FRA DIRITTO E TEOLOGIA: L’ARGOMENTAZIONE PROCESSUALE NELLA CULTURA MEDIEVALE

The tendency to apply procedural arguments to extra-legal situations is much more widespread than one might think. In the Middle Ages, this tendency incorporated different fields of knowledge in a much more casual and transversal way than is the case today. On the one hand, the entire construction of the Christian doctrine is characterized by the use of procedural metaphors (not only in the two events that mark the beginning and the end of humankind – the judgment against Adam in Eden and the Last Judgment – but also in biblical trials and the trial of Jesus). On the other hand, jurists’ remarks about trials, which date back to the end of the 12th century, aim to construct an “objective” system. Such an “ordo” would guarantee, by means of in-depth analysis of various procedural steps, attainment of a “true” truth, i.e. the procedural truth, which is unique, cannot be replicated, and represents a truth as sacred as the liturgical one