Medieval Monastic Ideas of the Compatibility Between the Individual and the Common Good

Abstract

AbstractThe discussion about the compatibility of the common good and individual good was a pressing theme in medieval monastic texts and moral philosophy. Monastic authors typically relied on the premises of ethical eudaimonism, which stresses the idea that the virtuous agent’s good is maximized and the individual and common good are in harmony. This chapter argues that rather than constructing a concise theory of the common good and individual good, theologians elaborated on related themes such as the problem of achieving the common good, common utility, self-interest, self-love, or individual needs and their role in communal life. Moreover, the vocabulary was undetermined since the common good and individual good could refer either to metaphysical and theological ideas or to more limited material welfare and utility. By analysing samples from the monastic rules of common living and from the individual authors (Peter Abelard, Hugh of St Victor and Aelred of Rievaulx), the chapter will systematically discuss scattered but original developments that contributed to later theoretical analyses of the common good and individual good.