1) Neo-Classical Scholasticism and Neo-Classical Humanism: Looking Back Toward the Classical/Pagan Greco-Roman worldview.

 

Neo-Classical Scholasticism (beginning c. 1100):

    -- Use of Reason to understand articles of faith: Christian truths become subject to logical analysis

 

    -- Birth of European universities

 

    -- Rediscovery of Aristotle's writings (preserved by Arab and Byzantine scholars) and thus Aristotle's philosophy; translation of Aristotle into Latin. 

 

    Aristotle had set out the basic principles of Scientific Reasoning:

    c) Attention to careful analysis: separating wholes into parts

    d) Categorization of information

    e) Understanding workings of natural world thru reason and examination.

 

    In contrast to Plato, Aristotle also points the way toward modern law and democracy:

    a) Argues for the "dialectic" and believed argumentation (rhetoric) was a useful for discovering the "truth"

    b) The dialectic implies tolerance for differing opinions and a willingness to challenge accepted knowledge

    c) Codification of the rules of logical discourse: a means of distinguishing what can and cannot be known.

 

Consider how different this is from Neo-Platonism: Plato vs. Aristotle

 

    -- Thomas Aquinas  (1225-1274): Moves scholars away from Platonic Idealism and St. Augustine's Neo-Platonism (354-430 AD) and a return to Aristotelian metaphysics (see here also) as the pre-eminent means of understanding the natural world and how we make sense of it.  Aquinas's argument:

   a) God created an ordered natural world. God also created man's ability to use reason.  Therefore:
 

   b) Rational philosophy (Aristotelian analytical method) is a valid compliment to theology; God created man's intellect and will, thus, celebrating and developing human freedom, intellect and will would promote God's will. 
 

    c) If God created an ordered, natural world, man could and should apply reason to understand the natural world, thereby better understanding and celebrating the will of God as manifest in his creation.

 

We cannot overstate the effects Aquinas's argument will have on Western Civilization; without him, we would still live in a world without science.  Of course he himself had no concept of where his argument would take civilization.

 

2) Scientific Revolution (1400-1700): Philosophical Shift and Major Findings leading to codified Scientific Method

 

          William of Ockham (1280-1349) Ockam's Razor, Nominalism, Franciscan Poverty and seeds of secular power.

 

            Nominalism  (as compared to Platonic Idealism)

             -- The natural "real" world exists in specifics, not universals, as opposed to Platonic Ideals/universals; this chair as an actual, specific identity all its own that is not based on an Ideal or Universal uber "Table" or "Chair" etc.
 

             -- Universals are of two types: conceptual (they only exist in our minds; we create them thru language) and God; thus, the concept "chair" exists only in man's mind; we name things (like "chairs" or "furniture") and thus create concepts (nominalism).  God's mind exists in an entirely separate way, outside of this realm.
 

            -- Mankind can only know the real world in its specifics and thru experience of specifics:  can touch, measure, know this chair but not some universal, Ideal "Table" or "Chair" etc.
 

            -- Mankind can only know God's mind and will thru revelation and faith

 

            -- This severs science from theology and/or philosophy: to know the natural world, study specific physical things; to know God, study scripture but the two are separate ways of knowing separate things. 

 

            -- The natural world can be best known thru the examination of specific things, NOT thru logic or thru Biblical or clerical authority.

 

          Copernicus (1473 – 1543), Kepler (1571-1630) and Galileo (1564 – 1642): disprove Aristotelian and Ptolemaic theory of geocentric (earth-centered) universe. Gradually theories then prove heliocentric (sun centered) universe.

 

            For the first time in 2000 years, people break the Roman and Judeo-Christian ban on "defiling" human corpses in order to understand human anatomy and how the human body actually functions.  Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564) shocks Renaissance Europe by publicly proving, among other radical ideas, that men and women have the same number of ribs.

 

            Larger connotations: these findings and their theories offer a verified means of understanding natural phenomena thru mathematical principles and/or direct observation and analysis of natural phenomena: measurement and formal logic/mathematical proofs; verification of mathematical proofs thru empirical measurement. This leads to an emerging schism between mathematical proof and biblical scripture and Aristotelian deductive logic; seeing universe thru the lens  of MATH (formal logic), verified thru empirical evidence.

            See: Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo

 

          Printing press: Johannes Gutenberg in 1450. Control of written word taken from Catholic church and church controlled “scribes”.   Combined with Reformation and need for individual literacy: individuals interpreting Bible in the vernacular.

