Saint Fulbert of Chartres

French religious leader and teacher

• Born: c. 960
• Birthplace: Rome (now in Italy)
• Died: April 10, 1028
• Place of death: Chartres, France

Fulbert founded the cathedral school at Chartres, where the curriculum was based on the seven liberal arts. This educational and church reform helped create the twelfth century renaissance and Christian Humanism.

Early Life

The eleventh century must be characterized as a time of religious zeal and reform. The much-needed reform arose from the era of the “pornographic Papacy,” as historians have sometimes referred to the tenth century Church. The reform spirit created, in the minds of many, a strong commitment to support traditional theology, monastic conservatism, and the founding of such reforming movements as the Cluniac and later the Cistercian. At the same time, new knowledge from the Arabic world, particularly Spain, and the secular demands of both political and urban revival recommended the use of reason to treat the realities of the world. This viewpoint created a dynamic tension in the eleventh century and introduced several problems that would occupy intellectual life for the next two centuries. No school was more deeply involved in this debate than the one at Chartres, founded by Fulbert of Chartres (FEWL-behr uhv shahrt).

The eleventh century thus marks the awakening of the medieval mind. The first person in the history of this awakening was Gerbert of Aurillac, who taught at the cathedral school at Reims around 972; he reigned as Pope Sylvester II until his death in 1003. In his acceptance of the dialectical method, his interest in mathematics, and his familiarity with Arabic sources acquired during his stay in Catalonia, Gerbert heralded the new era of intellectual curiosity and dynamic expansion that characterized the High Middle Ages (1000-1300). Equally significant in this creation of the medieval mind was Fulbert of Chartres, one of Gerbert’s outstanding students at Reims.

Although it is known that Fulbert was born in Rome about 960, not much information is available about his youth, his family, or his education. It is known, however, that Fulbert studied under Gerbert at Reims sometime between 972 and 990. After his stay at Reims and before going to Chartres, Fulbert spent time as a physician. He was practical rather than theoretical in his approach, and his treatment was characterized by his concern for the overall health of the patient rather than a specific ailment. Later, Fulbert would teach medicine, specifically the treatment of diseases, surgery, and pharmacology, all of which he is believed to have learned from Gerbert, who had first learned the practice in Catalonia.

Life’s Work

In 990, when he was about twenty-seven, Fulbert appeared in Chartres, where he founded and was the first master of the cathedral school. From this school would emerge many of the great thinkers of the eleventh century. Here too was the birthplace of the twelfth century renaissance and Christian Humanism. Although many schools were founded during the eleventh century, none could claim the preeminence of Chartres. After his outstandingly successful career as a teacher, the Church appointed Fulbert to serve as the bishop of Chartres (1006-1028), a particularly prestigious position, for Chartres was a shrine to the Virgin and a popular pilgrimage center to which many miracles were attributed. Fulbert’s temperament suited the assignment, as he was deeply devout and a man of saintly patience. He remained in this office until his death in 1028.

Fulbert’s life work clearly began and ended with his teaching in Chartres. It was at Chartres that the Humanist movement developed to full flower, epitomized in the thought and writings of another great bishop of Chartres, John of Salisbury, a man as deeply committed to the liberal arts as Fulbert. Elegance returned to Latin as all available classics were studied, including Arabic translations of Aristotle, the Neoplatonists, and some minor works of Plato. Philosophically, Fulbert was a Humanist and a Platonist. He was also a man who maintained order and was practical; he was in tune with the needs of his society and was knowledgeable about the world around him. Fulbert’s awareness of contemporary affairs was astute; in particular, he understood the operations of the socioeconomic structure, including the intricacies of feudalism.

In Fulbert’s day, the cathedral schools were new institutions, his being one of the first. These schools were therefore not bound by custom and tradition, leaving them free to follow new lines of thought and inquiry developed in the new methodologies. Fulbert instigated the teaching traditions that would be continued by subsequent generations of Chartres teachers. Significant among these traditions was Fulbert’s insistence that the proper role of a teacher was to encourage the development of the student’s best qualities. He also set the tradition of great loyalty and an affectionate relationship between teacher and student, which gave to medieval education its particular uniqueness, strength, and vitality. R. W. Southern, the renowned Oxford medieval scholar, has called Chartres the greatest of all the cathedral schools. He attributes its excellence to the wise foundation instituted by Fulbert; the curriculum established at Chartres became the model for that century.

