From description to prescription: Twelfth-century medicine for psychological and social health.

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This dissertation is an examination of five books on human psychology written between 1135 and 1210: William of St. Thierry's De natura ivrporis el animae, Aelred of Rievaulx's De anima, Isaac of Stella's Epistola de anima, Helinand of Froidmont's De cognitione sui, and an anonymous work entitled De spirilu et anima. In it, Walker argues that the authors of these texts shared a similar view of the mind and taught that a better understanding of psychology lay at the heart of efforts to improve mental, social and spiritual health.
Walker explains that all five books are libri de anima or "books on the soul" and that their authors placed the seat of the mind in the immaterial and immortal substance of soul, teaching that man's soul is made in the image of God and operates within the body as God operates within the world, or a king within his kingdom---i.e., by "animating" the body social or politic. Accordingly, soul was possessed (literally) by individuals and (metaphorically) by their institutions, states and societies, with the result that the health of individuals and collectives was discussed using identical language.
From here, Walker goes on to describe the exact structure of the soul and the essentially hierarchical nature of twelfth-century psycho-civic metaphor as a necessary prelude to uncovering the methods prescribed for optimizing inward health (i.e., soul-health). Through close examination of the texts, Walker argues that one can separate out descriptive and prescriptive psychology by identifying the structures of the mind discussed in the texts and then identifying the authors' ethical prescriptions---prescriptions which are also, in effect, psychological and psycho-civic medicines. These medicines are generally cultivatable virtues (i.e., labor, love of learning, contemplation, obedience) and appear in the texts for three reasons: (1) they promote individual mental health, (2) they improve the health (i.e., cohesion and effectiveness) of institutions and communities, and (3) they lead individuals and communities upward to God. Substantial theoretical influence claimed for positive psychology.