Passion of the Western Mind 0345368096, 9780345368096

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THE BRILLIANT BESTSELLER "The most lucid and concise presentation I have read, of the grand lines of what every student should know about the history of Western thought. The writing is elegant and carries the reader with the momentum of a novel.... It is really a noble performance."

Joseph Campbell

fU i-t.

MIND Understanding the Ideas That Have Shaped Our World View

RICHARD TARNAS

1 ex Uhris

Mitchell Kapor

? "THE BEST HISTORY OF WESTERN THOUGHT MASTERFUL." I HAVE READ Robert A. McDermott

Chairman, Philosophy Department Baruch College, City University of

"An

extraordinary piece of scholarship.

Western thought

history of sights

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It

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compelling narrative history oi the evolving Western world

view— the Western mind and

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Th,

Passion of the

Western

Mind Understanding the Ideas

That Have Shaped Our World View

Richard Tarnas

Ballantine Books

•

New

York

To Heather

Copyright © 1991 by Richard Tarnas All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copy-

Conventions.

right

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Card Number: 92-90050

ISBN: 0-345-36809-6

Cover design by James R. Harris Cover painting: Thomas Cole. The on canvas, 53 X

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Ballantine Books Edition: April 1993

9

8

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

3r >

Contents Preface

xiii

Introduction

1

The Greek World View

I.

The Archetypal Forms Ideas and Gods The Evolution of the Greek Mind from Homer

)

6 1

to Plato

]

16

The Mythic Vision

16

The

19

Birth of Philosophy

The Greek Enlightenment

25

Socrates

3

The

Platonic

Hero

35

The Philosopher's Quest and The Problem oi the Planets Aristotle

the Universal

Mind

48

and the Greek Balance

55

The Dual Legacy

II.

41

69

The Transformation

of the Classical Era

Crosscurrents o{ the Hellenistic Matrix

The Decline and Preservation of

the

73 75

Greek Mind

75

79

Astronomy Astrology

81

Neoplatonism

84

Rome The Emergence

87

III. Judaic

89

of Christianity

The

Christian World

Monotheism and the Divinization

Classical Elements

The Conversion

of History

and the Platonic Inheritance

of the Pagan

Mind

View

91

94 98 106

Contraries Within the Christian Vision

120

Exultant Christianity

125

Contents

Dualistic Christianity

130

Further Contraries and the Augustinian Legacy

138

Matter and

138

Spirit

Augustine

143

Law and Grace

148

Athens and Jerusalem

The Holy

Spirit

Rome and

and

151

Its

Vicissitudes

155

Catholicism

The Virgin Mary and A Summing Up

IV.

158

the Mother

Church

162 165

The Transformation

of the Medieval Era

171

The Scholastic Awakening The Quest of Thomas Aquinas

175

Further Developments in the High Middle Ages

191

179

The Rising Tide of Secular Thought

191

Astronomy and Dante

193

The

Secularization of the

Church and

the Rise

of Lay Mysticism Critical Scholasticism

The Rebirth

196

and Ockham's Razor

of Classical

Humanism

209 209

Petrarch

The Return of Plato

At

200

the Threshold

V. The Modern World View The Renaissance The Reformation The Scientific Revolution

2

1

220

223

224 233

248

Copernicus

248

The

251

Religious Reaction

Kepler Galileo

The Forging of Newtonian Cosmology The Philosophical Revolution

254 258 261

272

Bacon

272

Descartes

275

Contents

x

Foundations

o\ the

i

Modem World View

Ancients and Moderns

291

The Triumph

298

oi

Secularism

The Early Concord

Science and Religion:

Compromise and

298

Conflict

)01

308

Philosophy, Politics, Psychology

Modem

The

Character

}

Hidden Continuities

VI.

320

The Transformation

The Changing Image

of the

Human

of the

Modern Era

326

Self-Critique oi the

From Locke

to

325

from Copernicus

through Freud

The

1

Modern Mind

333

Hume

333

Kant

341

The Decline of Metaphysics

35

The

Crisis of

Modern Science

355

Fate

366

The Divided World View

375

Romanticism and The

Two

Its

366

Cultures

Attempted Syntheses: From Goethe and Hegel Existentialism

and hJihihsm

to

]ung

378 388

The Postmodern Mind At the Millennium

41

VII. Epilogue The Post-Copernican Double Bind

416

395

415

Knowledge and the Unconscious

422

The Evolution of World Views

433

Bringing

It

All Back

Home

441

Chronology

446

Notes

468

Bibliography

494

Acknowledgments Index

*>

* 1

515

Preface

This book presents a concise narrative history oi the Western world view

My

from the ancient Greek to the postmodern.

aim has been

within the limits of a single volume, a coherent account

mind and

of the Western

studies,

changing conception of

its

—

advances on several fronts

in philosophy,

The

evolution

reality.

Recent

depth psychology, religious

—have shed new

and history of science

evolution.

to provide,

ot the

on

light

remarkable

this

account presented here has been greatly

historical

in-

fluenced and enriched by these advances, and at the end o( the narrative I

have drawn on them to

set forth a

new

perspective for understanding

our culture's intellectual and spiritual history.

We

hear

much now about

the breakdown o( the Western tradition,

the decline oi liberal education, the dangerous lack of a cultural foundation for grappling with contemporary problems. Partly such concerns reflect insecurity

and nostalgia

in the face of a radically

Yet they also reflect a genuine need, and thoughtful

men and women who

addressed.

How

did the

it is

to

I

and working

them we must recover

of uncritical reverence for the views and values of ages

past, but rather to discover era.

ideas

influence the world today? These are

pressing questions for our time, and to approach

—not out

is

present condition?

its

How did the modern mind arrive at those fundamental

our roots

number of

recognize such a need that this book

modern world come

principles that so profoundly

changing world.

to that growing

and integrate the

historical origins of our

own

believe that only by recalling the deeper sources of our present

world and world view can we hope to gain the self-understanding necessary for dealing with our current dilemmas. The West's cultural and intellectual history

can thus serve

challenges that face us

all.

essential part of that history

Yet

I

also simply

history of

wanted

as a preparatory

Through more

this

book

I

education for the

have hoped

to tell a story

I

thought worth

Western culture has long seemed

telling.

Judaism and rhe

and imperial Rome, Church and the Middle Ages,

Hellenistic era

The

to possess the dynamics,

scope, and beauty of a great epic drama: ancient and classical

the Catholic

to Rial

readily accessible to the general reader.

rise

the Renai

4

(

C

Sreece, the

hristianity,

Reforma-

tion, and Scientific Revolution, the Enlightenment and Romanticism

xiv

Preface

and onward

own

to our

compelling time. Sweep and grandeur, dramatic

and astonishing resolutions have marked the Western mind's

conflicts

sustained attempt to

comprehend the nature of reality

—from Thales and

Pythagoras to Plato and Aristotle, from Clement and Boethius to

Aquinas and Ockham, from Eudoxus and Ptolemy to Copernicus and Newton, from Bacon and Descartes to Kant and Hegel, and from all these to Darwin, Einstein, Freud, and beyond. That long battle of ideas called "the

Western

been a

tradition" has

and consequence we

An

bear within ourselves.

all

adventure whose sum

stirring

epic heroism has

shone forth in the personal struggles of Socrates, of Paul and Augustine, of Luther and Galileo, and in that larger cultural struggle, borne by these

and by many

less visible protagonists,

extraordinary course. There

is

which has moved the West on

And there

high tragedy here.

its

something

is

beyond tragedy.

The

following account traces the development of the major world

views of the West's mainstream high culture, focusing on the crucial sphere of interaction between philosophy, religion, and science. Perhaps

what Virginia Woolf said of great works of literature could be of great world views:

much

in their

them

in

all

"The

success of the masterpieces seems to

freedom from

—but

in the

completely mastered

its

—indeed we

perspective."

no

its

My goal

evolution, and to take each

special priority for

present one (which

on

its

itself

its

been to

human

—seeking

own terms. I have assumed reality,

including our

spirit

that

to understand

consequences, to

Today the Western mind appears

let its

I

zation's

history.

believe

we can

I

would

and appreci-

meaning unfold.

be undergoing an epochal

to

transformation, of a magnitude perhaps comparable to any in our I

in the

multiple and in profound flux). Instead,

approach an exceptional work of art experience

not so

mind which has

Western mind

have approached each world view in the same

ate, to

a

in these pages has

any particular conception of

is

lie

tolerate the grossest errors

faults

immense persuasiveness of

give voice to each perspective mastered by the

course of

said as well

participate

intelligently

civili-

in

that

transformation only to the extent to which

we

Every age must remember

Each generation must exam-

ine

its

history anew.

and think through again, from

ideas that

have shaped

its

its

own

book

distinctive vantage point, the

understanding of the world.

from the richly complex perspective of the this

are historically informed.

late

Our task

is

to

twentieth century.

I

do so

hope

will contribute to that effort.

R. T.

The Passion of the

Western

Mind

The world

is

deep:

deeper than day can comprehend.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Introduction

A

book that explores the evolution oi the Western mind places spec ial demands on both reader and writer, for it asks us to enter into frames of reference that are sometimes radically different from our own.

book

invites a certain intellectual flexibility

cal imagination, a capacity for

men and women

—

Such

viewing the world through the eyes

from other times.

a

a sympathetic metaphysi-

One must

in a sense

wipe the

t

>t

slate

clean, attempt to see things without the benefit or burden of a pre-

conceived outlook.

Of course

only be striven

never achieved. Yet to aspire to that ideal

for,

such a pristine, malleable state of mind can is

perhaps

the single most important prerequisite for an enterprise such as

Unless we are able to perceive and articulate, on their without condescension, certain powerful

no longer consider

valid or defensible

conviction that the Earth

is

—

beliefs

for

own

this.

terms and

and assumptions that we

example, the once universal

the stationary center of the cosmos, or the

even more enduring tendency among Western thinkers to conceive of

and personify the human species then we will of our

own

fail

in

predominantly masculine terms

to understand the intellectual

thought.

Our constant

challenge

is

and to

cultural foundations

remain

faithful to the

historical material, allowing our present perspective to enrich, but not

the various ideas and world views

distort,

challenge should not be underestimated, that will

become

I

we examine. While

that

believe that today, for reasons

clear in the later chapters of the book,

we

are in a better

position to engage this task with the necessary intellectual and imaginative flexibility

The

than

at

perhaps any time in the past.

following narrative

is

organized chronologically according to the

three world views associated with the three major eras that have traditionally

been distinguished

in

Western

cultural history

— the

classical,

the medieval, and the modern. Needless to say, any division oi history into "eras"

and "world views" cannot

in itself

do

justice to the actual

complexity and diversity of Western thought during these centuries. Yet to discuss such an immense mass of material fruitfully, one must first introduce some provisional principles of organization.

overarching generalities, we may

Within these

then better address the complications

2

Introduction

and ambiguities, the internal

conflicts

and unanticipated changes that

have never ceased to mark the history of the Western mind.

We begin with the Greeks.

It

was some twenty-five centuries ago that

the Hellenic world brought forth that extraordinary flowering of culture that

marked the dawn of Western

civilization.

Endowed with seemingly

primeval clarity and creativity, the ancient Greeks provided the Western

mind with what has proved to be a perennial source of insight, inspiration, and renewal. Modern science, medieval theology, classical humanism all stand deeply in their debt. Greek thought was as fundamental

—

for

Copernicus and Kepler, and Augustine and Aquinas,

and Petrarch. Our way of thinking underlying logic, so

much

is

still

so that before

as for

Cicero

profoundly Greek in

we can begin

own thought, we must first look closely They remain fundamental for us in other ways as

its

to grasp the

character of our

at that of the

Greeks.

well: Curious,

innovative, critical, intensely engaged with ing for order

life

Greeks were originators of intellectual values were in the

and with death, search-

and meaning yet skeptical of conventional

fifth

century b.c. Let us

as relevant

verities,

the

today as they

recall, then, these first protagonists

of the Western intellectual tradition.

A detailed chronology for the events discussed in this book appears at the end of the text (page 446), while dates of birth and death for each historical figure cited can be found next to the individual's name in the Index. A discussion of gender and language in the text appears at the beginning of the Notes (page 468). Note:

I

The Greek World View

To

approach what was distinctive

protean as that of the Greeks, its

most

let us

striking characteristics

tendency to interpret the world

in a vision as

—

complex and

begin by examining one of

a sustained, highly diversified

in terms of archetypal principles.

This

tendency was in evidence throughout Greek culture from the Homeric epics onward, though

it first

emerged

in philosophically elaborate

form

the intellectual crucible of Athens between the latter part o( the

century b.c. and the middle of the fourth. Associated with the figure Socrates,

it

there received

its

foundational and in some

At

tive formulation in the dialogues of Plato.

cosmos

as

scendent

its

basis

of

respects defini-

was

a

view of the

an ordered expression of certain primordial essences or

first

in

fifth

tran-

principles, variously conceived as Forms, Ideas, universal*,

changeless absolutes, immortal deities, divine archai, and archetypes.

Although

this perspective

took on a number of distinct inflections, and

although there were important countercurrents to

this view,

it

would

appear that not only Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, and Pythagoras before lus

them and

Homer and lesiod, Aeschycommon visit in, reflect' something

Plotinus after, but indeed

and Sophocles

all

expressed

like a

1

4

The Greek World View

ing a typically

of

Greek propensity

to see clarifying universals in the chaos

life.

Speaking in these broad terms, and mindful of the inexactness of such

we may

generalities,

say that the

Greek universe was ordered by

which underlay concrete

plurality of timeless essences

reality,

giving

a it

form and meaning. These archetypal principles included the mathematical forms of

dark, male

of

man

geometry and arithmetic; cosmic opposites such

and female, love and hate, unity and

(anthropos)

and other

living creatures;

as light

and

multiplicity; the forms

and the Ideas of the Good,

the Beautiful, the Just, and other absolute moral and aesthetic values. In the pre-philosophical Greek mind, these archetypal principles took the

form of mythic personifications such

(Ouranos and Gaia),

as well as

as Eros,

more

Chaos, Heaven and Earth

fully personified figures

such

as

Zeus, Prometheus, and Aphrodite. In this perspective, every aspect of

existence was patterned and permeated by such fundamentals. Despite

the continuous flux of

phenomena

in

both the outer world and inner

experience, there could yet be distinguished specific immutable structures or essences, so definite

an independent

and enduring they were believed own.

reality of their

It

was upon

this

to possess

apparent im-

mutability and independence that Plato based both his metaphysics and his theory of

knowledge.

Because the archetypal perspective outlined here provides a useful point of departure for entering into the Greek world view, and because Plato was that perspective's preeminent theoretician and apologist,

whose thought would become the

single

the evolution of the Western mind,

we

most important foundation shall begin

Platonic doctrine of Forms. In subsequent chapters,

development of the Greek vision

historical

as a

for

by discussing the

we

shall pursue the

whole, and thereby

attend to the complex dialectic that led to Plato's thought, and to the equally complex consequences that followed from

it.

Yet to approach Plato, we must bear in mind his unsystematic, often tentative,

bear in

and even

mind too the

ironic style of presenting his philosophy.

inevitable

We

should

and no doubt often deliberate ambiguities

inherent in his chosen literary mode, the dramatic dialogue. Finally,

must of

recall the range, variability,

some

fifty years.

With

these qualifications, then,

we may make

provisional attempt to set forth certain prominent ideas and

suggested by his writings.

Our

we

and growth of his thought over a period a

principles

tacit guide in this interpretive effort will

be

The Greek World Ywu

the Platonic tradition

5

itself,

philosophical perspective

Having established

it

which preserved and developed

a

specific

regarded as originating with Plato.

that pivotal position within the

can then move backward and forward

Greek mind, we

— retrospectively

to

the early

mythological and Presocratic traditions, and then onward to Aristotle.

The Archetypal Forms What

has been

commonly understood

Platonism revolves around

as

Forms. That assertion demands a partial

though a profound one,

shift,

from what has come to be our usual approach to

we must

this shift,

its

the asserted existence of the archetypal Ideas or

cardinal doctrine,

first ask,

"What

is

reality.

To

understand

the precise relation between the

Platonic Forms or Ideas and the empirical world of everyday reality?"

Upon

this

question turns the entire conception. (Plato used the Greek

words

idea

and

eidos interchangeably. Idea

was taken over into Latin and

English, while eidos was translated into Latin as forma

and into English

as

"form.") It is

crucial to the Platonic understanding that these

Forms are

pri-

mary, while the visible objects of conventional reality are their direct Platonic Forms are not conceptual abstractions that the

derivatives.

human mind

creates by generalizing from a class of particulars. Rather,

they possess a quality of being, a degree of reality, that

superior to that

is

of the concrete world. Platonic archetypes form the world and also stand

beyond

They

They manifest themselves within time and

it.

constitute the veiled essence of things.

Plato taught that

what

can best be understood

is

perceived as a particular object in the world

as a concrete expression of a

Idea, an archetype which gives that object

A particular thing

condition. it.

Something

Beauty

is

dite) that

is

it is

it.

When

one

falls

it

is

What

The

art,

one

or

is

true,

Beauty (or Aphro-

the beloved object being

to,

the

meaning.

on

its

beautiful object. Beauty

essence.

The

Platonist

a limited perception of the

he answers, that the ordinary person

aware of an archetypal

is

not an archetype but a specific

some other

argues, however, that this objection rests is

it is

essential factor in the event

only an attribute of the particular, not

It

and

not the way one experiences an event

is

actually attracts

person, or a concrete work of

event.

special structure

this level that carries the deepest

could be objected that this

of this sort.

its

by virtue of the Idea informing

in love,

one recognizes and surrenders

archetype, and

is

what

more fundamental

"beautiful" to the exact extent that the archetype of

is

present in

Beauty's instrument or vessel.

It

yet are timeless.

level, despite its reality.

is

not directly

But Plato described

how

a

The Archetypal Forms

philosopher

on the

reflected itself,

who

7

has observed

mam

may suddenly glimpse

matter,

who

has long

absolute beauty

-Beauty

objects oi beauty, and

supreme, pure, eternal, and not relative to any specific person Of

The philosopher

thing.

beautiful

lies all

appearance. the absolute Plato's

If

thereby recognizes the Form or Idea

phenomena.

something

Form

is

\

le

th.it

under-

unveils the authentic reality behind the

beautiful,

so because

is

it

it

"participates" in

o\ Beauty.

mentor, Socrates, had sought to know what was

virtuous acts, so that he could evaluate

how one

common

to

all

should govern one's

He reasoned that it one wishes to choose actions that are good, one must know what "good" is, apart from any specific circumstances. To evaluate one thing as "better" than another assumes the conduct

in

life.

existence of an absolute good with which the two relative goods can be

compared. Otherwise the word "good" would be only

meaning had no

stable basis in reality,

word whose

a

and human morality would lack

secure foundation. Similarly, unless there was

some absolute

a

basis for

evaluating acts as just or unjust, then every act called "just" would be a

When

relative matter of uncertain virtue.

those

who engaged

with Socrates espoused popular notions of justice and

good and

evil,

be arbitrary, basis.

in dialogue

injustice, or of

he subjected these to careful analysis and showed them to

full

of internal contradictions and without any substantial

Because Socrates and Plato believed that knowledge of virtue was

necessary for a person to live a

life

of virtue, objective universal concepts

of justice and goodness seemed imperative for a genuine ethics. Without

human

such changeless constants that transcended the vagaries of

human

ventions and political institutions,

con-

beings would possess no firm

foundation for ascertaining true values, and would thus be subject to the dangers o{ an amoral relativism.

Beginning with the Socratic discussion of ethical terms and the search Plato ended with a comprehensive theory of

for absolute definitions, reality.

Just as

man

as

moral agent requires the Ideas o(

goodness to conduct his

life

well,

so

man

as scientist

justice

and

requires other

absolute Ideas to understand the world, other universals by which the

chaos, flux, and variety of sensible things can be unified and intelligible.

The

philosopher's task encompasses both the moral and the

scientific dimensions, It

seemed evident

property

—

as all

made

and the Ideas provide

to Plato that

a

when many

foundation object-

human beings share "humann

m

continued

those-

eaih

non |ewi was awakened. While the

the

inclusion ot

full

Israel

Jerusalem Christians, under the leadership o( lames and Peter, continued tor

some time

common

to require the observance ot traditional Jewish rules against

new

eating, thus circumscribing the

religion into the |udak

framework, Paul asserted, amidst much opposition, that the new tian

freedom and hope

tor salvation

Gentiles without the Judaic Law

hits

(

was already universally present,

as well as

lews within

needed, and could embrace, the divine Savior. In that doctrinal controversy within the early Church,

it.

All ot

first

tor

mankind

fundamental

was Paul's univenalism

it

that prevailed over Judaic exclusivism, with large repercussions tor the classical world.

For the reluctance on the part of most Jews to embrace the Christian

and the success

revelation,

o\ Paul's reaction

—combined with

the Gentiles

— bringing Christianity new

political events to shift the

to

religion's

center o\ gravity from Palestine to the larger Hellenistic world. After

movements led by the the Romans, reaching a

Jesus's death, the messianic political revolutionary

Zealot party continued critical

among

the Jews against

peak a generation later in a widespread Palestinian revolt In the

Roman

ensuing war,

troops crushed the rebellion, captured Jerusalem,

and destroyed the Jewish Temple (70 a.o.). The Christian community in

Jerusalem and Palestine was thereby dispersed, and the closest link

the Christian religion to Judaism

Jerusalem Christians

—was

must also be noted

many

culture was in sal in

both

its

transcended citizenship

all

that,

its

nationalities rights to

phenomenon. compared with Judaism, Greco«Roman vision.

The Rom. in Empire and

and previous

cosmopolitan HellemstK age, with

ita

as well as

Romans.

t

great urban centers

affirmed that universal

positions

all

human

beingi are

Cosm |ual

fre

Logos of Greek philosophy

immanent

in

I

he

I

he

:

World*

|

children

anscended

tr

— rhe divine Reason

and imperfections

the cosmos yet

the

I

and o

travel, joined together the civilized world as never before

mankind and

lawi

its

political boundaries, grai

conquered peoples

ideal o( the brotherhood of

m

more consistently nonsectarian and univer-

respects

practice and

and

and symbolized by the

severed. Christianity thereafter was

Hellenistic than a Palestinian It

— maintained

ot

ruling

rhe

ill

all

hum

human reason and potentially available

to

100

The

every individual of whatever nation or people. But above Christian religion of world proportions was

Roman

existence of the Alexandrian and

made

World View

Christian

all,

feasible

by the prior

empires, without

lands and peoples surrounding the Mediterranean would

a universal

still

which the have been

divided into an enormous multiplicity of separate ethnic cultures with

widely diverging linguistic, political, and cosmological predispositions. Despite the understandable antagonism

toward their

Roman

the freedom of

rulers,

it

by

felt

many

movement and communication that was From Paul,

the propagation of the Christian faith. Christianity, to Augustine,

its

most

molded by

its

indispensable to at

the start of

influential protagonist at the

the classical era, the character and aspirations of the decisively

early Christians

was precisely the Pax Romana that afforded

Greco-Roman

These considerations apply not only

new

end of

religion

were

context.

to the practical side of Christian-

dissemination but also to the elaborated Christian world view as

ity's

came

to rule the

imagined

as

an entirely independent and monolithic structure of

we may more

it

Western mind. Although the Christian outlook may be belief,

accurately distinguish not only opposing tendencies within

the whole, but also a historical continuity with the metaphysical and religious conceptions of the classical world.

Christianity, the pluralism

It is

true that, with the rise of

and syncretism of Hellenistic

culture, with

its

various intermingling philosophical schools and polytheistic religions,

were replaced by an exclusive monotheism derived from the Judaic tradition. It

is

also true that Christian theology established the biblical

revelation as absolute truth and

demanded

strict

conformity to Church

doctrine from any philosophical speculations. Within these limits,

however, the Christian world view was fundamentally informed by classical predecessors.

Not only

tween the tenets and

rituals of Christianity

its

did there exist crucial parallels be-

and those of the pagan

mystery religions, but in addition, as time passed, even the most erudite elements oi Hellenic philosophy

were absorbed by, and had their

influence on, the Christian faith. Certainly Christianity began and

triumphed in the gion

— eastern

Roman Empire

and Judaic

not

as a

in character, emphatically

vational, emotional, mystical, depending faith

and

belief,

philosophy but as a

and almost

fully

on

communal,

independent of Hellenic rationalism.

pagan intellectual system with which the view of

many

early

sal-

revelatory statements of

Yet Christianity soon found Greek philosophy to be not

in

reli-

it

just

an alien

was forced to contend, but,

Christian theologians, a divinely pre-

Classical Elements

and

the Platonic flJwiililwtl

101

arranged matrix tor the rational explication

The

essence of Paul's theology

ordinary

human

in a

ct

the Christian faith,

belid th.u |etua wai not mi

being hut was the Christ, the

man

incarnated as the glorious

lav in hii

otcrn.il Son d ( tod, who mankind and bring history to itl vision, God's wisdom ruled all ot Kistoq

Jesus to save

denouement. In

Paul's

hidden manner, hut had

at

become manifest

last

Christ,

who was

archetype of

all

him, and found tion.

its

which was patterned

triumphant meaning

Christianity thus

human

came

strivings, as

an unfolding

in his

ma

in

the

him, converged

after

in

incarnation and resume

to understand the entire movement

history, including all ot

coming of

made

the very principle ot divine wisdom. Christ

creation,

who

in Christ,

reconciled the world with the divine. All thingi had been

o!

various religious and philosophical

its

ot the divine plan that

was

fulfilled

In

the

Christ.

The correspondences between

this

conception of Christ and that

of

The

the Greek Logos did not go unnoticed by Hellenistic Christians.

remarkable Hellenistic Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria, an older

contemporary of Jesus and Paul, had already broached

on the term "Logos."4 But

svnthesis pivoted

it

a Judaic-C ireek

was with the opening

words of the Gospel according to John, "In the beginning was the Logos," that Christianity's relationship to Hellenic

Soon

potently initiated.

philosophy was

an extraordinary convergence

afterward,

Greek thought and Christian theology was

in progress that

would leave

both transformed. Faced with the fact that there already existed

nean culture

in the greater Medit.

a sophisticated philosophical tradition

from the Greeks, the

educated class of early Christians rapidly saw the need that tradition with

both

for their

own

tor integrating

Such an integration wis pursued assist the Greco-Rom. in culture in

their religious faith. satisfaction

and

to

understanding the Christian mystery. Yet

this

was considered no mar-

riage of convenience, for the Spiritually resonant Platonic philosophy

only harmonized with,

it

the Christian conceptions derived from the revelation

d

New

the

Testament. Fundamental Platonic principles now found

and new meaning

cosmos, the primacy

imperatives,

its

ttion

in the Christian context: the existence ofal

dent reality of eternal perfection, die

on the "tending

tU A

also elaborated and intellectually enha:

of the spiritual

I

I

divine

over the material,

wisdom

of the soul," the loul's immortality ,md high

experience of divine

i

in

'

U

the

102

The Christian World View

of scrupulous self-examination, the admonition to control the passions

and appetites that

it is

in the service of the

good and

better to suffer an injustice than to

death as a transition to more abundant condition of divine knowledge state,

now

true, the ethical principle

commit one, the

life,

belief in

the existence of a prior

obscured in man's limited natural

the notion of participation in the divine archetype, the progressive

assimilation to

God

as the goal oi

entirely distinct origins

human

aspiration. Despite

from the Judaeo-Christian

ancient Christian intellectuals the Platonic tradition was thentic expression of divine wisdom,

its

having

religion, for itself

many an au-

capable of bringing articulate

metaphysical insight to some of the deepest of Christian mysteries. Thus

matured during

as Christian culture

its first

several centuries,

its

religious

thought developed into a systematic theology, and although that theology was Judaeo-Christian in substance, largely Platonic.

the early

Such

Church

—

a fusion

first

metaphysical structure was

by Justin Martyr, then more

Alexandria and Origen, and In turn,

its

was advanced by the major theologians of

finally,

fully

by Clement of

most consequentially, by Augustine.

Christianity was regarded as the true

consummation of

philosophy, with the gospel as the great meeting ground of Hellenism

and Judaism. The Christian proclamation that the Logos, the world

Reason

itself,

had

actually taken

human form

in the historical person of

Jesus Christ compelled widespread interest in the Hellenistic cultural

world. In their understanding of Christ as the incarnate Logos, early

Christian theologians synthesized the Greek philosophical doctrine of the intelligible divine rationality of the world with the Judaic religious

Word of God, which manifested a personal God's and gave to human history its salvational meaning. In

doctrine of the creative providential will Christ,

the Logos became man: the historical and the timeless, the

absolute and the personal,

Through

the

human and

his redemptive act, Christ

the divine became one.

mediated the

soul's access to the

transcendent reality and thus satisfied the philosopher's ultimate quest. In terms strongly reminiscent of Platonism with

its

transcendent Ideas,

Christian theologians taught that to discover Christ was to discover the truth of the cosmos

and the truth of one's own being

in

one unitary

illumination.

The Neoplatonic

philosophical structure, developing simultaneously

alongside early Christian theology in Alexandria, seemed to offer an especially fitting metaphysical language within

which could be

better

KM

Classical Elements arid the Platonic Inheritance

comprehended theJudaeo-Christian vision. In Neoplatonism, the Inertia ble transcendent Godhead, the One, had brought forth its manifest image the divine Nous or universal Reason and the World Soul. In

— image— the Son

Christianity, the transcendent Father had brought forth his manifest

and the Holy

or Logos

Spirit.

now

Hut Christianity

brought dynamic historicity Into the Hellenic conception by asserting that the LogOS,

the eternal truth whieh had heen present from the

creation of the world, had

human

now heen

sent forth into world historj

means of the

form to bring that creation, by

Spirit

,

hack to

many

reconciled.

What had heen

the philosopher's private ipiritual

ascent was now, through the Incarnation destiny of the entire creation.

Through the indwelling

ot the

LogOS, the historical

The Word would awaken Holy

of the

One. That supreme

to the

its

One and

divine essence. In Christ, heaven and earth were reunited, the the

In

Spirit

all

mankind.

would occur the world's return

Light, the true source of reality shining forth

now recognized as the light ot As Clement of Alexandria announced, "By the Logos, the whole world is now become Athens and Greece."

outside Plato's cave of shadows, was Christ.

It

is

indicative o( this intimacy between Platonism and Christianity

that Plotinus

and Origen, the central thinkers,

school of pagan philosophy and the

first

shared the same teacher in Alexandria,

whom

figure

about

turn,

was pivotal

virtually

thought

profound

as to

is

school o\ Christian philosophy,

Ammonius

itself as

as

one

in

Saccas (a mysterious

known). Plotinus's philosophy,

in Augustine's gradual

Augustine saw Plotinus Plato's

nothing

respectively, of the last

whom

in

conversion to Christianity.

"Plato lived again," and regarded

"the most pure and bright

in

philosophy

.ill

be in almost perfect concordance with the

C

christian t.uth.

Thus Augustine held that the Platonic Forms existed within the reative mind of God and that the ground of reality lay beyond the world t the m

darkness and suffering, severance from God.

Augustine was the most modern of the ancients: he

In

a

cm

»r

144

The Christian World View

istentialist's self- awareness

with his highly developed capacity for

and time,

sciousness

psychological perspicacity,

his

God,

his intensity of inner conflict,

sophistication.

was Augustine who

It

first

—thereby

in the soul. Yet

gency of that ego on God, without

he

and

wrote that he could doubt

own

knowing, willing, and existing

human ego

without

self

his intellectual skepticism

everything, but not the fact of the soul's

of the

doubt and

his

human

remorse, his sense of the solitary alienation of the

in-

memory and con-

trospection and self-confrontation, his concern with

experience of doubting, of

affirming the certain existence

also affirmed the absolute contin-

whom

it

could not

alone be

exist, let

capable of attaining knowledge or fulfillment. For Augustine was also the

most medieval of the ancients. His Catholic predispositions, his otherworldly focus,

tokened the succeeding age God's sin,

will,

evil,

of the

—

and

as did his

religiosity, his

his

cosmic dualism

keen sense of the

Mother Church, of miracles,

monolithic

grace,

all fore-

invisible, of

and Providence, of

and the demonic. Augustine was a man of paradox and ex-

tremes, and his legacy would be of the same character. It

was certainly the quality and power of Augustine's conversion

experience of an overwhelming influx of grace from

away from the corrupt and

God

—the

turning

him

—that was

egoistic blindness of his natural self

the culminating factor in his theological vision, imprinting in

him

a

conviction of the supremacy of God's will and goodness and the imprisoned poverty of his own. intervention in his

what may have

life left

The luminous potency of Christ's positive human person in relative shadow. Yet

the

especially influenced his religious understanding

pivotal role played by sexuality in Augustine's religious quest.

was the

Although

mindful of nature's inherently divine ordering (and often more unstinting in his praise of the creation's beauty and bounty than a Platonist),

Augustine placed extreme emphasis in his

own

of his sexual instincts as the prerequisite for

life

on the

full spiritual

ascetic denial

illumination

—

point of view supported by his encounters with both Neoplatonism and

Manichaeism, yet

reflective of deeper roots in his

own

personality

and

experience.

Love of God was the quintessential theme and goal of Augustine's religiosity, and love of God could thrive only if love of self and love of the flesh were successfully conquered. In his view, succumbing to the flesh

of

was

at the heart of

man's

Knowledge of Good and

participated,

was

fall;

Adam's eating the

Evil, the original sin in

tied directly to

fruit

from the Tree

which

all

mankind

concupiscence (and indeed the biblical

Further Contraries arui the

Au^ustmum

\j

1

4S

"knowing" had always possessed sexual connotations). For Augustine, die evil character ot fleshly

was

lust

shame

visible In the

that attended

ita

expression, uncontrolled by the rational will, and that attended the mere

nakedness of the sexual organs. Procreation

would nor have entailed such

now

enduring commitment, and

brought offspring,

procreative purposes.

generation, BO that

and

suffering

and shame. Marriage

could realize some i:ood our ot the inherited

least

at

in Paradise before the Fall

bestial impulsiveness

all

But the primal sin infected

humanity was condemned

guilt in lite,

and

Augustine held that the root of

true that

it

o\

carnal

CO pain in childbirth, to

Only by

Christ's

traces of that sin be

all

removed and man's soul be freed from the curse of is

born

all

to the final evil ot death.

grace and with the resurrection oi the body would

It

evil, since

a limitation ot sexuality to

his fallen nature.

evil did

not reside in

matter, as the Neoplatonists suggested, for matter was God's creation and therefore good. Rather, evil was a consequence of man's misuse of his Evil lay in the act of turning itself

tree

will.

God

— not

in

what was turned

to.

—of turning

away from

Yet in Augustine's linking of that sinful

abuse of freedom to concupiscence and sexuality, and to the pervasive corruption of nature thereafter, the germ of the Neoplatonic and more

extreme Manichaean dualism lived on.

On

this

Creation

pivot

— man

rested

of Augustine's

tenor

the

as well as nature

—was

moral

theology.

indeed an infinitely marvelous

product or God's benevolent fecundity, but with man's primal sin that creation was set so fundamentally awry that only the next, heavenly,

would

restore

its

original integrity

and

glory.

Man's

life

was precipitated

fall

by his willful rebellion against the proper divine hierarchy, a rebellion

tounded spirit.

in the assertion of the values of the flesh against those of the

He was now

no longer

free to

enslaved to the passions of the lower order.

determine his

life

Man

was

simply by virtue of his rational will,

not only because circumstances beyond his control presented themselves, but also because he was unconsciously constrained by ignorance and

emotional conditioning. His

become ingrained in a state of

initial

sinful

thoughts and actions had

habits and finally ineluctable chains imprisoning

divine grace could possibly break the vicious spiral of

bound by

him

wretched alienation from God. Only the intervention

his vanity

and

sin.

Man

pride, so desirous of imposing his will

as to be incapable of transforming himself by his

present, fallen state, positive freedom for

acceptance of God's grace. Only

God

man

own

was so

on others,

powers.

could consist onlv

could free man, since

of

n

In his in

the

action by

146

The

man on his own could be sufficient God already knew for all time who

to

Christian

World View

move him toward salvation. And who the damned

were the elect and

based upon his omniscient foreknowledge of their different responses to his grace.

Although

official

Christian doctrine would not always accept

Augustine's more extreme formulations of predestination or his nearly

human

complete denial of any active

role in the process of salvation, the

subsequent Christian view of man's moral corruption and imprisonment

was one

Thus

largely it

congruent with Augustine's.

man who so decisively declared God's love and his own life also recognized, with a potency that

was that the

liberating presence in

never ceased to permeate the Western Christian tradition, the innate

bondage and powerlessness of the human soul Sin.

From

as perverted

this antithesis arose the necessity for

by Original

Augustine of a divinely

provided means of grace in this world: an authoritative Church structure,

man

within which haven

could

satisfy his overriding

needs for spiritual

guidance, moral discipline, and sacramental grace.

Augustine's critical view of

human

As an

evaluation of secular history.

Augustine was dominated in his

Church

preservation of

nature had

its

corollary in his

influential bishop in his

later life

own

era,

—the

by two pressing concerns

unity and doctrinal uniformity against the

entropic impact of several major heretical movements, and the historical

confrontation with the

fall

of the

Roman Empire

invasions. Faced with the crumbling empire civilization itself,

Augustine saw

ical progress in this world.

With

under the barbarian

and the apparent demise of

little possibility for its

any genuine histor-

manifest evils and cruelties, wars and

murders, with man's greed and arrogance, licentiousness and vice, with the ignorance and suffering

all

human

beings were forced to experience,

he instead saw evidence of the absolute and enduring power of Original Sin,

which made of

this life a

torment, a hell on earth from which only

Christ could save man. Augustine answered the great criticism aimed at the Christian religion by the surviving pagan

had undermined the opened the way

Roman

integrity of

for barbarian

triumph

its

—with

negative

—

that Christianity

imperial power and thereby

a different vision of history: All true progress

transcended this world and

Romans

a different set of values

was necessarily

fate.

What was

spiritual

and

and

important for

man's welfare was not the secular empire but the Catholic Church. Because divine Providence and factors in

human

spiritual salvation

were the ultimate

existence, the significance of secular history, with

its

Further Contraries and the

passing values and

Augustmum

147

Lej

fluctuating and generally negative progress, was

its

accordingly diminished.