The academic program reflected Fulbert’s own interests and training: science, medicine, theology, the Scriptures, and especially classical literature. Despite the literary and philosophical emphasis in the curriculum, study still focused on the mysteries of the faith, with the Scriptures and the writings of the church fathers accepted as supreme authority. Remaining faithful to his religious beliefs, Fulbert insisted that when the power of human reason failed to comprehend the divine creation and order of things, it should surrender and cease to look for a reasonable definition. Fulbert’s curriculum, however, opened the door to a new confidence in the efficacy of human reason to master all things. Here was the first stirring of modern rationalism. Along with the emphasis on reason, skepticism and pessimism also returned to the Western mind.

The disputed issues focused on whether boundaries must exist between reason and faith and on how much reason could legitimately be applied to Christian thought. No one was more committed to resolving these questions than Fulbert’s student Berengar of Tours , who insisted on submitting religious mysteries to the activity of reason, thereby denying traditional authority. His justification for challenging authority was that in reason humans most resembled God. Lanfranc of Bec, one of the great conservative minds of the day, rose to refute this position. The turmoil that accompanied the various and controversial medieval interpretations of Aristotle made Chartres the leading school of the twelfth century renaissance. It produced the Thomistic synthesis of reason and faith during the thirteenth century, a synthesis that would ultimately crumble under the weight of its own complexity.

Significance

Above all, Fulbert should be remembered as one of the most influential teachers of the eleventh century, the patriarch of the great masters produced by Chartres. Although he was never officially canonized, Fulbert is recognized as a saint. His feast day is April 10. By all accounts, he was a man of dignity, tolerance, gentle wisdom, and humanity. Though he never wrote anything particularly outstanding, he was notable among the great medieval correspondents. Fortunately, many of his letters have been preserved. They reflect his clear, concise, if not eloquent, style. He wrote in understandable Latin, something refreshing when compared to the laborious, antiquated language of most of his contemporaries.

A gifted teacher, Fulbert spoke to people in a language that they understood. Although he was intrigued by the relationship between words and reality, he started no new school of philosophy. Indeed, Fulbert contributed nothing new to learning but made what he discussed both understandable and familiar to his listeners.

Fulbert’s reputation, never tarnished or diminished, was built on the success of his students and their loyalty to him. In his day it was said that Fulbert was the spring from which all the rivers of the medieval mind flowed. This influence lasted for a century after his death, drawing students from all over Europe to his school. In spite of the distinguished reputation of Fulbert and Chartres, however, the school never became a university. Instead, the focus shifted in the twelfth century to Paris, some fifty miles away.

Although Chartres is remembered today more for the beauty of its Gothic cathedral and rose windows, which were made famous by Henry Adams’s book Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres (1904), in the Middle Ages, it was clearly the school and its remarkable teacher and founder, Fulbert, that made it famous.

Bibliography

Favier, Jean. The World of Chartres. New York: H. N. Abrams, 1990. A general work on Chartres that looks at the visionaries and craftsmen of Chartres, its buildings, and its place in society.

Fulbert, Saint. The Letters and Poems of Fulbert of Chartres. Translated by Frederick Behrends. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press, 1976. The introduction to the translation of the correspondence of Saint Fulbert provides valuable information on the man and his works. Indexes.

Lloyd, Roger B. The Golden Middle Age. Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Libraries Press, 1969. A look at education in the Middle Ages, focusing on John of Salisbury, a later bishop of Chartres.

MacKenney, Loren Carey. Bishop Fulbert and Education at the School of Chartres. Notre Dame, Ind.: Mediaeval Institute, University of Notre Dame, 1957. A discussion of education in the Middle Ages, in particular at the School of Chartres.

Querido, René M. The Golden Age of Chartres: The Teachings of a Mystery School and the Eternal Feminine. New York: Anthroposophic Press, 1987. An analysis of the intellectual life and school at Chartres. Bibliography and index.