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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good but flawed work, September 29, 2001
By A Customer
This review is from: Origins of Papal Infallibility, 1150-1350: A Study on the Concepts of Infallibility, Sovereignty and Tradition in the Middle Ages (Studies in the H) (Studies in the History of Christian Thought) (Library Binding)
The other on-line reviewer seems unaware of scholarly rebuttals to Tierney's book. Tierney's book is indeed a scholarly work and has many merits. However, his central thesis about Pope John XXII has been refuted in James Heft's "John XXII and Papal Teaching Authority" (1986). I strongly recommend that all readers of Tierney's book also read the critical reviews of it by A.M. Stickler (and the exchange between Stickler and Tierney) in the Catholic Historical Review (Oct.,1974 and April, 1975) along with J.A. Watt's insightful comments in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History (Jan., 1974). Both Stickler and Watt are renowned scholars. As you will see Tierney is hardly the last word on this issue. Wiki:
Theological history Pope Leo XIII, as Bishop of Rome and successor of the Apostle Peter, represented as guiding the ship of God's Church (painting by Friedrich Stummel in Kevelaer Shrine 1903).[31] Klaus Schatz asserts that "it is impossible to fix a single author or era as the starting point" for the doctrine of papal infallibility. Others such as Brian Tierney have argued that the doctrine of papal infallibility was first proposed by Peter Olivi in the Middle Ages. Schatz and others see the roots of the doctrine as going much further back to the early days of Christianity.
Brian Tierney argued that the Franciscan priest Peter Olivi was the first person to attribute infallibility to the Pope.[32] His idea was accepted by August Bernhard Hasler, and by Gregory Lee Jackson,[33] It was rejected by James Heft,[34] and by John V. Kruse.[35] Klaus Schatz says Olivi by no means played the key role assigned to him by Tierney, who failed to acknowledge the work of earlier canonists and theologians, and that the crucial advance in the teaching came only in the 15th century, two centuries after Olivi; and he declares that "it is impossible to fix a single author or era as the starting point".[36] Ulrich Horst criticized the Tierney view for the same reasons.[37] In his Protestant evaluation of the ecumenical issue of papal infallibility, Mark E. Powell rejects Tierney's theory about 13th-century Olivi, saying that the doctrine of papal infallibility defined at Vatican I had its origins in the 14th century--he refers in particular to Bishop Guido Terreni--and was itself part of a long development of papal claims.[38]
Schatz points to "the special esteem given to the Roman church community (that) was always associated with fidelity in the faith and preservation of the paradosis (the faith as handed down)." Schatz differentiates between the later doctrine of "infallibility of the papal magisterium" and the Hormisdas formula in 519 which asserted that "the Roman church has never erred (and will never err)." He emphasizes that Hormisdas formula was not meant to apply so much to "individual dogmatic definitions but to the whole of the faith as handed down and the tradition of Peter preserved intact by the Roman Church." Specifically, Schatz argues that the Hormisdas formula does not exclude the possibility of individual popes become heretics because the formula refers "primarily to the Roman tradition as such and not exclusively to the person of the pope."[39]
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3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Incredible Scholarship, April 10, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Origins of Papal Infallibility, 1150-1350: A Study on the Concepts of Infallibility, Sovereignty and Tradition in the Middle Ages (Studies in the H) (Studies in the History of Christian Thought) (Library Binding)
Brian Tierney has produced an outstanding piece of historical scholarship in "Origins of Papal Infallibility." The work is an exhaustive and meticulous examination of the origins of the modern Roman Catholic doctrine of papal infallibility. Tierney leaves no stone unturned in his research. He demonstrates conclusively that this doctrine originated in the 12th-14th century controversies between the Popes and the Franciscans. Ironically, it was opponents of the Pope who first suggested the idea and it was immediately condemned by the Pope. Later when it was realized that the doctrine could serve the purposes of the pope the papal opinion of the doctrine changed. This book is not an easy read, but it is a fascinating study for those willing to invest the time and effort. (...)The second edition of his book (the one available here) includes an appendix discussing the handful of published critiques and demonstrating why they all fail. As the Jesuit scholar Luis Bermejo said in his 1992 book, INFALLIBILITY ON TRIAL, no Roman Catholic scholar (...) has really adequately responded to Tierney yet.
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1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good but flawed work, September 29, 2001
By A Customer
This review is from: Origins of Papal Infallibility, 1150-1350: A Study on the Concepts of Infallibility, Sovereignty and Tradition in the Middle Ages (Studies in the H) (Studies in the History of Christian Thought) (Library Binding)
The other on-line reviewer seems unaware of scholarly rebuttals to Tierney's book. Tierney's book is indeed a scholarly work and has many merits. However, his central thesis about Pope John XXII has been refuted in James Heft's "John XXII and Papal Teaching Authority" (1986). I strongly recommend that all readers of Tierney's book also read the critical reviews of it by A.M. Stickler (and the exchange between Stickler and Tierney) in the Catholic Historical Review (Oct.,1974 and April, 1975) along with J.A. Watt's insightful comments in the Journal of Ecclesiastical History (Jan., 1974). Both Stickler and Watt are renowned scholars. As you will see Tierney is hardly the last work on this issue.
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