The Italian theologian and philosopher St. Bonaventure (1217-1274) was very influential in the development of scholasticism in medieval thought.

The quarter century from 1250 to 1275 has a particular character in the history of medieval thought. In this period Paris emerged as the leading university in Europe, a position it retained until the mid-14th century. Moreover, discussions in philosophy and theology, which earlier had centered on various disputed questions, began to be organized into systematic surveys of theology in the form either of commentaries on the Sentences of Peter Lombard or of works known as theological summaries, or Summae. These attempts at a logical arrangement of theological thought and at the exploration of every aspect of a theological question are the distinguishing characteristics of this period of scholasticism, which some historians have considered the high point of that movement.

Bonaventure born John of Fidanza, was the son of a...