Joachim of Fiore

Joachim of Fiore (also: Joachim of Fiori, Gioacchino da Fiore, J. of Flore de Flore, of Flora; * to 1130/1135 in Celico, Calabria, † 1202 in San Giovanni in Fiore ) was abbot and founder of the Order in Calabria and appeared in the 12th century as a historical theologian.

Life

Joachim of Fiore was born around 1130/35, the son of a notary in Celico (Calabria ). Initially, he worked on his parents' efforts as a notary in Cosenza and at the office at the court of William I in Palermo.

But this he soon left in order to pursue a religious life. So he made 1166/67 a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and visited Jerusalem. After arguing with his father about his future career as a preacher and hermit Joachim moved about the country, first spent some time on the hill Guarassano at Cosenza, and then near the Cistercian monastery Sambucina di Luzzi. In Rende, he was ordained by the Bishop of Catanzaro priest. Only now he joined a religious community: he entered the monastery of Corazzo. After he became Prior, he retired to the monastery of the Holy Trinity in Acri after Sambucina back, and only on the basis of the request of church dignitaries, he returned as abbot back to Corazzo. He headed the monastery from 1171 to 1177 and led there a Cistercian rule. 1183/84 he stayed in Casamari monastery and began the psaltery decem chorus about which he finished in Petralata (Calabria ) 1187/88. After he had sought in 1183 to the Curia for permission to be allowed to write about the revelation ( revelatio ), he was commissioned by Pope Clement III. 1188 permission to exclusively devote himself to his hermeneutical studies. To this end, he withdrew into the Sila mountains. However, the Cistercian General Chapter called him back to 1192 Corazzo. Instead, however, he founded a new monastery of San Giovanni in Fiore, over which he presided as abbot. At one Easter morning 1190-1195 he received his decisive enlightenment while meditating on the Apocalypse of John. In the period around 1190 drops his founding of the Florenser Order. Joachim of Fiore probably died in 1202 ( less likely in 1205 ) in San Giovanni in Sila.

Teaching

Significance is Joachim of Fiore mainly because of his view of history and his exegetical method, in which he prefers the typological- historical, the allegorical interpretations of Scripture. The historical course of the Old and New Testaments, he indicated in a salvation-historical sense. The story is divided into three periods, which he brings to the Trinity in conjunction: The Father's Age (Old Testament), the son (starts with the New Testament and ends after his prediction in 1260 ), and the Holy Spirit. This third, happy era will be enlightened by the intelligentia spiritualis and all the joys of the heavenly Jerusalem ( Revelation 21 ) offer. The last, the Third Age, is at the center of the joachimitischen of history. This era is also called the Third Reich ( see millenarianism ). The Third Age is preceded by the arrival of the Antichrist, which is then defeated by a religious personality. So identified some Joachimite Franciscan St. Francis because of his stigmata as age - Christ. His teaching is also referred to by the term " three-time teaching."

Joachim of Fiore accused Peter Lombard, he was introduced alongside the Father, Son and Holy Spirit or the Trinity as fourth collective unity and thus a Quaternitas. This thesis Joachim was sentenced at the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 as heresy, however, taken the monastery founded by Joachim in protection. In 1254 some of his other teachings were checked, but he was never condemned by the Church as a heretic personally, even if posthumously fake Bible Commentaries should damage his reputation. His teachings spread very rapidly for several decades after his death. In addition to the Joachimismus especially the so-called Pseudojoachimismus gained great influence. Especially the Franciscan order in the 13th century took on Joachimite ideas. The group of Joachimiten developed after the death of Joachim's always more as a cult and the teachings of the group had evolved primarily as a spin-off of the Franciscan Spirituals flow, were by Pope Alexander IV in 1256, officially condemned.

Work

His ideas found in the late 13th and 14th centuries, a strong appeal and spread quickly. They also influenced Dante Alighieri, probably via the spirituale flow of the Franciscans, who then took up also Joachim of Fiore in his Divine Comedy. Just as he was to the Franciscan Spirituals, so you can also its influence on the Anabaptists of the Reformation period, for example, in Thomas Müntzer and finally in Lessing's Education of the Human Race, as well as in Hegel, Auguste Comte, Karl Marx and Ernst Bloch's Principle see hope.

Joseph Ratzinger, the former Pope Benedict XVI. , Is a leading specialist Joachim decades. In his habilitation thesis in 1956, The Theology of History in St. Bonaventure, ( printed in 1959, reissued in 1993 and 2009), he dealt with the reception of Joachim's theology of history by Bonaventura. This was as Minister General of the Franciscan Order confronted with arguments about the role that had attributed some Order members St. Francis of Assisi in Joachim's theory of the three ages. In the second edition of the lexicon of Theology and Church Ratzinger wrote in 1960 the article " Joachim of Fiore " and stressed Joachim was not set anti-hierarchical, with Saint Benedict of Nursia, the spirit era had begun, according to Joachim.

The main works of Joachim of Fiore Concordia novi et veteris Testamenti, Expositio in Apocalypsim, psaltery decem choir about Tractatus super quatuor Evangelia, De articulis Fidei, Adversus Iudeos and the unfinished Vita S. St. Benedict.