Yet history, like It

all

else in creation,

Man

embodied God's moral purpose.

was

manifestation of God's

a

could not

in the present

time ot darkness and chaos,

vindicated only

at

to a great

it

grasp that purpose

meaning would he still

Augustine com-

spiritual in design (indeed,

melody by some

ineffable composer, with the parts of

melody being the dispensations suitable

that

its

the end o\ history. But although world history was

command and

under God's pared

hilly

tor

will.

to

each epoch),

its

secular

aspect was not positively progressive. Rather, because of Satan's continuing

power

in this world, history

Manichaean

battle

ot

was destined

good versus

to enact, as in the eternal

a deteriorating

evil,

and divisive

evolution of the spiritual elect and the mass of the worldly damned. In the course ot this drama, God's motives were often hidden but ultimately just.

For whatever apparent successes or defeats happened to individuals

in this lite,

souls

they were as nothing compared with the eternal fates their

had earned. The

and achievements of secular history

particulars

were of no ultimate importance

in themselves.

Actions in

this life

were

significant mainly for their afterworldly consequences, divine reward or

punishment. The individual history

from

and

this

this

soul's search for

God was

primary, while

world merely served as the stage for that drama. Escape

world to the next, from

God, from

self to

constituted the deepest purpose and direction of great saving grace in history was the

flesh to spirit,

human

Church founded by

life.

The one

Christ.

Instead o( the early Christian anticipation oi an immanent, as well as

imminent, world change, Augustine gave up the

whose

fallen

Christ had indeed already defeated Satan, spiritual

realm,

religious reality history,

field of this world,

tendency was naturally negative. In Augustine's vision,

the

but in the transcendent

only realm that genuinely mattered.

was not subject to the vagaries

and that

reality

interior experience of

could be

God

as

known

of

this

The

true

world and

its

only through the individual's

mediated by the Church and

its

sacra*

ments.

Here the Neoplatonic influence spiritual ascent

Judaic

— joined,

and

to

principle ot a collective,

— inward,

subjective, the individual

an extent took precedence OVCT, the historical

exterior,

spirituality.

The

penetration of Christianity by Neoplatonism borh augmented and explicated the mystical and interior element


t

rhe Christian revelation,

148

The Christian World View

But in so doing,

especially that of John's Gospel.

simultaneously

it

diminished the historical and collectively evolutionary element that primitive Christianity, especially Paul and very early theologians like

had inherited and

Irenaeus,

gustine's strong sense of

developed from Judaism. Au-

radically

God's government of history

—

dramatic

as in his

scenario of the two invisible societies of the elect and the damned, the

God and

city of

the city of the world, battling throughout creation's

history until the Last

Judgment

—

still

reflected the Judaic ethical vision

of God's purposefulness in history. Indeed, the doctrine of the two cities

would have much influence on subsequent Western the autonomy of the spiritual

Church

fundamental depreciation of the cal background,

history, affirming

vis-a-vis the secular state.

secular,

combined with

his psychological predispositions,

But his

his philosophi-

and

historical

his

context, transformed that vision in the direction of a personal and interior otherworldly religiosity.

In other essential aspects of Augustine's thought and the evolving

Christian world view

God ally

—

as in the

dualism o{ an omnipotent transcendent

versus the sin-enchained creaturely

and morally authoritative

—

nity of chosen believers

it

man, and the need

religious structure

was the Judaic

for a doctrin-

governing the

sensibility that

commu-

dominated.

This was particularly visible in the evolution of Christianity's characteristic

commandments.

attitudes toward God's moral

Law and Grace For the Jews, the Mosaic solidity,

that

a living guide, their pillar of existential

which morally ordered

good relation Jesus's

Law was

to

their lives

God. While the Judaic

time by the Pharisees, held forth the need for

the Law, early Christianity asserted what contrasting view: of

The Law was made

God, which eliminated the need

called up a liberating

own. That union o( earned

and retained them

tradition,

gift

Law could

strict

wills

with

obedience to

believed was a fundamentally

man and was fulfilled

for repressive

in the love

obedience and instead

and wholehearted embrace o{ God's

will as one's

was mediated only by divine grace, the un-

of salvation brought to establish,

for

it

its

mankind by

Christ. In this view, the

negative precepts written in stone, only an

imperfect obedience by fear. By contrast, Paul declared,

man

could be

genuinely justified only by faith in Christ, through whose saving act believers could

know

in

as represented in

the freedom o{ God's

grace.

The

all

Law's strictures

Further Contraries and the

made man

i tinner,

Angustmum

L

1

divided against himself. Instead ol being in "slavery"

under the Law, the Christian believer was he participated

tree,

because In

t

hrist'l grace

freedom.

in Christ's

Before his conversion, Paul himself had been a Pharisee and

defender of the Law. But after his Conversion, he deprecating Kal to the impotence

and the presence

Christ's love

of

Law compared with

the

of the Spirit

a fervid

with

testified

self-

the power of

working within the human

person. Paul's understanding of the Law, however, was viewed by Jeus a

parody

of

its

true nature. For them, the

called forth moral responsibility in

good works

pined

as necessary

elements

exemplified the ultimate

human

man.

in the

It

even

effort,

if

futility of a

Law was

God's

itself

gift

lt

s

and

human autonomy and

upheld

economy

role for those elements,

a

4 V>

of salvation. Paul, too,

but asserted that his

Law-governed

religiosity.

own

life

More than

divinely legislated, was required for something as

fundamental and suprahuman

as the

redemption of the human

soul.

Good works and moral

responsibility were necessary but not sufficient.

Only the supreme

oi Christ's incarnation and self-sacrifice

ble that life in

desired.

gift

harmony with God which the human

made

soul so deeply

Faith in Christ's grace, rather than scrupulous conformity to

ethical precepts,

was man's

surest path to salvation

—and the evidence of

that faith was the Christian's works of love and service that Christ's grace

made

possible. For Paul, the

because the true end of the

Law was no longer Law was Christ.

the binding authority,

Similarlv underscoring the break from the Judaic Law, John's Gospel

proclaimed, "For the law was given through Moses; but grace and truth

came through

Jesus Christ."

The

tension between God's will and man's,

between external regulation and inner inclination, could be dissolved the love of spirit.

God, which would unite human and divine

To awaken

Kingdom

to this state of divine love

one unitary

was to experience the

man

of Heaven. Because of Christ's redemption,

attain true righteousness in the eyes of

in

in

could

now

God, not by constraint but

in

happy spontaneity. Yet this contrast in the

New Testament

between moral

divinely graced freedom was not unambiguous.

The

with interpersonal ethics was a dominant element outlook, but

one hand,

its

the

restriction

Gospels' concern in

the Christian

character seemed open to both interpretations

tone of Jesus's teachings was often

compromising and judgmental, phrased

in

and

On

extremelv

the

un-

the hard dialectic of the

Semitic manner, and intensified in the light of the imminent end times.

150

The Christian World View

In Matthew's Gospel, followers

—

the

made even more

strict for Jesus's

for unconditional

moral integrity

under the urgency of the messianic transition. Jesus's

emphasis

righteousness, and

was

repeatedly

on the inner

His demands for heightened,

spontaneous thoughts

more than human

way

is

enemy

unceasing forgiveness, utter detachment from worldly

—and the demand

full

hand,

Law

requiring purity of intention as well as act, love of the

as well as friend,

things

the

for faith in

spirit

is

pressed to

On

the other

on compassion over

over the external letter of the law.

—judging

even absolute, moral purity

as well as deliberate acts

will to achieve

—seemed

to presuppose

such inner goodness, thus opening the

God's grace. Often his intention appeared to be that of

lending comfort to the poor, the desperate, the outcast and the

while direly warning the proud and spiritual

counted

and mundane

status.

more than

for

self-

A

sinful,

those secure in their

humble openness

to

divine grace

The Law was God's higher commandment of love.

legalistically righteous behavior.

constantly to be measured against

According to the

self-satisfied,

New

Testament, the extent to which a

legalistic

morality had overcome Jewish religious practice was evidence that the

Law had become entrenched and frozen in the course of time, an end in itself that was now obscuring rather than mediating the individual's true relation to

God and

to others.

But even the new Christian revelation of God's graciousness was open to antithetical interpretations

and consequences,

especially under later

The Pauline and Augustinian stress on divine grace human works and self-dependent righteousness lent itself not just to unitary notion of human fulfillment in embrace of the immanent

historical conditions.

over the

divine will, but also to an emphatic reduction of man's positive volitional

freedom relative to the omnipotence of God. In the struggle tion,

man's

own

efforts

for salva-

were comparatively inconsequential; only God's

saving power could be effective.

The

sole source of

good was God, and

only his mercy could save mankind from the natural fallen inclination toward blind perversity. Because of

Adam's

sin, all

human human

beings were corrupt and guilty, and only Christ's death had atoned for that collective guilt.

The

resurrection Christ brought to

human

being

he be condemned was dependent on the Church's

sacra-

present in the Church, and the justification that every required

lest

mankind was

ments, access to which in turn demanded conformity to specific ethical

and

ecclesiastical standards.

L.

Further Contraries and the Augiistmum

Since the Church and

its

151

sacred

tablished vehicles oi God's grace, the cant,

its

human

hierarchy absolutely authoritative,

beings were intrinsically prone

constant

temptation,

required

they

wore the divinely

institutes

Church was suprahumanlv its

to sin

stern

against uninhibited actions and thoughts,

es-

signify

laws definitive. Because

and lived

in B

world

oi

Church-defined sanctions

lest their

eternal souls

to

tall

the lame debased fate as their temporal bodies. Especially in the West,

under the historical exigencies

Church's responsibility

or the

for the

newlv converted (and, from the Church's perspective, morally primitive) barbarian peoples, a pervasive vertically in the institutional established, with

all spiritual

authority flowing

preme papal sovereign. Thus the Christian

Church

—with

judicial structure,

its

its

downward from the

^trevs

absolutist moral precepts,

its

complex

legal-

accounting system of good works and merits,

and sacraments,

its

—

often seemed

its

power of excommunication, and

on the inhibition of the

damnation

su-

characteristic tone of the medieval

meticulous distinctions between different categories of sin, beliefs

Church was

its

mandatory its

flesh against the continual

forceful

threat of

more reminiscent of the older Judaic concept

oi God's law, indeed an exaggeration of that concept, than of the

new

unitarv image of God's grace. Yet such elaborate safeguards appeared

necessary in the present world of moral waywardness and secular danger, to preserve a

genuine Christian morality and to guide the Church's

charges into the eternal

life.

Athens and Jerusalem Another dichotomy within the Christian question of

its

purity

and

integrity

belief system involved the

and how these should be preserved.

For the Judaic inclination toward religious exclusivism and doctrinal purity also passed itself

on

to Christianity, maintaining a constant ten-

sion with the Hellenic element,

which sought and found evidence

oi

i

divine philosophy in the works of diverse pagan thinkers, especially Plato.

While Paul

at times stressed the

need

for

complete differentiation

of Christianity from the deceptive ideas of pagan philosophy, which tor

on other occasions he suggested a more liberal approach, quoting from pagan poets and tacitly infusing elements of Stoic ethics into his Christian teachings (Paul's n.inw that reason should be carefully avoided,

i

152

The Christian World View

Tarsus in Asia Minor was in his time a cosmopolitan university especially

renowned

for

its

city,

Stoic philosophers). Later Christian theolo-

gians in the classical era were often imbued with

Greek philosophy before

converting to Christianity, and subsequently continued to find value in

A

the Hellenic tradition.

syncretistic mysticism informed

many

early

Christian thinkers as they eagerly recognized identical patterns of meaning in other philosophies and religions, often applying allegorical analysis to

compare

it

was found,

biblical

and pagan

for the

literatures.

The Truth was

one, wherever

Logos was all-comprehensive and boundlessly

creative.

As

early as the

second century, Justin Martyr

first

advanced a theology

that saw both Christianity and Platonic philosophy as aspiring toward

the same transcendent God, with the Logos signifying at once the divine

mind,

human

reason,

and the redemptive Christ who

both the

fulfills

Judaic and Hellenic historical traditions. Later, the Christian Platonist

school in Alexandria used as

its

basis the paideia,

the classical Greek

education system from Plato's time centered on the liberal

arts

and

now with theology as the highest and culminating new curriculum. In this framework, learning per se was a

philosophy, but science of the

form of Christian

discipline,

even of adoration. Such learning did not

limit itself to the Judaeo-Christian tradition, but

encompass a

moved beyond

knowledge with the

larger whole, to illuminate all

it

to

light of

the Logos.

A characteristic compromise position, Greek culture from

it,

at

once employing the admired

for Christian apologetic purposes

and yet keeping distance

was presented by Clement of Alexandria

in his use of

Odyssey: Sailing by the island o{ the Sirens on his way

home

Homer's

to Ithaca,

Odysseus tied himself to the mast of his ship so he could hear their seductive singing ("have

full

knowledge") without succumbing to their

temptation and destroying himself on their rocky shores. So too could the mature Christian

make

his

way through the sensual and

enticements of the secular world and pagan culture, having edge of them while tying himself to the cross

intellectual full

knowl-

—the mast of the Church

for spiritual security.

Just as often,

however, Christianity more

parent in rejecting virtually ideas

all

fully

resembled

Judaic

contact with non-Christian philosophical

and systems, considering them not only profane but

this view,

its

valueless. In

the true core of the Christian mystery was so unique and

Further Contraries and the Au^ustinunx LtgBCy

luminous that

1

could onlv be blurred, distorted, or

it

falsified

infusion or other cultural streams. For the Hellenic side of

hi im

C

5

J

by the

unity

,

the Logos (as Ood'i wisdom, the universal Reason) was seen as operative in

non-Christian wisdom preceding the revelation, and

framework of world history outside the Judaeo-Christian

in

the larger

tradition. But in

the more exclusivist understanding, the Logos (here understood more particularly as

God's Word) tended

Confines ot Scripture,

Church

with the secular sophistication

to he recognized solely within the

doctrine, and biblical history. ot

Compared

pagan philosophy, the Christian gospel

must seem mere foolishness, and any dialogue between the two would he

Thus Tertullian

futile.

in the late

second century emphatically ques-

tioned the relevance ot the Hellenic tradition in his dictum

Athens

to

Theological variants and religious innovations nism, Donatism, Pelagianism, Arianism

Church

—were

—Gnosticism, Monta-

especially abhorrent to

authorities, because they controverted matters close to the heart

o\ Christianity,

and were therefore viewed

as heretical, perilous,

requiring effective condemnation. Christianity's ot

doctrine and structure, with

its

demand

—

and

for uniformity

attendant intolerance, found part of

basis in the urgent primitive Christian imperative

Paul

"What has

do with Jerusalem?"

that the body of Christ (the

—seen

its

especially in

Church community) be pure and

undivided in readiness for the Parousia. Augustine presented, again, an influential stance containing elements of

respectful concerning classical culture

—knowledgeable and

both sides

and

particularly Platonic philoso-

phy, vet acutely conscious of Christianity's unique doctrinal superiority and, especially as he grew older, forcefully active in repressing heresies.

Christian thinking in the centuries following Augustine generally

re-

flected a similar position. Despite constant influences, both conscious

and unconscious, from other philosophical and

Church ance

tor

officially

adopted a restrictive dogmatic stance with

other systems on their

own

Thus Augustine's sense of the need hirr^elt

religious systems,

and others) the

pluralistic

the

little toler-

terms. for restraining or

and

heretical,

negating (in both

the biological,

the

worldlv, and the human, in favor of God, the spiritual, the one true Church and its one true sacred dextrine, was crystallized in the final moments of the ancient world, and, through his enduring influence on

major Church

embodiment

figures like

in the

Pope Gregory the Great, given

medieval Western Church. Because


t

institutional

the remark-

154

able

The Christian World View

power of

his thought, his writings,

and

his personality,

and because

Augustine in some sense articulated the nascent self-consciousness of an era,

the development of the Christian sensibility in the

largely

through his mediation. By the end of the

exultant and inclusive religious

spirit visible in

West took

place

classical period, the

primitive Christianity

had taken on a different character: more inward, otherworldly, and philosophically elaborate,

dogmatic.

yet also

more

institutional,

juridical,

and

The Holy The fundamental

and

Spirit

Its

Vicissitudes

tensions inhering in Christianity from

to clear focus in the extraordinary doctrine ot the

person ot the Christian Trinity with

The New Testament

God

stated that before Jesus died, he

the Holy Spirit" into a group ot the

as a

in

numinous

an upper room

in

Spirit to

had promised

his

remain with them

to

The subsequent "descent of disciples who had gathered together

continue and complete his redemptive

on Pentecost

lolv Spirit, the third

I

the Father and Christ the Son.

would send the Holy

disciples that ChkI

come

outset

its

task.

Jerusalem was reportedly experienced

accompanied by

visitation o\ great intensity,

sound

a

"like

the rush ot a mighty wind tilling the house," with "tongues as of fire"

The event was

appearing above each disciple.

interpreted by those

present as an overwhelming and indisputable revelation of Christ's continuing presence

among them

despite his death and ascension.

Im-

mediately afterward, according to the report in Acts of the Apostles, the inspired

began

disciples

Through the

Spirit the

preaching

ecstatically

Word was spoken

Christ's passion could be disseminated to

A

Spirit.

new

the

multitudes:

now

the fruit of

humanity. As Pentecost for Law on Mount Sinai, so now

all

the Jews had marked the revelation of the tor the Christians

to

to the world;

a new revelation, the pouring forth commenced with the Spirit's coming upon

marked

it

age had

people of God. This Pentecostal experience

—apparently

of the

the

all

renewed

in

subsequent communal gatherings, and in other circumstances involving charismatic

—

ecstasies

phenomena such

as

unexpected healings and prophetic

later served as the basis for the

Church's doctrine of the Holy

Spirit.

This doctrine conceived of the Holy Spirit

wisdom (the manifest

lite

as the spirit of truth

and

Paraclete, or Counselor), as well as the divine principle ot in

both material creation and

spiritual rebirth. In the first,

or revelatory, aspect, the Holy Spirit was recognized as the divine source ot

inspiration that

had spoken through the Hebrew prophets. Now,

however, the Spirit was democratized, made accessible to

and not Spirit

and

just the tew.

was recognized

as

,ill

In the second, or ptoc ieative, aspect,

as the

progenitor ot Christ within Mary

bein^ present at the beginning of Jesus's ministry

(

^hrisn.ms the Holy

hifl

m< »rher,

when he

156

The Christian World View

baptized by John the Baptist. Jesus had died that the Spirit might all:

come

to

only thus could take place humanity's death and rebirth into the

fullness of

God. Through the continuing

gressive incarnation of

God

influx of the Spirit, a pro-

humanity was being

into

and propelling the divine birth of Christ community. Although

human

a

renewing

effected,

in the continuing Christian

being's mortal reasonings were valueless

by themselves, with the inspiration of the Spirit one could attain divine

knowledge. Although on one's

own

resources a

human

being could not

one

find sufficient love within oneself for others, through the Spirit

could

know an

infinite love

embracing

all

humanity. The Holy Spirit was

the Spirit of Christ, the agent of man's restoration to divinity, God's

through and with the Logos. The presence of the

spiritual force acting

Holy Spirit made possible a sharing in the divine life, and a state communion within the Church that was in essence a participation

God.

Finally, because the

Holy

Spirit's

presence brought divine authority

and numinosity to the Church's believing community, the seen as the basis for the Church the

life

of the

ing tradition,

Church

—

its

and

blows "where

New it

its

was

Spirit

itself in all

aspects of

its

develop-

spiritual authority.

experience of the Holy Spirit, however, soon came

into conflict with the conservative

Church. The

expressing

sacraments, prayer, and doctrine,

hierarchy,

its official

The spontaneous

itself,

of in

imperatives of the institutional

Testament described the But

wills."

as such,

Spirit as like a

wind that

the Spirit possessed inherently

spontaneous and revolutionary qualities that placed

it,

by definition,

beyond any control. Individuals claiming the presence of the

Spirit

tended to produce unpredictably variable revelations and charismatic

phenomena.

Too

often

appropriate activities in verse

such manifestations

Church

services,

—unrestrained

in-

wandering preachers with

—seemed unconducive

and unorthodox messages

pursuit oi the Church's mission. For such

and

di-

to the positive

phenomena, the Church did

not consider the authority of the Holy Spirit to be genuinely present. not more circumspectly defined, the principle oi the Holy Spirit in

more extreme manifestations seemed at best

premature,

human

If its

to lend itself to a blasphemous, or

deification that

would threaten the traditional

separation between Creator and creature, and would contravene the

supreme uniqueness of Christ's redemptive

act.

In view of these tendencies toward the disruptive and heretical,

mindful oi the need to preserve an orderly structure of belief and the

Church came

to

and

ritual,

adopt a generally negative response to

self-

The Holy

Spirit

and fa Vidssitudts

proclaimed outbursts

the Holy Spirit.

of

expressions of the Spirit healings^ speaking lation

S7

1

The charismatk and

— spontaneous

spiritual

in tongues, prophecies,

— were increasingly discouraged

new

irrational

miraculous

ecstasies,

assertions of divine reve

in favor ol more- ordered, rational

manifestations, such as sermons, organized religious services and rituals, institutional authority,

k

and doctrinal orthodoxy.

apostolic writings was carefully selected

A

fixed c.inon ot spec

and permanently established,

with no new revelations recognized as God's infallible Word. thority ot the

now

Holy

Spirit,

it

The

au-

invested by Christ in the original apostles,

passed on in a sacredly established order to the bishops ot the

Church, with the ultimate authority pontiff, the successor CO Peter.

principle ot

West claimed by

in the

The notion

ot the

revolutionary spiritual power,

community and moving

it

Holy

Rom. in

Spirit as a divine

immanent

in

the

human

toward deification, diminished in Christian

belief in favor ot a notion of the

Holy

Spirit as solely invested in the

The

authority and activities of the institutional Church.

continuity oi the

the

stability

Church were thereby maintained, though

and

at the ex-

pense of more individualistic forms of religious experience and revolutionary spiritual impulses.

The

relation of the

defined in the

New

Holy

Spirit to the Father

Testament. The

first

and Son was not precisely

Christians were plainly more

concerned with God's presence among them than with meticulous theological formulations. Later

Church councils defined the Holy

Spirit

as the third

person of the triune God, with Augustine describing the

Spirit as the

mutual

spirit

of love uniting the Father and Son. For a time

in early Christian worship, the

(symbolized, as

it

would be

Holy

Spirit

later as well,

was imaged

by a dove), and was sometimes

referred to as the divine Mother. In the long run, the

conceived rather

in

more general and impersonal terms

and numinous power, whose intensity seemed minished apostles,

as

feminine terms

in

to

Holy

Spirit

as a mysterious

have radically

time grew more distant from the generation of the

and whose continuing presence,

lodged chiefly in the institutional Church.

activity,

was

difirst

and authority were

Rome and The

Judaic influence

vinely

mandated

God, the moral

on

Catholicism

Christianity in the

historical mission, the stress

—

West the sense of a dion obedience to the will of

—

the doctrinal conformity and exclusiveness

was and modulated by the influence of Rome. The Church's

rigor,

further amplified

conception of humanity's relationship to

God

as a judicial

Roman

defined by moral law was partly derived from

Church,

Catholic

based

in

Rome,

Roman

of the

effectiveness

strictly

which the

and integrated.

inherited religious

state's

one

law,

cult

The

was based upon

More fundamentalwere founded on the idea of jus-

meticulous observance of a multitude of regulations.

Roman

ly,

legal theory

and practice

tification; transposed to the religious sphere, sin

of a legal relationship established by

doctrine of justification

—was

tion

set forth

was a criminal violation

God between

himself and man.

of sin, guilt, repentance, grace, and restitu-

by Paul in his Letter to the Romans,

up again by Augustine

The

—

as the

12

and was taken

foundation of man's relationship to God.

Similarly, the Judaic imperative of subordinating the highly developed

but refractory

human

will to that of divine authority

cultural patterns in the political subordination

mense authoritarian

Roman

structure of the

found supporting

demanded by the im-

Empire.

God

himself was

generally conceived in terms reflective of the contemporary political

—

environment

unquestionably

as

commander and

just, a stern ruler

king, lord

of

all

and master, inscrutably and

who was

ultimately generous to

his favorites.

The

Christian Church, mindful of

responsibility

it

an unusually durable form classical world.

the

Roman

doctrinal

The

state

—were

its

spiritual mission

and the great

bore for the religious guardianship of mankind, required to ensure

its

survival

and influence

in the late

established cultural patterns and structures of both

and the Judaic

religion

—

particularly suited to the

psychological, organizational,

development of a strong and

self-conscious institutional entity capable of guiding the faithful

and

enduring through time. As the Christian religion evolved in the West, its

Judaic foundation readily assimilated the kindred juridical and au-

thoritarian qualities of the

Roman

Roman

imperial culture, and

much

of the

Church's distinctive character was molded in those terms: a

Rome and

Catholicism

1

powerful central hierarchy,

and

spirituality, the

demand

complex

a

oi

pnests and bishops, the

obedience from Church members and

tor

ment, formalised

effective enforce

its

and institutionalized Sacraments,

rituals

defense against any divergence trom authorized dogma, militant expansiveness aimed

and so

The

torth.

converting and

at

earth, a ruler

living representative ot

vital religious

ing in heaven* Christian truth itself

and

civilizing the harhanans,

and judge whose decisions regarding

communication, and other

strenuous

a

a centrifugal

bishop's authority was declared to be

and unquestionable. He was the

on

governing ethics

judicial structure

binding spiritual authority

SM

C

iod-ordained

God's authority heresy, ex-

sin,

matters were considered bind-

under Rome's influence became a

matter tor legislative battles, power politics, imperial edicts, military

enforcement, and eventually assertions of divinely the the

the

o\

infallible authority

by

new Roman sovereign, the pope. The fluid and communal forms of primitive Church gave way to the definitively hierarchical institution

Roman

Catholic Church. Yet within such a firm and com-

prehensive structure, Christian doctrine was preserved, the Christian faith

disseminated,

and

Christian society maintained

a

throughout

medieval Europe. In the period after Constantine's conversion in the early fourth century, the relationship of

reversal:

Rome

Rome

to Christianity

the persecutor had

gressively uniting itself with the

coincided with those of the

had undergone

a

complete

become Rome the defender,

pro-

Church. The Church's boundaries now

Roman

state,

and

its

role

was now

allied

with

the state in maintaining public order and ruling the activities and beliefs of

its

By the time of Pope Gregory the Great

citizenry.

and architect of the medieval papacy, who reigned sixth century

—Western

been Augustine's era

society

had changed so

at the turn of the

drastically that

what had pagan

dialectical statement against the spirit of the late

had now become the governing norm of the

theater, circuses,

— the exemplar

and

festal

culture.

n The

public

holidays of paganism had been replaced by

Christian sacramental celebrations and processions, holy days and days.

A

new

moved onto

the world stage with an unprecedented consciousness

mission to spiritually master the world. institution

feast

sense of public responsibility entered Christianity

o\

the Church,

The

the religious counterpart

Empire, increasingly absorbed and controlled the spiritual quest.

became Roman.

As

the

ot

its

centralized and hierarchical

Roman Empire became

to

focitt ot

the the

(

Roman hn

Christian, Christi

160

The Christian World View

The

decision by Constantine to

Rome

Empire eastward from

to

had immense consequences

also

move

the capital of the

Roman

Byzantium (renamed Constantinople) for the

West,

for after the empire's

division into an eastern

empire's collapse in the cultural

and western sector, and after the western wake of the barbarian migrations, a political and

vacuum occurred

in

much

of Europe.

The Church became

the

only institution capable of sustaining some semblance of social order and civilized culture in the spiritual

West, and the bishop of Rome,

head of the imperial metropolis, gradually absorbed many of

the distinctions and roles previously possessed by the

The Church took over sole literate class,

Roman

a variety of governmental functions

the sole patron of knowledge and the

who

as the traditional

arts, its clergy

emperor.

and became

became the West's

and the pope became the supreme sacred authority,

could anoint or excommunicate emperors and kings.

of Europe that were founded

on the

ruins of the

The new

states

Western empire, which

were successively converted to Christianity, inevitably perceived papal

Rome the

as the sovereign spiritual center of

first

power

Christendom. In the course of

millennium, the Western Church not only concentrated

in the

Roman

bishop,

it

its

also gradually but decisively asserted

its

independence from the Eastern churches centered in Byzantium and allied there

distances,

with the still-reigning Eastern emperor. The geographical

the differences in language, culture, and political circum-

stances, the differing effects of the barbarian

and Moslem incursions,

various major doctrinal conflicts, and finally the West's

tendencies

Rome and

—

all

14

the Greek church of Byzantium.

In these circumstances, Christianity in the historical opportunity. Freed East,

West experienced

from both the church and the

unimpeded by the previous

civil

and secular

empire in the West, and empowered by the their rulers, the

own autonomous

widened the separation between the Latin church of a unique

state of the

structures of the old

religiosity o{ its peoples

and

Western church assumed an extraordinarily universal

The Roman Church became not just the Empire's religious counterpart, but its historical successor. The ideal self-image of the ensuing medieval Church was that of a spiritual Pax Romana reigning over the world under the guidance of a wise and authority in medieval Europe.

beneficent priestly hierarchy. Augustine himself had envisioned the

fall

new Rome,

the

of the old spiritual

Rome, the temporal empire,

in the light of a

empire of the Christian Church, which began with the apostles

and would continue throughout history

as a reflection in this

world

R

between competing arguments, and with

reason tor discerning correct doctrine.

It is

not that Christian truths were called into question; rather, they were

now

subject to analysis.

negligence

it,

after

As Anselm

becoming firm

stated. "It

me

seems to

a

case ot

our faith, we do not strive to

in

understand what we believe."

Moreover,

atter long Struggle

thorities, the universities

won

own communities. With

with local religious and political au-

the right from king and pope to form their

the University oi Paris's receipt of a written

charter from the Holy See in 1215, a Civilization,

with the universities

now

new dimension entered European existing as relatively

autonomous

centers oi culture devoted to the pursuit o( knowledge. Although Christian theology

and dogma presided over

increasingly permeated by the rationalist spirit.

context that the

new

were

this pursuit, these

translations of Aristotle

It

was into

and

his

in turn

this fertile

Arabic com-

mentators were introduced. Initially

some

ecclesiastical authorities resisted the

sudden intrusion

o\

the pagan philosophers, especially their writings on natural philosophy

and metaphysics,

lest

Christian truth be violated. But their early bans on

teaching Aristotle quickened scholars' curiosity and provoked deeper Study of the censored texts. Aristotle could not in any case be easily dismissed, for his already

known works on

logic, passed

on by Boethius,

had been considered authoritative since the beginning of the Middle Ages, forming one of the bases of Christian culture. Despite the misgivings of conservative theologians, the culture's intellectual interests

were increasingly Aristotelian

in character

time the Church's strictures became

lax.

if

not yet in content, and

in

But the new attitudes were to

transform drastically the nature and direction of European thought.

The

principal occupation of medieval philosophy had long been the

joining of faith with reason, so that the revealed truths ot Christian

dogma could be

explicated and defended with the aid oi rational analysis.

Philosophy was the handmaid of theology, er.

Reason was thus subordinate

understanding of "reason" take

on

a

was

faith's interpret-

to faith. But with the introduction of

and the new focus on the

Aristotle

as reason

visible world, the early

as formally correct logical thinl

new meaning: Reason now

Schol in to

signified not only logic bur also

178

The Transformation of

empirical observation and experiment

With

world.

tellectual territory, the tension

The

A

had

man knowledge tic

between reason and

to be integrated with the

between

faith

now

was

radi-

this

demands of Christian

new

doctrine.

reason and faith, between hu-

of the natural world and the inherited doctrines o{ divine

emerged

fully in

philosophers Albertus

men

cognition of the natural

constantly growing multiplicity of facts about con-

resulting dialectic

revelation,

i.e.,

Medieval Era

the increasingly extended scope of the philosopher's in-

cally heightened.

crete things

—

the

the thirteenth century's culminating Scholas-

Magnus and

his pupil

Thomas Aquinas. Both

were devoutly loyal to biblical theology, yet also concerned with the

mysteries of the physical world, and sympathetic to Aristotle's affirmation

human intellect. These scholars of Scholasnot have known the ultimate consequences of

of nature, the body, and the ticism's

golden age could

their intellectual quest to

so directly this tension tian, reason

in the late

and

faith,

comprehend

all

that exists. For by confronting

between divergent tendencies— Greek and Chris-

nature and spirit— the Scholastics prepared the way

medieval universities for the massive convulsion in the Western

world view caused by the Scientific Revolution. Albertus was the

first

medieval thinker to make the firm distinction

between knowledge derived from theology and knowledge derived from science.

The

theologian

is

the expert in matters of faith, but in

mundane

matters the scientist knows more. Albertus asserted the independent value of secular learning and the need for sense perceptions and empirical observations

on which

to

ground one's knowledge of the natural world.

In this view, Aristotle's philosophy was regarded as the greatest achieve-

ment

of the natural

human

reason working without benefit of Christian

inspiration.

After Albertus had grasped the intellectual power of Aristotelianism

and established was

left

lenge.

it

as a necessary part of the university curriculum,

Aquinas

the philosophical task o{ coherently integrating the Greek chal-

Devout Dominican, son of

Italian nobility,

descendant of the Nor-

man and Lombard conquerors, student at Naples, Paris, and Cologne, advisor to Rome — Aquinas knew the breadth and dynamism of European cultural

life

and did

his pivotal teaching at the University of Paris, at the

epicenter of the West's intellectual ferment. In Aquinas, the forces at

work

in the

immediately previous centuries came to

his relatively brief life

full articulation.

he would forge a world view that dramatically

omized the high Middle Ages' turning of Western thought on a

new

direction of

In

epit-

its

axis, to

which the modern mind would be the heir and

trustee.

The Quest The

Thomas Aquinas

of

passion tor synthesis that Albertus and Aquinas experienced was

men

perhaps Inevitable tor such

between the

and the

past

or the natural

future:

new

world and a

moment

at that

Moreover,

it

faith in Christian revela-

was the peculiarity of that

—

era,

and of those men

two

to the natural world

and human reason on the other

loyalties

to the gospel

—were

antithetical but as mutally supportive. Albertus o\ the

Dominican order and thus

in

on the one hand, and

particular, that these

members

standing

drawn magnetically toward the opening range ot intellectual competence, yet

imbued with an unshakable, indeed renewed tion.

in history,

felt

not

as

and Aquinas were both

participants in a sustained

and

widespread influx of evangelical fervor spearheaded a generation earlier

by Dominic and Francis of Assisi.

The

quickly flourishing

Dominican

and Franciscan mendicant orders had brought not only new

vitality but

new

values to medieval Christianity.

Francis's mystical joy in the sacred fellowship of nature, Dominic's

cultivation of scholarship in the service of the gospel, their dissolution of rigid

boundaries between clerical and

internal

lay, their

more democratic forms of

government granting greater individual autonomy,

their call to

leave the monastic cloister to preach and teach actively in the world

these encouraged a

new openness

and freedom. Above

all,

to nature

and

society, to

human

this fresh infusion of apostolic faith

—

all

reason

supported a

between Christian revelation and the secular world,

direct dialogue

while recognizing anew an intimate relation between nature and grace. In the eyes of the evangelicals, the to be cloistered far

Word

from humanity's daily

the immediate particularities of

human

of

God

life,

was not a remote truth

but was directly relevant to

experience. By

the gospel required entrance into the world.

very nature,

its

3

Heirs to this religious rapprochement with the secular, Albertus and

Aquinas could more logical tradition,

freely

develop those aspects of the Christian theo-

found even

in

Augustine, that affirmed the Creator's

providential intelligence and the resulting order and beauty within the

created world.

It

was

a short step to their

conclusion

tli.it

world was explored and understood, the greater knowledge

ence

for

God would

result.

the more the «

»t

-ind rever-

Since there could be onlv one valid truth

180

The Transformation of

the

Medieval Era

derived from the one God, nothing reason would uncover could ultimately contradict theological doctrine. Nothing that was true and valuable, even

if

achieved by man's natural

could ultimately be

intellect,

foreign to God's revelation, for both reason and faith derived from the

same source. But Aquinas went

still

further, asserting that nature itself

could provide a deeper appreciation of divine wisdom, and that a rational exploration of the physical world could disclose

—not

dim

inherent religious

its

own

reflection of the supernatural but

on

its

terms, a rationally intelligible natural order discovered in

its

profane

value

just as a

reality.

Traditional theologians opposed the its

new

scientific perspective

because

purported discovery of regular determining laws of nature seemed to

diminish God's free creativity, while also threatening man's personal responsibility

and need

for faith in Providence.

To

assert the value of

nature seemed to usurp the supremacy of God. Basing their arguments on the teachings of Augustine concerning nature's

fall

and the need

for

God's redemptive grace, they viewed the new science's positive and deterministic conception of nature as a heretical threat to the essence of

Christian doctrine.

But Aquinas held that the recognition of nature's order enhanced

human

understanding of God's creativity and in no way lessened divine

omnipotence, which he saw

as expressing itself in a

according to ordered patterns over which

Within

own

this structure,

nature, with

man

God

continuous creation

God remained

willed each creature to

sovereign.

move according

virtue of his rational intelligence.

God, but rather was

into the fabric of the divinely created order.

And

mind

to

its

Man's freedom was not threatened

either by natural laws or by his relationship to

orderliness allowed

to

himself given the greatest degree of autonomy by

man

built

the fact of nature's

to develop a rational science that

would lead

his

God.

For Aquinas, the natural world was not just an opaque material stage

upon which man destiny.

Nor was

briefly resided as a foreigner to

his spiritual

nature governed by principles alien to spiritual con-

cerns. Rather, nature

other,

work out

and

spirit

were intimately bound up with each

and the history of one touched the history oi the other.

Man

himself was the pivotal center o{ the two realms, "like a horizon oi the corporeal and of the spiritual."

To

give value to nature did not, in

Aquinas's eyes, usurp God's supremacy. Rather, nature was valuable, as

was man, precisely because

God gave

it

existence.

To

be a creature of the

The Quest of ThonuLs AXIOMS

181

Creator did not signify a separation from God, but rather to

relationship

a

God. Moreover, divine grace did not vitiate nature, but perfected it. Aquinas was also convinced thai human reason and freedom were

valuable on their

own

account, and that their actualization would further

autonomy

serve the glory of the Creator. Man's

not limited by the taet

ot

intellect

was

God's omnipotence, nor would their

full

emergence be an inappropriate presumption against

founded

the Creator.

Rather,

God's own nature,

in

and

ot will

oi

powers by

creature

these special qualities were themselves tor

man was made

in

Man

God's Image.

autonomous

could, by his unique relationship with the Creator, enjoy

and volitional powers modeled on those o(

intellectual

a

God

himself.

Influenced by Aristotle's teleological concept of nature's relation to

Form and the Neoplatonic understanding of the

the highest

new

all-pervasive

One, Aquinas declared

a

Within human nature,

as divinely posited, lay the potential for actively

basis tor the dignity

and potential of man:

moving toward perfect communion with the infinite ground of man's God, who was the source of all development toward perfection in

being,

nature.

