translated Maximus the Confessor’s Quaestiones ad Thalassium and Gregory of Nyssa’s
De hominis opificio.
Eriugena’s major intellectual achievement was the Periphyseon, or On the Division of
Nature. This work, written ca. 864–66, is the mature product of his reflections on Greek
theology as well as on the western tradition of Augustine and Boethius. Its most
impressive feature is its scope: an inclusive treatment of all of nature, under which he
classifies both God and creation. Structuring the universe along the lines of procession
and return, Eriugena discusses all major theological and philosophical issues of his time
in a dialectical fashion. The discussion of nature ranges from God (nature that creates but
is not created) through a treatment of the divine ideas (nature that is created and creates)
and of spatiotemporal creations (nature that is created and does not create) back to God
(nature that does not create and is not created). In addition, his Expositiones in
ierarchiam coelestem (on Pseudo-Dionysius’s Celestial Hierarchy) and his homily Vox
spiritualis aquilae have become famous.
Due to the later association of Eriugena with the heresy of Amalric of Bène, Pope
Honorius III in 1225 ordered that all extant copies of the Periphyseon be burned. Yet,
through direct and indirect influence, Eriugena’s voice continued to be heard in the
medieval Christian-Platonic tradition. In connection with idealist philosophy and process
theology, Eriugena’s ideas also stimulate modern thinking.
Willemien Otten
[See also: CHARLES II THE BALD; DENIS; GOTTSCHALK; HINCMAR OF
REIMS; PHILOSOPHY; PSEUDO-DIONYSIUS THE AREOPAGITE; THEOLOGY]
Eriugena, Johannes Scottus. Commentaire sur l’évangile de Jean, ed. and trans. Édouard Jeauneau.
Paris: Cerf, 1972.
——. De divina praedestinatione liber, ed. Goulven Madec. CCCM 50. Turnhout: Brepols, 1978.
——. Expositiones in ierarchiam coelestem, ed. Jeanne Barbet. CCCM 31. Turnhout: Brepols,
1975.
——. Periphyseon (De divisione naturae), ed. I.P.Sheldon-Williams and Ludwig Bieler. 3 vols.
Dublin: Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1968–81.
——. Periphyseon=On the Division of Nature, trans. Myra I.Uhlfelder with summaries by Jean
A.Potter. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1976.
Marenbon, John. From the Circle of Alcuin to the School of Auxerre: Logic, Theology and
Philosophy in the Early Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982.
Moran, Dermot. The Philosophy of John Scottus Eriugena: A Study of Idealism in the Middle Ages.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
O’Meara, John J., and Ludwig Bieler, eds. The Mind of Eriugena. Dublin: Irish University Press,
1973.
Otten, Willemien. The Anthropology of Johannes Scottus Eriugena. Leiden: Brill, 1991.
ERWIN DE STEINBACH
(fl. late 13th-early 14th c.). Since Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s paean to Erwin de
Steinbach in Von deutscher Baukunst, published in 1772, the name of this master mason
at Strasbourg cathedral has been enshrined in the pantheon of legendary builders. The
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