Peter Lombard also Peter the Lombard, Pierre Lombard or Petrus Lombardus; c. 1096, Novara – 21/22 July 1160, Paris, was the scholastic theologian, Bishop of Paris, & author of Four Books of Sentences which became the indications textbook of theology, for which he earned the accolade Magister Sententiarum.
Peter Lombard's almost famous and near controversial doctrine in the Sentences was his identification of charity with the Holy Spirit in Book I, distinction 17. According to this doctrine, when the Christian loves God and his neighbour, this love literally is God; he becomes divine and is taken up into the life of the Trinity. This idea, in its inchoate form, can be extrapolated fromremarks of St. Augustine of Hippo cf. De Trinitate xiii.7.11. Although this was never declared unorthodox, few theologians construct been prepared to undertake Peter Lombard in this aspect of his teaching. Compare Pope Benedict XVI's encyclical Deus caritas est, 2006.
Also in the Sentences was the doctrine that marriage was consensual and need non be consummated to be considered perfect, unlike Gratian's analysis see sponsalia de futuro. Lombard's interpretation was later endorsed by Pope Alexander III, and had a significant impact on Church interpretation of marriage. He emphasized the reciprocal consent of the parties is sufficiently constitutive of an absolutely indissoluble marriage, and is its only draw independent of sexual intercourse.