Even human language incarnated the divine wisdom, and was

therefore a worthy instrument capable of approaching and elaborating

the mysteries of creation.

and yet according

faith

own

its

to

Hence human reason could function within its own principles. Philosophy could stand on and yet complementary

virtues apart from,

intelligence

and freedom received

their reality

to,

Human from God

theology.

and value

himselt, for God's infinite generosity allowed his creatures to participate in his

own

do so

to the full extent of his ever-developing

At

being each according to

distinctive essence,

infinite capacity of

God

man would

be to presume to lessen the

human freedom and

for the realization of specifically will.

God had

created the world as

with immanent ends, and to reach his ultimate ends, to pass through realize his

his very

source of

immanent

humanity.

all.

ends: to be as

Man

God, of

if

God

man were

to

a

realm

man wis intended man hid fully to

intended,

was an autonomous parr

autonomy allowed him Indeed, only

of freely loving

To strive human values

himself and his creative omnipotence.

was to promote the divine

and

and man could

humanness.

the heart of Aquinas's vision was his belief that to subtract these

extraordinary capacities from

for

its

make

of God'fl unil

his return freely to the

genuinely tree could he he capable

freely realizing his exalted spintu.il destiny.

>**«*£

182

The Transformation of

Aquinas's appreciation of

human

an appreciation that affected

nature extended to the

the

Medieval Era

human

body,

his distinctive epistemological orientation.

In contrast to Plato's antiphysical stance, reflected in

much

of the tenor

of traditional Augustinian theology, Aquinas incorporated Aristotelian

concepts to assert a

new

attitude. In

man,

spirit

and nature were

distin-

homogeneous whole: The soul was the form of man, the body was the matter. Man's body was thus guishable, but they were also aspects of a

intrinsically necessary to his existence.

to man's benefit that his soul

4

In epistemological terms,

was united with a body,

for

it

it

was

was only

man's physical observations that could activate his potential understand-

Aquinas repeatedly quoted from

ing of things.

Romans, "the

invisible things of

that are made."

The

God

Paul's Letter to the

are clearly seen

divine invisibles,

... by the things

among which Aquinas included

the "eternal types" of Augustine and Plato, could be approached only

through the empirical, the observation of the

visible

experiencing the particular through the senses, the

then move toward the universal, which made

and

particular.

human mind

By

could

intelligible the particular.

Therefore both sense experience and intellect were necessary for cognition,

and

each informing the other. In contrast to

intellect for

Aquinas were not opponents

Plato's implication, sense

in the quest for

but partners. Like Aristotle, Aquinas believed that the

knowledge,

human

could not have direct access to transcendent Ideas, but that sensory experience to

awaken

its

Just as Aquinas's epistemology

it

intellect

required

potential knowledge of universals.

more deeply

necessity of this- world experience for

stressed the value

human knowledge,

and even

so did his

ontology assert the essential worth and substantiality of this world's existence.

5

Sensible things did not exist merely as relatively unreal

images, as shadowy replications of the Platonic Ideas; rather, they had a substantial reality of their

own,

as Aristotle

had maintained. The forms

were genuinely embedded in matter, united with matter to produce a composite whole. But here Aquinas went beyond the Aristotelians'

tendency to view nature

as existing apart

from God, arguing that a

deeper philosophical understanding of the meaning of existence would

To

accomplish

this,

Aquinas

reintroduced the Platonic notion of "participation" in this

new

context:

fully

connect the created world with God.

Created things have true substantial Existence,

which

is

reality

because they participate in

from God, the infinite self-subsistent ground of

all

being. For God's essence was precisely his existence, his infinite act of

The Quest of Thomas Aquinas

183

being which underlay the finite existence of all created things, each with its

own particular essence. The essence of each thing,

its

specific

participation in the real existence

its

a thing

and the

is

God

created being. In

and the

tact that

tact oi his

alone

is

it

kind of being,

communicated

at all are

hfa

ot essence

essence

is

se.

tence. Existence for creatures

it

by God.

is

What

distinct aspects of

God

Thus every

and existence, while God alone

existence per

to

the measure of

is

is

"be-ing"

creature

is

any

God

there absolute simplicity, for what

is

being are one and the same:

unlimited, absolute, beyond definition.

pound

two

is

ifi

itself

a

com-

not a compound, for

Creatures have existence;

God

is

exis-

not self-given, and therein lay Aquinas's

tundamental philosophical tenet: the absolute contingency of the

finite

world on an infinite giver of being.

Thus torth,

Aquinas,

for

God was

not only the supreme Form drawing nature

but was also the very ground of nature's existence. For both

Aristotle

and Aquinas, form was an active principle

—not

just a struc-

dynamism toward realization; and the entire creation was dynamically moved relative to the highest Form, God. But whereas Aristotle's God was apart from and indifferent to the creation of which he was the unmoved mover, for Aquinas God's true essence was existence. God communicated his essence to his creation, each instance of which became real to the extent of its reception of the act of existence communicated by God. Only in this way was the Aristotelian Prime Mover genuinely connected to the creation he motivated. And conture,

but a

versely, only thus

was the Platonic transcendent genuinely connected to

the empirical world of multiplicity and flux. Building on philosophical developments in the Arab and Christian

Neoplatonist traditions (which were, besides Augustine and Boethius, the main sources for his knowledge of Plato), and particularly on the

thought of the ancient Eastern Christian mystic

who

used the

name

Dionysius the Areopagite, Aquinas aspired to deepen Aristotle by using Platonic principles. Yet he also saw Platonism's need for Aristotelian principles.

made

full

Indeed, for Aquinas, the Platonic theory

when

metaphysical sense only

principle of existence

existence might lend

itself,

itself to.

it

beyond the various types

And

this

ot

to reach the

of

being

tli.it

deepening required an Aristote-

lian context of a nature that possessed real being

through nature's constant process

participation

(A

was deepened

becoming,

its

—

a reality

achieved

dynamic movement

184

The Transformation of

from potentiality to

actuality.

Medieval Era

Thus Aquinas showed the complementar-

of the two Greek philosophers, o{ Plato's exalted spiritual absolute

ity

and

Aristotle's dynamically real nature,

an integration achieved by using

not to the Ideas but to Existence. In doing

Plato's participation relative

he further corrected Aristotle by showing that concrete individuals

so,

were not to

the

but were united both to each other and

just isolated substances,

God by

their

common participation

Yet he also corrected

in existence.

Plato by arguing that divine Providence did not pertain just to the Ideas,

but extended directly to individuals, each of which was created in the

image of

God and

participated, each in

limited fashion, in God's

its

unlimited act of existence.

Aquinas thus gave to

God

alone what Plato gave to Ideas in general,

but by doing so gave increased reality to the empirical creation. Since "to be"

to participate in existence,

is

God's

own

being,

founded in God's

and since existence

then every created thing possesses a true

infinite reality.

The

God

is

firstly

finite

and most

significantly in

God's nature, each in

God was not so much a

Aquinas synthesized crete reality by

its

specific

and perfection. an

thing,

entity that 7

being. In effect,

with Aristotle's con-

Plato's transcendent reality

loving infinite Creator, giving freely of his

dynamism,

the Platonic emphasis reality,

own

means of the Christian understanding o{ God

own

Similarly, he synthesized the Aristotelian stress

dent

the Ideas

of a series of other entities, but was rather the infinite act of

existence (esse) from which everything derived

teleological

all

own

its

a part of God's infinite variety

In Aquinas's understanding, first

reality

supreme essence. All created beings participate

manner manifesting

was the

of

on the deepest

the true and ultimate exemplar of creation, and

are inflections of that

gift

Ideas are in a sense the exemplars

of God's creation, as formal designs in God's mind; but level

the

itself

is

striving forward to

on

more

as the

being to his creation.

on

nature's

and man's

perfect realization, with

nature's participation in a superior transcen-

by conceiving the divine as standing in absolute ineffable

perfection and yet also as bestowing

created things. These are then

its

essence

—

i.e.,

existence

moved dynamically toward

precisely because they participate in being,

dynamic tendency toward the Absolute. As

which in

is

by

—

to

realization

its

Neoplatonism,

nature a all

crea-

tion begins and ends with, goes forth from and returns to, the supreme

One. But

for

Aquinas,

God

created and gave being to the world not by

necessary emanation but by a free act of personal love.

And

the creature

The Quest of Thomas Aquinas

lss

participated not merely in the

One

.is

b distant

So Aquinas followed and dynamism, ty

transcendent

and

tor individual beings,

reality, his belief in the

and goal

and

tor the

ot being,

its

reality

epistemological necessi-

Yet in his emphatic awareness

his strongly spiritual sensibility

infinite source ot

God.

b\

Aristotle in his regard for nature, for

sense experience.

of

semi*real emanation, but

entnv created

in "be-ing" (esse) as a fully real individual

ot

superior

a

immortality of the individual soul,

which focused on

a

loving

rod as the

c

he continued the Augustinian tradition

medieval theology and thereby more nearly resembled Plato and

Flotinus. But the distinction

and human knowledge was an epistemologically

in relation to the Ideas

significant

one,

tor

Aquinas made against Plato and Augustine

it

sanctioned

Christian

the

explicit

intellect's

recognition ot the essential value of sensory experience and empiricism,

which Plato and Augustine had devalued

in favor of direct illumination

from the transcendent Ideas. Aquinas did not deny the existence Ideas. Rather, ontologically

oi the

he denied their self-subsistence apart from

material reality (in keeping with Aristotle) and their separate creative apart from

status

God

keeping with Christian monotheism and

(in

Augustine's placement of the Ideas within the creative mind of God).

And

epistemologically he denied the

human

intellect's capacity to

know

the Ideas directly, asserting the intellect's need for sensory experience to activate an imperfect but meaningful understanding of things in terms of B

eternal archetypes.

knows

perfectly,

If

man would know even

he would have to open

For Aquinas, like Aristotle,

imperfectly what

God

his eyes to the physical world.

we know concrete

things

then we

first,

can know universals. For Plato and Augustine, the reverse was

true.

Augustine's theory of knowledge rested on the epistemological certainty that

man

could

know

truth by being illuminated directly from within by

the knowledge of God's transcendent Ideas. These Ideas constitute the

Logos, Christ, Augustine's inward teacher,

who

in

Aquinas would retain aspects Plato's epistemological

well as spirit,

edge

is

who

contains

an interior manner illuminates the human ot

all

intellect.

Ideas

and

Although

Augustine's view, he could not embrace

dependence on the Ideas alone.

and human cognition must

reflect

Man

1-

matter

as

both principles: knowl-

derived from the sensory experience ot concrete particulars, from

which universals can be abstracted, and because in recognizing the universal intellectually participating,

however

this

knowledge has

in singular thing! the

validity

human mind

is

indirectly, in the original pattern by

186

The Transformation of

which God created that

thing.

the

Medieval Era

Here Aquinas again integrated Plato with

Aristotle by identifying the soul's capacity for such participation with Aristotle's active

intellect,

common

entity

intelligence

—though

he strenuously opposed

who would make

the nous a single separate

or nous

those interpreters of Aristotle

mankind, which would tend

to all

and moral

deny individual

to

responsibility, as well as the immortality of the

individual soul.

Aquinas agreed that

a kind of reality

can be ascribed to the Ideas,

as

eternal types in the divine intellect akin to the forms that exist in an architect's

human (i.e.

mind

prior to his constructing a building, but

beings can directly

know them

in this

Only

life.

he denied that a

more

perfect

angelic) intelligence can enjoy intimate contact with God's eternal

,

notions and grasp them directly. Earthly man, however, understands things in the light of those eternal types in the same things in the light of the Sun.

blank

slate, in a state

The mind without

and thus

that he sees

sensory experience

intellect

would be

effectively blind. In his present condition,

focus his active intellect,

a

which contains within

it

unintelli-

man must

the likeness of the

divine light, onto his sensory experience of the physical world

going to attempt to grasp truth, and from that point he

means of

is

of potentiality with regard to things intelligible.

But sensory experience without the active gible,

way

if

he

is

may proceed by

discursive reasoning in the Aristotelian manner. In Aquinas's

philosophy, the Ideas recede into the background, and emphasis instead placed

on sensory experience

as that

is

which provides the neces-

sary particular sense images that the active intellect illuminates so as to

abstract intelligible species or concepts.

Aquinas thus offered

a solution to

one of the central and most endur-

ing problems of Scholastic philosophy, the problem of universals. early

ism"

The

medieval doctrine of universals was characteristically that of "Real-

—

i.e.,

the universal existed as a real entity. Since the time of

Boethius, opinion was divided as to whether the universal was real in the Platonic sense, as a transcendent ideal independent of the concrete particular,

or in the Aristotelian sense,

associated with

its

as

an immanent form

individual material embodiment.

fully

Under Augustine's

influence, the Platonic interpretation was usually favored. Yet in either

case the reality of universals was so generally affirmed that Anselm, for

example, argued from the existence of the Idea to the existence of the particular, the derivative of the Idea.

Anselm and teacher

But Roscellinus,

a

contemporary of

of Abelard, criticized the belief in real universals,

The Qiwst of

Tkamu

is;

Atftnca

asserting that the latter were merely words or

names (nonmui)- thus

giving voice to the philosophical doctrine of nominalism. Aquinas, using distinctions formulated by AJbertua

Magnus, strove

by suggesting that the Ideas had throe kinds the

mind

things

ot

God independent

(in re),

from things

and

ot existence: as

{anu rem),

ot things

exemplars

In

forms

in

as Intelligible

human mind formed

concepts in the

as

to resolve the dispute

by abstracting

{pOSi rem).

These meticulous epistemological distinctions and others were important

tor

human knowledge

Aquinas because

tor

them

like

him the nature and processes of

bore directly on matters of weighty theological con-

cern. In Aquinas's view,

man

could strive to

know

things as they are

because both the things and man's knowledge oi them were determined

same absolute being

— God.

Like Plato and Aristotle, Aquinas believed in the possibility oi

human

by and, like

man

himself, expressive of the

knowledge because he was convinced of an ultimate identity between

Man

could

formal, or universal, aspect.

Man

being and knowledge.

know an

object by comprehending

its

possessed this capacity for comprehen-

mind was merely impressed by superior separated the Ideas, but because his own mind possessed a superior, "nobler" element by which it could abstract valid universals from sense

sion not because his entities,

lumen

impressions. This capacity was the light o{ the active intellect

The

intelUctiis agentis.

light of

human

reason derived

divine Truth which contained the eternal types of

power from the

its

all

things. In

endow-

God had given him the potential for knowledge o\ the world, just as God had endowed all beings, as possible objects ot knowledge, with intelligibility. Thus the human mind could make true ing

man

with this

light,

judgments. Yet Aquinas held that, because of the relationship

o\

human

cognition.

the knower.

could

know

The

To know

was

by receiving

sented every instance of material embodiment. it

it

As

—

its

universal aspect,

Aristotle

had been created

had in

knowledge Aquinas recognized

-is

said, the soul

such a way it.

in the process

have that thing itself.

th.it

the thing's form apart from

order of the universe inscribed within this

in a sense to

soul received the form of an object into

a thing

things, because

a thing

being and

of

knowledge, something of deeper significance was involved

its

was

as to

The

which

individuating in

,\

sense

all

have the whole

G

end of man, but rather the supreme

beatific

vision

of

much

the state of philosophical contemplation recognized by Aristotle final

repre-

But the hmhe^r condition

the vision of

in

soul

4

as

Chri

the

188

The Transformation of

mysticism. By expanding his like

God, and

to be like

the

Medieval Era

own knowledge, man was becoming more

God was

man's true desired end. Because pure

being and pure knowledge were both expressive of God (with knowledge constituting the "being to itself" of being, the self-illumination of being),

and because lutes,

a finite being participates, in a partial way, in those abso-

every act of knowing was not only an expansion of one's

but an expanding participation in God's nature.

And

own

being

by knowing exis-

—though ever

tence in created things, the mind could gain a positive

—knowledge

imperfect

of

God, by

virtue of the analogy

being and Infinite Being. Thus for Aquinas, the

was endowed with profound the

way

finite

human effort to know The way of truth was

religious significance:

of the Holy Spirit. .*.*

The

between

^% " —

extraordinary impact Aquinas had

on Western thought

lay es-

pecially in his conviction that the judicious exercise of man's empirical

and rational

intelligence,

the Greeks, could the

human

now

which had been developed and empowered by

marvelously serve the Christian cause. For

intellect's penetrating

objects in this world

—

their order, their

their absolute

their finiteness,

it

was

cognition of the multitude of created

dynamism,

their directedness,

dependence on something more

—

that

revealed, at the culmination of the universe's hierarchy, the existence of

an

infinite highest being,

Christianity. For

God

an unmoved mover and

first

was the sustaining cause of

ultimate unconditioned condition for the being oi result of the metaphysical quest, of

cause: the

all

all

God

of

that exists, the

things.

The

final

which the Greeks were the prime

exemplars, was discovered to be identical to that of the spiritual quest, of

which Christianity was the

definitive expression.

reason, but was not opposed by

it;

Rather than view the workings of secular reason sis

to the truths of religious faith,

Faith transcended

indeed, they enriched each other. as a threatening antithe-

Aquinas was convinced that ultimately

the two could not be in conflict and that their plurality would therefore serve a deeper unity. Aquinas thereby fulfilled the challenge of dialectic

posed by the earlier Scholastic Abelard, and in so doing opened himself to the influx of the Hellenic intellect. It is

true that rational philosophy could not

on

its

own

offer

ling proof for all the spiritual truths revealed in Scripture

doctrine. But

it

compel-

and Church

could enhance the spiritual understanding oi theological

The Quest of Thonuis Affumos

1

enhance the philosophical understanding

matters, just as theology could

Because God's wisdom permeated

of worldly matters. creation,

knowledge of natural

of Christian

although

taith,

89

could only magnify the profundity

reality

in

aspects oi

all

ways that might nor be know able

in

advance. Certainly the philosophy of the natural mind alone could not penetrate fully into the deepest meanings oi the creation.

Human

Christian revelation was necessary.

darkened hy the

To approach

Fall.

And

Aristotle for

if

Word; and only

human

Aquinas

search for spiritual un-

(like Plato for

lacked an adequate conception of the Creator, Aquinas saw

on

Aristotle while correcting

love

But the philosophical enterprise was

nevertheless a vital element in the derstanding.

this,

human

the highest spiritual realities,

thought required the illumination of the revealed could truly reach the infinite.

For

intelligence was imperfect,

Augustine)

how

to build

and deepening him wherever necessary

whether by infusing Neoplatonic conceptions, by employing the special insights of Christian revelation, or by acuity.

Thus Aquinas gave

significance

—

as

or,

it

drawing on his

to Aristotelian

own

philosophical

thought a new religious

has been said, Aquinas converted Aristotle to

Christianity and baptized him. Yet

it is

equally true that in the long run

Aquinas converted medieval Christianity

to Aristotle

and to the values

Aristotle represented. Aristotle's

introduction

into

the

Aquinas opened Christian thought

mous dynamism

of this world, of

medieval West

to the intrinsic

man and

as

mediated by

worth and autono-

nature, while not forsaking the

Platonic transcendent of Augustinian theology. In Aquinas's view, an

understanding of Aristotle paradoxically allowed theology to become

more

fully "Christian,"

more resonant with the mystery of the Incarna-

tion as the redemptive reunion of nature and spirit, time and eternity,

man and God.

Rational philosophy and the scientific study of nature

could enrich theology and faith ideal

itself

while being

was "a theologically based worldliness and

a

fulfilled

by them.

theology open

world." For Aquinas the mystery of being was inexhaustible, but

mystery opened up to man, radiantly

if

to seek perfection, to

Aquinas thus texts,

know

a fuller

move beyond himself and return to embraced the new learning, mastered

the Absolute, to

and committed

himself to

the

th.it

never completely, through the

devout development of his God-given intelligence: so

onward from within

The

to the

God drew

in, in

participation in

his all

the available

Herculean intellectual

t,isk

of

The Transformation of

190

the

Medieval Era

comprehensively uniting the Greek and Christian world views in one great

summa, wherein the

scientific

and philosophical achievements of

the ancients would be brought within the overarching vision of Christian

More than a sum of its parts, Aquinas's philosophy was a live compound that brought the diverse elements of its synthesis to new theology.

expression

—

and then

set

as

if

he had recognized an implicit unity in the two streams

about drawing

it

out by sheer force of intellect.

Further Developments in the

The

High Middle Ages

Rising Tide of Secular Thought

Aqtlinas's optimistic confidence in the conjunction of reason and revela-

tion was not shared by everyone.

Other philosophers, influenced by

Arabic commentator, Averroes, taught Aristotle's

Aristotle's greatest

works without seeing the need

for or the possibility o{ consistently

coordinating his scientific and logical conclusions with the truths of Christian faith. These "secularistic" philosophers, centered in the arts faculty at Paris

and

led by Siger of Brabant,

noted the apparent

dis-

crepancies between certain Aristotelian tenets and those of Christian revelation

—

particularly such Aristotelian concepts as the single intellect

common to all mankind (which human soul), the eternity of the

implied the mortality of the individual material world (which contradicted the

creation narrative of Genesis), and the existence of

between

God and man

many

intermediaries

(which overruled the direct workings of divine

Providence). Siger and his colleagues asserted that

if

philosophical rea-

son and religious faith were in contradiction, then the realm of reason

and science must

in

some sense be outside the sphere of theology.

A

"double-truth" universe was the consequence. Aquinas's desire for fun-

damental resolution between the two realms thus found not only to the position of the traditional Augustinians,

itself

who

opposed

rejected the

intrusion of Aristotelian science altogether, but also to the Avenoists'

heterodox philosophy, which Aquinas viewed

as inimical to

an inte-

grated Christian world view and as undercutting the potential o(

a

genuine Christian interpretation oi Aristotle. But with better transitions of Aristotle's writings

and with

their gradual separation from the

Neoplatonist interpretations with which they had lon^ been conflated, the Aristotelian outlook was increasingly recognized as

cosmology not readily combined with

a

naturalistic

a straightforward Christian out-

look.

Faced with

this disturbing

outbreak of Intellectual independence

the universities, ecclesiastical authorities

condemned

the

in

new thought

iaj

The Transformation of

the

Medieval Era

Sensing the secularizing threat of the pagan Aristotelian- Arabic science, embrace of profane nature, the ol Ul autonomous human reason and its

Chuich was

pressed to take a stand against the antitheological thinking Spread.

The

truths of Christian faith

were supernatural, and

nee Jed to he safeguarded against the insinuations of a naturalistic rationalism. Aquinas had not succeeded in resolving the heated differences

pew

een the opposing camps, and after his early death in 1274 the rift more profound. Indeed, three years later when the Church made its

condemned propositions, some of those taught by Aquinas were included. Thus the division between the warring adherents of reason and •

faith

was further deepened,

secularists but also

by

for

its

censure of not only the

initial

Aquinas, the Church cut off communication between

the scientific thinkers and the traditional theologians, leaving the

camps increasingly aloof and

The Church's

many

distrustful

two

toward each other.

prohibition did not stop the

new

philosophers, the die was already cast.

thinking. In the eyes of

Having

tasted the

power of

the Aristotelian intellect, they rejected a return to the previous status

quo.

that their intellectual duty was to follow the

They recognized

critical

judgments of

human

reason wherever these led, even

contradicted the traditional verities of faith.

Not

if

that

that the truths of faith

could ultimately be doubted; but such truths could not necessarily be justified

by pure reason, which had

and which tound

The

its

its

own

logic

and

its

own conclusions,

application in a realm perhaps irrelevant to faith.

potential divorce between theology and philosophy was already

viable.

And once

opened, the Pandora's box of scientific inquiry would

not shut. In these final centuries o{ the

authority was

still

Middle Ages, however, the Church's

secure and could

without endangering

its

cultural

accommodate

itself to

doctrinal shifts

hegemony. Despite repeated censure by

new ideas were too attractive to be altogether suppressed, even among devout Church intellectuals. Half a century after Aquinas's death, his life and work were reevaluated by the Church the Church, the

hierarchy and he was canonized, a scholar-saint. All Thomist teachings

were removed from the

list

condemned

of

propositions.

Recognizing

Aquinas's prodigious achievement in interpreting Aristotle in Christian terms, the

Church began incorporating

into ecclesiastical doctrine, with positor.

Aquinas and

this

Aquinas

his Scholastic followers

mated Aristotle by working out

in

modulated Aristotelianism

as its

most authoritative ex-

and colleagues thus

legiti-

painstaking detail the unification of

Further Developmtnts

his science,

fa H^h Middk Ages

m

193

philosophy, and cosmology with Christian doctrine. With

out that synthesis,

it

questionable whether the force

is

ism and naturalism could have been

ol

(

taeek rational*

00 fully assimilated into a culture as

pervasively Christian as the medieval West.

Bui

with the Church's

gradual acceptance ol thai work, the Aristotelian corpus was elevated virtually to the status ol Christian

dogma.

Astronomy and Dante With

my

the discovery of Aristotle

came

BS well

Ptolemy's works on astrono-

explicating the classical conception ot the heavens, with the planets

revolving around the Harth in concentric crystalline spheres, and with the

mathematical refinements

further

epicycles,

ot

eccentrics,

and

equants. Although disparities between observation and theory continued to arise

and demand new solutions, the Ptolemaic system

the most sophisticated astronomy details while

convincing

maintaining

scientific

tixed with the

its

account

still

reigned as

known, capable of modifying

Above

basic structure. tor the natural

heavens moving around

it.

all,

it

itself in

provided

perception ot the Earth

Taken

a

as

together, the works of

Aristotle and Ptolemy offered a comprehensive cosmological paradigm

representing the best science of the classical era, one that had dominated

now swept

Arabic science and that

From the twelfth and thirteenth

the universities in the West.

centuries even the classical astrology

codified by Ptolemy was being taught in the universities (often linked to

medical studies), and was integrated by Albertus and Aquinas into Christian context.

Astrology

in

fact

a

had never entirely disappeared

during the medieval era, periodically enjoying royal and papal patronage

and scholarly repute, and constituting the cosmic framework ongoing and growing

vital

esoteric tradition.

longer an immediate threat to Christianity,

Middle Ages more gy in the

freely

scheme

of"

and

tion to astrology

—

by Aquinas in his

its

theologians ot the high

thini^. especially given

Aristotelian-Ptolemaic lystemarizafkwv

its

classical

Summu

»»t

astrolo-

pedi

traditional Christian ol

implicit negation ot tree will an TheologjCO. There

an

But with paganism no

explicitly accepted the relevance

The

tor

lie

wbm met

I

affirmed

rh.tr rlu-

planets

influenced man, specifically his corporeal nature, but thai thn High the use of his God-given reason and tree will

and achieve freedom from

man

COul

astrological determinism.

I

most

in-

The Transformation of

194

dividuals did not exercise this faculty

make

dictions. In principle, however, the soul was

maintained the Christian belief

man

Medieval Era

and were therefore subject to

planetary forces, astrologers were able to

according to astrologers, the wise

the

accurate general pre-

free to choose, just as,

ruled his stars. Aquinas thus

and divine grace while

in free will

acknowledging the Greek conception of the

celestial powers.

Astrology, conjoined with astronomy, rose again to high status as a

comprehensive science, capable of disclosing the universal laws of nature.

The

planetary spheres

Saturn

ter,

affecting

—formed

human

—Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars,

successive

Jupi-

heavens surrounding the Earth and

existence. For underlying the restored classical cosmolo-

movement must

gy was Aristotle's fundamental axiom, "The end of every

be one of the divine bodies moving in the sky."

As

the translations from

the Arabic continued during the succeeding generations, the esoteric

and

astrological conceptions forged in the Hellenistic era, enunciated in

the Alexandrian schools and Hermetic tradition and carried forward by the Arabs, gradually achieved widespread influence

among

the medieval

intelligentsia.

But

it

was when the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic cosmology bestowed to

Christianity by the Scholastics was embraced by Dante that the ancient

world view

fully

reentered the Christian psyche and was there elaborated

and permeated with Christian meaning. Closely following Aquinas time and

spirit,

Dante

le,

and

similarly inspired by the scientific

realized in his epic

The Commedia

achievement

Divina

Commedia what was

represented,

on

in Christian culture.

several counts, an unprecedented

As

a sustained act of the poetic

imagination, Dante's epic transcended earlier medieval conventions its

literary sophistication,

in

its

in

its

its

instruments o( religious understanding, in

its

human

eros

in

in

its

expression of a

upholding oi poetry and learning

as

implicit identification of

the feminine with the mystical knowledge of God, in amplification of

—

eloquent use of the vernacular, in

psychological insight and theological innovations, in

deepening individualism,

in

and cosmological paradigm of the medieval

effect the moral, religious, era.

poem La

in

wisdom of Aristot-

its

a Christian context.

bold Platonic

But especially

consequential for the history of the Western world view were certain ramifications of the epic's cosmological architecture. For by integrating

the scientific constructs of Aristotle and Ptolemy with a vividly imagined portrayal oi the Christian

universe,

Dante created

a

vast classical-

Christian mythology encompassing the whole of creation that would

Further Development*

m

the lli^h

exert a considerable

l^s

Middle

— and

complex—-influence on

the latei Christian

imagination. In Dante's vision, as in the medieval vision generally, the heavens were both numinous and humanly meaningful. The human microcosm directlv reflected the

macrocosm, and the planetary spheres embodied

human

the various forces influencing

Dante

destiny.

our

filled

general conception by poetically uniting the Specific elements

ban theology with the equally specific elements

ot

this

hns

I

astronomy.

ot classical

Commedia, the ascending elemental and planetary spheres

In the

envelop the central Earth culminate the throne ot

spheres

m

God, while the

reverse,

in the highest sphere,

descend toward the corrupt core

Aristotelian geocentric universe thus ture tor the moral

drama

became

ot Christianity,

.1

and balanced

at

references,

situated

and earthly

his ethereal

the moral pivot between his spiritual

now

corporeal natures. All ot the Ptolemaic planetary spheres

Christian

The

ot the Earth.

massive symbolic struc-

which man was

in

between Heaven and Hell, drawn between abodes,

containing

mirroring the celestial

Hell,

circles ot

thai

with

ranks

specific

ot

angels

and

took on

and archangels

responsible for each sphere's motions, even for their various epicyclic

refinements.

being

The Commedia

portrayed the entire Christian hierarchy of

— ranging from Satan and Hell

Earth, out through the

Mount

in the dark

ot Purgatory,

successive angelic hosts to the supreme celestial sphere,

point,

all

God

depths o( the material

and on up through the

in Paradise at the highest

with man's earthly existence at the cosmological mid-

carefully

mapped onto

resulting Christian universe

humankind was positioned

The

the Ptolemaic-Aristotelian system.

was

a divine

macrocosmic

womb on

securely in the center, enclosed

God's omniscient and omnipotent being. Thus Dante, achieved an extraordinarily comprehensive ordering

in

which

sides by

.ill

Aquinas,

like

of the COSII*

medieval Christian transfiguration of the cosmic order

set forth

K

the

Greeks.

But the

ven,-

power and vividness

was to encourage an unexpectedly psyche. its

core,

The

of this

critical turn nt

events

medieval mind perceived the physical world

and that perception had gained new

of Aristotle and Greek science

K

BS B srniaur.il

Christian world view readily established

with every aspect

ci

in

the uilrur.il

,is

lymbolk

specificity with the

Christian intellectuals.

the Ptolemaic-Aristotelian cosmology

imagination,

Greek-Christian integration

itself in

the Greek

iseol

I

foundation

the collective scientific

tO

eml

(

tor the

.hristi.m

The Transformation of

196

imbued with

the

Medieval Era

In the minds of Dante and his

religious significance.

contemporaries, astronomy and theology were inextricably conjoined,

and the cultural ramifications of found: for

if

this

cosmological synthesis were pro-

any essential physical change were to be introduced into that

system by future astronomers

—such

as, for

example, a moving Earth

the effect of a purely scientific innovation would threaten the integrity of the entire Christian cosmology.

The

intellectual

comprehensiveness and

desire for cultural universality so characteristic of the Christian

mind

in

the high Middle Ages, bringing even the details of classical science into its

were leading

fold,

it

into directions that

would

later

prove intensely

problematic.

The Secularization of the Church and the Rise of Lay Mysticism In the high Middle Ages, the Christian world view was

The

question.

status of the institutional

after the

a role of

tenth century, the

immense

beyond

Church, however, had become

considerably more controversial. Having consolidated

Europe

still

authority in

its

Roman papacy had gradually assumed

political influence in the affairs of Christian nations.

By the thirteenth century, the Church's powers were extraordinary, with the papacy actively intervening in matters of state throughout Europe,

and with enormous revenues being reaped from the the growing magnificence oi the papal court and

its

faithful to support

huge bureaucracy. By

the early fourteenth century the results of such worldly success were both clear

and

unsettling.

Christianity

had become powerful but com-

promised.

The Church hierarchy was visibly prone to financial and political motivation. The pope's temporal sovereignty over the Papal States in Italy

involved

it

in political

complicated the Church's

and military maneuverings that repeatedly

spiritual self-understanding.

Moreover, the

Church's extravagant financial needs were placing constantly augmented

demands on the masses o( devout

Christians. Perhaps worst o{

secularism and evident corruption of the papacy were causing in the eyes of the faithful,

its

it

all,

the

to lose,

spiritual integrity. (Dante himself had

made

the distinction between spiritual merit and the ecclesiastical hierarchy,

and

felt

compelled to consign more than one high Church

Inferno for betraying the Church's apostolic mission.)

official to

The

the

very success

Further Developmeiu*

of the

in the

Church's striving

vated, was

WuLile

lli^h

l«->7

tor cultural

now undermining

hegemony,

.u

spiritually moti-

first

religious tomul.it ions.

its

meantime, the secular monarchies of the European nation* had gradually gained power and cohesion, creating i situation in

In the states

which the papal claim

to

toward serious conflict At the height panstveness, the

was inevitably leading

universal authority ot

Church suddenly found

extreme institutional disruption—

Avignon under French control

tirst

wealth and worldly ex

its

itself

caught up

with the transfer

century

in a

ot

the papal

\

of

DO

(the "Babylonian captivity") and sub-

sequently with the unprecedented situation of having two, and then three,

With

popes simultaneously claiming primacy (the "Great Schism"). the BttCred papal authority SO obviously forces,

political

at

wayward

the mercy ot

worldly pomp, and personal ambition, the Church's

actual spiritual role was

becoming increasingly obscured and the unity

ot

Western Christendom dangerously threatened. Dunns: these same years

Church's accelerating seculanz.it ion,

ot the

in

the late thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, an extraordinary wave ot

much of Europe, especially men and women laypersons as

mystical fervor swept through

involving thousands of

—

the Rhineland. well as priests,

monks, and nuns. Intensely devotional, Christ-centered, and aimed

at

achieving a direct inner union with the divine, this religious outpouring

took place largely without regard to the established structures of the

Church. The Christian mystical impulse that found

Dante

Aquinas and

in

a theological expression of considerable intellectual complexity

took a more purely affective and devotional character in the central

European

lay population.

Intellectuality ot threat subtlety played a role

here too in the person of Meister Eckhart, the movement's leading teacher,

whose metaphysical

vision derived philosophical support from

Aquinas and Neoplatonism, and whose

original

formulations ot the

mystical experience sometimes appeared to threaten the limits ot ortho-

doxy: "The eye with which

my

God

sees

me

eve and his are one." Yet the impact

is ofl

the eye with which his widely

I

see

him;

sermom

heard

Johann Taulei and Heinrich Suso, was

ot the teachings ot his disciples

not primarily intellectual or rational but moral and

reli

e all,

their concern was with direct religious illumination an

tified lite

hue and service. But with such an emphaMs on

of Christian

than on the need

for

internal

communion

the Church's institutionalized

collective forms of worship, the

Church

itself

was

with

(

fad, rathei

The Transformation of

198

for the spiritual enterprise.

With advanced

and bishop were no longer regarded Similarly,

spiritual activity.

much

rationalist

development

as to clergy,

as necessary

the

mediators of

the relative unimportance of words and

reason in the context of the soul's relationship to

Church doctrine seem

now

religious experience

perceived as directly available to lay people as priest

Medieval Era

the

ot theology

superfluous.

God made

and the contentious

From the opposite

from Scholasticism, but with identical

the highly

subtleties of

side of the issue

reason and faith were

effect,

growing ever further apart.

Of greater immediate

import was the growing divergence between the

ideal of Christian spirituality

In the view of the

new

and the

Church.

reality of the institutional

mystical preachers and lay brotherhoods, personal

piety took precedence over ecclesiastical office, just as internal experi-

ence superseded external observance. The true Church, the body of Christ, was faithful

now

increasingly identified with the

souls of the

and the graciously illuminated, rather than with the

sanctioned Church hierarchy.

God's

humble

Word

A

new

as the basis of that true

institutional Church's stress

officially

on the Bible and faith in Church began to displace the

stress

on dogma and papal

sovereignty.

A

life

of

renunciation and simplicity was upheld as the authentic path to God, in contrast to the

life

of wealth and power enjoyed by the privileged

officeholders of the ecclesiastical establishment.

All of these widely experienced dichotomies suggested a potential

break from the traditional structure of the medieval Church. Yet that break did not occur. Those involved were devout Christians ally

who

recognized no need for active rebellion against the Church.

gener-

Where

reform and renewal were sought, as these were by several major religious

movements in the later Middle Ages, it was still generally within the existing Church framework. But a seed was sown. The life of Christ and the apostles was acknowledged as the paradigm of spiritual existence, but that

life

appeared to be neither represented nor mediated by the contem-

porary structures of the Catholic Church.

my embraced by the Rhineland and the Low Countries, tended

And

the

new

spiritual

autono-

mystics, as well as by others in England to place the

in the realm of authentic spirituality.

Church

Already

in a secondary role

at the turn of the thir-

teenth century, Joachim of Fiore had set forth his influential mystical vision of history as divided into three eras of increasing spirituality

Age

of the Father (the

Old Testament), the Age of the Son

Testament and Church), and

a

coming Age oi the

Spirit,

—the

(the

New

when

the

Further Developments

m

the

hhgh WuLUe Ages

199

whole world would be Bufiused with the divine and the Church would no longer be necessary.

With

the

new emphasis

mstitution.il

given to the individual's direct and private

relation to God, the elaborate institutional tonus and regulations of the Church were devalued at the same moment th.it the secularization ot the Church made its spiritual mission appeal increasing open to question.

