Medieval Disputation: Assessments That Preserve Civilization
The History of Assessment Series
By Emily Andrews
Estimated Reading Time: 7 minutes
When teachers set out to create a test, it is common for them to have in mind the future of their test-takers. But what about the future of the content being tested?
The medieval period is remarkable for the intensity with which scholars and educators went about reconciling the truth they inherited from pagan civilizations with the Truth of the Gospel. Between the 11th and 14th centuries, the study of logic and dialectic grew in popularity, resulting in the birth of Scholasticism, which utilized the tools passed down by Aristotle and other ancient masters for the purpose of harmonizing all knowledge into a unified whole.
In the centuries that spanned the collapse of ancient civilization and the spread of Christianity, the responsibility of cultivating intellectual virtue fell primarily to the Church. Hastings Rashdall, in his seminal study, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, writes, “With the progress of the barbarian invasions, the old Imperial and municipal Schools had everywhere disappeared: their place had been taken by the episcopal and monastic Schools which the imperative needs of the Church had called into existence.” (1) In order to preserve and hand down the teachings of the Church, authorities needed to be equipped to read Scripture and the Church Fathers with understanding, as well as expound those teachings to laypeople with clarity. Therefore, it was in the best interest of the Church to ensure that the tradition of the liberal arts endured, even in the midst of adversity.
Dialectic as the Path to Truth
Among the ecclesiastics who maintained an interest in classic literature, their approach is best characterized by Augustine’s famous “plundering the Egyptians” metaphor. In his formulation, taking what is useful from ancient learning is akin to the Israelites accepting heathen gold on their way out of captivity. Pagan wisdom must be distinguished from “false and superstitious fancies and heavy burdens of unnecessary toil,” and then Christians must use the materials for “their proper use in preaching the gospel.” (2) Because all truth belongs to God, any grasp on reality achieved by ancient masters can be safely integrated into a Christian understanding of the world.
The process of integration, however, was one that unfolded slowly over time – and can be said to continue to this day. Discerning truth from falsehood has always proved more challenging than human beings are prone to admit. It was for that reason that the Scholastics employed the rigorous art of dialectic in their investigations.
There is no better way to glimpse the form dialectic took in the late Middle Ages than to scan almost any page from the corpus of Thomas Aquinas. His Summa Theologica, for example, is composed of a series of propositions, followed by arguments for and against each proposition, with accompanying evidence to support those arguments. Each section then ends with a resolution that synthesizes the two seemingly contradictory sides of the question into a unified understanding of truth.
The writings of Aquinas reflect in written form a practice that was performed orally in the Universities called disputatio. Here we find the origins of the dissertation defense as it exists in universities today. However, students were examined on a broad range of knowledge, not just one specialized area of research. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy takes their definition of disputation from Bernardo Bazán, who described it as “a regular form of teaching, apprenticeship and research, presided over by a master, characterized by a dialectical method which consists of bringing forward and examining arguments based on reason and authority which oppose one another on a given theoretical or practical problem and which are furnished by participants, and where the master must come to a doctrinal solution by an act of determination which confirms him in his function as master.”
Disputation as a Bridge Between Past, Present, and Future
At the inception of the university system, assessments were conducted as formalized dialogues. But unlike the dialogues of Socrates, those who wished to become Masters were required to reconcile conflicting statements in order to provide a positive answer to the question at hand. They looked deeply into all possible perspectives on a significant question, and then exercised discrimination to adopt and defend a conviction of their own. Candidates were thoroughly interrogated by other Masters to prove not only their familiarity with a body of knowledge, but the quality of their thinking and argumentation as well.
John of Salisbury, an English grammarian, lived in the 12th century and studied in Paris under Abelard, the father of early Scholasticism. In the Policraticus, he writes, “The first task of man aspiring to wisdom is the consideration of what he himself is: what is within him, what without, what below, what above, what opposite, what before, and what after.” (3) By engaging in rigorous dialectical inquiry, medieval students came to understand their relationship to the world around them. But the effect of understanding themselves in this way was that they were then equipped to act as a bridge between what came “before” and “what after.”
In sifting through the wisdom of the past and establishing connections to Universal Truth, these scholars carried the Great Tradition of learning in the West into the future. They did this primarily by ensuring that the tradition did not remain a stagnant artifact. Not only did they enliven dead knowledge with the flame of eternal Truth, but the tradition also took on their particular flavor as it passed through their hands. By engaging in conversation with past authorities, they made the tradition their own and preserved it as a living entity that could speak to their needs in the present and inform the lives of future generations in years to come. In the same way, today’s classical movement holds that every generation must wrestle anew with the tradition, reconciling past and present understanding while submitting all to the final standard of timeless Truth.
Assessment as a Safeguard for the Tradition
The early Universities were so convinced of the importance of this kind of assessment, that they barred anyone who had not been submitted to such interrogation from teaching at the higher level. Rashdall chronicles the history of the jus ubique docendi, the custom by which the three oldest universities (Salerno, Bologna and Paris) granted its graduates “the right to teach everywhere.”(4) Any who had not received this right were subject to examination by the authorities of the institution where they wished to teach before they could offer instruction.
Consequently, disputation served not only as a pathway to truth, but as its safeguard. Not just anyone received the privilege of handing down the tradition. Assessment in this sense was not only practiced for the sake of the student, the society, or the university – it was practiced to preserve wisdom herself.
In contemplating medieval dialectic, it becomes clear that a truly meaningful assessment must maintain a high standard because the very soul of civilization depends upon it. A true test must challenge a student’s understanding to make sure it contains depth and complexity, or at least the capacity to attain further depth and complexity. To diminish the weight of Truth through misrepresenting a student’s progress is to endanger humanity’s access to the very thing that gives our lives purpose and meaning.
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(1.) Hastings Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, Volume 1: Salerno, Bologna, Paris (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1895), 26.
(2.) Augustine, from On Christian Doctrine, in The Great Tradition, ed. Richard Gamble (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2008), pg. 226.
(3.) John of Salisbury from the Policraticus, in The Great Tradition, ed. Richard Gamble (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2008), pg. 269.
(4.) Rashdall, The Universities of Europe in the Middle Ages, 12-17.
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Emily Andrews is the Marketing Content Manager for CLT. She lives with her husband and daughter in Spokane, WA and enjoys hoarding books, eating good meals, and failing to complete crossword puzzles.
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Published on 28th August 2026.