Thirteenth-century Christian doctrine held that faith must not be rationally provable

Evidence

The Dominican missionary strategy was in line with developing thirteenthcentury doctrine, which increasingly affirmed that the truth of Christianity could not rationally be proven, for if it could, there would be no merit in faith (in the oft-evoked words of Pope Gregory I). Reason was an arm that could be used offensively to prove the “irrationality” of rival creeds or defensively to defend Christianity against the charge of irrationality, but it could not prove the Christian truth, for faith was indispensable. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 1220

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the ongoing theme of medieval apologetics and the anti-Islamic polemic tradition in this book; also parallels modern debates about whether apologetics concedes ground by engaging on reason’s terms.
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: how did the 1231 prohibition on Aristotle’s scientific works in Paris relate to the growing Greco-Arabic philosophical influence — and did it create the very intellectual armature later used against Islam?