more pointedly that Anselm’sposition was a prayer rather than a proof, substantiated through his monastic commitmentsand roles. Stolz builds an interesting interpretation based on “literary genres”, arguing thatthe Proslogion provides a mystical theology, specifically challenging Barth’s assertions thatChapters 2–3 provide a theological argument. In turn, Barth argues that Anselm’s positionprovides a noetic formula, not a proof, focused on intellectus fidei. Barth emphasizes thatintelligere strictly follows from faith, not the reverse. In contrast, Southern’s position empha-sizes that Anselm’s Proslogion position was not a “proof” of God’s existence, but rather aproof that the essences of attributes, such as Goodness, Truth, Justice, etc., were the necessaryattributes of God, and that such attributes must cohere in a single Being. While thesepositions provide agreeable interpretations of the Proslogion position, none develop theirconclusions with formalized analytic tools. However provocative, thus, such positions aresubject to challenges asserted on analytic grounds. In contrast, our interpretation congeniallyfalls in line with such positions, but additionally is supported by formalized analyticalprocedures, claims, and conclusions.

11 In light of such poetic structure, it may be worthwhile to reconsider diverse interpretations,such as provided by Stolz, Barth, Evans, Ward, and even analytic-philosophical positionssuch as provided by Hick, among others.

12 See A. Daniels’s classic argument, “Quellenbeitrage und Untersuchungen zur Geschichteder Gottesbeweise”, in Dreizehnten Jahrhundert Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie desMittelalters, Vol. 8 (1–2) (Munster: Aschendorffsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1909), pp. 111–131ff.; and also J. Chatillon, “De Guillaume d’Auxerre à S. Thomas d’Aquin: L’Argumentde S. Anselme chez les premiers scolastiques du XIIIe siècle”, in Spicilegium Beccense (Paris:J. Virin, 1959), pp. 209–231. Rovighi alternatively argues that the Proslogion may have hadsome influence on thinkers in the twelfth century, but that Anselm’s philosophical workother than the now named “ontological proof” was more significant to the period. Themoral doctrine and doctrine of freedom, for example, not the Chapter 2–4 argument, seem

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to have had wide influence, S. Vanni Rovighi, “Notes sur I’in uence de Saint Anselme au XIIe siècle: suite et fin”, Cahiers De Civilisation Mèdièvale, Vol. 8 (Janvier-Mars, 1965) pp. 43–58. See also Ward.

13 Among many possible illustrations, consider Aquinas and Kant. Consider also that it isnow commonly held that neither actually read the germane Proslogion texts themselves.



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