As the medieval

era reached

alwavs present in

Church

more

final stages, the earnest cries tor reform,

history,

found Strong voice

— Dante, — and became, from

diversity of figures

Wyclitte, Jan

it>

Hus

heretical in character.

in

Marsilius of Padua, Dietrich of

a

growing

Niem, John

the hierarchy's perspective, ever

Critical Scholasticism

While one

and Ockham's Razor

cultural stream, represented by the

new

lay mysticism,

toward religious autonomy, the Scholastic stream continued

Western

able development of the

And role

if

less so.

On

now ambiguous,

the one hand, the

whole academic enterprise

the other hand,

enterprise under control, either by

intellectual

where Christian doctrine

in the universities,

On

its

Church was supporting the

was explicated with unprecedentedly rigorous creasingly greater scope.

moved

remark-

under Aristotle's tutelage.

intellect

the Church's spiritual role was

was no

its

logical

it

method and

in-

attempted to keep that

condemnation and suppression, or by

giving doctrinal status to certain innovations such as those of Aquinas as

if

to say,

"This far and no further." But within this ambivalent

atmosphere, the Scholastic inquiry went on, with increasingly weighty implications.

The Church had

largely accepted Aristotle.

interest in Aristotle did

But the culture's new

not stop with the study of his writings, for that

interest signified a broader,

and ever-broadening,

interest in the natural

world and a growing confidence in the power of Aristotelianism in the late Middle Ages was more

the developing scientific

such

as

spirit in

human

reason.

symptom than cause of

Europe. Already Scholastics in England

Robert Grosseteste and his pupil Roger Bacon were performing

concrete scientific experiments (moved in part by esoteric traditions such as

alchemy and

astrology), applying the

mathematical principles held

supreme by the Platonic tradition to the observation of the physical world recommended by Aristotle. This new focus on direct experience

and reasoning was beginning

to

undermine the Church's exclusive

vestment in the authoritativeness o{ the ancient texts as well as biblical

own

and

terms, in specifics

patristic. Aristotle if

—now

Aristotelian

was being questioned on

not in overall authority.

Some

in-

his

of his principles

were compared with experience and found lacking, logical

fallacies in his

proofs were pinpointed, and the corpus of his works was subjected to

minute examination.

The

Scholastics' exhaustive critical discussions o( Aristotle

and

often shrewd suggestions of alternative hypotheses were forging a intellectual spirit, increasingly perceptive, skeptical,

and open

their

new

to fun-

ami OdJiam'j

Critical Scholasticism

damental change.

In

201

K.

tellectual climate that not only

and quantitative view

accommodate the moving the

their probings

particular,

encouraged

m

more empirical, mechanis*

a

hut would in tune

nature,

ot

were creating an

more

easily

radical shift of view necessary tor the conception

*>t

.1

Earth. By the fourteenth century, a leading Scholastic such as

Parisian

scholar and

bishop Nicole d'Oiesme could defend the

theoretical possibility o( a rotating Earth (even while personally rejecting

out ot >heer logical vigor proposing ingenious arguments against

it),

Aristotle concerning optical

would

that

heliocentric theory. ot

projectile

To

and

felling

arguments

bodies

the

solve difficulties presented hy Aristotle's theory

motion, Oresme's teacher, Jean Bundan, developed an

impetus theory, applying

which would

relativity

he used by Copernicus and Galileo to support

later

lead directly to Galileo's

and

phenomena, mechanics and Newton's first law

to both celestial

it

terrestrial

of motion. Aristotle continued to provide the terminology, the logical method,

and the increasingly empiricist But ironically,

philosophy.

it

spirit

overthrow. size

it

developing

was contributing

inviting such intense examination,

And

the

o\

Scholastic

was Aristotle's very authority

that,

by

to his eventual

was the meticulous and energetic attempt

to synthe-

Aristotelian science with the indubitable tenets of Christian revela-

tion that was bringing forth

all

the critical intelligence that would

ultimately turn against both the ancient and the ecclesiastical authorities.

In retrospect, Aquinas's

medieval mind toward

summa had been one

^^

^Sfc

This new autonomy was portentously asserted tury in the paradoxical figure

strangely priest

modern and

born soon

ot'

William

of

vet altogether medieval.

after

ot the final steps ot the

intellectual independence.

full

Aquinas's death,

fourteenth cen-

in the

Ockham,

A

Ockham

man

a

he emploved both empiricism.

Yet

a

in

Parisian secularists,

competence Although

o\

highly developed the w.ike ot

Ockham

the natural

his intentions

were

to be the pivotal thinker

m

»>t

looked

.it

matters with .it

sh.irplv

upholding Christian revelation,

logical

method and an augmented

the Church's

strove above

human

once

British philosophei

the same passion for ration, il precision as Aquinas, but arrived different conclusions. In the service

-it

reason

condemnation limit

all

to

to

Lirasp

entirely to the conrr.irv,

the late medieval

umvcrs.il (

t

the presu

Vkham

the

med

truths. pr

movement toward

the

The Transformation of

202

modern outlook. And although the

modem mind

dismiss the intellectual conflicts that concerned

itself

him

would

modern thought could

establish

its

largely

as the insignificant

quihhlings of a decadent and overwrought Scholasticism, precisely those recondite conceptual battles that

Medieval Era

the

had

would be

it

to be fought before

radical revision of

human knowledge

and the natural world.

The

central

Ockham's thought, and the most con-

principle of

sequential, was his denial of the reality of universals outside of the

human mind and human

Driving Aristotle's

language.

on the

stress

ontological primacy of concrete particulars over Platonic Forms to logical extreme,

Ockham

its

argued that nothing existed except individual

beings, that only concrete experience could serve as a basis for knowl-

and that universals existed not

edge,

only as mental concepts. In the

as entities external to the

last analysis,

what was

mind but was the

real

particular thing outside the mind, not the mind's concept of that thing.

Since

knowledge had

all

on the

to be based

and since

real,

all real

existence was that of individual beings, then knowledge must be of particulars.

Human

yond concrete

concepts possessed no metaphysical foundation be-

particulars,

between words and

and there existed no necessary correspondence

things.

Ockham

to the philosophical position of sion),

which held that

and not

would play

it

sical

new

(in

its

names

had argued

was from the time of

force

and

vitality

conceptualist ver-

or mental concepts

a similar position in the

Ockham

a central role in the evolution of the

that nominalism

Western mind.

Ockham, another prominent Scholastic Duns Scotus, had already modified clas-

In the generation before

known

nominalism

universals were only

real entities. Roscellinus

eleventh century, but

thereby gave

as the "subtle doctor,"

Form

theories in the direction of the concrete individual by assert-

ing that each particular

which possessed

had

its

own

a positive reality of

participation in the universal

—

or,

individual "thisness" (haeccitas),

its

more

own

precisely, apart

in a

common

saw

as necessary to allow the individual

from

its

sharing

nature. This added formal quality of individuation Scotus

terms, apart from

would be

apart from the particular's

its

an

intelligibility

on

its

own

universal form (otherwise the individual in itself

unintelligible, perhaps

even to the divine mind).

He

also

saw

this principle of individuation as a necessary recognition of the in-

dividual

human

free will

and

especially of God's

freedom to choose

he created each individual, rather than God's or

how

man's being bound by

the determinism of eternally fixed universals and necessary emanations

Critical Scholasticism

from the

—

20

ft

\

Cause. These modifications away from fixed universale and

First

determinism periment

and Qcfchom'a

turn

in

encouraged

attention

and ex-

observation

to

to study the unpredictable creation ot a free

)od and heightened the distinction between rational philosophy and religious i.e.,

(

truth.

But \vherea> ScOtUS,

had assumed

and metaphysical

of his

predecessors hack tO AugUStine,

human concept

correspondence between

real

Ockham

existent,

Only concrete

gether.

most

like

and

a direct

denied that correspondence

Individual being! were real, and

common

alto-

natures

(Scotus), intelligible species (Aquinas and Aristotle), or transcendent

Forms (Plato) were conceptual

A

universal tor

Ockham

fictions derived

was

a

from that primary

reality.

term signifying some conceptualized

aspect ot a real, concrete individual being, and did not constitute

metaphysical entity

A

in itself.

separate,

independent order of

moved

Forms

to eliminate the last vestige ot Platonic

reality

Ockham

populated by universals or Forms was expressly denied.

in

a

thus

Scholastic

thought: Only the particular existed, and any inference about real universals,

whether transcendent or immanent, was

with such force did

Ockham

are not to be multiplied

So often and

spurious.

use the philosophical principle that "entities

beyond necessity" (non

Inacter necessitatem) that the principle

came

sunt multipUcanda cniia

to be

known

as

"Ockham's

razor

Hence, according mind, not basis of

They

in reality.

its

empirical observations of more or

are not

dividuals, for

pleased. issue

Ockham, universals exist only in the human They are concepts abstracted by the mind on the

to

Only

less similar

God's pre-existing Ideas governing

God

was absolutely

free to create

individuals. ot

his creation

anything

in

in-

any way he

Ockham, rhe how ephemeral

his creatures exist, not Ideas of creatures. For

was no longer the metaphysical question

as

to

came from real transcendent Forms, hut the epistemological question as to how abstract universal concepts came from real individuals. "Man" as a species signified not a distinct real entity in itself, but a shared similarity in many individual human beings -is recognised by the mind. It was a mental abstraction, nor a real entity. The problem of individuals

universals was therefore a marrer of epistemology, ^niimur, and log

not of metaphysics or ontoL

Ockham,

again following

possibility of

moving from

-

le

a

lished by Scotus,

all

rational apprehension oi rhe tiers

world to any necessary conclusions about

(

'her relig

I

(

»t

rhe this

The Transformation of

204

the

Medieval Era

The world was utterly contingent on God's omnipotent and indefinable will. Hence man's only certainty derived from direct sensory observation or from self-evident logical propositions, not from rational speculations

about invisible

realities

and universal essences. Because

create or determine things according to his will, any

God was free human claim

to to

certain knowledge of the cosmos as a rationally ordered expression of

transcendent essences was altogether relativized.

way he

things in any

such

as

created

without the use of intermediaries

Thomism. of God, given by

the celestial intelligences of Aristotelianism and

There were two revelation,

realities

and the

Beyond

ence.

arbitrarily wished,

God could have

given to man: the reality

given by direct experi-

reality of the empirical world,

those, or

between them,

man

could not legitimately claim

cognitive access, and without revelation he could not

could not empirically experience

God

material object in front of him. Since

on the sensory

all

know

of God.

known

by reason.

Man

same way he could the

human knowledge was founded

intuition of concrete particulars, something

senses, such as the existence of

could not be

in the

beyond the

God, could only be revealed by

The concept

faith,

it

of an absolute divine being

was only a subjective human construction, and could not therefore serve as a secure

In

foundation for theological reasoning.

Ockham's understanding, the determinism and necessary causes of

Greek philosophy and

science,

which Aquinas sought

to integrate with

Christian faith, placed arbitrary limits on God's infinitely free creation,

and

this

Ockham

vigorously opposed.

human

nize the real limits of

Such

a philosophy failed to recog-

rationality. For

Ockham,

all

knowledge of

nature arose solely from what comes through the senses. Reason was a

powerful tool, but ter

its

power

with the concrete

sessed

could

no divine

light, as

move beyond

lay only in relation to the empirical

facts of "positive" reality.

encoun-

The human mind

Aquinas taught, by which the active

pos-

intellect

the senses to a valid universal judgment grounded in

absolute being. Neither the

mind nor the world could be

said to be

ordered in such a coherently interconnected fashion that the mind

knows the world by means of real universals that govern both knower and known. Because only particulars demonstrably exist, and not any transcendent relation or coherence between them, speculative reason and metaphysics lacked any real foundation.

Without

interior illumination or

some other means of epistemological

certainty such as Aquinas's light of the active intellect, a newly skeptical attitude toward

human knowledge was both

inevitable

and mandatory.

Critkd

Scholasticism

and Ockham's Razor

Since onlv dn

I

knowledge, and since the**

individual exigents provided a ba>

nringen-

e

nipotence that knew no determined boil

anvthing was possible t

God

tor

and empirical, and was.

:e at all.

sal k:

human

;tv

—then human knowledge was tinallv.

limited to

not necessarv and univer-

was not limited bv the structures of

will

rationality-, tor his ibtjolutt volitional

freedom and omnipotence

could allow him to make what was evil good, and vice vers, wished. There was no mandators relation between God's freelv created

human

universe and the

I

a world of rational intelligibility

oi probability were legitimate.

could make

strict

logical

demonstrations on the

K

nmediate

-anlv relativized the absolute certaintv oi the logic.

Ockham's ontoloj

At

The human mind

ng contingent on God's free

experience, but that expene:

.

And

will,

because

emr

vdusivelv of concrete individuals, the

world had to be viewed from an exclusivelv phvsical standpoint. The metaphvsical organizing pnnciples ot Anstotle or Plato could not be

denved from immediate experience.

Ockham

therefore attacked the earlier Scholastics' speculative theo-

logical rationalism as

inappropnate to logic and science (empl

unvenfiable and superfluous entities beings),

and

like the

Forms to explain individual

dangerous to religion (presuming to

to put limits of order

know Gods

and intermediate causes onto

reasons or

hi

n

creation, while elevating pagan met::

He

therebv severed the units so painstakinglv constn-

For

Ockham,

faith). inas.

there was one truth described bv Christian reveL

which was both bevond doubt and bevond

rational comprehension,

and

there was another truth comprising the observable particular fac

senbed bv empincal science and rational philosophv. The two truths were not necessanlv continuous. In a sense,

ment

Ockham

both opposed and

oi the previous century.

fulfilled

He forcefullv

the seculanstic

proclaimed a nc

double-truth universe, with a religious truth and a so. effectively cutting the link earlier secularists

when

it

-uth,

between theologv and philosophv. But the

had argued

for

unwilling to restrict Greek and position

n.

such a division because

tr

nate

philosor

conflicted with Christian belief.

Ockham, bv

contrast,

—

wished to preserve the preeminence oi Christian docmne God's absolute freedom and omnipotence as Creat

especiallv

rung

206

The Transformation of

the limits of the natural reason. In doing so, however,

the

Medieval Era

Ockham

negated

Aquinas's confidence that God's creation would be warmly open to

human

efforts at universal

ham, the human mind had

understanding. For both Aquinas and Ockto

accommodate

its

intellectual aspirations to

the fact that God's reality and man's rational knowledge were infinitely distant from each other. But

where Aquinas

left

room

for a rational

knowledge that approached the divine mystery and enhanced theological understanding, limit.

A

Ockham saw

the necessity of defining a more absolute

positivist reason could

be carefully and modestly employed in

approaching the empirical world, but only revelation could illuminate the greater realities of God's will, his creation, and his gratuitously

bestowed salvation. There was no humanly

intelligible continuity be-

tween the empirical and the divine.

Ockham's

logical rigor

was matched by

worldly magnificence of the

his

moral

rigor.

Avignon papacy, he endorsed

Against the a life of total

poverty for true Christian spiritual perfection, following the example of Jesus,

the apostles, and Francis of Assisi. For

fervent Franciscan, whose religious conviction

excommunication by the pope with Christian truth. In a

Ockham not only

the

latter's policies

series of fateful

himself a

seemed

to risk

to conflict

encounters with the papacy,

upheld radical poverty against the secular wealth of the

ecclesiastical hierarchy,

tax

if

Ockham was

moved him even

Church property

he

also

defended the right of the English king to

(as Jesus, in

to temporal authority),

"rendering unto Caesar," had submitted

condemned the Church's infringement on

in-

dividual Christian freedom, denied the legitimacy of papal infallibility,

and outlined the various circumstances ly

in

which

deposed. In the personal drama between

a

pope could be

Ockham and

the

rightful-

Church

were foreshadowings oi an epochal drama to come. But

it

was on the philosophical

most immediately potent,

level that

for in his

Ockham's impact was

to be

emphatic assertion of nominalism,

the growing medieval tension between reason and faith began to snap. Paradoxically, the very intensity of

Ockham's

allegiance to God's

om-

nipotent freedom, combined with his acute sense of logical precision, led

him to formulate a philosophical position remarkable for its modernity. In Ockham's view, one could not assume that man's mind and God's were fundamentally connected. Empiricism and reason could give a limited knowledge of the world in

edge of God, for which only God's

its

particulars, but

Word

no

certain knowl-

could be a source. Revelation

offered certainty, but could be affirmed only through faith

and grace, not

Critical Scholasticism

and Ockham's

ft

through natural reason. Reason ihould rightly toois on nature rathei than God, because only nature provided the senses with concrete data

upon which reason could ground

knowledge.

its

Ockham left no bridge between human reason and divine revelation, between what man knows and what he believes. Yet his uncompromising emphasis on the individual concrete things

power

human

ol

world, Ins mist in the

of this

reason and logic Do ascertain necessary entities and to

differentiate evidence

and degrees

and

ol probability,

his skeptical atti-

tude toward traditional and institutionally sanctioned ways all

encouraged the

directly

scientific

thinking

oi

Indeed, from such

enterprise.

duahstic starting point, science could be tree to develop along lines

with

less fear of

potential doctrinal contradiction

entire COStnOtOgy was called into question.

both Buridan and Oresme, two

ot

It

—

own

its

at least until the

was not accidental that

the most original scientific thinkers

the late Middle Ages, worked in the Parisian nominalist school

Ockham had been

a central influence.

.1

Although Ockham's

*

>t

which

in

interests lay

principally in philosophy rather than natural science, his elimination ot

the fixed correspondence between reality,

and

his assertion that all

tence, helped

human concept and

metaphysical

genuine existence was individual

open the physical world

to fresh analysis.

Now

exis-

direct

contact with concrete particulars could overcome the metaphysical

mediation

by

universals.

abstract

Significantly,

as

the

Ockham's

alliano

nominalism and empiricism represented

in

through the universities

century (despite papal cen-

sure),

in the fourteenth

Ockham's way of philosophy was known

contrast to Aquinas's and Scotus's via antiqua. enterprise,

committed

as the via

The

ideas

moderns,

tradition.il

to joining faith with reason,

s|

in

& holastk

was coming

to

an

end.

Thus with the fourteenth century, the bng~a8sumed metaphysical unity of concept and bein^ began to break down. The assumption that the

human mind knows

things by intellectually L^raspmL: their Inherent

— whether through

interior illumination bv transcendent

forms

and Augustine,

in Plato

immanent

r

particulars, as in AristotL

universals from

—was now challenged

Aquinas ical

Kle-

through the active intellect's abstracts

In the

absence

oi rh.ir

I

presupposition, the ambitiously comprehensive systems consa

bv the thirteenth-century Scholastics were no bnger possible. With die Jation by empirical e

displacement

knowledge, the

earlier

metaphysical

im-

The Transformation of

208

plausible. lian

The underlying medieval world view

—continued

thereby undoing

arose,

intellectual pluralism. In

more

but new,

intact,

Medieval Era

—Christian and

Aristote-

interpretations

critical

the earlier synthesis

many

the

and engendering

a

now new

matters, probability replaced certainty, as

empiricism, grammar, and logic began to supersede metaphysics.

Ockham's

vision prefigured the path subsequently taken by the West-

ern mind. For just as he believed the rated from the secular world

Church must be

for the integrity

and

politically sepa-

rightful

freedom of

both, so he believed God's reality must be theologically distinguished

from empirical

Only thus would Christian

reality.

truth preserve

its

transcendent sacrosanctness, and only thus would the world's nature be

comprehended on

properly

its

own

terms, in

full particularity

its

contingency. Herein lay the embryonic foundations

and metaphysical

as well as religious

Western world view

in the

so

it

was that

consummation ent

spirit

of a

in the

just

for

coming changes

wrought by the Reformation, the

the medieval vision had attained

as

work of Aquinas and Dante, the altogether

new epoch began

had achieved the

—

political

and the Enlightenment.

Scientific Revolution,

And

to be

and

and

—epistemological

its

differ-

to arise, propelled by the very forces that

earlier synthesis.

The

great medieval masterworks

had

culminated an intellectual development that was starting to break into

new

territories,

even

if

that

meant stepping out of the Church's

tablished structure of education and belief. But

modernism was

new

era

still

ahead of

would receive

its

its

es-

Ockham's precocious

time. Paradoxically, the culture of this

major initiating impulse not from the line of

medieval Scholasticism, natural science, and Aristotle, but from the other pole of classical Humanism, belles just as

Aquinas had

so did

Dante have

lettres,

and

a revived Plato. For

his contrasting philosophical successor in

Ockham,

his contrasting literary successor in Petrarch,

born in

the same decade Dante began writing La Divina Commedia, at the start of the fourteenth century.

The Rebirth

Humanism

of Classical

Petrarch

It

\va>

a

moment

pivotal

Western

in

cultural

experienced that entire period

diminishment

Petrarch

Rome and

an< lent

ol

human

as a decline o\

and moral excellence,

o\ literary

when

history

looked back on the thousand yean since the decline

greatness

itself,

a

impoverishment, Petrarch beheld the immense cultural wealth

to this

Greco-Roman

human

civilization, a

rediscovering and

gradually

seeming golden age

For centuries,

expansiveness.

.1

"dark" age. In contrast

oi creative

of

genius and

medieval schoolmen had been

integrating

works,

the ancient

Petrarch radically shifted die focus and rone

but

now

Instead

oi that integration.

of Scholasticism's concern with logic, science, and Aristotle, and with

the constant imperative of Christianizing the pagan conceptions, Petrarch

and

his followers

saw value

in all the literary classics of antiquity

poetry, essays, letters, histories and biographies, philosophy in the form of elegant Platonic dialogues rather

embraced these on tion, but as

their

own

— and

terms, not as needing Christian modifica-

noble and inspirational

classical civilization.

than dry Aristotelian treatises

they stood in the radiance

just as

Ancient culture was

of

a source not just for scientific

knowledge and rules for logical discourse, bur tor the deepening and enrichment of the

human

spirit.

The

classical texts

provided

a

new

foun-

dation for the appreciation of man; classical scholarship constituted rhe

"humanities." Petrarch

set

about the task

of

the great works of anc lent culture—Virgil and

Homer

and Plato— not

masters, but to

instill in

just to inculcate

a

(

rinding and absorbing )icero,

and Petrarch called

was being established,

a

1

trace

and Livy, flu-

himself the same moral and imaginative

they had so superbly expressed. Europe had forgotten heritage,

1

Sterile imitation of

tor

its

recollection.

A

its

past

tire th.»t

noble da

n
earch

much

lost

of

its

in

thus signified

thought With orthodoxy,

Ockham,

Buridan, Oresme,

modema

via

original impetus. By the fifteenth century,

a

tresh

The influx

failing.

the universities trapped in

a Platonic

Academe

halt ot the fifteenth century,

under the patronage

and the leadership

^nd

of Ficino,

in the

second

CostmO de Medu

oi

became the

this

intellectual

oi

Florence

in

ti.idi

European

revitalizing

backwater

a

founded

w.is

ItseU

Scholar

Planum

the

of

umd

and expansive

win

metaphysical

In

the fourteenth century, the

deism's intellectual net\e was

tkm

moderna

via

and the concern with

ontkfua'a interest

after the brilliance oi

and their contemporaries had

via

he

I

|

such minute controversy,

to

terminological accuraq

tor

And

iterilc subtleties.

was especially prone

formal logic displaced the prehensivenes>.

ova

I

flourishing centei

i

oi

the Platonic revival. In Platonism

and Neoplatonisrn the Hum. mists discovered

Christian spiritual tradition possessing

seemingly comparable to that corpus implied the existence it\

a religious

of Christianity

non-

.
Socrates as to

Humanists' suddenly expanded reading

lists

wrote saini

.»

gave evidence

ot

of learning, ofintellectu.il. spiritual, and imaginative insight,

expression not only in the history

—

in the

chissic.il

Hermetic corpus,

m

Kaballah, in Babylonian ,md Egyptian texts— that bespoke a Logos that manifested

With

the influx ot this tradition

and the divine.

m

itself

came

a

,1

I

tli.it

found

civilised

the

Hebrew

cross-cultural revelation

continually and universally.

new

vision ot

in. in.

nn

mism, based on Plotinus's cotia

I

he

tradition

,i

Greeks hut throughout

Zoroastrian oracles,

his

*>t

I

the

world as an emanation from the transcendent On.

permeated by planets,

divinity,

light,

plants.

noble expression

s

as Christ

bathed

was the

.i

possessing

divme

attributes.

verse ordered according

intense renewal ot

iffl

light -t

light oi the world,

,md with d

in divinitv

the

c

Neoplatonist Humanists declared the

God,

oi

t(

»

The

itself,

the

with

World SouL

5

numinous d imension to he the light

Sun .ill

creation th

ot

tb

lite,

l,m

ancient Pyd

transcendent mathernatJi

..t

-^

I

*

214

The Transformation of

the

Medieval Era

by a mystical intelligence whose language was number and geometry.

The garden

of the world was again enchanted, with magical powers and

transcendent meanings implicit in every part of nature.

The Humanists' Neoplatonic conception

of

man was

equally exalted.

man was capable of discovering within himself He was a noble microcosm of the divine asserted in his Platonic Theology that man not only

Possessing a divine spark,

the image of the infinite deity.

macrocosm. Ficino

was "the vicar of God" in the great extent of his earthly powers, but was of "almost the same genius as the his intelligence.

The devoutly

Author of the heavens"

Christian Ficino even went on to praise

man's soul for being capable "by means of the those twin Platonic wings

.

.

.

in the range of

intellect

of becoming in a sense

all

and

will, as

things,

by

and even

a god."

With man now attaining, in the light of the revivified classical past, a new consciousness of his noble role in the universe, a new sense of history arose as well. The Humanists embraced the ancient Greco-

Roman

conception of history

as cyclical, rather

traditional Judaeo-Christian vision;

than only linear

they saw their

own

as in the

period as a

rebirth out of the barbarian darkness of the Middle Ages, a return to

ancient glory, the

dawn

Neoplatonic Humanists,

of another golden age. In the vision of the this

world was not so fallen

as

it

had been

for

Moses or Augustine, and neither was man. Perhaps the young and brilliant Pico della Mirandola best this

new

spirit

summed up

of religious syncretism, broad scholarship, and optimistic

reclamation of man's potential divinity. In 1486, at the age of twentythree,

Pico announced his intention to defend nine hundred theses

derived from various Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and Arabic writers, invited scholars from

composed

all

for the

over Europe to

Rome

for a public disputation,

event his celebrated Oration on

the Dignity of Man.

Pico described the Creation using both Genesis and the Timaeus as sources, but then

went

further:

When God

and In

it

initial

had completed the creation

of the world as a sacred temple of his divine wisdom, he at last considered

the creation of man, whose role would be to reflect on, admire, and love the immense grandeur of God's work. But types remaining with

which

to

God

found he had no arche-

make man, and he

therefore said to his

last creation:

Neither an established place, nor a form belonging to you alone, nor any special function have

We

given to you,

O Adam,

and

for

The

Rebirth uf Classical

this reason, thai

liuvuimsm

you may have and possess, according

and judgment, whatever tions you shall desire.

been determined, You, your

hand

is

The

nature

have placed you.

We

I

have

you

set

mac more

that from there you

world.

other creatures, which hat

ot

confined within the hounds prescribed

who are confined hv no limits, own nature, in accordance with I

to youi desire

and whateva tmu

place, whatever form,

shall

your

determine

own

ol

m

whose

the world, so

survey whatever

easily

I

yourself

fbi

tree will,

the center

at

In

Is

in

the

have made you neither heavenly nor earthly, neither

mortal nor immortal. so that, more freely and more honorahh the

molder and maker form you

you may fashion youneli

ot yourself,

You

shall prefer.

shall he able to

in

whatewi

descend among the lower

forms o\ being, which are hrute beasts; you shall he ahle CO he reborn out o\ the judgment

which

your

ot

own

soul into the higher beings,

are divine.

To man had been

given freedom, mutability, and the power

of lelf

man God had

transformation: thus Pico affirmed that, in the ancient mysteries,

had been symbolized

man

bestowed to universe,

breast of

tor

own

of

glory,

spiritual elevation

a biblical Original Sin,

man's

leemingly

was now emerging aneu

m

in-

un-

the

Western man.

Imagination

of attaining knowledge of the universe was differei

now

Through the

disciplined

capacity

its

use ot

Thus could the mind recover

its

to render metaphysical

Imagination

consciousness those transcendenr living

own

Forms

man th.ir

Eact,

communicating metaphysical and psychological observant for the hidden Mgnifi

pagan gods

1

Neoplatonk Humai

the

chetypal meaning in each concrete

N

could bring to his

deepest OfgBTlU

with the

r-usm's

integral

in the hierarchy of re.ilr

employing the pantheon

of

pl.meMr.

i

in

truth.

ordered the uni\

*ith their

ing empiricism and concretises,

Following

on the epistemologi'

rose to the highest position

cal spectrum, unrivaled in

itself

Prometheus.

union with the supreme

full

sense oi man's

powers and capacity

The new mode well.

figure of

ascending to

ot

classical Greeks'

contaminated by

mythic

the ability to determine freely his position in the

even to the point

God. The tellectual

as the great

reunite in. •••

ar

2

1

c

The Transformation of

line.

nalist

Prominent Scholastics such

Oresme

Humanists'

Academy,

as the

the

Medieval Era

fourteenth-century nomi-

had Opposed astrologers' predictive claims, but with the astrology

influence

in royal courts

God now

|udaeo-Christian

still

an J goddesses were

Horoscopes abounded,

—

reigned supreme, but the

new

given

the

in

Florentine

The Greco-Roman gods

aristocratic circles, in the Vatican.

and

life

and value

and references

became ubiquitous.

zodiacal symbols

flourished

again

It is

in the

scheme of things.

the planetary powers and

to

true that mythology, astrology,

and esotericism had never been absent from even orthodox medieval culture: allegories

and

artistic

images, the planetary

names

the week, the classification of the elements and humors, aspects o\

the

presence. But

liberal arts

now

and sciences

all

The

and many other

reflected their continuing

they were rediscovered in a

revivify their classical status.

for the days of

new

light that served to

gods regained a sacred dignity, their

forms portrayed in paintings and sculptures with a beauty and sensuousness resembling that of the ancient images. Classical mythology began to

be regarded as the noble religious truth of those as a

theology in

pietas.

so that

its

study

lived before Christ,

became another form of

The pagan Venus, goddess of beauty, was restored

spiritual beauty, soul's

itself,

who

awakening

as the

an archetype in the divine Mind that mediated the to divine love

—and

as

such could be identified

alternative manifestation of the Virgin Mary. Platonic images trines

docta

symbol of

as

an

and doc-

were reconceived in Christian terms, the Greek deities and

daimones seen

as Christian angels, Socrates's teacher in the

Diotima, recognized

as inspired

by the Holy

Spirit.

Symposium,

A flexible syncretism

was emerging, encompassing diverse traditions and perspectives, with Platonism espoused as a new gospel.

Thus while Scholasticism had energetically forwarded the rational mind in the Aristotelian tradition, and while the evangelical orders and Rhineland mystics had nurtured the Christian tradition,

oi the Platonic tradition, different

spiritual heart

Humanism now evoked all

in the primitive

the imaginative intelligence

of these developments directed in their

ways toward reestablishing man's relation to the divine.

Humanism gave man new dignity, nature new meaning, and new dimensions and yet less absoluteness. Indeed, man,

—

the classical heritage were

which provoked rid

a radical

all

divinized in the

expansion of

human

Christianity nature,

and

Humanist perception, vision

and

activity far

the medieval horizon, threatening the old order in ways the

Humanists did not

fully anticipate.

The

111

afCbsskd Humanism

Rebirth

For with the rediscovery

of

such

a sophisticated

and viable

Christian spiritual tradition, the absolute uniqueness

ot

yet

non-

the Christian

revelation was relativized and the Church's spiritual authority implicitly

undermined. Moreover, the

hounds

1

lumanists' celebration ot inferiority and the

human

riches ot the individual

imagination overstepped the dogmatic

the Church's traditional forms ot spirituality, which abjured an

ot

unrestrained private imagination as dangerous in favor oi institutionally

detmed

ritual,

and meditation on the mysteries

prayer,

doctrine. Similarly, Neoplatonism's assertion o\ the o\

all

of Christian

immanent

divinity

nature confronted the orthodox Judaeo-Christian tendency to

uphold God's absolute transcendence,

was revealed only distant

biblical

his utterly

in special places like

And

past.

Mount

unique divinity which

Sinai or Golgotha in a

especially disturbing

were the polytheistic

implications or Neoplatonic Humanist writings, in which references to

Venus, Saturn, or Prometheus seemed to signify something more than allegorical conveniences.

Equally uncongenial to conservative theologians was the Neoplatonic belief in the

uncreated divine spark in man, whereby divine genius could

overtake the

human

personality

and exalt man

While

illumination and creative power.

this

to the

summits of spiritual

conception, as well as the

ancient polytheistic mythologies, provided a foundation and stimulus for the emerging Renaissance artistic genius (Michelangelo, for example,

was Ficino's student

in Florence),

tional limitation of divinity to stitutions oi the

it

God

also undercut the

Church's

tradi-

alone and to the sacramental in-

Church. The elevation of

man

to a God-like status, as

described bv Ficino and Pico, seemed to contravene the more strictly

defined orthodox Christian dichotomy between Creator and creature,

and the doctrine of the that

man

Fall. Pico's

statement in the Oratio to the effect

could freely determine his being at any level of the cosmos,

including union with God, without any mention of a mediating savior,

could easily be interpreted as a heretical breach of the established sacred hierarchy. It

is

not surprising, then, that a papal commission

ot Pico's propositions, or that the

condemned

several

pope forbade the international public

Rome largely especially as men like

assembly Pico had planned. Yet the Church hierarchy in tolerated

and even embraced the

Church

resources to

made

classical revival,

way into papal power and began using underwrite the enormous artistic masterworks of the

the Florentine Medici

their

Renaissance (establishing indulgences, for example,

to

help

\\\

i j

The Transformation of

g

the

Medieval Era

them). The Renaissance popes were sufficiently enamored of the new of life, that cultural movement, with its classical and secular enrichments souls the Church's spiritual guardianship of the larger body of Christian often leemed altogether neglected. It was the Reformation that would

on orthodox Christian dogma that the Humanist movement was encouraging nature as immanent divinity, :m:e

all

the infringements

—

pagan lensuousnett and polytheism,

:

(

hristianity. Yet the Protestants

nme

1

1

lumanists criticisms of the

institutional

deification, universal reli-

therefore call a halt to the Renaissance's Hellenization

gion— and would i

human

The new

reform.

revitalised the spiritual life of

would simultaneously build on those

Church and demands

for spiritual

religious sensibility of the

Western

culture just as

it

and

Humanists

was decaying

under the secularization oi the Church and the extreme rationalism of the late medieval universities. Yet by emphasizing Hellenic

Christian religious values,

it

and

trans-

was also to provoke a purist Judaeo-

Christian reaction against this pagan intrusion into the traditional sacrosanct religion based solely

The

on

biblical revelation.

scientific ramifications of the Platonic revival

were no

less signifi-

The Humanists' anti-Aristotelianism strengthmovement toward intellectual independence from the

cant than the religious.

ened the

culture's

increasingly dogmatic authority of the Aristotelian tradition dominating

the universities. ot

More

particularly, the influx of the

Pythagorean theory

mathematics, in which quantitative measurement of the world could

reveal a

numinous order emanating from the supreme

would

intelligence,

directly inspire

Copernicus and his successors through Galileo and

ton

efforts

in

their

to

penetrate

nature's

mysteries.

New-

Neoplatonist

mathematics, added to the rationalism and nascent empiricism of the late Scholastics,

provided one of the final components necessary for the

emergence of the Scientific Revolution.

It

was Copernicus's and Kepler's

tenacious Neoplatonic faith that the visible universe conformed to and

was illuminated by simple, precise, and elegant mathematical forms that mi pel led them to overthrow the complex and increasingly unworkable centric system of Ptolemaic astronomy.

The development

of the Copernican hypothesis was also influenced by

the Neoplatonists' sacralization of the Sun, as celebrated by Ficino in particular.

The

intellectual force that

Copernicus and especially Kepler

brought to bear on transforming the Earth-centered universe received an important impetus from their Neoplatonic apprehension of the reflecting the central

Sun

as

Godhead, with the other planets and the Earth

The

Rebirth of Classical

revolving around Plato's Republic

219

Humiinism

(or as Kepler put

it

it,

moving

adoration around

in

had declared that the Sun played the same

visible

realm

realm.

Given the boundless

as did the

from the Sun, the most

supreme Idea

o\ the

gifts ot light, lite,

brilliant

Good

it).

role in the

transcendent

in the

and warmth that emanated

and creative entity

in the

other body seemed equally appropriate tor the role

ot

heavens, no

center of the

universe. Moreover, in contrast to the finite Aristotelian universe, the

Neoplatonic supreme Godhead, and

Infinite nature ot the

its

infinite

fecundity In creation, suggested a corresponding expansion of the universe that further mediated the break from the traditional architectural structure ot the medieval cosmos. Accordingly, Nicholas of Cusa, the

erudite

Chinch

cardinal and Neoplatonic philosopher-mathematician oi

the mid-titteenth century, proposed a (or

omnicentered)

And

infinite

moving Earth

so the Humanists' Platonic revival extended

the creation ot the

modern

era,

not only through

Renaissance proper

—with

the

latter's

sophical syncretism, and cult of direct

as part of a centerless

Neoplatonic universe.

and indirect consequences

With

Revolution.

artistic

human for the

genius

momentously into

its

inspiration of the

achievements,

—but

philo-

also through

its

Reformation and Scientific

the recovery of the direct sources of the Platonic line,

the medieval trajectory was in a sense complete. Something like the

ancient Greek balance and tension between Aristotle and Plato, be-

tween reason and imagination, immanence and transcendence, nature

and

spirit,

external world and interior psyche, was again emerging in

Western culture Christianity fertile

—

itself

a

polarity

with

its

own

further complicated internal dialectic.

balance would issue forth the next age.

and

From

intensified

by

this unstable but

At

the Threshold

had occurred

In the course of the long medieval era, a potent maturation

within the Christian matrix on every front ical,

religious,

Ages, this matrix.

ample

political,

scientific,

—

philosophical, psycholog-

By the

artistic.

high Middle

later

development was beginning to challenge the

limits of that

Extraordinary social and economic growth had provided an

basis for

such cultural dynamism, which was further provoked by

the consolidation of political authority by the secular monarchies in

competition with that of the Church. Out o{ the feudal order had grown towns, guilds, leagues, states, international commerce, a class, a

mobile peasantry, new contractual and

ments, corporate

liberties,

and

new merchant

legal structures, parlia-

and repre-

early forms o{ constitutional

sentative government. Important technological advances were

made and

disseminated. Scholarship and learning progressed, both in and out of

the universities.

