This lesser known saint loved Greek philosophy
His work became a resource for many writers into the Middle Ages
By Tony Staley
Compass Editor
St. Severinus Boethius is one of those saints most people have probably never heard of. Yet, as the first scholastic theologian, he played an important role for centuries of theological thinking in the church.
So who was this sixth century saint?
Ancius Manlius Severinus Boethius was born in Rome. His father, Flavius Manlius Boethius, was a consul or chief magistrate in 487. After Boethius' parents died, Q. Aurelius Symmachus raised Boethius and eventually married him to his daughter, Rusticiana.
Boethius' love for learning began as a child. As an adult, he devoted himself to translating all of Plato and Aristotle from Greek into Latin and reconciling their philosophies. He never realized the latter goal, but he did translate all of the two philosophers' works, as well as the writings of Archimedes, Euclid, Ptolemy and Pythagoras. His efforts provided a valuable resource for the theologians and philosophers of the Middle Ages.
Boethius also was knowledgeable in astronomy, logic, music and theology and wrote several theological works that still exist, including De Sancta Trinitate.
Plato's belief that philosophers made the best governors convinced Boethius to enter public life. Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths (493-526), made Boethius a consul in 510 and a dozen years later also appointed Boethius' two sons as consuls.
Eventually, Theodoric gave Boethius even more power, until one day Theodoric had Boethius arrested for defending Consul Albinus, who had been accused of conspiring with Justin, the Eastern Emperor, to overthrow the Ostrogoth rulers.
Theodoric accused Boethius of treason and sacrilege for an alleged misuse of astronomy. For the next nine months, he was held prisoner at Pavia, near Milan. While there he wrote The Consolation of Philosophy, his most famous work. He wrote it as a dialogue between himself and philosophy. In it, he wrote that earthly success is fleeting, so we need to concentrate on the eternal truths of the divine.
In The Consolation of Philosophy, Boethius wrote: "Hope is not placed in God in vain and prayers are not made in vain, for if they are the right kind they cannot but be efficacious. Avoid vice, therefore, and cultivate virtue, lift up your mind to the right kind of hope, and put forth humble prayers on high."
After nine months in prison, Theodoric had Boethius tortured and killed. But his work lived on as a valuable resource for centuries of medieval theologians.
Sources: Dictionary of Saints, Lives of the Saints and Voices of the Saints
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