WRITING AUTHORITY IN LATE MEDIEVAL ... - Cornell University

communicability from which infidels—by virtue of their absolute alterity from the faithful—are
hopelessly excluded.
Under Hostiensis’s arguments, the Christian community works as a type of
deconstructive state, where the authority of law is guaranteed through the radical difference of
one being to another by virtue of speech. As an alternative, Vladimiri’s Opinio makes a full
defense of the law’s “dominium” ‘authority’ as a universal quality outside ontological
distinctions. He argues that sovereignty extends to Christians and non-Christians alike because it
is applicable to all of the Lord’s sheep regardless of their subjective relation towards the
discourse of grace:
Prima conclusio. Licet infideles non sint de ovili Ecclesiae, omnes tamen sunt oves Christi, sine
dubio secundum creationem; Ioannis, x: alias oves habeo, quae non sunt de hoc ovili, scilicet
Ecclessiae. Innocentius. Secunda. Verba ad personam Petri prolata voce Dominica, videlicet:
Pasce oves meas, accipienda sunt pro omnibus: fidelibus et infidelibus indistincte. Et ideo Petri
successor debet, non solum pascere, sed etiam eas defendere et, quibus paterna provisione tenetur
consulere, non debet impugnare vel laedi permittere nisi causa rationalibis id exposcat. Ratio: quia
non debent inde iniuriae procedere unde iura nascuntur; De natis ex libero ventre, c. unico.
Innocentius[…]Quinta. Non licet infidelibus, etiam Romanum imperium non recognoscentibus
auferre dominia sua, possessiones, vel iurisdictiones; quia sine peccato et Deo auctore ea
possident: qui creavit haec indifferenter propter hominem, quem formavit ad suam imaginem.
Unde: omnia subiecit sub pedibus eius, oves et boves universas, etc. Beatus Thomas, Innocentius,
et communiter alii.
First conclusion. Let it be granted that the infidels are not from the flock of the Church;
nevertheless, all are sheep of Christ, without doubt according to creation. John x: Other sheep I
have, which are not from this flock, namely the Church (Innocent.) Second, the words spoken by
the Lordly voice to the person of Peter, namely: “Feed my sheep,” must be taken as everyone
without distinction: the faithful and the infidel. And even the successor of Peter should, not only
feed, but also defend them, and he is held to care for them with paternal provision; he should not
fight or permit them to be hurt unless a rational cause requires it. Reason: because from whence
rights are born, there should not come injury; (On births from the free womb, Single Chapter,
Innocent) […] Fifth. It is not permitted even to the Roman Empire to take the possessions,
lordship, or jurisdiction from the non-recognizant infidels; because without sin, they possess these
from God as author: who created these things indifferently on account of man, which he formed to
his image. From whence: he has subjected “all things under his feet, all the sheep and cows, etc.”
(Blessed Thomas, Innocent, and commonly others) [My emphasis]. 83
Following Innocent, Vladimiri reads Jesus’s command to Peter “pasce oves meas” ‘feed my
sheep’ as a commanding the church to care for all humans, “fidelibus et infidelibus indistincte”
83 Belch 2.869-870.
49