Human

experience in the West was reaching

new

levels

of sophistication, complexity, and expansiveness.

The

on

character of this evolution was visible

Aquinas's affirmation of the

human

a philosophical level in

being's essential

and of the value of

of the natural world's ontological significance, empirical knowledge,

divine mystery.

More

all as intrinsic

generally,

dynamic autonomy,

elements in the unfolding of the

was evidenced in the Scholastics' long

it

and polemical development of naturalism and rationalism, and

in their

encyclopedic summae integrating Greek philosophy and science into the Christian framework.

It

was

visible in the unparalleled architectural

achievement of the Gothic cathedrals and epic.

It

was conspicuous

Bacon and Grosseteste,

in Dante's great Christian

in the early experimental science in

Ockham's

assertion of

bifurcation of reason and faith, and in Buridan's

advances in Aristotelian science. mysticism and private society

and the

arts,

religiosity, in

It

advanced by

nominalism and the

and Oresme's

could be seen in the

the

new

in the secularization of the sacred

sensibilities

aesthetically refined as that of Petrarch,

critical

o{ lay

realism and romanticism in

found in the

celebration of redemptive amor by the troubadors and poets.

measured by the emergence o(

rise

as

It

could be

complex, subtle, and

and especially

in his articulation

of a highly individualized temperament at once religious and secular in

At

221

the Threshold

orientation.

It

was evident

their recovery of the

Europe tall o\

was

ot

the

visible in the

Ficino.

Platonic

an autonomous

Roman

A new

in the

Humanists' revival

tradition,

and

theil establishment

secular education tor the

And

Empire.

ot classical letters,

first

perhaps most tellingly,

new Promethean image

ot

th.it

man proclaimed

and growing independence

o\

spirit

in

time since the evolution

by Pico and

was everywhere

apparent, expressed in often divergent hut always expanding directions. Slowly, painfully, but wondrously and with ineluctable torce, the West-

mind was opening to The medieval gestation

ern

threshold, beyond

which

a

oi it

new

universe.

European culture had approached a

structures. Indeed, the thousand-year maturation of the

Bert itself in a series ot give birth to the

modern

critical

would no longer be containable by the old

enormous

world.

West was about

cultural convulsions that

would

V The Modern World View The

modern world view was the outcome of an extraordinary

convergence of events,

ideas,

and

figures

which, for

all

their

conflicting variety, engendered a profoundly compelling vision o\ the universe

and of the human being's place

novel in character and paradoxical in factors also reflected,

ern character.

mind, we

known tion.

shall

and wrought,

a

its

in

it

—

a vision radically

consequences. Those same

fundamental change in the West-

To understand the historical emergence now examine the complexly intermingled

as the Renaissance, the

of the

modern

cultural epochs

Reformation, and the Scientific Revolu-

The Renaissance much

in the sheer diversity

expressions as in their unprecedented quality.

Within the span of a

The phenomenon of

its

of the Renaissance lay as

single generation, Leonardo, Michelangelo,

New

mastenvorks, Columbus discovered the against

and Raphael produced

their

World, Luther rebelled

the Catholic Church and began the Reformation, and Coperni-

cus hypothesized a heliocentric universe and

Revolution.

Compared with

his

commenced

the Scientific

medieval predecessors, Renaissance

appeared to have suddenly vaulted into virtually superhuman

was now capable of penetrating and reflecting nature's

status.

man

Man

secrets, in art as

well as science, with unparalleled mathematical sophistication, empirical precision,

the

He had immensely expanded discovered new continents, and rounded the globe. He

and numinous aesthetic power.

known world,

could defy traditional authorities and assert a truth based on his own,

judgment. feel

new

He

could appreciate the riches of classical culture and yet also

himself breaking beyond the ancient boundaries to reveal entirely realms. Polyphonic music, tragedy

architecture,

and sculpture

all

achieved

and comedy, poetry, painting,

new

levels of

complexity and

beauty. Individual genius and independence were widely in evidence.

domain of knowledge,

creativity, or exploration

No

seemed beyond man's

reach.

With

the Renaissance,

human

life

in this

world seemed to hold an

immediate inherent value, an excitement and existential significance, that balanced or even displaced the medieval focus spiritual destiny.

Man no

God, the Church, activity, Pico's

on an

afterworldly

longer appeared so inconsequential relative to

or nature.

On many fronts,

in diverse realms of

proclamation oi man's dignity seemed

fulfilled.

human

From

its

beginnings with Petrarch, Boccaccio, Bruni, and Alberti, through Eras-

mus, More, Machiavelli, and Montaigne, to

its

final expressions

in

Shakespeare, Cervantes, Bacon, and Galileo, the Renaissance did not

new paragons of human achievement. Such a prodigious development of human consciousness and culture had not been seen

cease producing

since the ancient

Greek miracle

at the very birth of

Western man was indeed reborn.

Western

civilization.

225

The Renaissance

Yet

would be

it

Renaissance as

a

deep misjudgment to perceive the emergence of the

and splendor,

all light

for

it

of unmitigated disasters and thrived in the midst

Beginning

in

mid-fourteenth

the

through Europe and destroyed

a

fatally undermining the balance

ot

had sustained the high medieval wrath

ot

God had come upon

wake

arrived in the of

continuous upheaval. black

the

century,

plague

swept

third ot the continent's population,

economic and

cultural elements that

Many believed that the The Hundred Years' War

civilization.

the world.

between England and Erance was an interminably ruinous Italy

of a series

conflict, while

was ravaged by repeated invasions and internecine struggles.

rates, bandits,

and mercenaries were ubiquitous. Religious

strife

Pi-

grew to

international proportions. Severe economic depression was nearly universal tor decades.

Europe through

The

universities

ports

its

worship tlourished,

were

and took

as did

sclerotic.

New

diseases entered

Black magic and devil

their toll.

group flagellation, the dance of death in

cemeteries, the black mass, the Inquisition, tortures and burnings at the stake. Ecclesiastical conspiracies

were routine, and included such events

backed assassination

in front of the Florentine cathedral altar

as a papally at

High Mass on Easter Sunday. Murder,

daily realities,

threatened to

famine and pestilence annual

overwhelm Europe

And

pectations abounded. cultural institution, tion, this

its

rape,

seemed

the to

at

Church

many

perils.

itself,

pillage

were often

The Turkish hordes

any moment.

Apocalyptic ex-

the West's fundamental

the very center of decadent corrup-

and purpose devoid of spiritual

structure

and

integrity. It

was against

backdrop of massive cultural decay, violence, and death that the

"rebirth" oi the Renaissance took place.

As with

the medieval cultural revolution several centuries earlier,

technical inventions played a pivotal role in the making of the

Four in particular

(all

new

era.

with Oriental precursors) had been brought into

widespread use in the West by this time, with immense cultural ramifications: the

magnetic compass, which permitted the navigational

opened the globe

to

feats that

European exploration; gunpowder, which contrib-

uted to the demise of the old feudal order and the ascent of nationalism; the mechanical clock, which brought about a decisive change in the

human

relationship to time, nature, and work, separating and freeing the

structure o{

human

and the printing ing,

made

activities

press,

from the dominance of nature's rhythms;

which produced

a

tremendous increase

available both ancient classics

in learn-

and modern works

to

an

The

226

Modem

World View

ever-broadening public, and eroded the monopoly on learning long held by the clergy. All o( these inventions were powerfully modernizing and ultimately secularizing in their effects.

The

artillery-supported rise oi separate but

internally cohesive nation-states signified not only the overthrow of the

medieval feudal structures but also the empowerment of secular forces against the Catholic Church.

With

parallel

effect

in

the realm of

thought, the printing press allowed the rapid dissemination of often revolutionary ideas throughout Europe. tion would have been limited to a relatively a

Without

it,

new and

the Reforma-

minor theological dispute

remote German province, and the Scientific Revolution, with

dependence on international communication among many

in its

scientists,

would have been altogether impossible. Moreover, the spread of the

new cultural ethos noncommunal forms of

printed word and growing literacy contributed to a

marked by increasingly individual and

private,

communication and experience, thereby encouraging the growth of

in-

dividualism. Silent reading and solitary reflection helped free the individual from traditional ways of thinking, and from collective control of

thinking, with individual readers

Similarly progressive in

now having

private access to a multi-

and forms of experience.

plicity of other perspectives its

consequences was the development of the

mechanical clock, which with

its

precisely articulated system of wheels

and gears became the paradigm of modern machines, accelerating the advance of mechanical invention and machine building of

kinds.

all

new mechanical triumph provided a basic conceptual model and metaphor for the new era's emerging science indeed, for the entire modern mind profoundly shaping the modern view of the cosmos and nature, of the human being, of the ideal society, even of God. Likewise, the global explorations made possible by the magEqually important, the

—

—

netic compass greatly impelled intellectual innovation, reflecting and

encouraging the new scientific investigation of the natural world and further affirming the West's sense of being at the heroic frontier of civilized history.

By unexpectedly revealing the

errors

and ignorance of

the ancient geographers, the discoveries of the explorers gave the

ern intellect a

new

sense o{

its

own competence and even

the previously unsurpassed masters of antiquity plication, all traditional authorities.

Among

mod-

superiority over

—undermining,

by im-

these discredited geogra-

phers was Ptolemy, whose status in astronomy was therefore affected as well.

The

navigational expeditions in turn required more accurate astro-

227

The Renaissance

nomical knowledge and more proficient astronomers, out of whose number would emerge Copernicus. Discoveries oi new continents brought

new

economic and

possibilities tor

European

radical transformation ot

came

coveries

social structures.

encounter with new cultures,

also the

introducing into the European awareness

ot lite,

relativism concerning the absoluteness of

The

tions*

expansion, and hence the

political

political

West's horizons

— were changing

—

its

own

those dis-

religions,

new

a

With

and ways

spirit o\ skeptical

traditional assump-

geographical, mental, social, economic,

and expanding

in

unprecedented ways.

Concurrent with these advances was an important psychological de-

velopment

in

which the European character, beginning

and cultural atmosphere

political

of

Renaissance

unique and portentous transformation. fourteenth and fifteenth centuries

—were

and others

many ways

in

The

— Florence,

in the peculiar

underwent

Italy,

a

Italian city-states of the

Milan, Venice, Urbino,

the most advanced urban centers in

Europe. Energetic commercial enterprise, a prosperous Mediterranean

and continual contact with the older

trade,

civilizations of the East

presented them with an unusually concentrated inflow of economic and

weakening of the

cultural wealth. In addition, the

struggles with the incohesive

Holy

Roman

Roman Empire and

papacy in

its

with the rising

nation-states of the north had produced a political condition in Italy of

marked

The

fluidity.

independence

Italian city-states' small size, their

from externally sanctioned authority, and their commercial and cultural vitality all

creative,

provided a political stage upon which a

and often

new

spirit

ruthless individualism could flourish.

earlier times, the life of the state

o{ bold,

Whereas

in

was defined by inherited structures of

power and law imposed by tradition or higher authority, now individual and deliberate

ability

weight.

The

action and thought carried the most

was seen

as

state itself

manipulated bv

making the

political

human

will

and

something to be comprehended and

intelligence, a political understanding

Italian city-states forerunners of the

modern

state.

This new value placed on individualism and personal genius reinforced a similar characteristic of the Italian

Humanists, whose sense of personal

worth also rested on individual capacity, and whose that of the emancipated tian ideal in

which personal

lective Christian

mode

man

body

protean

self

identity

was

ideal

was similarly

The medieval

Chris-

largely absorbed in the col-

of souls faded in favor of the

— the individual man

ot the

of many-sided genius.

as adventurer, genius,

was best achieved not through

more pagan heroic

and

rebel. Realization

saintly withdrawal

from

The

228

the world but through a

unity: activity in the

devotion to

artistic activity, in

commercial enterprise and

Old dichotomies were now comprehended

social intercourse.

World View

of strenuous action in the service of the

life

and

city-state, in scholarly

Modem

in a larger

world as well as contemplation of eternal truths;

state, family,

and

self as well as to

God and Church;

physical

pleasure as well as spiritual happiness; prosperity as well as virtue.

Forsaking the ideal of monastic poverty, Renaissance

enrichments of

and

life

afforded by personal wealth, and

the

artists flourished in

commercial and

new

man embraced

the

Humanist scholars

cultural climate subsidized by the Italian

aristocratic elites.

The combined

influences of political dynamism,

broad scholarship, sensuous

art,

eastern Mediterranean cultures

and all

economic wealth,

a special intimacy with ancient

and

encouraged a new and expansively

secular spirit in the Italian ruling class, extending into the inner

sanctum

o{ the Vatican. In the eyes of the pious a certain paganism and amorality

was becoming pervasive in

Italian

life.

Such was

visible

not only in the

calculated barbarities and intrigues of the political arena, but also in the

unabashed worldliness of Renaissance man's edge, beauty, and luxury for their in the

dynamic

ity,

sakes.

knowl-

was thus from

origins

It

its

culture of Renaissance Italy that there developed a

new Western

distinctive

own

interests in nature,

personality.

Marked by

individualism, secular-

strength of will, multiplicity of interest and impulse, creative innova-

tion,

and a willingness

this spirit

of the

Roman

activity,

soon began to spread across Europe, providing the lineaments

modern

Yet for

on human

to defy traditional limitations

all

character.

the secularism of the age, in a quite tangible sense the

Catholic Church

itself

attained a pinnacle of glory in the Re-

naissance. Saint Peter's Basilica, the Sistine Chapel, the Stanza della

Segnatura in the Vatican

Church's

final

Here the

full

articulated,

moments

all

as

to the

grandeur of the Catholic Church's self-conception was

encompassing Genesis and the

ceiling), classical

drama (the

biblical

Greek philosophy and science (the School

poetry and the creative arts (the Parnassus),

theology and supreme pantheon of

Roman

all

Sistine

of Athens)

,

culminating in the

Catholic Christianity (La

Disputa del Sacramento, The Triumph of the Church). centuries,

monuments

stand as astonishing

undisputed sovereign of Western culture.

The

procession of the

the history o{ the Western soul, was here given immortal

embodiment. Under the guidance of the inspired unpriestlike

Pope

Julius

II,

protean

artists like

albeit

thoroughly

Raphael, Bramante, and

229

The Renaissance

Michelangelo painted, sculpted, designed, and constructed works of unsurpassed beauty and power

of art

the majestic Catholic

to celebrate

Thus the Mother Church, mediatrix hetween God and man, matrix of Western culture, now assembled and integrated all her diverse elements: Judaism and Hellenism, Scholasticism and Humanism, Platovision.

nism and Aristotelianism, pagan myth and Renaissance

artistic

imagery

as

its

written, integrating the dialectical

transcendent synthesis.

was

It

as

if

With

biblical revelation.

language, a

new

components

of

pictorial

Summa was

Western culture

in a

the Church, subconsciously aware

the wrenching fate about to befall

it,

called forth from itself

of

most

its

exalted cultural self-understanding and found artists of seemingly divine stature to incarnate that image.

Yet this efflorescence oi the Catholic Church in the midst of an era that was so decidedly embracing the secular

and the present world was

the kind of paradox that was altogether characteristic of the Renaissance.

For the unique position in cultural history held by the Renaissance as a

whole derives not

many

least

from

simultaneous balance and synthesis of

and pagan, modern and

opposites: Christian

sacred, art

its

and science, science and

Renaissance was both an age to

and modern,

it

was

still

itself

classical, secular

and politics. The At once medieval

religion, poetry

and

and

a transition.

highly religious (Ficino, Michelangelo, Erasmus,

More, Savonarola, Luther, Loyola, Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross), yet

undeniably

worldly

(Machiavelli,

taigne, Bacon, the Medici

At the same time

and Borgias, most of the Renaissance popes).

that the scientific sensibility arose and flourished,

religious passions surged as well,

The Renaissance

and often

in inextricable

combination.

integration of contraries had been foreshadowed in

the Petrarchian ideal of docta

pietas,

scholars like Erasmus and his friend

and was now

literate

the Christian

restraint, worldly activity

classical erudition served the Christian cause in

A

fulfilled in religious

Thomas More. With

Humanists of the Renaissance, irony and

had not witnessed.

Mon-

Castiglione,

Cellini,

and

ways the medieval era

and ecumenical evangelism here seemed

replace the dogmatic pieties of a

more primitive

age.

A

to

critical religious

intellectuality sought to supersede naive religious superstition.

The

phi-

losopher Plato and the apostle Paul were brought together and synthesized to produce a

But perhaps era's contraries

it

new

was the

and

philosophia Christi.

art of the

Renaissance that best expressed the

unity. In the early Quattrocento, only

paintings could be found with a nonreligious subject.

A

one

in

twenty

century

later,

The Modern World View

230

Even

there were five times as many.

nudes and pagan deities

now

inside the Vatican, paintings of

faced those of the

Child. The human body was celebrated

and proportion, yet often

in

Madonna and

Christ

beauty, formal harmony,

its

in the service of religious subjects or as a

revelation of God's creative wisdom. Renaissance art was devoted to the

exact imitation of nature, and was technically capable of an unprece-

dented naturalistic realism, yet was also singularly effective in rendering

and mythic beings and even

a sublime numinosity, depicting spiritual

contemporary human

figures

with a certain ineffable grace and formal

perfection. Conversely, that capacity for rendering the

numinous would

have been impossible without the technical innovations mathematization of space, linear perspective, atomical knowledge,

sfumato

chiaroscuro,

striving for perceptual realism

—

aerial perspective,

an-

that developed from

the

and empirical accuracy. In

achievements in painting and drawing propelled in

—geometrical

later scientific

anatomy and medicine, and foreshadowed the

global mathematization of the physical world.

turn, these

advances

Scientific Revolution's

It

was not peripheral to

the emergence of the modern outlook that Renaissance

art

depicted a

world of rationally related solids in a unified space seen from a single objective viewpoint.

The Renaissance maintaining no

thrived

on

a determined "decompartmentalization,"

divisions

strict

between

realms of

different

knowledge or experience. Leonardo was the prime exemplar mitted to the search for knowledge as for beauty,

who was

artist

of

human

— as

com-

many mediums

continuously and voraciously involved in scientific research of

wide range. Leonardo's development and exploitation of the empirical eye for grasping the external world with fuller awareness and cision were as

much

new

pre-

in the service of scientific insight as of artistic

representation, with both goals jointly pursued in his "science of painting." His art revealed an

uncanny

spiritual expressiveness that

accom-

panied, and was nurtured by, extreme technical accuracy of depiction.

was uniquely characteristic of the Renaissance that

who

it

produced the

not only painted the Last Supper and The Virgin of

also articulated in his

the Rocks,

It

man but

notebooks the three fundamental principles-

empiricism, mathematics, and

mechanics— that would dominate modern

scientific thinking.

So too did Copernicus and Kepler, with Neoplatonic and Pythagorean motivations, seek solutions to problems in astronomy that would satisfy aesthetic imperatives, a strategy

which

led

them

to the heliocentric

231

The Renaissance

No

universe.

less significant

was the strong religious motivation, usually

combined with Platonic themes, impelling most the Scientific Revolution through Newton. activities

Bge

was the halt-inarticulate notion

when

known

things had been

all

>tate ot

significance*

And

and myth

equally

Garden

Mankind's

Greek

so

ot

these

all

Eden, ancient

from

tall

this primal

a drastic

loss

of

knowledge was therefore endowed with

religious

Athens the

religion,

once again,

ot the ancient spirit ot

in

mythical golden ot

enlightenment and grace had brought about

knowledge. Recovery art,

For implicit in

ot a distant

— the

classical times, a pa>t era ot great sages.

major figures

ot the

just as in classical

Greeks met and interacted with the new and

rationalism and science, this paradoxical conjunc-

tion and balance was attained in the Renaissance.

Although the Renaissance was the rich and burgeoning

many

in

culture ot the

senses a direct outgrowth of

high Middle Ages, by

all

ac-

counts, between the mid-fifteenth and early seventeenth centuries, an

unmistakable quantum leap was made in the cultural evolution of the

West. The various contributing factors can be recognized in retrospect

and listed— the rediscovery of antiquity, the commercial city-state personality, the technical inventions, all

and so

vitality, the

forth.

But when

these "causes" of the Renaissance have been enumerated, one

still

senses that the essential thrust o{ the Renaissance was something larger

them combined. Instead, the there was concurrently on many fronts an

than any of these factors, than historical record suggests

emphatic emergence oi

a

all

oi

new consciousness— expansive,

rebellious,

energetic and creative, individualistic, ambitious and often unscrupulous,

committed

curious, self-confident,

to this

and

life

world,

this

open-eyed and skeptical, inspired and inspirited— and that this emer-

gence had

its

own

raison d'etre, was propelled by

subsuming force than any combination of

some

greater and

more

political, social, technological,

religious, philosophical, or artistic factors.

It

was not accidental to the

character of the Renaissance (nor, perhaps, unrelated to

its

new

sense oi

artistic perspective) that,

while medieval scholars saw history divided

into two periods, before

and

vaguely separated from the

medieval,

modern— thus

with their

own

era of Christ's birth, Renaissance

new

perspective on the past: history was

first

time as a tripartite structure— ancient,

sharply differentiating the classical and medi-

eval eras, with the Renaissance itself at the vanguard of the

The

time only

Roman

historians achieved a decisively

perceived and defined for the

after Christ,

new

age.

events and figures converged on the Renaissance stage with

The Modern World View

232

amazing

even simultaneity. Columbus and Leonardo were both

rapidity,

born in the same half decade the Gutenberg press, the oi

Greek scholars

fall

(

1450-55) that brought the development of

of Constantinople with the resulting influx

and the end of the Hundred Years'

to Italy,

through which France and England each forged ness.

The same

two decades

Academy's Neoplatonic revival

(1468-88) at

its

its

that

War

national conscious-

saw

the

Florentine

height during the reign o{ Lorenzo

the Magnificent also saw the births of Copernicus, Luther, Castiglione,

Raphael, Diirer, Michelangelo, Giorgione, Machiavelli, Cesare Borgia, Zwingli, Pizarro, Magellan, and More. In the same period, Castille were joined by the marriage of Ferdinand

and

Aragon and

Isabella to

form

the nation of Spain, the Tudors succeeded to the throne in England,

Leonardo began

his artistic career

Verrocchio's Baptism of Christ, Botticelli painted Primavera

with his painting of the angel in

then his

and The

Theologia Platonica and published the in the

own

Adoration of the Magi,

Birth of Venus, first

Ficino wrote the

complete translation of Plato

West, Erasmus received his early Humanist education in Holland,

and Pico

della

Mirandola composed the manifesto of Renaissance

Humanism, the Oration on operative here.

A

the Dignity of

Man. More than "causes" were

spontaneous and irreducible revolution of conscious-

ness was taking place, affecting virtually every aspect of Western culture.

Amidst high drama and painful convulsions, modern man was born the Renaissance, "trailing clouds of glory."

in

The Reformation lr

was when the

theology and the

spirit of

Renaissance individualism reached the realm

of

person

o(

religious conviction within the

German Augustinian monk Martin

Europe the momentous

accommodated both

Church,

Luther, that there erupted in

Protestant Reformation.

classical culture

in the

The Renaissance had

and Christianity

in

one expansive

unsystematic vision. But the continued moral deterioration in the

south

north.

The

now encountered

new

a

of

it

the papacy

surge of rigorous religiosity in the

relaxed cultural syncretism displayed by the Renaissance

Church's embrace

mense expense

ot

ot

Greco-Roman pagan

culture (including the im-

patronage this embrace demanded) helped precipitate

the collapse of the Church's absolute religious authority.

Armed

with the

thunderous moral power or an Old Testament prophet, Luther defiantly

Roman

confronted the

Catholic papacy's patent neglect of the original

Christian taith revealed in the Bible. Sparked by Luther's rebellion, an insuperable cultural reaction swept through the sixteenth century, decisively reasserting the Christian religion while simultaneously shattering

the unity ot Western Christendom.

The proximate

cause of the Reformation was the papacy's attempt to

finance the architectural and artistic glories of the High Renaissance by the theologically dubious means of selling spiritual indulgences. Tetzel, the traveling

friar

whose

of indulgences in

sale

Germany provoked

Luther in 1517 to post his Ninety-five Theses, had been so authorized by the Medici Pope Leo

An

X

to raise

money

for building Saint Peter's Basilica.

indulgence was the remission of punishment for a sin after guilt had

been sacramentally forgiven

—

a

Christian Germanic custom of

crime to a money payment.

To

Church

practice influenced by the pre-

commuting the

physical penalty for a

grant such an indulgence, the

Church

drew from the treasury of merits accumulated by the good works of the saints,

and

in return

the recipient

made

a

contribution to the Church.

A

Church

to

voluntary and popular arrangement, the practice allowed the raise

At

money

tirst

tor financing crusades

and building cathedrals and

applied only to penalties imposed by the

Luther's time indulgences were being granted to

by

God

in

Church

hospitals.

in this

lite,

by

remit penalties imposed

the afterlife, including immediate release from purgatory.

The Modern World View

234

With indulgences penance

itself

even the remission of

effecting

sins,

the sacrament of

was seemingly compromised.

But beyond the matter of indulgences lay more fundamental sources of the Protestant revolution

the

Church

ing

it

piety

— the

long-developing political secularism of

hierarchy, undermining

and military

in diplomatic

and poverty among the Church

irreligious but socially

spiritual integrity

its

while embroil-

struggles; the prevalence of faithful,

both deep

in contrast to

and economically privileged

an often

clergy; the rise of

monarchical power, nationalism, and local Germanic insurgency against the universal ambitions of the

Roman

Roman

papacy and the Habsburgs' Holy

Empire. Yet the more immediate cause, the Church's expensive

patronage of high culture, does illuminate a deeper factor behind the

Reformation

—namely,

the

anti-Hellenic

sought to purify Christianity and return tion. For the

Reformation was not

spirit

to

it

its

with which

Luther

pristine biblical founda-

least a purist "Judaic" reaction against

Roman) impulse of Renaissance culture, of Scholastic and of much postapostolic Christianity in general. Yet per-

the Hellenic (and

philosophy,

haps the most fundamental element in the genesis of the Reformation

was the emerging particularly

spirit

of rebellious, self-determining individualism, and

growing

the

dependence, which had

impulse

intellectual

for

now developed

and

spiritual

to that crucial point

in-

where

a

potently critical stand could be sustained against the West's highest cultural authority, the

Roman

Luther desperately sought of so

much

Catholic Church.

for a gracious

God's redemption in the face

evidence to the contrary, evidence both of God's damning

judgment and of Luther's own himself or in his

own

sacraments, not in papal indulgences.

He

works, nor did he find

its

It

sinfulness.

it

failed to find that grace in

in the

ecclesiastical hierarchy,

Church

—not

and assuredly not

in

its

in

its

was, finally, the faith in God's redeeming power as

revealed through Christ in the Bible, and that alone, which rendered Luther's experience of salvation, and his

new church

upon

that exclusive rock he built

of a reformed Christianity. Erasmus, by contrast, the

devoutly critical Humanist, wished to save the Church's unity and mission by reforming in other matters,

it

from within. But the Church hierarchy, absorbed

remained intransigently insensitive to such needs,

while Luther, with equal intransigence, declared the necessity of complete schism

and independence from an

seat of the Antichrist.

institution

he now viewed

as the

235

The Reformation

X

Pope Leo

considered Luther's revolt merely another "monk's quar-

and long delayed any response adequate

rel,"

When,

to the problem.

almost three years atter the Ninety-five Theses were posted, Luther

he publicly burned

finally received the papal bull to submit,

ensuing meeting of the imperial Diet, the Habsburg Holy or C'harles in

Y

declared himself certain that a single

denying the validity

Wishing

years.

triar

it.

At the

Roman Emper-

could not be right

during the previous thousand

ot all Christianity

to preserve the unity ot the Christian religion, yet

heed on

with Luther's obstinate refusal to recant, he placed an imperial ban

Luther

German

But empowered by the rebellious

as a heretic.

princes

and knights, Luther's personal theological insurgency rapidly expanded to

an international upheaval.

In

the post-Constantinian

retrospect,

welding of the Christian religion to the ancient to be a

ascendance and to maintained

now

Roman

state

had proved

two-edged sword, contributing both to the Church's cultural

in

its

Europe

eventual decline. tor a

The overarching

union

cultural

thousand years by the Catholic Church was

irrevocably split asunder.

But

it

was Luther's personal

religious

dilemma that was the

sine qua

non of the Reformation. In his acute sense of alienation and terror before the Omnipotent, Luther saw

it

needed God's forgiveness, not

was the whole

just particular sins that

be erased by proper Church-defined actions.

symptoms of healing.

One

a

man who was

more fundamental

The

corrupt and

one by one could

particular sins were but

sickness in man's soul that required

could not purchase redemption, step by step, through good

works or through the legalisms of penance or other sacraments, not to

mention the infamous indulgences. Only Christ could save the whole

man, and only man's

faith in Christ could justify

man

thus could the terrible righteousness of an angry God,

before

who

God. Only

justly

damns

sinners to eternal perdition, be transformed into the merciful righteous-

ness of a forgiving

As Luther

God, who

exultantly discovered in Paul's Letter to the

not earn salvation; rather,

The

freely rewards the faithful

God

gave

it

with eternal

bliss.

Romans, man did

freely to those

who have

faith.

source of that saving faith was Holy Scripture, where God's mercy

revealed

itself in Christ's

Christian

Church

believer

—with

its

find

crucifixion for mankind.

the

means

to

his

There alone could the

salvation.

The Catholic

cynical marketplace practice of claiming to be dispens-

ing God's grace, distributing the merits of the saints, forgiving men's sins,

and releasing them from debts owed

in the afterlife, in return for

236

The

money garnered

for

its

ing papal infallibility

own

Modem

World View

often irreligious purposes, meanwhile claim-

—could only be an

longer be reverenced as the sacred

The Church could no

impostor.

medium

of Christian truth.

Roman Church

All the accretions brought into Christianity by the that were not found in the

New

Testament were now solemnly ques-

tioned, criticized, and often expelled altogether by the Protestants: the centuries' accumulation of sacraments,

rituals,

and

organizational structures, the priestly hierarchy and ity,

the complex

art,

its

spiritual author-

the natural and rational theology of the Scholastics, the belief in

purgatory, papal infallibility, clerical celibacy, the eucharistic transubstantiation, the saints' treasury of merits, the popular worship of the

Virgin Mary, and finally the Mother Church herself. All these had

become

antithetical to the individual Christian's primary

need

for faith

The

in Christ's redemptive grace: Justification occurred by faith alone.

Christian believer had to be liberated from the obscuring clutches of the old system, for only by being directly responsible to to experience God's grace. lay in the literal

The only

meaning of

God

could he be free

source of theological authority

Scripture.

The complicated

now

doctrinal de-

velopments and moral pronouncements of the institutional Church were irrelevant. After centuries of possessing relatively indisputable spiritual

authority, the

Roman

Catholic Church, with

all its

accoutrements, was

suddenly no longer considered mandatory for humanity's religious wellbeing.

In defense of the

Church and

its

continued unity, Catholic theolo-

gians argued that the Church's sacramental institutions were both valuable

and necessary, and that

and elaborated the

Church

its

in the present

tion of the

less

Church

God's

Word would

understood by the Christian

Holy

which interpreted

certainly

inherent sanctity and validity were

tradition, they held,

world and

doctrinal tradition,

original revelation, held genuine spiritual authority.

Moral and practical reforms made, but

its

faithful.

still

be

less

had preceded the

New

Church

in

Testament, produced

its it,

potent in the

Through the

Spirit invested in the institutes of the

to be

sound. Without

inspira-

Church, the

could draw out and affirm elements of Christian truth not the biblical text. For indeed, the

needed

latter

fully explicit in

earliest apostolic stages

and

later

canonized

it

as

God's inspired Word. But the reformers countered that the Church had replaced faith in the person of Christ with faith in the doctrine o( the Church. vitiated the potency of the original Christian revelation

It

had thereby

and placed the

The Reformatum

£37

Church opaquely

in the

middle

(A

man's relation to God. Only direct

human

soul direct contact with

true Christianity

was founded on "faith

contact with the Bible could bring the Christ. In

the Protestant vision,

alone,"

"grace

Church agreed religion)

alone,"

and "Scripture alone." While the Catholic

that those indeed were the fundaments oi the Christian

maintained that the institutional Church, with

it

its

sacra-

ments, priestly hierarchy, and doctrinal tradition, was intrinsically and

dynamically related to that foundation

— and

in Scripture

—

faith in

God's

L^race as

revealed

served the propagation ot that faith. Erasmus also

argued against Luther that man's tree will and virtuous actions were not he entirely discounted as elements in the process o\ salvation.

to

Catholicism held that divine grace and

human

merit were both in-

strumental in redemption and did not have to be viewed in opposition,

with exclusively one or the other operative. Most important, the Church argued, institutional tradition and the Scripture-based faith were not in

opposition.

On

the contrary, Catholicism provided the living vessel for

the Word's emergence in the world.

But tor the reformers, the Church's actual practice too ideal, its

hierarchy was too manifestly corrupt,

remote from the original revelation. ture

To

its

much

belied

doctrinal tradition too

reform such a degenerate struc-

trom within would be both practically

futile

and theologically

erroneous. Luther argued persuasively for God's exclusive role in vation,

man's

institutional

spiritual

helplessness,

its

the

moral

sal-

bankruptcy of the

Church, and the exclusive authority oi Scripture. The

Protestant spirit prevailed in half of Europe, and the old order was

broken. Western Christianity was no longer exclusively Catholic, nor monolithic, nor a source oi cultural unity.

The

peculiar paradox of the Reformation was

character, for

it

was

at

once

its

essentially

ambiguous

a conservative religious reaction

radically libertarian revolution.

The

and

a

Protestantism forged by Luther,

Zwingli, and Calvin proclaimed an emphatic revival oi a Bible-based

Judaic Christianity

— unequivocally

monotheistic,

affirming

Abraham and Moses as supreme, omnipotent, "Other," with man as fallen, helpless, predestined ot

salvation, and, in the case oi the latter, fully tor

his

redemption.

the

God

transcendent, and for

damnation or

dependent on God's grace

Whereas Aquinas had posited every

creature's

The Modern World View

238

participation in God's infinite

and

free essence,

and asserted the

positive,

God-given autonomy of human nature, the reformers perceived the absolute sovereignty of light,

God

over his creation in a more dichotomous

with man's innate sinfulness making the independent

inherently ineffective and perverse.

human

will

While Protestantism was optimistic

concerning God, the gratuitously merciful preserver of the

elect,

was

it

uncompromisingly pessimistic concerning man, that "teeming horde of infamies" (Calvin). sisted

Human

freedom was so bound to

merely in the ability to choose

the reformers, lay solely in

autonomy suggested

obedience to God's

among

apostasy.

will,

could bring

him

Man's

true

and the capacity

closer to salvation.

it

con-

different degrees of sin. For

arose solely from God's merciful gift o{ faith.

own

evil that

freedom and joy such obedience

for

Nothing man did on

Nor could

his

his illumination be

achieved through the rational ascents of a Scholastic theology con-

Only God could provide genuine

taminated by Greek philosophy. illumination,

and only Scripture revealed the authentic

Against

truth.

the Renaissance's dalliance with a more flexible Hellenized Christianity,

with pagan Neoplatonism and tion,

its

universal religion

and human

deifica-

Luther, and more systematically Calvin, reinstituted the more

strictly defined,

morally rigorous, and ontologically dualistic Augustinian

Judaeo-Christian view.

Moreover,

this reassertion of "pure" traditional Christianity

was given

further impetus throughout European culture by the Catholic Counter-

Reformation when, beginning in the mid-sixteenth century with the

Council of Trent, the Catholic Church vigorously reformed itself from within.

finally

awakened

to the crisis

The Roman papacy

religiously motivated, often austerely so,

and

again became

and the Church restated the

basics of Christian belief (while maintaining the Church's essential

structure

and sacramental authority)

as the Protestants

it

in the Catholic south

and the Protestant north, orthodox Christianity

was energetically reestablished in

a

conservative religious backlash

against the Renaissance's pagan Hellenism, naturalism,

Yet for against the culture

the

all

the Reformation's conservative character,

as a successful social

first

and

its

act in

rebellion

Western

political insurgency against

papacy and ecclesiastical hierarchy, with the reformers sup-

ported by the secular rulers o{ but

and secularism.

Church was an unprecedentedly revolutionary

—not only

Roman

dogmatic terms

in just as militantly

opposed. Thus on both sides of the European divide,

and foremost

as

Germany and

other northern countries,

an assertion of the individual conscience against

239

The Reformation

the established

Church framework

ot

belief,

fundamental question

structure. For the

ritual,

of the

and organizational

Reformation concerned

the locus ot religious authority. In the Protestant vision, neither the pope

nor the Church councils possessed the spiritual competence to define Christian

belief.

Luther taught instead the "priesthood

religious authority rested finally

and

solely in

of all believers":

each individual Christian,

reading M\d interpreting the Bible according to his

own

private con-

The

science in the context of his personal relationship to God.

ence

Holy

the

ot

noninstitutional

in

Spirit,

all

was

freedom,

its

to

quenching constrictions

agginst the

liberating,

be

affirmed

o\ the

in

pres-

inspirational,

directly

Christian

every

Roman Church. The

in-

dividual believer's interior response to Christ's grace, not the elaborate ecclesiastical

machinery

of the Vatican, constituted the true Christian

experience.

For

was the very unflinchingness of Luther's individual confronta-

it

tion with

God

The two

contraries characteristic of Protestantism, independent

self

that

had revealed both God's omnipotence and

his mercy.

human

and all-powerful Deity, were inextricably interconnected. Hence the

Reformation marked the standing forth of the individual

in

two senses

alone outside the Church, and alone directly before God.

impassioned words before the imperial Diet declared a

Luther's

new manifesto

of

personal religious freedom:

Unless

I

am convinced

by Scripture and plain reason

—

I

do not

accept the authority of popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other

God.

I

cannot and

conscience

is

— my

I

conscience

a

captive to the

is

Word

of

not recant anything, for to go against

neither right nor

The Reformation was dividualism

will

safe.

new and

God

help me.

Amen.

decisive assertion of rebellious in-

—

of personal conscience, of "Christian liberty," of critical

private

judgment against the monolithic authority of the

Church

—and

o\ the

medieval Church and medieval character. Although the con-

as

such further propelled the Renaissance's

institutional

movement out

servative Judaic quality of the Reformation was a reaction against the

Renaissance in the

latter's

Hellenic and pagan aspects, on another level,

the Reformation's revolutionary declaration of personal as a if

continuation of the Renaissance impulse

partially antithetical,

autonomy served

—and was thus an

intrinsic,

element of the overall Renaissance phenom-

The Modern World View

240

enon.

