St. Anselm was the founder of Scholasticism, a philosophical school of thought that dominated the Middle Ages. He was recognized in modern times as the originator of the ontological argument for the existence of God (based on the idea of an absolutely perfect being, the fact of the idea being in itself a demonstration of existence).
Anselm’s mother, Ermenberga, belonged to a noble Burgundian family and possessed considerable property. His father, Gondolfo, was a Lombard nobleman who intended that Anselm would make a career of politics and did not approve of his early decision to enter the monastic life. Anselm received an excellent Classical education and was considered one of the better Latinists of his day. In 1057 Anselm left Aosta to enter the Benedictine monastery at Bec. In 1060 or 1061 he took his monastic vows. He was elected prior of the monastery after Lanfranc became abbot of Caen in 1063. In 1078 he became abbot of Bec.
Under Anselm, Bec became a centre of monasic learning and some heological questioning. Anselm continued his efforts to satisfactorily answer questions concerning the nature and existence of God. His Proslogium (“Address,” or Allocution”), originally itled Fides quaerens intelectum (“Faith Seeking Understanding”), estabished the ontological argument for the exisence of God. In it he argued that even a fool has an idea of a being greater than which no other being can be conceived to exist; that such a being must really exist, for the very idea of such a being implies its existence.
Anselm was named archbishop of Canterbury by William II Rufus, the son and successor of William the Conqueror, in March 1093. Anselm accepted the position somewhat reluctantly but with an intention of reforming the English Church. Anselm later became a major figure in the investiture controversy; i.e., over the question as to whether a secular ruler (e.g., emperor or king) or the pope had the primary right to invest an ecclesiastical authority, such as a bishop, with the symbols of his office.Anselm spent the last two years of his life in peace. In 1163, with new canons requiring approvals for canonization (official recognition of persons as saints), Archbishop Thomas Becket of Canterbury (1118?–1170) referred Anselm’s cause to Rome.
Anselm was probably canonized at this time, for the Canterbury records for 1170 make frequent mention of the pilgrimages to his new shrine in the cathedral. For several centuries he was venerated locally. Clement XI (pope from 1700 to 1721) declared Anselm a doctor (teacher) of the church in 1720.
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