3) Neo-Classical Humanism:

       

  -- Classical/Pagan (Greek/Roman) literature as an expression of wider love for man and nature:

 

          -- “Paganism”: Greek belief that soul and body are one: actions of the body naturally and properly expressed the humanity of the soul

         

-- Original goodness of man (vs. original sin)

 

-- Relative tolerance for intellectual diversity, free thinking

 

  -- NOT opposed to Christianity but correcting errors and excesses of Medieval church: attempt to show that Greek and Christian VIRTUE are the one and the same (in this way similar to the Reformation as both attempted to address excesses and errors of the Church)

         

 -- Movement truncated -- or deferred -- by Reformation

 

 -- As opposed to and in relation to Scholasticism: knowledge and art/music increasingly taken from monastic control; the logical (deductive logic) reconciliation of Christian theology to rational questions, originating in religious schools founded in 9^th/10^th centuries; asceticism (nature as a beautiful snare, the flesh as evil, monastic life)

 

 -- Strong effect on later Renaissance's Neo-Classical love, respect and copying Greek and Roman aesthetic/literary forms and topics.  Examples:

Michelangelo: Neo-Classical Humanism

 

Petrarch: (1304-1374), Italy: translation of Greek/Roman literature into Latin (which, thru the printing press, spreads them far and wide); reintroduces the sonnet form, Classical/Pagan themes such as romantic love, tragedy, heroism

 

Shakespeare (1564-1616): love of life, Greek tragedy, secular poetic form, love of free-spirited intellect, love of the individual, love of Romantic love.

 

4) Discovering The New World and Rise Of Colonialism

          -- Increased and constant contact with new cultures, including those indigenous cultures' governmental models, religions, moral codes etc.

          -- Increased and constant contact with new natural phenomena ("unicorn" myth becomes understood as "the rhinoceros")

          -- Exploitation of foreign peoples, growth of European dependence on slavery: emerging racism, “Other-ing”, Bible as means to justify slavery and exploitation of non-Europeans

          -- Growth of merchant class; diminished power of aristocracy

          -- Need for new economic systems to fund colonial exploration and exploitation

          -- Distance breeds freedom and independence

          -- Shift of trade dominance from Mediterranean to Atlantic: from Italy to England and (initially) Spain.  This economic dominance, combined with Locke-an freedoms vs. Counter Reformation crackdown will give England increased power until the rise of Post-WW II U.S. hegemony.

5) Politics/Religion:  Decline of Holy Roman (Catholic) Empire, Emerging Nation-States, Absolutist Kings “Europe” Emerges

 

Reformation: End of Holy Roman Empire and the Advent of Protestantism:  Also known as the "Protestant Revolution". Generally speaking, begins when in 1517 the German, Catholic priest Martin Luther nails his famous "95 Theses" to the Castle Church door, in Wittenberg Germany.  The "Theses" generally condemned priests for acting immorally and, most importantly, for selling indulgences; that is, for a price, forgiving people's sins. 

 

In short, Luther challenged the theology  of the Papacy, and although he initially only meant to reform the Church, he sparked (and in Germany led) a complete revolution against its its religious and political authority.

 

An emerging plurality of political models concerning how secular political institutions relate to church/religion:

         -- England: Henry VIII 1534: Anglican Church/Church of England: church and state alliances but church subservient to state on civic matters (leading to the English Civil War as Anglicans, Catholics and Puritans all fight for dominance)

         -- Germany (see Reformation, below): Martin Luther (1550s) – Protestantism, German Nation State, Translation of Bible to German

        -- Geneva: John Calvin (1536 – 1564) – Theocratic Dictatorship City State , Puritanism

 

 

Reformation: Four Levels of Change:

 

1) Religious: Personal relationship with Biblical word, word of God, Bible translated into vernaculars, beginning with Luther's translation of the bible into German (Note relationship to spread of literacy; technology: printing press; philosophy: individualism and freedom) etc.

 

2) Aesthetic/Cultural: Northern European cultural Revolt Against Papal, Italian, Renaissance Splendor. Move toward Simplicity, Sparseness, Puritanism.

 

3) Political And Social: The rise of the Nation State. Germany under Luther; Geneva under Calvin.  Rise of Absolutist Kings: Freed from Papal control, Catholic and Protestant monarchs both root power in Divine Right: a king answers to no one but God.

 

4) Economic: Freed from Rome, nation-states develop new economic models, competition among countries to control/exploit colonies, death of "money-lender taboo (usury) and growth of capitalism.

 

Wars and Spreading Protestantism  As is often the case when a single, strong ruler or ruling system is eliminated, the Reformation leads to a violently swinging Intolerance/Tolerance pendulum: Catholics and Protestants (as well as struggles between Catholic sects, and between Protestant denominations etc.)  denounce each other as  heretics and/or followers of Satan (and of course Jews are routinely burned by both); Europe plunged into a varied series of wars that cost hundreds of thousands of lives, cripples it economically and will greatly influence that colonization of the New World. (This is the chaotic, violent, brutal political and civil landscape upon which Candide is set.)

 

Consider the Thirty Years War, between Catholics and Protestants, in what is essentially now modern Germany, Austria and Bavaria: killed between 1/5 to 1/3 of the entire population, largely thru direct genocide of unarmed civilians.  This constituted the largest civilian slaughter in Europe, for all time, until WWI and WWII.

 

See English Civil War Notes

See Protestant England Notes