It is believed that Ockham was born in the English village of Ockham in Surrey, and that as a youngster he entered and received his early schooling at the Order of St Francis in London (the Franciscans), followed by theological studies at the University of Oxford. Rather, he was stating his belief in the overriding authority of the Word of God, while advocating the use of reason and perception in evaluating the cause of anything. But Ockham was not giving the world a 14 th-century equivalent of ‘Keep it simple, stupid’. For example, atheists like to claim their disbelief in God is superior to theism because it involves one less entity and so is simpler. Skeptics and atheists using Ockham’s razor today inevitably leave out the last bit, and in doing so they misuse the concept. “Nothing ought to be posited without a reason given, unless it is self-evident or known by experience or proved by the authority of Sacred Scripture.” 2 Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy /ockham.It could thus well be that this principle became associated with ‘razor’ not because of its subject matter but because it was a corrective to thought-‘Ockham’s eraser’ as it were. Others point out that before erasers were in use, writing was corrected by scraping ink away with a razor. But that may be a modern-day explanation after the fact. 1 Some claim that it is called a ‘razor’ because it refers to the ‘shaving away’ of unnecessary explanations. The term ‘Ockham’s razor’ first occurred long after Ockham’s time, in 1852 in the work of British mathematician William Hamilton. Rather, he was advocating that one should not propose any more causes than are necessary to account for any phenomenon. This concept has been inappropriately restated as ‘All things being equal, the simplest explanation tends to be the right one.’ 1 However, Ockham was not claiming that nature always follows the simplest course, nor that a simple explanation trumps a better, more complex one nor yet that simplicity should overrule the need to explain all the data. Ockham’s razor is a phrase that in Latin is usually rendered Entia non sunt multiplicanda sine necessitate, which translates as: ‘Entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity’. Even though he did not invent this idea, he used it so effectively that it came to bear his name. However, he is better known today for the problem-solving logical prinĬiple known as ‘Ockham’s razor’. He opposed the church leadĮrship of his day because they had abandoned clear Bible teaching and instead sought power, influence, and wealth. Was a Bible-believing 14 th-century English philosopher. simply Ockham (sometimes sp elled ‘Occam’), Instead, I will examine his nominalism, and the implications it has for theology.William of Ockham ‘ The first Protestant’ In what follows I will not focus on the political writings of his later period. In those works, too, he heralds a new age, in which the boundaries between the secular and the religious realms are strictly drawn. In his German period, he produced mainly political works on the limits of the power of the papacy, such as De imperatorum et pontificium potestate, Dialogus, and Opus Nonaginta Dierum. Ockham wrote his most important theological and philosophical works in the 1320s, such as his Commentary on the Sentences, a number of works on logic (including his Summa Logicae), a commentary on Aristotle’s Physics, a treatise On Predestination and Future Contingents, Quodlibetal Disputations, as well as treatises on the Eucharist. Excommunicated, Ockham was to stay in southern Germany (mainly Munich) under the protection of the Emperor, until the end of his life (after 1347, perhaps as a victim of the Black Death). On May 26, 1328, Ockham and a number of other Franciscans fled to the court of Louis of Bavaria. The controversy surrounding apostolic poverty – in which the Pope adopted a position severely critical of the one propagated by the Franciscans – did little to improve Ockham’s views on the papacy of John XXII, especially after Ockham unearthed a document by Pope Nicholas III (1279–81) which supported the Franciscan view. Ockham travelled to Avignon, where the papal court held residence. In 1324, before he had formally finished his education, charges of heresy were formally brought against him. He joined the Franciscan Order and studied in London and Oxford, where he lectured on Peter Lombard’s Sentences. He was born in Surrey, in the south of England, c. Our knowledge of the life of William of Ockham is fairly limited.

Ockham predestination