An

era that

saw both Renaissance and Reformation was revolu-

and

tionary indeed,

it

was perhaps on account of

this

Promethean

the force of Luther's rebellion rapidly amplified far past what

Zeitgeist that

he had anticipated or even desired. For in the end, the Reformation was but

one

salient

particularly

expression

of a

transformation taking place in the Western *i^

much

mind and

larger

cultural

spirit.

^% " —

Here we encounter the other extraordinary paradox of the Reformation. For while religious,

its

ultimate

its

and

secularizing,

essential character effects

was so intensely and unambiguously

on Western

culture

were profoundly

in multiple, mutually reinforcing ways.

By overthrow-

ing the theological authority of the Catholic Church, the internationally

recognized supreme court o( religious dogma, the Reformation opened the

way

and

finally a

West

in the

then religious skepticism,

for religious pluralism,

complete breakdown in the until then relatively homoge-

neous Christian world view. Although various Protestant authorities

would attempt

to reinstitute their particular

form of Christian belief

the supreme and exclusively correct dogmatic truth, the

—the priesthood of

Luther's reform

all

believers

Once

the

infallible insight

—

necessarily

new orthodoxies. new claims to legitimate. The immediate

efforts to

Mother Church had been

premise of

first

and the authority of the

individual conscience in the interpretation of Scripture

undercut the enduring success of any

as

enforce

behind, no

left

could long be regarded as

consequence of the liberation from the old matrix was

a manifest libera-

tion of fervent Christian religiosity, permeating the lives of the

new

Protestant congregations with fresh spiritual meaning and charismatic

power. Yet as time passed, the average Protestant, no longer enclosed by the Catholic

womb

of grand ceremony, historical tradition, and sac-

ramental authority, was

left

somewhat

of private doubt and secular thinking. belief

less

From Luther on, each

was increasingly self-supported; and the Western

faculties

leaving

believer's

intellect's critical

were becoming ever more acute.

Moreover, Luther had been educated

and

protected against the vagaries

him

faith

in the nominalist tradition,

distrustful of the earlier Scholastics'

attempt to bridge reason

with rational theology. There was for Luther no "natural

human reason in its cognition and Like Ockham, Luther saw the natural

revelation," given by the natural analysis of the natural world.

human

reason as so far from comprehending God's will and gratuitous

The

241

Reftyrrrkitum

salvation that the rationalist attempts to do SO by Scholastic theology

No

appeared absurdly presumptuous. secular

mind and Christian

truth was possible, tor Christ's sacrifice

the cross ums foolishness to the

could provide

man ,\nd

significant

its

The Reformation's against

a

wisdom

ot

ot

God's ways.

and unanticipated consequences

apprehension restoring ot

on

the world. Scripture alone

with the certain and saving knowledge

These assertions held

modern mind

genuine coherence between the

tor

the

ot the natural world. a

predominantly biblical theology

theology helped to purge the modern mind

Scholastic

ot

Hellenic notions in which nature was permeated with divine rationality

and

Protestantism thus provided a revolution of theological

final causes.

context that solidified the outlook

ot classical

new

of a

movement begun by Ockham away from

Scholasticism, thereby supporting the development

science o\ nature.

The

increased distinction

reformers between Creator and creature

and man's

finite intelligence,

world's contingency

with

a

new

the

—between God's

made by the

inscrutable will

and between God's transcendence and the

— allowed the modern mind

sense oi nature's purely

mundane

to

approach the world

character, with

its

own

ordering principles that might not directly correspond to man's logical

assumptions about God's divine government. the

human mind

site for

to a this-worldly

created the world, fully distinct from his

now

reformers' limiting of

knowledge was precisely the prerequi-

the opening up of that knowledge.

that world could

The

God had graciously and freely own infinite divinity. Hence

be apprehended and analyzed not according to

assumed sacramental participation

manner of Neoplatonic and

in static divine

its

pattemings, in the

Scholastic thought, but rather according to

own distinct dynamic material processes, God and his transcendent reality. its

devoid of direct reference to

By disenchanting the world of immanent divinity, completing the process initiated by Christianity's destruction of pagan animism, the

Reformation better allowed

The way was then cosmos, moving

for

its

radical revision by

first

to the

Even the Reformation's renewal of the as

science.

remote rationalist Creator of Deism, and

finally to secular agnosticism's elimination of

man's dominion

modern

clear for an increasingly naturalistic view of the

found

in

any supernatural

reality.

biblical subjection of nature to

Genesis contributed to this process,

encouraging man's sense of being the knowing subject against the object oi nature, and of being divinely authorized to exercise his sovereignty

over the natural

— hence nonspmtual — world.

As God's magnitude and

The Modern World View

242

distinctness relative to his creation was affirmed,

magnitude and distinctness

so too was man's

relative to the rest of nature.

Subduing

nature for man's benefit could be seen as a religious duty, eventually taking

on

a secular

autonomy, and course of the

A

further

momentum of its own

modern

era.

similarly

modern mind involved deepest truths were these then

Church

ambiguous

new

a

effect of the

Reformation on the

attitude to truth. In the Catholic view, the

divinely revealed as recorded in the Bible,

first

became the

tradition

man's sense of self- worth and

powers of dominion, continued to increase in the

his

and

as

basis for a continuing

and

growth of truth through

—

each generation of Church theologians inspired by

the Holy Spirit, creatively acting upon that tradition and forging a more

profound Christian doctrine. sense impressions and from

Much

Aquinas's active intellect took

as

them formed

intelligible concepts, so did the

Church's active intellect take the basic tradition and from penetrating formulations of spiritual truth. perspective, the truth lay finally

God, and

and objectively

fidelity to that unalterable truth

certainty. In this view, the

Roman

it

render more

But from the Protestant in the revealed

Word

of

alone could render theological

Catholic tradition was a long and

ever-worsening exercise in subjective distortion of that primal truth.

Catholic "objectivity" was nothing other than the establishment of

demands of the Catholic mind,

doctrines conforming to the subjective

not to the external sacrosanct truth of the Word.

had become

especially distorted by

its

And the Catholic mind Greek

theological integration of

philosophy, a system of thought intrinsically alien to biblical truth. Protestantism's reclamation of the unalterable

Bible thus fostered in the emerging

need to discover unbiased objective distortions of tradition. scientific mentality.

subject

all beliefs

To

It

Word

modern mind truth, apart

a

God

in the

stress

on the

of

new

from the prejudices and

thereby supported the growth of a critical

confront entrenched doctrines courageously, to

to fresh criticism

and

direct testing, to

come

face-to-

face with objective reality unmediated by traditional preconceptions or

vested authorities

—such

a passion for disinterested truth

informed the

mind and thence the modern mind generally. But in time, the Word itself would become subject to that new critical spirit, and secularProtestant

ism would triumph. Indeed, the very foundation for the reformers' appeal to objective truth

would provoke

its

meaning of Scripture

dialectical collapse. Luther's stress

as the exclusive reliable basis for

on the

literal

knowledge of

The Reforrruitum

243

God's creation was tension as

it

present the

to

incongnient

with an impossible

confronted the distinctly unbiblical revelations soon to be

established hv secular science.

and one

modem mind

—

truths

scientific.

had

The

to be

Two

apparently contradictory

— or

at least

maintained simultaneously, one religious

fundamentalist's Bible was to hasten the long-

developing schism between faith and reason experienced by the Western

mind

as

attempted to accommodate science. The Christian

it

too deeply ingrained to be readily sloughed

tar

oft

was

faith

altogether, but neither

could the scientific discoveries be denied. Eventually the latter would

outweigh the former

m

far

both intellectual and practical significance.

In

the process of that shift, the West's "faith" would itself be radically

realigned and transferred to the victor. In the long term, Luther's zealous

reinstatement

of a

Scripture-based religiosity was to help precipitate

its

secular antithesis.

The Reformation had another dividual's religious response

would lead gradually but inevitably

modern mind's sense of the

As time

role

in

relevance of ideas, as increasingly

determining truth

passed, the Protestant doctrine of

individual's faith than it

on Christ

—on

the personal

were, rather than on their external validity.

became the measure of

things, self-defining

philosophy and Romantic philosophical idealism

philosophical pragmatism and existentialism of the late

The Reformation was loyalties.

general,

Previously, the if

secularizing too in

Roman

its

of secular nationalism and

rise

Roman

least

The

resulting

Kantian

modern

the

era.

virtually all Europeans.

because

German

it

coincided with

rebelliousness against

Empire, especially against the

attempts to assert a European- wide authority. universal ambition and

to

to, finally,

realignment of personal

sometimes controversial, allegiance of

the papacy and the Holy

defeated.

self-

Catholic Church had maintained the

But the Reformation had succeeded not the potent

and

The

Truth increasingly became truth-as-experienced-by-the-self.

Thus the road opened by Luther would move through Pietism critical

to the

through the individual's faith in Christ seemed to place

more emphasis on the

legislating.

to

the final

inferiority of religious reality,

and the pervasive

individualism o( truth,

played by the personal subject.

self

on the modern mind contrary

For Luther's appeal to the primacy of the in-

Christian orthodoxy.

justification

effect

With

the Reformation, the

dream of the Catholic imperium was

empowerment

latter's

finally

of the various separate nations and

The Modern World View

244

states of

now

Europe

displaced the old ideal unity of Western Christen-

dom, and the new order was marked by intensely aggressive competition. There was now no higher power, international and individual states were responsive.

spiritual, to

which

all

Moreover, the individual national

languages, already spurred forward by the Renaissance literatures, were further strengthened against Latin, the previously universal language of

the educated, by the compelling

above

Bible,

new

vernacular translations of the

German and

Luther's translation into

all

The

committee's into English.

the King James

now became the authority. The medieval

individual secular state

defining unit of cultural, as well as political,

Catholic matrix unifying Europe had disintegrated.

No

were

significant

less

political-religious dynamics,

With

state.

complex

effects

on

both within the individual and within the

now

secular rulers

Reformation's

the

defining the religion of their territories,

moved power from church to state, just layman. And because many of the principal

the Reformation unintentionally as

did from priest to

it

monarchs chose

and absolutize

centralize allied

remain Catholic,

to

—

—

continuing attempts to

power caused Protestantism

political

with resisting bodies

their

cities

that sought to maintain or increase their separate

Hence

the cause of Protestantism

self-responsibility

growth of

became

and the priesthood of

political liberalism

all

and individual

sense of personal religious believers also abetted the rights.

At

the same time,

the religious fragmentation o{ Europe necessarily promoted a tellectual

and

religious diversity.

From

all

liberties.

associated with the cause of

The Reformation's new

political freedom.

to be

aristocrats, clergy, universities, provinces,

new

in-

these factors ensued a succes-

sion oi increasingly secularizing political and social consequences:

first

the establishment of individual state-identified churches, then the division of church and state,

dominance of the dogmatic

secular society.

religiosity of the

ralistic tolerant liberalism

The Reformation had secularizing effects.

man's inherent world

new

toleration,

religious

Out

and

finally

the pre-

of the exceedingly

illiberal

Reformation eventually emerged the plu-

oi the still

modern other

era.

unexpected and paradoxically

Despite the reformers' Augustinian demotion of

spiritual

power, they had also given

significance in the Christian

scheme of

human

things.

life

in this

When

Luther

eliminated the traditional hierarchical division between clerical and and, in blatant defiance of Catholic law, decided to

and father

a family,

he endowed the

activities

lay,

marry a former nun

and relationships oi

The Reformation

ordinary

245

with a religious meaning not previously emphasized by the

life

Catholic Church. Holy matrimony replaced chastity

Domestic

ideal.

life,

tasks of daily existence

which the

areas within

work

ot

were now upheld more spirit

Christian the

explicitly as important

could grow and deepen.

Now

occupational

every variety was a sacred calling, not just monasticism as in the

Middle Ages. With Calvin,

a Christian's worldly

pursued with spiritual and moral fervor

vocation was to be

in order to realize the

on earth. The world was to be regarded not

God

as the

mundane work, and

the raising ol children,

expression ot God's

to be passively

will,

hut rather as the arena in

as

God's social

and cultural

of

the inevitable

accepted in pious submission,

which man's urgent

was to

religious duty

through questioning and changing every aspect

will

Kingdom

of life,

fulfill

every

institution, in order to help hring about the Christian

commonwealth. Yet in time this religious uplifting of the secular was to take on an

autonomous, nonreligious character. Marriage,

for

example, freed from

Church control as a Catholic sacrament and now regulated by civil law, in time became an essentially secular contract, more easily entered into or dissolved, more easily subject to losing its sacramental character. On a larger social scale, the Protestant call to take this world more seriously, to revise society

and to embrace change, served

religious antipathy

the

both to

this

embryonic modern psyche the

restructuring

ism in

many

it

to

overcome the

traditional

world and to change, and thereby gave religious

sanction

and internal

required to propel the progress of modernity and liberal-

spheres, from politics to science. Eventually, however, this

powerful impulse to

make over

becoming independent of

its

the world became autonomous, not only

originally religious motivation, but finally

turning against the religious bulwark

itself as

yet another,

and especially

profound, form of oppression to be overcome.

Important social consequences of the Reformation also became evident in

its

complex relationship

northern European nations.

The

to the

pline and the holy dignity o{ one's

combined with whereby the

economic development of the

Protestant affirmation of moral disci-

work

in the

world seems to have

a peculiarity in the Calvinist belief in predestination,

striving (and anxious) Christian, deprived of the Catholic's

recourse to sacramental justification, could find signs ui his being

the elect

if

among

he could successfully and unceasingly apply himself to

ciplined work and his worldly calling.

the fruit of such effort, which,

dis-

Material productivity was often

compounded by

the Puritan

demand

for

246

The Modern World View

ascetic renunciation of seltish pleasure

and frivolous spending, readily

lent itself to the accumulation oi capital.

Whereas

threatening to the religious

as directly as

traditionally the pursuit of

commercial success was perceived life,

mutually beneficial. Religious doctrine

now

the two were recognized

itself

was

at times selectively

transformed or intensified in accord with the prevailing social and eco-

nomic temper. Within

few generations, the Protestant work ethic,

a

along with the continued emergence of an assertive and mobile individualism, had played a major role in encouraging the growth of an

economically flourishing middle

class tied to the rise of capitalism.

already developing in the Renaissance Italian city-states, was

latter,

further propelled by

from the

New

ulations,

new

nizations

numerous other

factors

—the accumulation

new developments

financial strategies,

and technologies. In time, much of the

secular concerns,

its

of wealth

World, the opening up oi new markets, expanding pop-

and on the material rewards

religious zeal yielded to

economic

in industrial orga-

originally spiritual

become focused on more

orientation of the Protestant discipline had

Thus

The

realized by

its

productivity.

which pressed forward on

vigor,

own. *^

The Counter-Reformation,

for

Wm

^m

its

part,

on un-

similarly brought

foreseen developments in a direction opposite from that intended.

Catholic Church's crusade to reform Protestantism took practical reforms

many

itself

and oppose the spread of

forms, from the revival of the Inquisition to the

and mystical writings of John of the Cross and Teresa of

Avila. But the Counter-Reformation was spearheaded above Jesuits, a

to the

Roman

The

Catholic order that established

itself as

all

by the

militantly loyal

pope and attracted a considerable number of strong-willed and

intellectually sophisticated

men.

Among

their various activities in the

secular world designed to accomplish their Catholic mission,

which

ranged from heroic missionary work overseas to assiduous censorship and Byzantine political intrigue in the courts o{ Europe, the Jesuits took on the responsibility of educating the young, especially those of the ruling class,

to forge

celebrated

a

new Catholic

teachers

elite.

Jesuits

soon became the most

on the Continent. Their educational

strategy,

however, involved not only the teaching oi the Catholic faith and theology, but also the

full

humanistic program from the Renaissance and

The Reformation

247

— Latin and Greek science and mathematics, And fencing —

classical era

ethics,

acting

letters, rhetoric,

all In

and metaphysics,

logic

music, even the gentlemanly arts of

the service oi developing a scholarly "soldier

of Christ": a morally disciplined, liberally educated, critically intelligent

man

Christian

ing the great

Hundreds

capable

Western ot

ot

outwitting the Protestant heretics and further-

tradition ot Catholic learning.

educational

institutions

were founded by the Jesuits

throughout Europe, and were soon replicated by Protestant leaders simmindful or the need to educate the

ilarly

on the Greek

tradition based

tic

faithful.

peddeio

The

classical

humanis-

was thereby broadly sustained

during the following two centuries, offering the growing educated class of

Europeans ity,

with

a

new

source of cultural unity just as the old source, Christian-

was fragmenting. But its

pagan

exposure

ot

consequence of such

as a

many

students to

as well as Christian,

critical rationality, there

and with

a liberal program,

eloquently articulate viewpoints, its

disciplined inculcation of a

could not but emerge in educated Europeans a

decidedly nonorthodox tendency toward intellectual pluralism, skepticism, and even revolution. cartes, Voltaire

And

It

and Diderot

was no accident that Galileo and Des-

all

received Jesuit educations.

here was the final and most drastic secularizing effect of the

Reformation. For with the revolt of Luther, Christianity's medieval matrix

split

into two,

then into many, then seemingly commenced

new divisions battled each other throughout Europe with unbridled fury. The resulting chaos in the intellectual and cultural lite ot Europe was profound. Wars of religion reflected violent destroying

disputes

itself as

the

between ever-multiplying

of absolute truth would prevail.

religious sects over

The need

whose conception

for a clarifying

and unifying

vision capable of transcending the irresolvable religious conflicts was

urgent and broadly

felt.

It

was amidst

this state of acute

metaphysical

turmoil that the Scientific Revolution began, developed, and finally

triumphed

in the

Western mind.

The

Scientific Revolution

Copernicus The

Scientific Revolution was both the final expression of the Renais-

sance and

its

definitive contribution to the

Poland and educated Renaissance.

Though

was destined to become an unquestioned princi-

it

modern psyche, the

inconceivable to most Europeans in his other single factor,

it

in

Copernicus lived during the height o( the

in Italy,

ple of existence for the

modern world view. Born

central tenet of his vision was

own

More than any

lifetime.

was the Copernican insight that provoked and

symbolized the drastic, fundamental break from the ancient and medieval universe to that o( the

Copernicus sought planets:

means

how

modern

new

a

era.

solution to the age-old problem of the

to explain the apparently erratic planetary

of a simple, clear, elegant

mathematical formula.

the solutions proposed by Ptolemy and

all

movements by

To

recapitulate,

his successors, solutions based

on the geocentric Aristotelian cosmos, had required the employment increasingly

minor

numerous mathematical devices

epicycles, equants, eccentrics

—

—

of

major and

deferents,

attempt to make sense of

in the

the observed positions while maintaining the ancient rule of uniform circular motion.

planet

When

a planet's

movement

move

did not appear to

in a

another, smaller circle was added, around which the

perfect circle,

hypothetically

moved while

it

moving

continued

around

the larger circle. Further discrepancies were solved by compounding the circles, displacing their centers, positing yet

another center from which

motion remained uniform, and so on. Each new astronomer, faced with newly revealed tempted

that contradicted the basic scheme,

irregularities

to resolve

them by adding more refinements

at-

—another minor

epicycle here, another eccentric there.

By the Renaissance, the Ptolemaic cus's words,

"monster"

a

which, despite to

account

accuracy.

longer

all

for

The

— an

had produced,

in

or predict

Moreover,

Coperni-

inelegant and overburdened conception

the complicated ad hoc corrective devices,

still

failed

observed planetary positions with reliable

original conceptual

existed.

strategy

economy

different

o( the Ptolemaic model no

Greek,

Arabic,

and

European

The

24 c >

Revolution

Scientific

used

astronomer!

methods and

different

principles,

com

different

now existed based on Ptolemy. The science ol

binations ot epicycles, eccentrics, and equants, so thai there a

confusing multiplicity

lystems

ol

astronomy, lacking any theoretical homogeneity, waft riddled with uncertainty. Further, the accumulation ol

Ptolemak predictions,

10

that

it

new modification

unlikely that .un

continued maintenance

ot the

many

centuries

ol

observations

more and worse divergences from the seemed to Copernicus Increasingly

lince Ptolemy's time had revealed

of that

system would be tenable.

ancient assumptions was making

it

The im-

astronomers to compute accurately the actual movements

possible tor

heavenly bodies. Copernicus concluded that

classical

ol

astronomy must

contain, or even he based upon, some essential error.

Renaissance Europe

Church,

tor

urgently

needed

a

better

which the calendar was indispensable

liturgical matters,

undertook

its

calendar,

and the

in administrative

reform. Such reform depended on

and

astro-

nomical precision. Copernicus, asked to advise the papacy on the problem, responded that the existing confused state of astronomical science-

precluded any immediate effective reform. Copernicus's technical proficiency as

an astronomer and mathematician enabled him

to recognize

the inadequacies of the existing cosmology. Yet this alone would not

have forced him

to devise a

new

system. Another, equally competent

astronomer might well have perceived the problem of the planets intrinsically insoluble, too

system to comprehend.

It

complex and

as

refractory for any mathematical

would seem

above

to be

all

Copernicus's

participation in the intellectual atmosphere of Renaissance Neoplato-

nism

— and

specifically his

embrace of the Pythagorean conviction

thai

nature was ultimately comprehensible in simple and harmonious mathematical terms of a transcendent, eternal quality

—

that pressed and guided

him toward innovation. The divine Creator, whose works were where good and

orderly, could not

every-

have been slipshod with the heavens

themselves.

Provoked by such considerations, Copernicus painstakingly reviewed all

the ancient scientific literature he could acquire,

recently

become

available in the

Humanist

Greek manuscripts from Constantinople several

revival

to the

much

of

and the

West.

which had transfer

He found

t

that

Greek philosophers, notably of Pythagorean and Platonist backa moving Earth, although none had developed the

ground, had proposed

astronomical

and mathematical conclusions. Hence

Aristotle's geocentric conception

had not been the only judgment of the

hypothesis to

its full

250

The Modern World View

revered Greek authorities.

Armed

with

this sense of kinship

with an

ancient tradition, inspired by the Neoplatonists' exalted conception of the Sun, and further supported by the university Scholastics' critical o{ Aristotelian

appraisals

physics,

Copernicus hypothesized a Sun-

centered universe with a planetary Earth and mathematically worked out the implications.

Despite the innovation's apparent absurdity,

its

application resulted in

a system Copernicus believed to be qualitatively better than Ptolemy's.

The

heliocentric

model

readily explained the apparent daily

of the heavens and annual motion of the rotation

on

its

axis

The appearance

and

of the

its

Sun

as

movement

due to the Earth's daily

annual revolution around the central Sun.

now be recognized as own movements. The great celestial

moving Sun and

deceptively created by the Earth's

stars

could

motions were then nothing but a projection of the Earth's motion in the opposite direction.

To

would be disruptive

to itself

the traditional objection that a moving Earth

and objects on

it,

Copernicus countered that

the geocentric theory necessitated an even swifter

movement by

the

immensely greater heavens, which would constitute a patently worse disruption.

Many

particular problems that

tion seemed

had long haunted the Ptolemaic

more elegantly solved by

a heliocentric system.

The

tradi-

appar-

ent backward and forward movements of the planets relative to the fixed stars,

and

their varying degrees o{ brightness, to explain

which astrono-

mers had employed innumerable mathematical contrivances, could be understood more simply

as the result of

—which would produce the

moving Earth

viewing those planets from a retrograde appearances with-

out the hypothetical use of major epicycles. automatically terrestrial

make

A

moving Earth would

regular planetary orbits around the

observer as irregular

now

movements around the

Sun appear to the Earth. Nor were

equants any longer necessary, a Ptolemaic device that Copernicus found especially objectionable

on

aesthetic grounds because

of uniform circular motion. Copernicus's

new

it

violated the rule

ordering of the planets

—Mercury, Venus, Earth and Moon, Mars, Earth-centered —replaced the

outward from the Sun ter,

and Saturn

order,

traditional

Jupi-

and

provided a simple and coherent solution to the previously ill-resolved

problem of why Mercury and Venus always appeared close

The explanation

for these

problems and others

like

them

to the Sun.

strongly sug-

gested to Copernicus the superiority oi the heliocentric theory over the

Ptolemaic system.

The appearances were

saved (albeit

still

approximate-

The

251

Scientific Revolution

and with greater conceptual elegance. Despite the obvious com* monsense evidence to the contrary, not to mention almost two millennia ly),

of scientific tradition, Copernicus was convinced the Earth truly moved.

Having

down

set

Commcntanolus, Copernicus circulated

Two

1514.

was given

decades

later, a lecture

Rome

in

manuscript, the

a first version of his thesis in a short it

among

his friends as early as

on the principles

who

hetore the pope,

o\ his

new system

approved. Subsequently, a

formal request to publish was made. Yet throughout most ot his

Copernicus held hack from

publication oi his extraordinary idea.

De

Revolutionibus, dedicated to the pope,

(Later, in his preface to the

Copernicus confessed

his reluctance to reveal publicly his insight into

nature's mysteries lest

it

Pythagorean practice of

and particularly finally

life,

tull

be scorned by the uninitiated

— invoking

the

secrecy in such matters.) But his friends

strict

his closest student, Rheticus, prevailed

upon him, and

Rheticus was allowed to take the completed manuscript from

Poland to Germany to be printed.

On

the

last

day of his

life,

in the year

1543, a copy of the published work was brought to Copernicus.

But on that day, and even during the following several decades, there

was

little

indication in Europe that an unprecedented revolution in the

Western world view had been

new conception was false,

as

initiated. For

most who heard of

it,

the

so contradictory to everyday experience, so patently

not to require serious discussion.

But

as

few proficient

a

astronomers began to find Copernicus's argument persuasive, the opposition began to

mount; and

it

was the

religious implications of the

new

cosmology that quickly provoked the most intense attacks.

The In

the beginning,

that opposition did not

Church. Copernicus was dral

Religious Reaction

a

canon

and an esteemed consultant

in

come from

good standing

to the

Church

at a

in

the Catholic

Catholic cathe-

Rome. His

friends

urging publication included a bishop and a cardinal. After his death,

Catholic universities did not avoid using the De Revolutionibus in astron-

omy

classes.

Moreover, the new Gregorian calendar instituted by the

Church was based on was

this

calculations according to Copernicus's system.

Nor

apparent flexibility altogether unusual, for throughout most of

the high Middle Ages and Renaissance,

Roman

Catholicism had allowed

considerable latitude in intellectual speculation. Indeed, such latitude

252

The Modern World View

was

a

major source of Protestant criticism of the Church. By tolerating

and even encouraging the exploration of Greek philosophy, science, and secular thinking, including the Hellenistic metaphorical interpretation

the

of Scripture,

Church had,

allowed pristine

in Protestant eyes,

Christianity and the literal truth oi the Bible to be contaminated. It

most

was antagonism from the Protestant reformers that arose forcefully,

and understandably

tradicted several passages in

so:

Holy Scripture concerning the

fixity of

Earth, and Scripture was Protestantism's one absolute authority.

by

biblical revelation questioned

and

first

the Copernican hypothesis con-

human

the

To have

science was just the kind of

Hellenizing intellectual arrogance and interpretive sophistry the reformers

most abhorred

in Catholic culture. Protestants

Copernican astronomy and condemn the

to recognize the threat of

impiety.

were therefore quick

Even before the publication of the De

called Copernicus an "upstart astrologer"

who

Revolutionibus,

Luther

wished to reverse

foolishly

the entire science of astronomy while flagrantly contradicting the Holy Bible. Luther

was soon joined by other reformers

Calvin, some of whom

recommended

like

Melanchthon and

that stringent measures be taken to

suppress the pernicious heresy. Quoting a passage from the Psalms, "the

world also

is

established, that

it

cannot be moved," Calvin asked:

will dare to place the authority of

Spirit?"

When

"Who

Copernicus above that of the Holy

Rheticus took Copernicus's manuscript to Niirnberg to be

Even

published, he was forced by reformers' opposition to go elsewhere. in Leipzig,

where he

left

the book with the Protestant Osiander to

publish, the latter inserted an

anonymous preface without Copernicus's

knowledge, asserting that the heliocentric theory was merely a convenient computational method and should not be taken seriously as a realistic

The been

account of the heavens.

ploy

may have saved

the publication, but Copernicus had indeed

serious, as a close reading of the text revealed.

time in the early seventeenth century, a

renewed sense of the need

And

for doctrinal

orthodoxy

—

felt

take a definite stand against the Copernican hypothesis. earlier century,

by Galileo's

the Catholic Church

Aquinas or the ancient Church

fathers

—now with

compelled to

While

in

an

might have

readily considered a metaphorical interpretation of the scriptural passages in question,

thereby eliminating the apparent contradiction with

sci-

ence, the emphatic literalism of Luther and his followers had activated a similar attitude in the Catholic

Church. Both

sides of the dispute

now

The

Scientific Revolution

wished

2 5

an uncompromised

to secure

\

with respect to the biblical

solidity

revelation.

Moreover,

guilt by association

Copernicanism

in

had recently hurt the reputation of

the case o\ the mystical Neoplatonist philosopher

and astronomer Giordano Bruno. Bruno had widely promulgated an

advanced version of the heliocentric theory osophy, hut had

later

heen

tried

as part ot his esoteric phil-

and executed by the Inquisition

heretical theological views. Mis stated beliefs

followed tor religions

its

moral teachings rather than

and philosophies should coexist

derstanding, had received

its

astronomy, and that

in tolerance

at best,

and

refrac tory as his ideas

all

and mutual un-

enthusiasm trom the Inquisition. In the

little

heated atmosphere o\ the Counter-Reformation, such

unwelcome

tor

the Bible should he

th.it

in the case of

liberal

views were

Bruno, whose character was as

were unorthodox, they were scandalous. Certainly

man who

the tact that the same

held heretical views on the Trinity and

other vital theological matters had also taught the Copernican theory' did

not augur well for the

(though not

latter.

After Bruno was burned at the stake in 1600

for his heliocentric teachings),

more dangerous theory

—both

Copernicanism seemed

to religious authorities

and

a

to philosopher-

astronomers, each tor their different reasons.

Yet not only did the

now

new

theory conflict with parts of the Bible,

was

apparent that Copernicanism posed a fundamental threat to the

entire Christian

framework of cosmology, theology, and morality. Ever

since the Scholastics and Dante had embraced

dowed

it

Greek science and en-

with religious meaning, the Christian world view had become

inextricably

The

it

embedded

essential

in

an Aristotelian-Ptolemaic geocentric universe.

dichotomy between the

celestial

and

terrestrial realms, the

Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory, the

great cosmological structure of

circling

planetary spheres with angelic hosts, God's empyrean throne above the moral drama of

human

heavens and corporeal Earth ed altogether by the

life

—

new

all

pivotally centered

would be

theory.

between

cast into question or de-

Even discounting the elaborate

medieval superstructure, the most basic principles of the Christian gion were

now hem, the reputation ot Copernican astronomy was further enhanced. Yet major theoretical problems

For Copernicus was

revolutionary

a

tional assumptions that

->r

1

remained.

1 1

who had maintained

worked against the immediate

mflny tradi-

mil cess 0nificance; they did

meaning

to his

life.

not exist

They were

whose character and morions were

man,

tor

to light

straightforwardly material entirely

the

mechanistic principles having no special relation either to

product

human

oi

exis-

288

The Modern World View

tence per se or to any divine

reality.

All specifically

human

world were

qualities formerly attributed to the outer physical

or personal

now

recog-

nized as naive anthropomorphic projections and deleted from the objec-

were similarly recognized

tive scientific perception. All divine attributes as the effect of primitive superstition

removed from

and wishful thinking, and were

The

serious scientific discourse.

universe was impersonal,

not personal; nature's laws were natural, not supernatural. The physical

world possessed no intrinsic deeper meaning. not the visible expression of (7)

With

It

was opaquely material,

spiritual realities.

the integration of the theory of evolution and

of consequences in other fields,

its

multitude

the nature and origin of

man and

the dynamics oi nature's transformations were

now

understood to be

exclusively attributable to natural causes and empirically observable processes.

What Newton had

accomplished

for the physical

cosmos,

Darwin, building on intervening advances in geology and biology (and later aided

nature.

5

by Mendel's work in genetics), accomplished for organic

While the Newtonian theory had

and extent of the universe's established

mension

new

the

—both

its

spatial

structure

new

established the

structure

dimension, the Darwinian theory

and extent of nature's temporal

great duration

and

its

transformations in nature. While with

di-

being the stage for qualitative

Newton

planetary motion was

understood to be sustained by inertia and defined by gravity, with Darwin biological evolution was seen as sustained by

defined by natural selection.

As

random

variation and

the Earth had been removed from the

center of creation to become another planet, so

now was man removed

from the center of creation to become another animal.

Darwinian evolution presented vindication,

continuation,

a

seemingly final

o{ the intellectual impulse established in the Scientific

Revolution, yet classical

a

it

also entailed a significant break

from that revolution's

paradigm. For evolutionary theory provoked a fundamental

harmony

shift

away from the regular, orderly, predictable Newtonian world in recognition of nature's ceaseless and indeterminate change, struggle, and development. In doing

so,

of the Cartesian-

Darwinism both

fur-

thered the Scientific Revolution's secularizing consequences and vitiated that revolution's

compromise with the

traditional Judaeo-Christian per-

spective. For the scientific discovery o{ the mutability of species con-

troverted the biblical account of a static creation in deliberately placed at

certain that

its

which man had been

sacred culmination and center.

man came from God

It

was now

less

than that he came from lower forms o{

Modem

Foundations of the

289

World Vieu

The human mind was nor a divine endowment but a biolo The structure and movement o( nature was the result not ofGod's

primates. tool.

benevolent design and purpose, but

Nature

nOtOodora

itself,

an amoral, random, and brutal

which success went not

struggle tor survival in fit.

of

to the virtuous but to the

transcendent Intellect, was now the origin

of nature's permutations. Natural selection and chance, not Aristotle's teleological tonus or the Bible's purposeful Creation, governed the processes of

lite.

who had

The

initiated

world

ordered

modern concept

early

and then

— the

an impersonal

to itself a fully

modern science

deist

u

C

avator

formed and eternally

compromise between Judaeo-

cosmological

last

Christian revelation and

left

of

— now receded

an

in the face oi

evolutionary theory that provided a dynamic naturalistic explanation for the origin of species and plants, organisms, rocks

entire universe could

all

other natural phenomena. Humans, animals,

and mountains, planets and

now

the

stars, galaxies,

be understood as the evolutionary outcome

ol

entirely natural processes. In these circumstances, the belief that the universe

was purposefully

designed and regulated by divine intelligence, a belief foundational to

both the

classical

Greek and the Christian world views, appeared

creasingly questionable.

human

tervention in

The

history

Second Adam, the Virgin ing

—seemed

in-

Christian doctrine oi Christ's divine in-

— the Incarnation of the Son of God,

Birth, the Resurrection, the

the

Second Com-

implausible in the context of an otherwise straightforward

survival-oriented Darwinian evolution in a vast mechanistic

Newtonian

cosmos. Equally implausible was the existence of a timeless metaphysical

realm of transcendent Platonic Ideas. Virtually everything in the empirical

world appeared explicable without resort to a divine

modern universe was now an was

a secular

phenomenon

reality.

The

phenomenon. Moreover, changing and creating itself

entirely secular

that was

still

not a divinely constructed finality with eternal and

it

static structure, but

an unfolding process with no absolute goal, and with no absolute foundation other than matter

and

of evolutionary direction,

being

in nature,

(8)

Finally,

the

in

its

permutations.

With nature

and with man the only rational conscious

human

future lay emphatically in man's hands.

contrast with the medieval Christian world view,

modern man's independence

—

intellectual, psychological, spiritual

radically affirmed, with increasing depreciation cA

existential

am

— was

religious belief or

would

inhibit man's natural right

and poten-

autonomy and

individual self-expression.

While the

institutional structure that tial for

the sole source

290

The Modern World View

purpose of knowledge for the medieval Christian was to better obey

God's

will,

man's

will.

purpose for modern

its

The

man was

to better align nature to

on apocalyptic Second

Christian doctrine of spiritual redemption as based

the historical manifestation of Christ and his future

Coming was first reconceived as coinciding with the progressive advance of human civilization under divine providence, conquering evil through man's God-given reason, and then was gradually extinguished altogether man's natural reason and

in light of the belief that

ments would progressively

realize a secular

rational wisdom, material prosperity,

The Christian now receded

Utopian era marked by peace,

and human dominion over nature.

sense of Original Sin, the Fall, and collective favor of an optimistic

in

development and the eventual triumph of

human

ignorance, suffering, and social

While the

human

intellectual

and

man

affirmation of rationality

human human

guilt self-

and science over

evils.

Greek world view had emphasized the goal of

classical

reunification) of

spiritual activity as the essential unification (or

with the cosmos and

while the Christian goal was to reunite

modern

scientific achieve-

its

man and

divine intelligence, and

the world with God, the

goal was to create the greatest possible freedom for

nature; from oppressive political, social, or restrictive metaphysical or religious beliefs;

economic

—from

man

structures;

from

from the Church; from the

Judaeo-Christian God; from the static and finite Aristotelian-Christian

cosmos; from medieval Scholasticism; from the ancient Greek authorities;

from

all

primitive conceptions of the world. Leaving behind

tradition generally for the

modern man

set

principles of his

power of the autonomous human

intellect,

out on his own, determined to discover the working

new

universe, to explore

and further expand

its

new

dimensions, and to realize his secular fulfillment.

The above

description

is

necessarily only a useful simplification, for

other important intellectual tendencies existed alongside ran counter

to,

the dominant character of the

forged during the Enlightenment.

It will

of,

modern mind

and often that was

be the task of later chapters to

more complex, and more paradoxical portrait of the modern sensibility. But first we must examine more precisely the extraordinary dialectic that took place as the dominant modern world view just described formed itself out of its major predecessors, the classical and draw

a fuller,

the Christian.

Ancients and Moderns Greek thought had provided Renaissance Europe with most oi die theoretical equipment it required to produce the Scientific Revolu-

Classical

tion:

the Greeks' initial intuition of a rational order in the cosmos,

Pythagorean mathematics,

the

Platonically

problem

defined

the

ot

planets, Euclidean geometry, Ptolemaic astronomy, alternative ancient

COSmological theories with

a

moving

Earth, the Neoplatonic exaltation

of the Sun, the atomists' mechanistic materialism, Hermetic esotericism,

and the underlying foundation

and Presocratic empiri-

oi Aristotelian

cism, naturalism, and rationalism. Yet the character and direction oi the

modern mind were such

that the latter increasingly disavowed the an-

and depreciated

cients as scientific or philosophical authorities

their

and unworthy of serious consideration. The

world view

as primitive

intellectual

dynamics provoking

this discontinuity

were complex and

often contradictory.

