Roman Law Without Greek Philosophy: A Hard Way Towards a Beginning of Dogmatic Jurisprudence

The article analyzes the features of the reception of Roman law in Europe from the 5^th to the 12^th centuries. It is emphasized that both Greek logic and Roman law, as inherent elements of the cultural heritage of Antiquity, did not fit well with the early-Christian cultural basics. Therefore, these areas of secular knowledge had not remained in the focus of intellectual research and development for a long time. Logic, being represented by very few translated and commented Greek works, was not in demand as a meaningful intellectual technology. And without a fully developed logical apparatus, Roman law could only be explored as a set of Antique literature texts, i.e. via very scarce instruments reduced to rhetoric and grammar only. From the institutional point of view, that attitude to law and the methods of its intellectual development give grounds to call the period under consideration the era of “law without lawyers”. In other words, due to “stigmatization” of Greek logic (and rationality in general), Roman law existed as a set of “silent” texts, which available methods of comprehension could only reveal as literature, and not as a system of legal constructions. During the so-called Renaissance of the 12^th century, there was a radical re-evaluation of rationality as a basic value of culture, which was manifested, among other things, in the “rehabilitation” of Greek logic. First of all, it affected Aristotle’s logic, which became an intellectual tool that made it possible to create a basis for lasting tradition of European law and legal science, deeply rooted in Roman jurisprudence. It is concluded that the specific features of the reception of Roman law during the early medieval period of the history of legal thought may be regarded as an illustration and particular case of a general rule – full apperception of Roman legal tradition (and probably any legal tradition) is possible only if rationality receives the grade of the highest value of culture. 

Keywords: reception of Roman law, rationality, logic, juridical constructions, glossators, Irnerius, Aristotle, Renaissance of the 12^th century, education, Christianity