Roger Marston (c. 1235-1303) was an English Franciscan theologian who studied in Paris in the 1270s, when the challenge coming from Aristotle’s philosophical works was reaching fever pitch in the university. He returned to England and became a doctor of theology at Oxford where he left a significant collection of Disputed and Quodlibetal Questions dealing with the inner operations of the triune God and with creation, with the fallen nature of man and the limitations of his natural powers, especially the will as a remedial agent, and with the nature of the soul, knowledge and freedom. He is considered a significant voice in the Franciscan school, which provided him with a strong collection of influential Franciscan companions, including St. Bonaventure, Richard of Mediavilla, William of Ware, Matthew of Aquasparta and his immediate teacher, John Pecham. This movement represented in a significant way the Augustinian tradition as it faced the alternative Christian Aristotelian vision of reality, presented mainly by Thomas Aquinas.
Roger Marston, as witnessed by the manuscripts of his works, was an English Franciscan. During his lifetime, more than 32 English parishes, towns and townships carried the name ‘‘Marston,’’ so modern scholars debate the exact location that bequeathed him his name. The lists of Franciscan lectors at Oxford and Cambridge and of Franciscan Provincial Ministers, his own declarations, and his many references to the writings of other Franciscans establish his membership in the Order of Friars Minor. It is quite likely that Roger was born around 1235. After joining the Franciscans and completing his novitiate year, he studied theology for three or four years at an English studium before going on to Paris. He was in Paris for the school year 1269-1270 and spent his years there as a bachelor of theology, returning to England before the school year 1276-1277. He incepted at Oxford, and was known as a doctor of Oxford and Cambridge, not Paris. Most recent scholarship places him in Cambridge during the academic years 1276-1278 and ties his inception at Oxford to the school year 1281-1282. After teaching at Oxford, he was elected the 13th Provincial Minister of the English province in 1292, an office he held until 1298. With sparse evidence to support it, he is supposed to have spent his last years as guardian at Norwich and to have died there in 1303.
There is also only slight evidence that Roger wrote a commentary on Peter Lombard’s Sentences before he became a Master of Theology. However, manuscript references to it are vague and no text has been found. All of Roger’s literary productions are magisterial works: Disputed Questions and Quodlibet Questions. His Disputed Questions have been gathered and edited under three titles: De aeterna emanatione, De statu naturae lapsae and De anima. De aeterna emanatione (On the Eternal Emanation) is a collection of seven questions, which center on the inner operations of the divine nature considered in itself and in comparison to the origin of creation, and also on the generation of the Son and the production of the Holy Spirit within the Godhead. De statu naturae lapsae (On the State of Fallen Nature), limited to two questions, examines whether man was created with a faulty nature or whether his present condition is due to an inheritance derived from a fall from the original state of nature, and then asks whether man can attain rightness of will on the basis of his own natural powers. The ten-question treatise, De anima (On the Soul), treats a wide variety of puzzles dealing with the nature of the soul and its faculties of intellect and will, including self-knowledge, the sources of our knowledge of all things, and the challenges to human freedom. The De anima questions depend on Matthew of Aquasparta’s De cognitione (On Knowledge), disputed in 1278-1279, and on Henry of Ghent’s Quodli-bet V(1280). The Disputed Questions, then, seem to be the product of Roger’s work as a Master at Oxford. Henry of Ghent’s various Quodlibeta, along with other sources, also provide clues to the dating of Roger’s four Quodlibets. The latest research places Roger’s Quodlibet I before Easter 1282, Quodlibet II before Easter 1283, Quodlibet III before Christmas 1283 and Quodlibet IV during Lent 1284. All of Marston’s surviving works thus fall within the academic years 1282-1284 when he was teaching at the studium of St. Anthony in Oxford.