One

of the most productive motives impelling sixteenth- and seven-

teenth-century European scientists to engage in detailed observation and

measurement of natural phenomena derived from the heated controversies

between orthodox Scholastic Aristotelian physics and the heterodox

revival of Pythagorean-Platonic mathematical mysticism.

It is

no small

irony that Aristotle, the greatest naturalist and empirical scientist oi antiquity,

whose work had served

as the sustaining

science for two millennia, was jettisoned by the

impetus oi a romantic Renaissance Platonism tive idealist

who most

new

— from

science under the Plato, the specula-

systematically wished to leave the world oi the

senses. But with Aristotle's transformation by the sities

impulse of Western

contemporary univer-

into a stultified dogmatist, the Platonism of the Humanists had

succeeded

in

opening the

intellectual adventure.

At

a

scientific

deeper

imagination to a fresh sense

level,

oi

however, Aristotle's empiricist

this-worldly direction was extended and fulfilled by the Scientific Revolution ad extremum;

that revolution,

it

rebellion by the

Yet

and although Aristotle himself was overthrown

could be said that this was no more than the Oedipal

modern science

just as decisively

deposed

in effigy

in

of

which he was the ancient

was Plato overthrown. Indeed,

while maintained in

spirit,

it

father.

Aristotle was

Plato was vindicated

in

292

The Modern World View

theory but altogether negated in

The

spirit.

Copernicus to Newton had depended upon and been inspired by a of strategies

and assumptions derived

from

Scientific Revolution

directly

series

from Plato, his Pythago-

rean predecessors, and his Neoplatonic successors: the search for perfect

phenomenal world, the a movements conformed to continuous and

timeless mathematical forms that underlay the priori belief that planetary

regular geometrical figures, the instruction to avoid being misled by the

apparent chaos of the empirical heavens, a confidence in the beauty and simple elegance of the true solution to the problem of the planets, the exaltation of the

Sun

as

image of the creative Godhead, the proposals of

nongeocentric cosmologies, the belief that the universe was permeated

with divine reason and that God's glory was especially revealed in the heavens. Euclid, whose geometry formed a basis both for Descartes's rationalist philosophy

and the entire Copernican-Newtonian paradigm,

had been a Platonist whose work was principles.

Modern

scientific

Galileo, was founded

method

fully

itself, as

on the Pythagorean

physical world was one of number,

constructed on Platonic

developed by Kepler and

faith that the language of the

which provided

a rationale for the

conviction that the empirical observation of nature and the testing of hypotheses should be systematically focused through quantitative

measurement. Moreover, Plato's

all

modern science

fundamental hierarchy of

reality,

changing material nature was viewed certain unifying laws

govern.

Above

ic belief

all,

as

in

implicitly based itself

which

a diverse

upon

and ever-

being ultimately obedient to

and principles that transcend the phenomena they

modern science was the

inheritor of the basic Platon-

in the rational intelligibility of the world order,

essential nobility of the

human

and

in the

quest to discover that order. But those

Platonic assumptions and strategies eventually led to the creation of a

paradigm whose thoroughgoing naturalism cal tenor of Platonic metaphysics.

patterns celebrated by

appeared,

the

left little

The numinosity

room

for the mysti-

o{ the mathematical

Pythagorean-Platonic tradition

now

dis-

regarded in retrospect as an empirically unverifiable and

superfluous appendage to the straightforward scientific understanding of

the natural world. It

is

true that the Pythagorean-Platonic claim for the explanatory

power of mathematics was being constantly vindicated by natural sciwhy should mathematics work so ence, and that this apparent anomaly

—

consistently and elegantly in the realm of brute material

caused some puzzlement

among

phenomena?

thoughtful philosophers of science. But

Ancients and Moderns

293

most practicing

for

scientists alter

Newton, such mathematical con-

were considered

sistencies in nature

to represent a certain

mechanical

tendency toward regular patterning, with no deeper meaning per

They were seldom seen

as revelatory

was comprehending the mind simply "in the nature of things,

ua> not interpreted

now

M

or in the nature oi the

The own on

spirit.

stood on their

oi

se.

man

God. Mathematical patterning was

in a Platonic light as giving

changeless world ot pure timeless,

ot

Forms by which the mind

human mind, and

evidence

oi

an eternal

laws oi nature, although perhaps a material foundation, dissociated

from anv divine cause.

Thus with the somewhat perplexing exception of mathematics, the Platonic stream oi philosophy generally ceased to be viewed as a viable

form

oi

thought

character was

left

modern context, and

the

in

science's quantitative

with an entirely secular meaning. In the face of the

indisputable success of mechanistic natural science and the ascendance

of positivistic empiricism and nominalism in philosophy, the idealist

claims of Platonic metaphysics reality

—the

the transcendent

eternal Ideas,

wherein resided true being and meaning, the divine nature of the

heavens, the spiritual government of the world, the religious meaning of science

—were now

primitive

dismissed as elaborately sophisticated products of the

imagination.

served as the sine qua

Paradoxically,

non

for a

the

Platonic

philosophy

had

world view that seemed directly to

controvert the Platonic assumptions. Thus "the irony of fate built the

mechanical philosophy of the eighteenth century and the materialistic philosophy of the nineteenth out of the mystical mathematical theory of the seventeenth."

A

6

further irony lay in the

Aristotle

—

and Plato

at the

modern

defeat of the classical giants

hands of the ancient minority

traditions. In

the course of the later classical and medieval periods, the mechanistic

and materialistic atomism oi Leucippus and Democritus; the heterodox (nongeocentric or nongeostatic) cosmologies of Philolaus, Heraclides,

and Aristarchus; the icus

—

all

radical Skepticism of Pyrrho

and Sextus Empir-

these had been overshadowed, almost trampled undertoor and

extinguished, by the culturally more powerful philosophical triumvirate of Socrates,

Plato,

and Aristotle and by the dominant Aristotelian-

Ptolemaic cosmology. ists

7

But the minority views' retrieval by the

Human-

during the Renaissance eventually served to reverse that hierarchy in

the world of science, with

many

of their tenets enjoying an unexpected

validation in the theoretical conclusions and philosophical tenor of the

294

The Modern World View

A

Scientific Revolution

and

come

whose secular humanism and

to the Sophists,

aftermath.

its

similar restoration

would

relativistic skepti-

cism found renewed favor in the philosophical climate o{ the Enlighten-

ment and subsequent modern thought. But the isolated and seemingly fortuitous insights of a few speculative theorists

were not

sufficient to offset

Nor was

of the ancient mind.

modern

science's critical evaluation

the utility of various premises from the

Platonic and Aristotelian traditions enough to counterbalance what were

The

seen as their misguided and insufficiently empirical foundations. retrospective

awe

by medieval and Renaissance thinkers toward the

felt

genius and achievements of the classical golden age luminaries no longer

seemed appropriate when on every practical

and

was useful

for

modern man was proving

side

intellectual superiority. Thus, its

present needs, the

culture in terms respectful of

its

his

having extracted whatever

modern mind reconceived

classical

and humanistic accomplish-

literary

ments, while generally dismissing the ancients' cosmology, epistemology,

and metaphysics

A

as

more sweeping

—

naive and scientifically erroneous. dismissal was given to the esoteric elements of the

—

had

also

been instrumental in the genesis of the

Scientific Revolution.

The

ancient birth of astronomy, and of science

itself,

ancient tradition

alchemy,

astrology,

Hermeticism

that

had been inextricably

tied to the primitive astrological understanding of the

heavens

carefully observed because of their symbolic import for

the ensuing centuries, astrology's the

latter's

that gave astronomy political

ties to

technical progress, for

and military

its

social

it

human

affairs.

In

astronomy had been essential

for

was the astrological presuppositions

and psychological relevance,

utility in

as a

movements

superior realm of divine significance, with the planetary

as well as its

matters of state. Astrological predictions

required the most accurate possible astronomical data, so that astrology supplied the astronomical profession with

its

most compelling motive

attempting to solve the problem of the planets.

It

prior to the Scientific Revolution the science of astronomy enjoyed

most rapid development precisely during those periods era, the

high Middle Ages, and the Renaissance

for

was no accident that

—the

—when

its

Hellenistic

astrology was

most widely accepted.

Nor

did the major protagonists of the Scientific Revolution

sever that ancient bond. Copernicus Revolutionibus

between astronomy and

jointly as "the

head of

all

made no

move

to

De them con-

distinction in the

astrology, referring to

the liberal arts." Kepler confessed that his

Ancients and Moderns

295

astronomical research was inspired by his search

tor the celestial

of the spheres." Although outspokenly critical

oi

contemporary

Holy

was

Kepler

astrology,

his

era's

and both he and Rrahe served

theoretician,

Roman

Emperor. Even Galileo,

like

"music

the lack o\ rigor in

foremost

astrolo

as royal astrologers to the

most Renaissance astrono-

mers, routinely calculated astrological birth charts, including one for his

patron the Duke o\ Tuscany in 1609, the year

Newton

ies.

reported that

it

was

his

own

o\ his telescopic discover-

early interest in astrology that

stimulated his epochal researches in mathematics, and he later studied

alchemy

at considerable

length.

termine the actual extent

alchemy, but the

demarcation

modem

It

is

sometimes

of these pioneers'

difficult

commitment

now

to de-

to astrology or

historian of science looks in vain for a clear

in their vision

between the

scientific

and the

esoteric.

For a peculiar collaboration between science and esoteric tradition was

norm of the Renaissance, and played an indispensable role in modern science: Besides the Neoplatonic and Pythagorean mathematical mysticism and Sun exaltation that ran through all the in tact the

the birth of

major Copernican astronomers, one finds Roger Bacon, the pioneer of experimental science whose work was saturated with alchemical and astrological principles;

championed an

who

laid early

Gilbert,

Giordano Bruno, the polymath

infinite

esotericist

who

Copernican cosmos; Paracelsus, the alchemist

foundations of modern chemistry and medicine; William

whose theory of the

Earth's

magnetism

rested

on

his proof that

who human

the world-soul was embodied in that magnet; William Harvey,

believed his discovery of the circulation of the blood revealed the

body to be

a

microcosmic reflection of the Earth's circulatory systems and

the cosmos's planetary motions;

Descartes's affiliation with

Rosicrucianism; Newton's affiliation his belief that

with the Cambridge

mystical

Platonists,

and

he worked within an ancient tradition of secret wisdom

dating back to Pythagoras and beyond; and, indeed, the law of univer-

modeled on the sympathies of Hermetic philosophy. The modernity of the Scientific Revolution was in main ways

sal

gravitation

itself,

ambiguous.

But the new universe that emerged from the Scientific Revolution was

room tor the reality of astrological or other explicitly esoteric principles. While the original revolutionaries themselves called no attention to the problems the new not so ambiguous, and appeared to leave

paradigm posed

little

for astrology, those contradictions

for others. For a planetary Earth

seemed

to

soon became apparent

undermine the very tounda-

296

The Modern World View

tion of astrological thinking, since the latter assumed the Earth was the

absolute central focus of planetary influences.

It

was

difficult to see

how

without the privileged position of being the fixed universal center, the Earth could continue to deserve such distinctive cosmic attention.

cosmography delineated from Aristotle through Dante

entire traditional

was shattered

The

moving Earth now

as the

previously defined as the exclusive

trespassed into celestial realms

domain of

specific planetary powers.

After Galileo and Newton, the celestial-terrestrial division could no

and without that primordial dichotomy, the

longer be maintained,

metaphysical and psychological premises that had helped support the astrological belief system

began to

to be prosaically material objects

archetypal symbols relatively

moved by

a cosmic intelligence.

who

astrology

considered

worth examining. Increasingly marginalized,

it

went underground, surviving only among small groups of 8

otericists

and the

sciences"

and the guide of emperors and kings

uncritical masses.

no longer

millennia, astrology was

With

There had been

who were not convinced of generation after Newton there were

few thinkers in the Renaissance

astrology's essential validity, but a

few

The planets were now known moved by inertia and gravity, not

collapse.

After being the classical "queen of for the better part of

the exception of the Romantics, the

mous dimension of

existence.

modern mind

also gradually as

an autono-

That the gods were nothing more than

pagan fantasy needed

Enlightenment on. Just

two

credible.

outgrew the Renaissance's fascination with ancient myth

colorful figments of

es-

as the Platonic

argument from the

little

Forms died out

in philosophy,

their place taken by objective empirical qualities, subjective concepts,

cognitive categories, or linguistic "family resemblances," so did the

ancient gods assume the role of literary characters,

metaphors without any claim to ontological

artistic

For modern science had cleansed the universe of spiritual properties previously projected

neutral, opaque,

possible thority. ically

images, useful

reality.

upon

it.

all those human and The world was now

and material, and therefore no dialogue with nature was

—whether through magic,

mysticism, or divinely certified au-

Only the impersonal employment of man's

critical

and empir-

based rational intellect could attain an objective understanding of

nature.

Although

in

fact

sources had converged to

immense

an astonishing variety of epistemological

make

possible the Scientific Revolution

—the

imaginative (and antiempirical) leap to the conception oi a

planetary Earth,

9

Pythagorean and Neoplatonic aesthetic and mystical

Modems

Ancients and

2 l >7

beliefs, Descartes's revelatory

ence and concept

own

his

dream and vision of a now universal sciit, Neuron's Hermetically Inspired

mission to forge

the serendipitous recoveries of the

ot gravitational attraction, all

ancient manuscripts

Archimedes,

(Lucretius,

Sextus

the

Empiricus,

Neoplatonists), the fundamentally metaphorical character of the various scientific theories

and explanations

nificant only in the context

— these were

viewed

all later

ot scientific discovery.

.is

sig-

In the context of

any hypothesis,

scientific justification, oi ascertaining the truth value of

only empirical evidence and rational analysis could he considered

legiti-

mate epistemological bases, and in the wake oi the Scientific Revolution these

modes dominated the

cretistic,

scientific enterprise.

and mystical epistemologies of the

elaborate metaphysical consequences, were Classical culture

The

too flexible, Byn-

classical period,

now

their

would long remain an exalted realm haunting the

West's imaginative and aesthetic creations.

modern thinkers with

It

would continue

events and personalities of ancient history would interest

to provide

and moral ideas and models.

inspiring political

Greek philosophy, the Greek and Latin languages and

modern mind avid

and

repudiated.

and scholarly

literatures, the

all still

evoke

in the

respect, often bordering

on

reverence. But the humanistic nostalgia for classicism could not disguise

the at

latter's

growing irrelevance

hand was

for the

a stringent philosophical

the classical world view, whatever er

its

and

claim for his

own

intellectual rigor

and

issue

scientific analysis of reality,

historical importance,

virtues in aesthetic or imaginative terms,

compare with the Yet

its

modern mind. For when the

efficacy

and whatev-

could not favorably

modern man could

justly

understanding.

for all that, the ancient

Greek mind

still

pervaded the modern. In

the virtually religious zeal of the scientist's quest for knowledge, in his often unconscious assumptions concerning the rational intelligibility of

the world and man's capacity to reveal

judgment and

his ambitious drive to

it,

in his critical

independence

ot

expand human knowledge beyond

ever more distant horizons, Greece lived on.

The Triumph

of Secularism

The Early Concord

Science and Religion:

The

fate of Christianity in the

wake of the

Scientific Revolution

was not

own

share of

dissimilar to the fate of classical thought, nor did

paradox.

lack

it

requisite for the Scientific Revolution, the Catholic

dogmatic

its

the Greeks had supplied most of the theoretical provisions

If

strictures,

Church,

for all

its

had provided the necessary matrix within which the

Western mind was able

to develop

The

derstanding could emerge.

and from which the

un-

scientific

nature of the Church's contribution was

both practical and doctrinal. From the beginning of the Middle Ages, the

Church had provided

in

its

monasteries the only refuge in the

West

within which the achievements of classical culture could be preserved

and

And from the turn of the first millennium,

their spirit continued.

Church had

officially

supported and encouraged the vast Scholastic

and education without which modern

enterprise of scholarship tellectuality

the

might never have

in-

arisen.

This momentous act of ecclesiastical sponsorship was

justified

by a

unique constellation of theological positions. The precise and profound

comprehension of Christian doctrine required,

in the medieval Church's

and

a corresponding capacity for logical clarity

evolving view, tellectual acuity.

Beyond

that rationale

emerged another,

for

in-

with the

increasing recognition of the physical world in the high Middle

Ages

there arose a corresponding recognition of the positive role a scientific

understanding could play in the appreciation of God's wondrous creation. For all

its

wariness of

mundane

life

and "the world," the Judaeo-

Christian religion nevertheless placed great emphasis on the ontological reality of that

world and

Christianity took this

its

life

ultimate relationship to a good and just God. seriously.

Therein

lay a significant religious

impetus for the scientific quest, which depended not only on a sense of the

human

on

being's active responsibility in this world, but also

in this world's reality,

its

order, and, at the start of

modern

a belief

science,

its

coherent relationship to an omnipotent and infinitely wise Creator.

Nor was

the contribution of the Scholastics merely an imperfect

Christianized recovery and sustaining of the Greek ideas. For

it

was the

The Triumph of Secularism

299

Scholastics' exhaustive examination and criticism oi those ideas, and their creation of

new

alternative theories and concepts

formulations ot inertia and

momentum,

treelv tailing bodies, hypothetical

modem

allowed forging

rudimentary

the uniform acceleration oi

—

moving Earth that science from Copernicus and Galileo onward to begin arguments

tor a

new paradigm. And perhaps most consequential was not

its

nature ot the Scholastics' theoretical innovations,

Specific

re\ itahzation ot

attitude

istential

the

nor their

Hellenic thought, but rather the more intangible ex-

medieval thinkers passed on to their modern de-

scendants: the theologically founded but decidedly robust confidence

God-given reason possessed the capacity, and the

that man's

comprehend the

duty, to

religious

natural world. Man's intellectual relation to the

creative Logos, his privileged possession of the divine light ot the active intellect

—Aquinas's

lumen intdlectUS

agentis

perspective precisely what mediated the

cosmos. Descartes's natural light of the

—was

human human

from the Christian

understanding of the reason was the direct

half-secularized inheritor of that medieval conception.

himself

who had

written in his

Summa

It

was Aquinas

Theolvgica that "authority

the

is

weakest source of proof," a dictum central for the protagonists ot the

modern mind's independence. Modern empiricism

all

had Scholastic

rationalism,

naturalism,

and

roots.

But the Scholasticism encountered by the sixteenth- and seventeenthcentury natural philosophers was a senescent structure of pedagogical

dogmatism that no longer spoke

to the

nothing fresh was emerging from within Aristotle, failure

marked

its

new its

spirit

of the age. Little or

confines.

Its

obsession with

oversubtle verbal distinctions and logical quibbles, and

to submit theory systematically to the test of experiment late

its

all

Scholasticism as an outmoded, ingrown institution whose

intellectual authority

had

to be

overthrown

lest

the brave infant science

be fatally smothered. After Bacon, Galileo, Descartes, and Newton, that authority had been effectively impugned, and Scholasticism's reputation

never recovered. From then on, science and philosophy could move forward without theological justification, without recourse to a divine light in the

human

intellect,

without the colossal supportinu superstruc-

ture of Scholastic metaphysics

and epistemoloL'y

Yet despite the unambiguously secular character of the modern science that eventually crystallized out o\ the Scientific Revolution, the original scientific revolutionaries

themselves continued to

act, think,

and speak

of their work in terms conspicuously redolent ot religiou* illumination.

300

The Modern World View

They perceived

their intellectual breakthroughs as foundational contri-

butions to a sacred mission. Their scientific discoveries were triumphant spiritual

awakenings to the divine architecture of the world, revelations

of the true cosmic order. Newton's joyful exclamation,

"O God,

think

I

thy thoughts after thee!" was only the culmination of a long series of such

epiphanies marking the milestones of modern science's birth. In the

De

more

di-

Revolutionibus, Copernicus celebrated

vine than human," closest to

God

upheld the heliocentric theory

astronomy

as a "science

in the nobility of

its

and

character,

grandeur

as revealing the true structural

and precision of God's cosmos. Kepler's writings were ablaze with

his

sense of being divinely illuminated as the inner mysteries of the cosmos

unfolded before his eyes.

most high

He

declared astronomers to be "priests of the

own

with respect to the book of nature," and saw his

role

honor of guarding, with my discovery, the door of God's temple,

as "the

in

God

10

which Copernicus

serves before the high altar." In Sidereus Nuncius,

Galileo spoke of his telescopic discoveries as grace enlightening his mind.

made

possible by God's

Even the worldly Bacon envisioned human-

progress through science in explicitly religious, pietistic terms, with

ity's

the material improvement o{

mankind corresponding

to

spiritual

its

approach to the Christian millennium. Descartes interpreted his vision

new

of the

universal science,

and a subsequent dream

in

which that

science was symbolically presented to him, as a divine mandate for his life's

work:

assured

him

God had shown him

the way to certain knowledge, and

of his scientific quest's ultimate success.

And with Newton's

achievement, the divine birth was considered complete.

had been written. As Alexander Pope declared Nature and nature's laws

God

said, "Let

Newton

A new Genesis Enlightenment:

for the

lay hid in night;

be," and

all

was

light.

For the great passion to discover the laws of nature that was scientific revolutionaries derived

not

least

the

lost in

the primal

human mind had comprehended God's working

eternal laws governing Creation, the divine handiwork

unveiled by science. Through science glory,

by the

from a sense that they were

recovering a divine knowledge that had been last

felt

man had

principles.

itself,

At The

Fall.

now

stood

served God's greater

demonstrating the mathematical beauty and complex precision,

the stupendous order reigning over the heavens and the Earth.

The

luminous perfection of the discoverers' new universe compelled

awe

their

KM

The Triumph of Secularism

before the transcendent intelligence which they attributed to the

(

Creator

of such a cosino>.

Nor was was

the religiosity of the major scientific pioneers

sentiment with

religious

little specific

as zealously absorbed in Christian theology

prophecy

Church from Inquisition,

m

he was

as

a

Newton

and studies

ol

biblical

Galileo was committed to saving his

physics.

error and,

despite his confrontation with

the

and

died a devout Catholic. tellectuallv pervasive,

generalized

steadfast in his Catholic piety. Descartes lived

costly

remained

.1

relation to Christianity.

And

their Christian presuppositions were in

embedded

in the very

tabnc

and

ot their scientific

philosophical theories. Roth Descartes and

Newton

cosmological systems on the assumption

God's existence. For Des-

cartes, the objective

the

world

ot

existed as a Stable reality

constructed their

because

stood in

it

mind of God, and human reason was epistemologically

reliable

because ot God's intrinsically veracious character. Similarly, for Newton,

matter could not he explained on

mover,

its

own

terms but necessitated a prime

supreme architect and governor. God had established

a creator, a

the physical world and

its

laws,

and therein

lay the world's

continuing

existence and order. Indeed, because of certain unresolved problems in his calculations,

Newton concluded

cally necessary to

that God's intervention was periodi-

maintain the system's regularity.

Compromise and

Conflict

But the early modern accord between science and Christianity was already

displaying

creationist ontology

universe

— with

planetary Earth

its

tensions still

and contradictions,

mechanical

—was

for

forces,

its

scientific

material heavens,

and

Any

maintained only by religious

belief,

new

central focus o( the

universe was

not by scientific evidence.

The

Earth

and mankind might be the metaphysical pivot of God's creation, but status could not be supported by a purely scientific understanding,

saw both the Earth and the Sun

moving through

its

not notably congruent with traditional Christian

conceptions of the cosmos.

others

the

from

apart

underpinning the new paradigm, the

a

as

merely two bodies

boundless neutral void.

"I

am

which

among COimtleM

terrified," said the

intensely religious mathematician Pascal, "by the eternal lllence infinite spaces." Intellectually sensitive Christiana

tb.it

oi

these

attempted to remter-

302

pret

The Modern World View

and modify

their religious understanding to

drastically different

accommodate

a universe

from that of the ancient and medieval cosmology

within which the Christian religion had evolved, but the metaphysical hiatus continued to widen. In the Enlightenment's

heaven and had

had

hell

Newtonian cosmos,

lost their physical locations, natural

phenomena

symbolic import, and miracles and arbitrary divine

lost their

human

terventions into

now

affairs

in-

appeared increasingly implausible,

contradicting the supreme orderliness of a clockwork universe. Yet the

deeply rooted principles of Christian belief could scarcely be negated altogether.

Thus

arose the psychological necessity of a double-truth universe.

Reason and

faith

came

to be seen as pertaining to different realms, with

Christian philosophers and scientists, and the larger educated Christian public, perceiving

and the

no genuine

integration between the scientific reality

religious reality. Joined together in the high

Middle Ages by the

Scholastics culminating in Aquinas, then severed in the late medieval

Ockham and

period by

nominalism, faith had moved in one direction

with the Reformation, Luther,

literal Scripture,

fundamentalist Protes-

tantism and Counter-Reformat ional Catholicism, while reason had

moved

in

another direction with Bacon, Descartes, Locke, Hume,

empirical science, rational philosophy, and the Enlightenment. At-

tempts to bridge the two generally failed to preserve the character of one or the other, as in Kant's delimiting of religious experience to the moral

impulse.

With both

science and religion simultaneously vital yet discrepant,

the culture's world view was by necessity bifurcated, reflecting a metaphysical schism that existed as

relevant

less

within the individual as within the

to the outer world than to the inner

contemporary afterlife,

much

Religion was increasingly compartmentalized, seen as

larger society.

spirit

less to

than

less

self,

to revered tradition, less to this

to the

than to the

life

everyday than to Sunday. Christian doctrine was

believed by most, and indeed, as

if

in reaction to the abstract

still

mechanical

universe of the Enlightenment's physicists and philosophers, a host of fervently emotional religious

ism in France,

Awakening

in

movements

—Pietism

in

Germany, Jansen-

the Quakers and Methodists in England,

America

—emerged and found broad popular

the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. traditional Christian

mold continued

Devout

the Great

support in

religiosity

to be widespread; these

in the

were the

The Triumph

of Secularism

very years in which Western religious music reached

and Handel, both

bom

within months

wherein the

this pluralism,

and

scientific

apogee in Bach Newton's Prmcipia Bui amidst

o(

its

temperaments pursued

religious

their separate paths, the overriding cultural direction

was

rationalism was ineluetahlv on the ascent, demonstrating

Over ever-larger areas

human

of

Within rwo centuries outlook had icallv

fully established itself

proved

ientific

sovereignty

its

experience.

Newton, the

after

w

lean

^

seculaiitj

modern

the

of

Mechanistic materialism had dramai

explanatory power and utilitarian ettu,u\. Experiences

it>

and events that appeared

to detv accepted scientific principles

miracles and faith healings,

all

self-proclaimed religious revelations and

spiritual ecstasies, prophecies, symbolic interpretations of natural phe-

nomena, encounters with God

regarded as the effects of madness,

concerning the existence o\

God

devil—were now

or the

charlatanry,

increasingly

or both.

Questions

or a transcendent reality ceased to play

which was becoming the

a decisive role in the scientific imagination,

principal factor in defining the educated puhlic's shared belief system.

Already

tor

Pascal

religious doubts

in

the seventeenth century,

and philosophical skepticism, the leap

to sustain Christian belief

had become

leading edge of Western thought,

What, then, caused

this

shift

it

a wager.

seemed

equally

emphatic

secularism

of

main

tor

a losing bet. religiosity

Western

the

in

intellect

to

the

i>t

resulting from the attempt to

hold together such innately divergent systems and to force the issue in

the

of

and seventeenth centuries

the

two outlooks, the cognitive dissonance had

the

at

nineteenth and twentieth? Certainly the metaphysical incongruity

ly

own

of faith necessary

Now,

from the explicit

scientific revolutionaries o( the sixteenth

the

faced with his

one direction or the

sensibilities, eventual*

other.

The

character and

implications of the Christian revelation simply did not cohere well with

those of the scientific revelation. Essential to the

C

Ihristian faith

belief in Christ's physical resurrection after death, an event

apostolic witness

Christianity.

and

all

phenomena

foundational miracle, as well as

in all

terms

of

its

a virgin birth

the scientific

rhe other supernatural

recounted in the Bible, could no longer

savior,

of

regular natural

command

Raisings from the dead, miraculous healings

human

with

interpretation, had served as the very foundation of

But with the near-univers.il acceptance

explanation oi

th.it,

wis rhe

from h

laws,

that

phenomena

unquestioning i

m

belief.

divinewater,

304

The Modern World View

water from rocks, partings of seas to the

modern mind, bearing

—

all

appeared increasingly improbable

as they did too

many

similarities to other

mythical or legendary concoctions of the archaic imagination.

Damaging

criticism of the absolute truth of Christian revelation also

emerged from the new academic

which

discipline of biblical scholarship,

human

demonstrated Scripture's variable and manifestly

sources.

Both

the Renaissance Humanists and the Reformation theologians had pressed for a return to the original

led to a

more

critical

Greek and Hebrew sources of the

their historical authenticity

and

which

integrity. In the course of several gen-

erations of such scholarship, Scripture began to lose

divine inspiration.

Bible,

reading of the original texts and reevaluations of

The

its

sacral aura of

now be recognized less as the unand pristine Word of God than as a hetero-

Bible could

questionably authoritative

geneous collection of writings in various traditional

composed, collected, and

editorially modified

genres,

literary

many human hands

by

over the centuries. Soon biblical textual criticism was followed by

critical

dogma and the church, and by historical investigations into the life of Jesus. The intellectual skills developed for analyzing secular history and literature were now being applied to the

historical studies of Christian

sacred foundations of Christianity, with unsettling consequences for the faithful.

By the time such

studies were joined by the

Darwinian theory's

discrediting of the creation narrative found in Genesis, the validity of scriptural revelation

have been made

had become

in the

entirely problematic.

image of

God

if

he was

Man

could hardly

also the biological

descendant of subhuman primates. The thrust of evolution was not one of spiritual transfiguration but of biological survival.

Newton

While up through

the weight of science had tended to support an argument for the

existence of

God

based on evidence of design in the universe, after

Darwin the weight of science was thrown against that argument. The evidence of natural history seemed more plausibly comprehended in terms of evolutionary principles of natural selection and random mutation than in terms of a transcendent Designer.

Certainly some scientists of a Christian persuasion noted the affinity

between the theory of evolution and the Judaeo-Christian notion of God's progressive and providential plan of with the

New

history.

These drew

parallels

Testament's conception of an immanent evolutionary

process of divine incarnation in

man and

nature,

and even attempted

remedy some of Darwinism's theoretical shortcomings with

to

religious

The Triumph of Secularism

\Q$

explanatory principles. Yer

tor a culture generally

more

derstanding

its

between the

static original creation ot species In

Bible

winian evidence

ar

tor their

the

value,

face

accustomed

glaring

to un-

inconsistency

Genesis and the Dar-

transmutation ovei aeons

commanded

time

ot

the greater attention, ultimately encouraging massive agnostic defections

from the religious

told.

For at bottom, the Christian belid in

a

c

who

iod

acted through revelation and grace appeared wildlv incompatible with

common

everything

actually worked.

sense and science suggested about the way the world

With

Luther, the monolithic structure

ot

the medieval

Christian Church had cracked. With Copernicus and Galileo, medieval Christian cosmology itself had cracked. With Darwin, Christian world view showed signs ot collapsing altogether.

the

the

In an era so unprecedentedly illuminated by science and reason, the

"good news" ot Christianity became

less

less

The

psychologically necessary.

nexus

ot

less

ha\'e suddenly

and place only

historical time

single brief

on

become

convincing

metaphysi-

a

to build one's

lite,

and

sheer improbability o\ the whole

events was becoming painfully obvious

God would

nation,

and

upon which

cal structure, less secure a foundation

a particular

— that an

human

infinite eternal

being

in a specific

to be ignominiously executed.

That

a

taking place two millennia earlier in an obscure primitive

lite

a planet

now known

matter revolving about one

and impersonal universe

—

star

to be a relatively insignificant piece

among

billions in

that such an undistinguished event should

have any overwhelming cosmic or eternal meaning could no longei be compelling belief

d

an inconceivably vast

for reasonable

men.

a

was starkly implausible that the

It

universe as a whole would have any pressing interest in this minute part oi

its

the

immensity

—

if it

modern demand

statements of

What was

belief,

had any

own image

God was

a

and anthropomorphic projection

to assuage all the pain It,

intellect,

peculiarly durable combination

and

right

all

— made

the wrongs

in

man

by contrast, the unsentimental

reason could adhere closely to the concrete evidence, there was

necessity to posit the existence of such a Cjod, and

against

the spotlight ot

modern

probable, in the judgment of the critical

found unbearable in his existence.

no

Under

the essence of Christianity withered

o\ wish-fulfillment fantasy

human

all.

for public, empirical, scientific corroboration ot all

was that the Judaeo-Christian man's

"interests" at

it.

world and

The its

scientific data

1

much

that

overwhelmingly thar the natural

history were expressions of an impersonal pr

exactly what caused this complex

phenomen

both

306

The Modern World View

order and chaos, dramatic and yet evidently purposeless, out of control in

the sense of lacking divine government

—

to go so far as to posit

and

define what was behind this empirical reality had to be regarded as intellectually

unsound, a mere dreaming about the world. The ancient

concern with cosmic designs and divine purposes, with ultimate metaphysical issues, with the why's of

attention of scientists.

It

phenomena, now ceased

was patently more

to

fruitful to focus

engage the

on the

hou/s,

the material mechanisms, the laws of nature, the concrete data that

could be measured and tested.

Not

11

on the hard

that science perversely insisted

"narrower" vision out of simple myopia. Rather, the

empirical

and tangible

correlations

it

causes,

facts

and on

a

was only the how's, that

could be ex-

perimentally confirmed. Teleological designs and spiritual causes could

not be subjected to such testing, could not be systematically isolated, and therefore could not be

known

to exist at

It

all.

was better to deal only

with categories that could be empirically evidenced than to allow into the scientific discussion transcendent principles abstract

—

could a

God

the character and

was scarcely a testable

modus operandi

in the

no more be corroborated than

that in the final analysis could

fairy tale.

—however noble

entity.

And

in

any case,

of the Judaeo-Christian deity

ill

fitted

the real world discovered by science.

With

its

apocalyptic prophecies and sacred rituals,

hero and world savior motifs,

its

its

deified

human

miracle stories, moralisms, and venera-

tion of saints and relics, Christianity seemed best understood as a singularly successful folk

and order

—

inspiring

hope

meaning

in believers, giving

to their lives, but without ontological foundation. In such a

could be seen as well-meaning but credulous.

light, Christians

victory of

myth

Darwinism (and notably

in the

With

the

wake o{ the celebrated Oxford

debate in 1860 between Bishop Wilberforce and T. H. Huxley), science

had unequivocally achieved win, there seemed

little

its

independence from theology. After Dar-

further possibility of contact of any kind

between

science and theology, as science focused ever more successfully

on the

objective world, while theology, virtually incapacitated outside ever-

smaller

religious

intellectual

spiritual concerns. intelligible

circles,

Faced by the

final

focused exclusively on

inward

severance of the scientifically

universe from the old spiritual verities,

modern theology

adopted an increasingly subjective stance. The early Christian belief that the Fall and tire

cosmos,

a

Redemption pertained not

just to

man

but to the en-

doctrine already fading after the Reformation,

now

The Triumph of Secularism

\qq

disappeared altogether the process

ol salvation,

it

it

had any nu\im:

pertained solely to the personal relation between

all,

God and man.

inner rewards ol Christian faith were

now

continuity between the experience

Christ and that

God

world.

ot

was wholly other than man and

the religious experience.

The

stressed,

with

he

I

a radical dis-

the everyday

ot

this world, and therein lay

"leap ot faith," not the self-evidence ot the

created world or the objective authority ot Scripture, constituted

tin-

principal basis tor religious coin action.

Under such less

modern Christianity assumed

limitations,

encompassing intellectual

In

role.

its

a

new and

long«held capacity

explanatory paradigm tor the visible world and universal belief system

Western

culture, the Christian revelation

had

lost its

potency.

that Christian ethics were not so readily depreciated by the

atheists, the ot

many

For

sensibility.

non-Christians,

as

Word

ot

God

true

secular

admirable as those

any other ethical system. But the Christian revelation

infallible

Is

tor

even outspoken agnostics and

moral ideals taught by Jesus remained

miracles and so forth

It

new

tar

both

as

as a

— the

whole

in the Bible, the divine plan o\ salvation, the

—could

not be taken seriously. That Jesus was

simply a man, albeit a compelling one, seemed increasingly self-evident.

Compassion ideal,

A

but

its

humanity was

tor

basis

still

upheld

as a social

and individual

was now secular and humanistic rather than

religious.

humanitarian liberalism thereby sustained certain elements of the

Christian ethos without the

modern mind admired the

latter's

transcendent foundation. Just

loftiness of spirit

philosophy while simultaneously negating

its

as the

and moral tone oi Platonic metaphysics and epistemol*

ogy, so too Christianity continued to be tacitly respected, and indeed closely followed, for its

its

larger metaphysical It is

ethical precepts, while increasingly doubted tor

and

religious claims.

also true that in the eyes of not a few scientists

science

itself

and philosophers,

contained a religious meaning, or was open to

a religious

interpretation, or could serve as an opening to a religious appreciation ^\

the universe.

The beauty

of nature's forms, the splendor ot

its

variety,

human body, the evohl* human mind, the mathe-

the extraordinarily intricate functioning of the tionary development of the

human

eye or the

matical patterning of the cosmos, the unimaginable magnitude ^\ the

—

heavenly spaces

to

some these seemed

to require the existence

divine intelligence and power ot miraculous sophistication. Bur others argued that such phenomena were the Straightforward and tively

random

results of the

natural

laws

>>t

physics,

chemistry,

t

a

many rela-

and

308

The Modern World View

The human

biology.

psyche, longing for the security of a cosmic provi-

dence, and susceptible to personifying and projecting

its

own

capacity for

value and purpose, might wish to see more in nature's design, but the

understanding was

scientific

beyond such wishful an-

deliberately

thropomorphizing: the entire scenario o{ cosmic evolution seemed ex-

chance and necessity, the random

plicable as a direct consequence of

interplay of natural

had

plications

laws.

any apparent religious im-

In this light,

to be judged as poetic but scientifically unjustifiable

extrapolations from the available evidence.

hypothesis."

