Saint Albert Facts: Details Revealed On The Greatest German Philosopher

Great Saint Albert the Great ('Albertus Magnus') was born in 1200 in Swabia, which is today the home of Stuttgart, southern Germany.

Albertus was the wealthy lord's eldest son. He attended the Universities of Padua and Paris, which was the intellectual capital of Western Europe. Saint Albert the Great entered the Dominican Order and was the first German Dominican friar to get a master's degree in theology in the middle ages.

St. Albert the great rose to prominence as one of his generation's most distinguished scholars. He was a pioneer in exposing Aristotle's writings to Western philosophy.

He was the first person to employ the inductive way of thinking. Saint Albert the Great was also a distinguished natural science scholar and researcher who studied animals, plants, insects, birds, plants, and minerals.

In geography, mathematics, physics, astronomy, chemistry, minerals, biology, scripture, philosophy, and theology, his 40 volumes of publications served as an encyclopedia of human knowledge at the time. He was known as 'Saint Albert the Great' ('Albertus Magnus') and a 'universal doctor' by his contemporaries.

In Cologne, he was a student of Thomas Aquinas. Pope Pius XI canonized Albert der Grosse. He displayed friendship in his work called 'De bono.'

Saint Albert: Life History

Great Saint Albert was a Doctor of the Catholic Church and the patron saint of philosophers and scientists.

Philosophical students know him as Thomas Aquinas' master. Albert's effort to understand Aristotle's writings set the milieu in which Thomas Aquinas built his synthesis of Greek knowledge and Christian theology.

On the other hand, Albert deserves to be recognized as an inquisitive, honest, and hardworking scholar on his own merits. He was the eldest son of a prominent and wealthy German lord.

Albert had a liberal arts education in Germany. Despite strong opposition from his family, he joined the Dominican novitiate and became the first German Dominican friar to get a master's degree in theology by entering the Dominican order.

Due to his insatiable curiosity, he decided to compile all knowledge, including natural science, rhetoric, logic, mathematics, ethics, politics, astronomy, medieval science, economics, and metaphysics. It took him 20 years to develop his explanation of learning.

'Our goal,' he explained, 'is to make all of the parts mentioned above of knowledge understandable to Latins0". He was sent to the Dominican convent to study.

He accomplished his goal while working as a teacher in Cologne and Paris (western Europe) to teach theology, as a Dominican provincial, and as the pastor of Regensburg for a brief period of time.

He followed the ways of lecturing on sentences of Peter Lombard. Albert spent his last time supporting the work of his student Thomas Aquinas.

He supported the mendicant commands in Germany and Bohemia and preached the Crusade. During his later years, he traveled from Cologne on two long excursions.

He spoke in favor of recognizing Rudolf of Habsburg as German king in the second Assembly of Lyon, France, in 1274.

In 1277, he journeyed to Paris to preserve the excellent reputation and works of Thomas Aquinas, who'd already died only a few years previously, and to uphold some Aristotelian concepts that he and Thomas both believed to be true. Albert died at 74 years of age.

Saint Albert: Contribution To Society

The path to expertise by revelation and belief was differentiated by Saint Albert the Great, the patron saint, from the path to knowledge by science and philosophy. The latter followed the authorities of the history according to their competence. Still, it also used observation and progressed to the highest degrees of abstract concept by reason and intellect.

These two paths are not mutually exclusive for Saint Albert the Great; there is no 'double truth,' one truth for belief and a contradictory reality for reason. All that is genuinely true is brought together in perfect harmony.

Although some mysteries can only be understood via faith, some aspects of Christian teaching can be understood through both faith and reason, such as the doctrine of the individual soul's immortality.

Albertus became well-known as a result of his talks and publications. He became as famous as the Arabian scholars Avicenna and Averroes and Aristotle himself. Albertus was regarded as 'the most distinguished of Christian intellectuals' by Roger Bacon, an English Literary scholar who wasn't particularly fond of him.

Saint Albert: Known For

The work of St Albert the Great encompasses the entirety of European knowledge at the time, including philosophy, natural sciences, theology, and scientific sciences. His significance for medieval science stems primarily from his promotion of Aristotelianism over reactionary tendencies in contemporary theology.

On the other hand, he granted Neoplatonic speculation the most latitude, maintained by his follower Ulrich of Strasbourg and the German spiritualists of the 14th century, without feeling any contradiction. However, via his writings on natural sciences, he had the most impact.

St Albertus must be recognized as a one-of-a-kind figure in his day for making Aristotelian understanding of nature accessible and available, as well as for enriching it with his findings in all disciplines of natural science. Because of this feat, he has been given a prominent role in the history of science.

His relics are present at Dominican St. Andreas Church in the Roman sarcophagus.

He is credited for discovering the element arsenic and experimenting with photosensitive compounds such as silver nitrate.

Books Based On Saint Albert

The books based on him are 'St Albert the Great: Champion of faith and reason' and 'Saint Albert by Tardif OMI, Emile.'

The book written by him is called 'On cleaving to God.'