This book aims at establishing that Abelard's ethical theory has to be considered from a theological point of view. Georges complains that Abelard is still seen as a champion of reason in the perspective of Bernard of Clairvaux, even if this judgement has now gained a positive connotation (p. 15). Consequently, he wants ‘to sharpen the theological perspective which coins fundamentally Abelard's ethics’ (p. 16) and aims at refuting the understanding of Abelard as a philosopher who works with a reason which is independent of the Christian faith (p. 21). Indeed, Georges believes that just by demonstrating this theological point of view, ‘current patterns of interpretation as e.g. the understanding of his ethics as a precursor of Kant's ethics’ can be questioned (p. 16). This means that Georges sees Abelard not just as a theologian, but as a theologian assuming the primacy and independence of theology which is typical of modern Protestant approaches. This is questionable in the case of a thinker like Abelard, a philosopher by profession, who intended to elucidate theological questions by rational arguments and who did not hesitate to identify a Christian ‘divinitas’ with a pagan ‘ethics’. If such a thinker, as Georges himself points out regarding Abelard (p. 21), does not make a sharp distinction between philosophy and theology, this can only mean that his theology, whatever its merits, is deeply rooted in a philosophical conception, the understanding of which is crucial for grasping the author's theological point. Thus, one can ask from the outset whether Abelard is treated here from an adequate point of view.

In the main part of the volume Georges interprets Abelard's Collationes, his Ethics, his Commentary on Romans and his letter 8 (the rule for the paraclete). While he is therefore using the three standard sources for interpreting of Abelard's ethics, he does not – strangely for a theologian – take into account his three Theologiae, which are regarded even by philosophical thinkers (De Siano, Marenbon, Perkams) as crucial for Abelard's ethics. The interpretation of each of the four works treated begins with a long introduction which for the Collationes is barely shorter than the commentary on the text. This is unnecessary for the introduction does not shed any new light on the works in question; it is simply repetitive. Where he deviates, cautiously, on the dating of the Collationes, which he prefers to see in the 1130s rather than in the 1120s (pp. 74–8), his argument seems insubstantial.

The interpretation of the works itself may be summarised only briefly in this review. Georges's approach to the Collationes is dominated by Abelard's identification of ‘vera ethica’ with ‘divinitas’ which Georges understands as a ‘deeply theological discipline’ (p. 98); this is, however, only partly true, because the object of the whole dialogue is the philosophical concept ‘summum bonum’, which is redefined by the Christian mostly with rational arguments. While interpreting the Commentary on Romans Georges argues, among other things, for God's will as the measure of goodness. It is interesting to note that his interpretation at p. 181 n. 122, rests on the same quotation that this reviewer cited in support of a contrary reading (‘Liebe als Zentralbegriff der Ethik’, 113). I am still convinced, however, that Abelard's statement ‘non enim aliter bonum a malo discernere possumus, nisi quod eius [i.e. dei] consentaneum voluntati’ (Commentary on Romans 168, 506–8 [Buytaert edn]) recall that God's will is important for man because it helps man in his wish to find out what is good and bad: man does not need God's will in order to identify the distinction between good and bad (he knows this through natural reason [Commentary on Romans 208, 718–21]), but he can have confidence in God's will having ordered everything in the best possible way. Furthermore, the goodness of God's will itself depends upon God's own adherence to the good, which thus precedes even God's own will (cf., for example, Theol. schol. 514, 449–51 [Buytaert/Mews edn]). This fact shows not only the consequences of ignoring the Theologies while interpreting Abelard's ethics, but also a certain amount of naïveté regarding the complexity of Abelard's attempt to integrate different currents of thought – Augustinian theology, Boethian logic, Stoic ethics – in a coherent system held together by deeply-rooted philosophical presuppositions.

In his conclusion, Georges stresses that Scripture is ‘central for Abelard's especially ethical theory’ (p. 271) and that Abelard's doctrine of ‘peccatum’ is well suited to do justice to the concept of original sin because of the dynamics of sin in individual human beings (p. 279). Those discussions are interesting because the topics treated are often neglected by Abelardian scholars. But other, more traditional, questions about Abelard's theology are not adequately treated, for example in particular, Abelard's alleged Pelagianism and theological rationalism.

This book, then, is not the great study of Abelard's theology many scholars are waiting for. One can still, fortunately, rely on Richard Weingart's monograph which gives a much more vivid impression of the complex theological thinker who developed out of Peter Abelard the logician.