Gottschalk (theologian)

Gottschalk (Latin: Godescalc, Gotteschalchus) of Orbais (c. 808 – October 30, 867? AD) was a Saxon theologian, monk and poet who is best known for being an early advocate of the doctrine of two-fold predestination. From his friend Walahfrid Strabo, Gottschalk also received the nickname Fulgentius, after Fulgentius the Mythographer, whom he may have studied intensively.

Gottschalk was born near Mainz, and was given to the monastic life (oblatus) from infancy by his parents. His father was a Saxon, Count Bern or Bernius. He was trained at the monastery of Fulda, then under the abbot Hrabanus Maurus, and became the friend of Walafrid Strabo and Loup de Ferrières. In June 829, at the synod of Mainz, on the pretext that he had been unduly constrained by his abbot, he sought and obtained his liberty, withdrew first to Corbie, where he met Ratramnus, and then to the monastery of Orbais in the diocese of Soissons. There he studied St Augustine, with the result that he became an enthusiastic believer in the doctrine of absolute predestination, believing in a predestination to condemnation as well as in a predestination to salvation--a position that, to the horror of Gottschalk's opponents, implied that God positively wills some persons to commit evil acts, so that they may be damned.

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