The principal sources outside the Franciscan order employed by Marston were St. Augustine, St. Anselm, Richard of St. Victor, Robert Grosseteste, Thomas Aquinas and Henry of Ghent. Roger borrows abundantly from St. Augustine for both his theology and philosophy, especially for his theory of science and his judgments concerning the insufficiency and errors of the philosophers in regard to the knowledge of God and even of the world. Using the words of Augustine, Marston praised Plato and Aristotle ‘‘who knew many things concerning the one God.’’ Yet, echoing Augustine, and in this case Roger Bacon also, he noted that ‘‘all philosophers erred in something.’’ For instance, because they had a false view of man’s ultimate end, they fell short in their view of truth and also in their way of living. He warned ‘‘philosophizing’’ theologians, ‘‘drunk with philosophic nectar,’’ not to mix the wine of Sacred Scripture with the water of worldly philosophy. Speaking of the immortality of the soul, Roger says: ‘‘I believe firmly that the arguments of the Saints are much more efficacious than all philosophic statements, even though in regard to this matter the same truths are affirmed by the Fathers and the philosophers.’’ He refers to St. Anselm and Richard of St. Victor as his teachers and he follows them as the faithful interpreters of St. Augustine. He considered Robert Grosseteste as the Commentator of Pseudo-Dionysius and cites in all cases his translations of the Angelic Hierarchy, the Divine Names and Mystical Theology. He also employed the Bishop of Lincoln’s commentaries in disputing Richard of
Mediavilla’s interpretation of St. Augustine’s illumination theory of knowledge. He bears great respect for the subtlety of Thomas Aquinas, but, like many of his contemporary Franciscan colleagues, he judged him to be one of the ‘‘philosophizing’’ theologians who abandoned St. Augustine’s teachings and dedicated themselves too much to worldly philosophy. He also criticized Pelagian leanings he found in Aquinas’ early writings, though he noted that Thomas either retracted or contextualized his positions on grace and will in his later works. Marston praised Henry of Ghent, whose Quodlibet questions served as a major source for Roger’s four Quodlibeta. He praised his deep philosophical knowledge, noting that he had been steeped in it since infancy. He criticized some of his theories concerning human knowledge and the plurality of forms in man, but these criticisms must be read carefully, since for the most part, he is criticizing Henry as his teachings are presented by opponents, such as William of Ware.
Roger’s main Franciscan sources were Alexander of Hales, St. Bonaventure, Richard of Mediavilla, William of Ware, Eustachius of Arras, William de la Mare, Matthew of Aquasparta, and beyond all, his teacher, John Pecham. These authors held many positions in common, so that they have been considered by many historians of medieval philosophy and theology as a unity, usually described as ‘‘the Franciscan School.’’ Among their common philosophical doctrines are the primacy of the will, the plurality of forms and the theory of divine illumination. In the sixth of the Disputed Questions on the ‘‘De anima,” Roger followed Matthew of Aquasparta as he attempted to show how in contemplation the will added a further dimension of savoring experience to whatever is attained by the intellect. The plurality of forms, stressing the increasing developments of living things, was rooted in the teachings of Alexander of Hales and St. Bonaventure, but its explanation was brought to full strength by Mar-ston in the criticisms of the unity of form position of Thomas Aquinas as presented by John Pecham and William de la Mare. In the third of his Disputed Questions on the ‘‘De anima’’, Marston, following Matthew of Acquasparta, acknowledged how the material content of our knowledge arises from the senses, but that the certainty of our knowledge needs a different ground, i. e., illumination by the eternal reasons, to provide its guarantee. In these matters where the late thirteenth-century Franciscans share common positions, in whole or in part, Marston is known for his long citations from fellow Franciscans, especially John Pecham, and is even accused by some modern historians of plagiarism. The editors of His Disputed Questions admitted that ‘‘not rarely’’ do we see long citations from St. Bonaventure, Matthew of Aquasparta and John Pecham in his works. However, the editors of the Quodlibeta caution us not to read ‘‘not rarely’’ as identical with ‘‘always,’’ ‘‘on the whole,’’ or ‘‘quasi word for word.’’ To see his originality amid this commonness, it is necessary to note also the differences and to read Marston with exceptional care.
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