God was

"an unnecessary

12

Philosophy, Politics, Psychology developments in philosophy during these centuries reinforced

Parallel

the same secular progression. During the Scientific Revolution and the early

Enlightenment,

religion

continued

to

hold

its

own among

philosophers, but was already being transformed by the character of the scientific

mind.

preference

In

Enlightenment Deists

to

like Voltaire

or a "natural religion."

traditional

religions

Christianity,

Such would be appropriate not only

rational apprehension of nature's order sal first cause,

biblical

argued in favor of a "rational religion"

and the requirement of

to the

a univer-

but also to the West's encounter with other cultures'

and ethical systems

—an

encounter suggesting to many the

existence of a universal religious sensibility grounded in

common human

experience. In such a context, the absolute claims of Christianity could

not enjoy special privilege. Newton's cosmic architecture demanded a

cosmic architect, but the attributes of such a

God

could be properly

derived only from the empirical examination of his creation, not from the extravagant pronouncements of revelation. Earlier religious con-

ceptions

—

primitive,

biblical,

infantile steps to the

medieval

—could

now

be recognized as

more mature modern understanding of an im-

personal rational deity presiding over an orderly creation.

The rationalist God, however, soon began to lose philosophical support. With Descartes, God's existence had been affirmed not through faith but

through reason; yet on that basis God's certain existence could

not be indefinitely sustained,

as

Hume

and Kant, the culminating

philosophers of the Enlightenment, noted in their different ways. as

Ockham had warned

Much

four centuries earlier, rational philosophy could

The Tnumph of Secularism

not presume to pronounce on matters that so ically

based intellect At the

start of

far

transcended the empir-

the Enlightenment,

in

the late

seventeenth century, Locke had systematically pursued Bacon's empiricist

directive by rooting

all

knowledge

and subsequent reflection on the

ol

the world in sensor) experience

basis ot rbar experience.

Locke'fl

inclinations were Peist, and be retained Descartes's Certainty thai Ood'l

existence wa> logically demonstrable from self-evident intuitions. the empiricism be

championed

human

necessarily limited the

But

reason's

capacity tor knowledge tO that which could be tested by concrete experi-

ence.

As

successive philosophers drew

the empiricist basis, justifiably

make

it

became

no longer immortality and free-

clear that philosophy could

assertions about

dom, or otber propositions

more rigorOUS conclusions from

God, the

soul's

that transcended concrete experience.

In the eighteenth century,

Hume

and Kant systematically refuted the

traditional philosophical arguments tor God's existence, pointing out the

unwarrantahility of using causal reasoning to the supersensible.

Only the realm of

move from

possible experience, ot concrete

particulars registered in sensation, offered any

sophical conclusions. For

Hume, an

the sensible to

ground

for valid philo-

entirely secular thinker

unequivocal in his skepticism, the matter was simple:

To

and more

argue from the

problematic evidence of this world to the certain existence of the good

and omnipotent

God

of Christianity was a philosophical absurdity. But

even Kant, though highly

religious himself

and intent on preserving the

moral imperatives of the Christian conscience, nevertheless recognized that Descartes's laudable philosophical skepticism had ceased too abruptly

with his dogmatic assertions about God's certain existence derived

from the

cogito.

For Kant,

God was

an unknowable transcendent

thinkable, not knowable, only by attending to man's inner sense ot moral duty. Neither

human

reason nor the empirical world could give any

direct or unequivocal indication of a divine reality. in

God,

Man

could have faith

he could believe in his soul's freedom and immortality, but he

could not claim that these inner persuasions were rationally certain the rigorous

modern philosopher, metaphysical

Foi

certainties about

or the like were spurious, lacking as they did a sound basi> tor verification.

The

inevitable and proper

outcome of both empiricism and

crit icil

philosophy was to eliminate any theological substrate from modern philosophy.

At

the same time, the bolder thinkers of the French Enlightenment

increasingly tended toward not only skepticism but

m.iten-

310

The

Modem

World View

alism as the most intellectually justifiable consequence of the scientific Diderot, chief editor of the Encyclopedic,

discoveries.

the Enlighten-

ment's great project of cultural education, illustrated in his gradual transformation of a reflective

then to skepticism, and a deistic ethics.

who

portrayed

whose

man

man

The

the physician La Mettrie,

an organic machine

as a purely material entity,

an independent soul or mind was produced

its

physical components.

ethical consequence of such a philosophy, to advocate.

physicist

the

ambiguously joined with

finally to a materialism

simply by the interplay of

life

from religious belief to Deism,

More uncompromising was

illusion of possessing

own

Hedonism was the

which La Mettrie did not

Baron d'Holbach

terminisms of matter as the only intelligible

fail

similarly affirmed the dereality,

and declared the

absurdity of religious belief in the face of experience: given the ubiquity

of evil in the world, any justice

and compassion.

good and

evil

God must

On

be deficient either in power or in

the other hand, the

random occurrence of

accorded readily with a universe of mindless matter lacking

any providential overseer. Atheism was necessary to destroy the chimeras

human

of religious fantasy that endangered the

race.

Man

needed

to be

brought back to nature, experience, and reason. It

would be the nineteenth century that would bring the Enlighten-

Comte,

Mill,

Feuerbach, Marx, Haeckel, Spencer, Huxley, and, in a somewhat

differ-

ment's secular progression to

ent

The

Nietzsche

spirit,

all

Judaeo-Christian

that creation

Human

had

its

logical conclusion as

sounded the death knell of traditional

God was

man's

own

creation,

necessarily dwindled with man's

religion.

and the need

for

modern maturation.

history could be understood as progressing from a mythical

theological stage, through a metaphysical and abstract stage, to

its

and final

triumph in science, based on the positive and concrete. This world of

man and

matter was clearly the one demonstrable

reality.

Metaphysical

speculations concerning "higher" spiritual entities constituted nothing

more than and

its

idle intellectual fantasy,

present fate.

The

God, who was merely

and were

humanity

a disservice to

duty of the modern age was the humanization of

a projection of man's

own

inner nature.

One

could

perhaps speak of "an Unknowable" behind the world's phenomena, but that was the extent of what could be said with any legitimacy.

more immediately apparent, and more

modern world view, was comprehended,

that the world's

What was

positively contributive to the

phenomena were being

to humanity's inestimable benefit, by science,

superbly

and that

the terms of that comprehension were fundamentally naturalistic.

The

The Tnumph of Secularism

question remained o\ the

who, or what,

as to

hut

universe,

\

intellectual

precluded any certain con-

elusions or even progress in such an inquiry. illy

beyond man's ken and,

whole phenomenon

Initiated the

honesty

in the

1

bee

Its

answer L\ epistemo*

ot

more immediate and

beyond

attainable intellectual objectives, increasingly

his interest.

With

utes and Kant, the philosophical relation between Christian belief

and human

had grown ever more attenuated. By the

rationality

late

nineteenth century, with tew exceptions, that relation was effectively absent.

There were

many nonepistemological

also

economic, psychological tion ot the belief.

—

pressing toward this

modern mind and

Even before the

factors

its

political,

same end, the

social,

seculariza-

disengagement from traditional religious

Industrial Revolution

had demonstrated science's

superior utilitarian value, other cultural developments had

the scientific view over the religious.

The

recommended

Scientific Revolution

had

been born amidst the immense turmoil and destruction of the wars religion that followed the Reformation, wars that in the

name

vergent Christian absolutisms had caused over a century of Europe. In such circumstances

much doubt was

the Christian understanding, as well as upon ot relative

peace and security,

let

the increased fervor of religiosity vinist,

cast

its

upon the

di-

crisis

in

integrity ot

ability to foster a

world

alone of universal compassion. Despite

—whether Lutheran, Zwinglian, CalCatholic —experienced by the

Anabaptist, Anglican, Puritan, or

European populace

in the

wake of the Reformation,

that the culture's failure to agree

on

subjective and

more

rationally persuasive.

verifiable world

reception

among

it

was clear to many

a universally valid religious truth

created the need for another type of belief system,

ically

ot

ot

Thus the

less

had

controversially

neutral and empir-

view of secular science soon found an ardent

the educated class, offering a

conceptual framework that peacefully cut across boundaries. Just as the

last

commonly acceptable

all political

major convulsions

ot

and

religious

post'Reformational

bloodshed had been expended, the Scientific Revolution was approach'

The

ing completion.

final

decade of the Thirty Years' Wtr, 1638 48, law

the publication of both Galileo's Dialogue Concerning Tu

and Descartes's

Principles of Philosophy,

Circumstances of a more part in the

modern

existed a fateful

shift

Neu

as well as the birth of

Sciences

Newton.

specifically political nature wire also to play a

away from

religion.

For centuries, there had

association between the hierarchical

view and the established social-political structur

(

hristian world idal

Europe,

312

The Modern World View

centering on the traditional authority figures of God, pope, and king. By the eighteenth century,

advantageous.

The growingly apparent

injustices of the other

had become mutually

that association

combined

implausibilities of the

dis-

one and

to produce the image of a system

whose

senile oppressiveness demanded revolt for the larger good of humanity. The French philosophes Voltaire, Diderot, Condorcet and their successors among the French revolutionaries recognized the Church itself in

—

its

wealth and power

—

as a bastion of reactionary forces, allied inextricably

to the conservative institutions of the ancien regime.

To

the philo-

sophes, the power of the organized clergy posed a formidable obstacle to

the progress of civilization. In addition to the issue of economic and

atmosphere of censorship, intolerance, and

social exploitation, the

tellectual rigidity that the philosophes

rary intellectual

and vested

life

in-

found so abhorrent in contempo-

was directly attributable to the dogmatic pretensions

interests of the ecclesiastical establishment.

Voltaire had seen and admired firsthand the consequences of En-

which

gland's religious toleration, clarifications of

in turn,

with the superior intellectual

Bacon, Locke, and Newton, he enthusiastically pre-

sented to the Continent for emulation.

Armed with

empirical facts, the Enlightenment saw

itself as

science, reason,

and

engaged in a noble

struggle against the constricting medieval darkness of

Church dogma and

popular superstition, tied to a backward and tyrannical political structure of corrupt privilege.

13

The

cultural authority of dogmatic religion

was

recognized as inherently inimical to personal liberty and unhampered

and discovery. By implication, the

intellectual speculation

—except

sensibility itself

as antagonistic to

in rationalized, deistic

human

form

—could

religious

well be seen

freedom.

Yet one philosophe, the Swiss-born Jean-Jacques Rousseau, asserted a very different view. Like his fellows in the vanguard of the Enlighten-

ment, Rousseau argued with the weapons of critical reason and reformist zeal.

Yet the progress of civilization they celebrated seemed to him the

source of

much

of the world's

corrupt sophistications, of simplicity,

evil.

Man

sincerity,

equality,

kindness,

Moreover, Rousseau believed religion was tion.

He contended and

from

civilization's

his natural condition

and true understanding.

intrinsic to the

human

condi-

that the philosophes' exaltation of reason

neglected man's actual nature intuition

suffered

which alienated him from

spiritual

—

his feelings, his depths of impulse

hunger that transcended

all

had and

abstract formulae.

Rousseau certainly disbelieved in the organized churches and clergy, and

The Triumph of Secularism

\

thought absurd the orthodox Christian

belief that

one—the

the exclusively and eternally genuine

its

form

ol

1

\

worship was

only religion acceptable

to the Creator oi a world most t

hum, in observation.

344

The Transformation of

They

grounded epistemologically

are

the

in the nature of the

Modern Era

mind, not

ontologically in the nature of things. Because mathematical propositions

on

are based

direct intuitions o( spatial relations, they are "a priori"

constructed by the mind and not derived from experience are also valid for experience, priori

form of space.

It

is

entangled in contradiction as a

whole

—

to ascertain

in trying to decide

which

will

yet they

by necessity conform to the a

true that pure reason inevitably

becomes

attempts to apply these ideas to the world

if it

what

is

beyond

true

whether the universe

or space. But as regards the

—and

is

all

possible experience

infinite or finite either in

—

as

time

phenomenal world that man does experience,

time and space are not just applicable concepts, they are intrinsic

components of mandatory

for

all human experience human cognition.

of that world, frames of reference

Moreover, further analysis reveals that the character and structure of the

mind

are such that the events

subject to other a priori principles

it

perceives in space and time are

—namely,

the categories of the un-

derstanding, such as the law of causation. These categories in turn lend their necessity to scientific knowledge.

related in the world outside the

man

the world that predispositions,

it

Whether

mind cannot be

experiences

is

events are causally

all

ascertained, but because

necessarily determined by his mind's

can be said with certainty that events in the phe-

and science can so proceed. The

nomenal world

are causally related,

mind does not

derive cause and effect from observations, but already

experiences

observations in a context in which cause and effect are

presupposed

its

realities: causality in

experience but

As with

is

human

cognition

not derived from

is

brought to experience.

cause and effect, so too with other categories of the un-

derstanding such as substance, quantity, and relation. Without such

fundamental frames of reference, such a

human mind would

priori interpretive principles, the

be incapable of comprehending

its

world.

Human

experience would be an impossible chaos, an utterly formless and miscellaneous manifold,

except that the

human

sensibility

and under-

standing by their very nature transfigure that manifold into a unified perception, place

it

in a

framework of time and space, and subject

it

to

the ordering principles of causality, substance, and the other categories.

Experience

The

is

a construction of the

a priori forms

experience.

They

and

mind imposed on

sensation.

categories serve as absolute conditions of

are not read out of experience, but read into

are a priori, yet empirically applicable

—and

it.

They

applicable only empirically,

The

Self-Critique of the

H^

Modern Mind

not metaphysically. For the only world that world of phenomena,

man

extent that

or

on

construction.

its

We

the empirical

can know things

restricted to the sensible effects

is

and these appearances or phenomena

US,

la

"appearances," and that world exists only to the

participates in

only relative to ourselves. Knowledge of things

man knows

are,

as

it

were,

predigested Contrary to the usual assumption, the mind never experiences what

is

"out there" apart from the

mind

in

some

one

ot his

own making, and

the world in

itself

clear, undistOTted

man

mirroring of objective "reality." Rather, "reality" tor

is

necessarily

must remain something

one can only think about, never know.

The

man

perceives in his world

is

thus an order grounded not in

that world hut in his mind: the mind, as

it

were, forces the world to obey

its

own

the

order

organization. All sensory experience has heen channeled through

filter ot

human

Man

a priori structures.

can attain certain knowledge

of the world, not because he has the power to penetrate to and grasp the

world in

itself,

but because the world he perceives and understands

world already saturated with the principles of his tion.

This organization

is

what

is

own mental

is

a

organiza-

absolute, not that of the world in

itself,

which ultimately remains beyond human cognition. But because man's mental organization genuine certainty

is

— know, that

phenomenal world. Thus man does not receive knowledge

Kant assumed, man can know with

absolute, is,

all

the only world he can experience, the

his

knowledge from experience, but

in a sense already introduces itself into his

his

experience in the

process of cognition. Although Kant criticized Leibniz and the rationalists

for believing that reason alone

late the universe (for,

without sense experience can calcu-

Kant argued, knowledge requires acquaintance

with particulars), he also criticized Locke and the empiricists for believing that sense impressions alone, without a priori concepts of the

understanding,

could

ever

lead

knowledge

to

particulars

(for

are

meaningless without general concepts by which they are interpreted).

Locke was correct

to

deny innate ideas

tions o\ physical reality, but

wrong

thought without sensation

is

blind.

Only

in

to

in the sense of

mental representa-

deny innate formal knowledge. As

empty, so

is

sensation without thought

conjunction can understanding and sensibility supply

objectively valid knowledge of thing's.

For Kant, Hume's division of propositions into those based on intellect

pure-

(which are necessary but tautological) and those based on pure

sensation (which are factual but not necessary) required

a

third

and more

346

The Transformation of

Modern Era

the

important category, one involving the intimately combined operation of

both

faculties.

Without such

a

combination, certain knowledge would be

One cannot know something

impossible.

about the world simply by

thinking; nor can one do so simply by sensing, or even by sensing and

The two modes must be

then thinking about the sensations.

in-

terpenetrating and simultaneous.

Hume's

had demonstrated that the human mind could never

analysis

attain certain

knowledge of the world,

apparent order oi

for the

all

past

experience could not guarantee the order of any future experience. Cause

was not directly perceivable

and the mind could not

in the world,

penetrate beyond the veil of phenomenal experience o{ discrete particulars. It

was therefore clear to Kant that

if

we

received

o{ things from sensation alone, there would be

then moved beyond

Hume

no

our knowledge

all

But Kant

certainty.

because he recognized the extent to which

the history of science had progressed only

on the

basis of conceptual

predispositions that were not derived from experience, but were already

woven ton's

He knew

into the fabric of the scientific observation.

that

New-

and Galileo's theories could not have been derived simply from

observations,

for purely accidental observations

prearranged according to to a general law.

on nature

human

that have not been

design and hypothesis could never lead

Man can elicit from nature universal

like a pupil for answers,

laws not by waiting

but only, like an appointed judge, by

putting shrewd questions to nature that will be deliberately and precisely revealing. Science's answers derive from the

On

same source

as

its

questions.

the one hand, the scientist requires experiments to ascertain that his

hypotheses are valid and thus true laws of nature; only by sure there are

no exceptions and

o{ the understanding and not only imaginary. scientist also requires a priori hypotheses

observe and

test

the nature of

all

only that which

it

fruitfully.

human it

And

tests

can he be

that his concepts are genuine concepts

even

On to

the other hand, the

approach the world, to

the situation of science in turn reflects

experience.

The mind can know with

has in some sense already put into

Man's knowledge, then, does not conform to

conform to man's knowledge. Certain knowledge

its

objects, is

certainty

experience.

but objects

possible in a phe-

nomenal universe because the human mind bestows to that universe its own absolute order. Thus Kant proclaimed what has been called his "Copernican revolution":

movement

as

Copernicus had explained the perceived

of the heavens by the actual

movement

o( the observer, so

I

he sdi

i

'.ntuiuc

r/u-

>f

modem

Hie continuing

ambiguous. Ing

\$1

sense o( Intellectual progress, lea\

behind the ignorance and misconceptions

the fruits oi now

concrete technological

od past eras

wink- reaping

was again

results,

K

Even Newton had been corrected and Improved upon evolving,

sophisticated

increasingly

man) who had regarded determinism

materialistic

the

4

new

universe

as antithetical to

values, die

human

die

oi

seemed

will

to

subatomic particles were indeterminate,

it

spiritual

s

In*

given

application in

knowledge,

a

central role in the larger

and

science.

Human

scheme

with

phenomena encouraged

new

1

I

scientists

began

the smallest

to

new understanding

oi

holistic thinking about the world,

question modern science's pervasive,

measurable components

reductionist program,

oi

in

and

likely

to

reality

.ill

the physical world would In

the universe.

miss

th.it

to

I

he

many

which was most

the nature ot things.

Vet such inferences were neithei universal noi even widespread practicing physicists. interpretation,

often

it

effort to reduce

dominant since Descartes, now appeared

he myopically selective,

significant

more

i

he Jeep interconne< ted

eventually reveal that which was most fundamental

to

least

at

be given

oi

social, moral. anJ religious implications. Increasing numbers

unconscious, assumption that the intellectual to

to

things with the

oi

a

consciousness, oi

seemed

the subject's influence on the observed objec

oi

broadei

its

complementarity between mutually exclusive ways

liko religion

observation and interpretation,

mam

in

new

s

principle oi

11 u-

complementarity governing waves and particles suggested

ness oi

quantum

unexpected and welcome broach

perhaps more conducive to

to s reality

freedom

terptetation.

human

and

mechanistic

ol

human

the

to

intellectual possibilities. Matter's fbrmei hard substantiality

had given waj

foothold

the evei

modern mind. Moreover,

scientific

relativistk revolution represented an

bolsti

Modem

physics was perhaps open

hut did not necessarily

compel

it.

to

Nor was

.1

among

spiritual

the largei

population intimately conversant with the arcane conceptual ch

wrought by the new physics. Moreover, tu>n

m

m

[Musks did not

the other

natural

result

and

m

largely

cal physics. Nevertheless,

many

sciences,

felt

aspii

transformations

theii

theoretical

th.u the old materialistic world

offered possible opportunities

with man's humanistic

although

al

on the me< hanistk principles of classic

had been irrevocably challenged, and reality

several decades the revolu

comparable theoretic

social

programs ha J been based

tor

rh.it t.-i

.1

the new scientific timJ.imrnt.il

\

lew

models

oi

rapprochement

358

The Transformation of

Yet these ambiguous turbing factors.

To

possibilities

the

Modern Era

were countered by other, more

begin with, there was

dis-

now no coherent conception

of

the world, comparable to Newton's Principia, that could theoretically

complex variety of new

integrate the

any consensus

as to

how

to

Conceptual con-

respect to defining the ultimate nature o{ reality. tradictions, disjunctions,

evaded resolution."

come

data. Physicists failed to

the existing evidence should be interpreted with

and paradoxes were ubiquitous, and stubbornly

A certain irreducible irrationality

7 ,

already recognized

human psyche, now emerged in the structure of the physical world To incoherence was added unintelligibility, for the conceptions derived from the new physics not only were difficult for the layperson to in the

itself.

comprehend, they presented seemingly insuperable obstacles

human

intuition generally:

a

curved space,

the

to

unbounded; a

yet

finite

four-dimensional space-time continuum; mutually exclusive properties possessed by the same subatomic entity; objects that were not really things at

phenomena

but processes or patterns ot relationship;

all

that

took no decisive shape until observed; particles that seemed to affect

each other

at a distance

with no

known

fundamental fluctuations oi energy in Moreover,

for all the

to a less materialistic

change in the

and

essential

as to

still

Nor was

minutia.

a total

vacuum.

apparent opening of the scientific understanding less

mechanistic conception, there was no real

modern dilemma: The universe was

impersonal vastness in which sciousness was

causal link; the existence of

man

an ephemeral,

randomly produced

inexplicable,

there any compelling answer to the looming question

what ontological context preceded or underlay the "big-bang"

o{ the universe.

Nor

to

birth

did leading physicists believe that the equations of

quantum theory described the confined

an

still

with his peculiar capacity for con-

abstractions,

actual world. Scientific

mathematical

knowledge was not of the world

itself,

knowledge was

"shadows."

symbols,

Such

which now more than ever seemed

beyond the compass of human cognition.

Thus of the

in certain respects the intellectual contradictions

new

physics only heightened the sense oi

and obscurities

human

alienation growing since the Copernican revolution.

relativity

and

Modern man

was

being forced to question his inherited classical Greek faith that the world

was ordered

in a

the physicist P.

manner

W.

clearly accessible to the

human

intelligence. In

Bridgman's words, "the structure of nature

may

eventually be such that our processes of thought do not correspond to sufficiently to permit us to think about

it

at all.

.

.

.

The world

it

fades out

The

Crisis of

and eludes

Modem

us.

.

.

Sck

.

have reached the

We are confronted with something

We

truly ineffable.

limit o( the vision ci the great pioneers ot science, the

we

vision, namelv, that

sympathetic world

live in a

in that

com-

is

it

prehensible by our minds.'" Philosophy's conclusion was becoming ence's

M

can objectively

compounded

insecure relativism

man

ici«

may not he structured in am way the human mind discern. Thus incoherence, unintelligibility, and an

well: Reality

the earlier

modern predicament

of hu-

alienation in an impersonal cosmos.

When

relativity theory

and quantum mechanics undid the absolute

Newtonian paradigm, science demonstrated, in a way convinced Newtonian could never have anticipated, the

certainty of the that

Kant

BLS

a

validity of Kant's skepticism

certain

knowledge of the world

truth o\

human

Newtonian

science,

Because he was certain

in itself.

a basis for the

centurv physics, the bottom

damental Kantian

a prioris

longer applicable to after

all

Newton

Newtonian achievement,

—

in general.

o\ the ot

out of Kant's

fell

last certainty.

space, time, substance, causality

phenomena. The

to be universal

scientific

as well

But with twentieth-

The

fun-

—were no

knowledge that had

and absolute had

quantum mechanics

to be recognized

reveal in unexpected fashion the radical validity

ot Kant's thesis that the nature described by physics itself

tor

Bohr, and Heisenberg as limited and provisional. So too

atter Einstein,

did

mind's capacity

Kant had argued that the categories

man's epistemological competence

seemed

human

cognition congruent with that science were themselves absolute,

and these alone provided as for

concerning the

but man's relation to nature

i.e.,

was not nature

in

nature as exposed DO man's form

of questioning.

What had been

implicit

in

Kant's critique,

apparent certainty of Newtonian

physics,

obscured by the

but

now became

explicit:

Because

induction can never render certain general laws, and because scientific

knowledge

is

a

product ot

selves relative, variable, act ot observation in

human

interpretive structures

and creatively employed, and

rh.it

finally

some sense produces the objective

are

them-

because the

reality science

attempts to explicate, the truths of science are neither absolute nor unequivocally objective. In the combined wrake

philosophy and

twentieth-cenfurv science, the

of absolutes, but also disconcertingly tree

t

o(

eighteenth~century

modern mind was any

K>lid

ground

left

tree

360

The Transformation of

Modern Era

the

This problematic conclusion was reinforced by a newly

critical

approach to the philosophy and history of science, influenced above by the work of Karl Popper and of

Hume

Thomas Kuhn. Drawing on

all

the insights

and Kant, Popper noted that science can never produce knowl-

edge that

is

certain, nor

even probable.

Man

making imaginative guesses about

stranger,

He cannot approach

observes the universe as a

its

structure

and workings.

the world without such bold conjectures in the

background, for every observed fact presupposes an interpretive focus. In science, these conjectures

yet

however many

must be continually and systematically

tests are successfully passed,

more than an imperfectly corroborated conjecture. At any

viewed

as

time, a

new

possibility.

could

test

Even the

falsify

it.

is

scientific truth

is

immune

to such a

new framework. Man can never claim

to

the real essences of things. Before the virtual infinitude of the

world's

egy

No

basic facts are relative, always potentially subject to

a radical reinterpretation in a

know

tested;

any theory can never be

phenomena, human ignorance

itself is infinite.

The

wisest strat-

to learn from one's inevitable mistakes.

But while Popper maintained the rationality of science by upholding its

fundamental commitment to rigorous testing of theories,

its

fearless

neutrality in the quest for truth, Kuhn's analysis of the history of science

tended to undercut even that security.

knowledge required interpretive

Kuhn

agreed that

structures based

digms or conceptual models that allowed researchers to elaborate theories, and solve problems. But citing

all scientific

on fundamental

isolate data,

many examples

he pointed out that the actual practice of

history of science,

seldom conformed to Popper's

para-

ideal of systematic self-criticism

in the

scientists

by means

of attempted falsification of existing theories. Instead, science typically

proceeded by

seeking

confirmations

of

the

prevailing

paradigm

gathering facts in the light of that theory, performing experiments on basis,

extending

its

range of applicability, further articulating

its

its

struc-

ture, attempting to clarify residual problems. Far from subjecting the

paradigm it

itself to

constant testing, normal science avoided contradicting

by routinely reinterpreting conflicting data in ways that would support

the paradigm, or by neglecting such awkward data altogether.

To an

extent never consciously recognized by scientists, the nature of scientific practice

makes

as a lens

through which every observation

its

governing paradigm self-validating.

an authoritative bulwark by texts, scientific

common

is

filtered,

The paradigm

and

is

acts

maintained

as

convention. Through teachers and

pedagogy sustains the inherited paradigm and

ratifies its

The

MooV™

Crisis of

Science

\6

tending to produce

credibility,

1

firmness oi conviction and theoretical

a

rigidity not unlike an education in systematic theolo

Kuhn

turrher argued that

when

the gradual accumulation

ing data finally produces a paradigm crisis sis

and

ol conflict'

new imaginative synthe-

a

eventually wins scientific favor, the process by which that revolution

rakes place

is

from rational.

tar

depends

It

as

much on

the established

community, on aesthetic, psychological, and on the presence ot contemporary root metaphors and

ot the scientific

customs

sociological (actors,

on unpredictable imaginative

popular analogies,

and

leaps

M

gestah

switches," even on the aging and dying ot conservative scientists,

and arguments. For

disinterested tests

in tact the rival

and hence different

ot interpretation

creates

its

own

gestalt, so

different paradigms

common

seem

comprehensive that

falsification,

standard tor comparison. scientists

is

working within

Nor

What

that

all

there any

is

an important problem

is

upon

scientists agree for

not for another. Thus the history of science

linear rational progress

as a

one group ni

is

not one

o\

moving toward ever more accurate and complete

knowledge of an objective

roles.

differing

measure, such as problem-solving ability or theoretical coher-

ence or resistance to

which

scientists

on

Each paradigm

sets ot data.

to be living in different worlds.

s

paradigms are

seldom genuinely comparable; they are selectively based on

modes

l(

truth, but

a multitude oi nonrational

one of

is

radical shifts of vision in

and nonempirical

Whereas Popper had attempted

to

factors play crucial

temper Hume's skepticism by

demonstrating the rationality of choosing the most rigorously tested conjecture, Kuhn's analysis served to restore that skepticism.

With

4

these philosophical and historical critiques and with the revolu-

tion in physics, a

more

intellectual circles. Science

knowledge, but

became widespread

in

patently effective and powerful in

its

tentative view of science

scientific

senses, a relative matter.

was

still

knowledge was now regarded

The knowledge

as,

in several

science rendered was relative to

the observer, to his physical context, to his science's prevailing paradigm

and

his

own

theoretical assumptions.

It

was relative

to his culture's

prevailing belief system, to his social context and psychological predispositions, to his very act of observation.

might be overturned

at

any point

in

And

the face of

science's

first

principles

new evidence. Moreover,

bv the later twentieth century, the conventional paradigm structures of other science^, including the Darwinian theory ot evolution, were coming under increasing pressure from conflicting data and alternative theories.

Above

all,

the bedrock certainty ot the Cartesian-Newtonian world

362

The Transformation of

the

Modem

view, for centuries the acknowledged epitome and model of

knowledge and

still

tuitively accessible

human

pervasively influential in the cultural psyche, had

And

been shattered.

Era

the post-Newtonian world order was neither in-

nor internally coherent

— indeed,

scarcely an order

at all.

Yet for

science's cognitive status

all this,

would

still

have retained

unquestioned preeminence for the modern mind. Scientific truth

its

might be increasingly esoteric and only provisional, but truth, continually being

practical effects in the

its

it

was

a testable

improved and more accurately formulated, and form oi technological progress— in industry,

agriculture, medicine, energy production,

communication and

trans-

portation—provided tangible public evidence for science's claims to render viable

knowledge of the world. But

gible evidence that for

it

it

was, paradoxically, this same tan-

was to prove crucial

in

an antithetical development;

was when the practical consequences oi

no longer be judged to reevaluate

As

its

scientific

exclusively positive that the

knowledge could

modern mind was

early as the nineteenth century,

Emerson had warned that man's

technical achievements might not be unequivocally in his interests:

forced

previously wholehearted trust in science.

own

best

"Things are in the saddle and ride mankind." By the turn of the

century, just as technology was producing

mobile and the widespread application of

new wonders electricity,

began to sense that such developments might

signal

like the auto-

a few observers

an ominous reversal

human values. By the mid-twentieth century, modern science's brave new world had started to become subject to wide and vigorous criticism: of

Technology was taking over and dehumanizing man, placing him context of

artificial

in a

substances and gadgets rather than live nature, in an

unaesthetically standardized environment where

means had subsumed

ends, where industrial labor requirements entailed the mechanization of

human

beings,

where

all

problems were perceived

as soluble

by technical

research at the expense of genuine existential responses.

The

self-

propelling and self-augmenting imperatives of technical functioning were

man and uprooting him from his fundamental relation to the Human individuality seemed increasingly tenuous, disappearing

dislodging Earth.

under the impact of mass production, the mass media, and the spread of a bleak and problem-ridden urbanization. Traditional structures and values

were crumbling.

With an unending stream

of technological

inno-

The

Crisis of

Moden\

modem

vations,

\o

Science

life

was subject

was becoming

lived

an unprecedentedly disorienting

to

Gigantism and turmoil, excessive noise, speed, and

rapidity ot change.

human environment. The

complexity dominated the

man

as

impersonal as the COSRIOS

world

man's capacity to retain

humanity

his

technology seemed increasingly freedom,

of

mankind's

become

creation, had

In

e.

With

modem

oi

life,

An environment determined by

doubt.

in

ability to

which

In

kmh

s^

oi his

the pervasive anonymity, hollowness, and materialism

human

\

For many,

the question of

maintain mastery over

its

own

acute.

But compounding these humanistic critiques were more disturbingly concrete signs

tamination

of

untoward consequences. The

science's

ot the planet's water,

on animal and plant

effects

lite,

air,

and

soil,

critical

con-

the manifold harmful

the extinction ot innumerable species,

the deforestation ot the globe, the erosion ot topsoil, the depletion ot

groundwater, the vast accumulation of toxic wastes, the apparent exacerbation ot the greenhouse effect, the breakdown of the ozone layer in

the atmosphere, the radical disruption of the entire planetary ecosystern

—

all

these emerged as direly serious problems with increasing force

and complexity.

From even

a

human

short-term

perspective,

accelerating depletion of irreplaceable natural resources had

the

become an

alarming phenomenon. Dependence on foreign supplies of vital resources brought

New

a

new

precariousness into global political and economic

life.

banes and stresses to the social fabric continued to appear, directly

or indirectly tied to the advance of a scientific civilization

overdevelopment and overcrowding, cultural and

numbingly mechanical automobile and

social

— urban

rootlessness,

labor, increasingly disastrous industrial accidents,

air travel fatalities,

cancer and heart disease, alcoholism

and drug addiction, mind-dulling and culture-impoverishing

television,

growing levels of crime, violence, and psychopathology. Even science's

most cherished successes paradoxically entailed new and pressing problems, as rates,

when

the medical relief of human illness and lowering ot mortality

combined with technological

strides in

food production and trans-

portation, in turn exacerbated the thre.it ot global overpopulation. In

new

other cases, the advance of science presented in

those surrounding the unforeseeable future uses

More

generally, the scientifically

Faustian dilemmas, as ot genetic

untathomed complexity

variables— whether in global or local environments, in the

human body— made

the consequences

tion of those variables unpredictable

*

»t

engineering.

oi

in social

.ill

relevant

systems, or

technological manipula-

and often pernicious.

364

The Transformation of

the

Modern Era

All these developments had reached an early and ominous proleptic

when

climax

natural science and political history conspired to produce

the atomic bomb.

It

seemed supremely,

tragically,

if

ironic that the

Einsteinian discovery of the equivalence of mass and energy, by which a particle of matter could be converted into

energy

—

human

a discovery

by a dedicated

intellectual brilliance

and

an immense quantity of

pacifist reflecting a certain

creativity

—

apex of

precipitated for the

With

time in history the prospect oi humanity's self-extinction.

first

the

dropping of atomic bombs on the civilians of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,

moral neutrality, not to say

faith in science's intrinsic

its

unlimited

powers of benign progress, could no longer be upheld. During the protracted and tense global schism oi the Cold

War

numbers of unprecedentedly destructive nuclear

that followed, the

missiles

multiplied until the entire planet could be devastated

relentlessly

many

times over.

now brought into peril by virtue of its own genius. The same science that had dramatically lessened the hazards and burdens of human survival now presented to human survival its gravest menace. The great succession of science's triumphs and cumulative progress was now shadowed by a new sense of science's limits, its dangers, and its culpability. The modern scientific mind found itself beleaguered on several fronts at once: by the epistemological critiques, by its own Civilization itself was

theoretical problems arising in a growing

number

of fields, by the in-

creasingly urgent psychological necessity of integrating the look's

human- world

divide,

and intimate involvement

and above

all

by

its

in the planetary crisis.

of scientific research with the political,

modern

out-

adverse consequences

The

military,

close association

and corporate

es-

tablishments continued to belie science's traditional self-image of de-

tached purity.

many

The

very concept of "pure science" was

as entirely illusory.

The

belief that the scientific

access to the tmth oi the world, that

it

now

criticized

by

mind had unique

could register nature like a perfect

mirror reflecting an extrahistorical, universal objective reality, was seen

not only as epistemologically naive, but also as serving, either consciously or unconsciously, specific political

and economic agenda, often

allowing vast resources and intelligence to be commandeered for pro-

grams of social and ecological domination. The aggressive exploitation of the natural environment, the proliferation of nuclear weaponry, the threat of global catastrophe

human

reason

itself,

—

now

destructive irrationality.

all

pointed to an indictment of science, of

seemingly

in

thrall

to

man's

own

self-

The

Crisis of

Modem

hypotheses were to be rigorously and disinterestedly

If all scientific

tested,

then

seemed

it

U>s

Science

thai the "scientific world view"

modern

ing metahypothesis oi the

deleterious and counterproductive consequences

The

which

enterprise,

scientific

cultural predicament -philosophical,

had now provoked

a biological

earlier

its

in

In the

simph by

time not in religion but

in

a

belief that the

advance and

engineering had been confounded. The West was again losing this

its

psychological

social,

scientific

by

empirical world.

emergency. The optimistic

world's dilemmas could he solved

falsified

had presented

itages

religious,

the govern-

itself,

was being decisively

era,

its

social faith,

human

science and in the autonomous

reason.

Science was its

still

valued, in

many

respects

untainted image as humanity's liberator.

It

had

claims to virtually absolute cognitive reliability. longer exclusively benign, with

its

and economic

ot scientific

also lost

With

Long'Secure

productions no

evident susceptibility

its

knowledge could no longer be affirmed.

— mixed with —seemed

Hume's

a relativized

On

the basis of these

radical epistemologi-

Kantian sense of a

publicly vindicated. After

tive structures

its

lost

bias, the previously unqualified trustworthiness

several interacting factors, something like cal skepticism

its

had

it

reductionist understanding of the

natural environment apparently deficient, with to political

revered. But

still

priori cogni-

modern philosophy's

acute epistemological critique, the principal remaining foundation for reason's validity

had been

its

empirical support by science.

The

philo-

sophical critique alone had been in effect an abstract exercise, without definite influence

continued

if

on the

larger culture or

the scientific enterprise had

equivocally positive in

its

practical

on

science,

itself

and would have so

continued being so un-

and cognitive

progress.

But with

science's concrete consequences so problematic, reason's last foundation

was now unfirm.

Many

thoughtful observers, not just professional philosophers, were

forced to reevaluate the status of

knows

human knowledge. Man might

things, scientifically or otherwise, but there

tee for this:

he had no

a

priori

rhink he

was clearly no guaran-

rational access to

universal

truths;

empirical data were always theory-soaked and relative to the observer;

and the previously

reliable scientific world

view was open to fundamental

question, for that conceptual framework was evidently K>rh creating and

exacerbating problems tor humanirv on

a global scale. Scientific

edge was stupendouslv effective, hut those

knowledge from

a limited perspective

effects suggested that

could he

a

knowl-

much

us rhin^.

Romanticism and The

Two

Its

Fate

Cultures

From the complex matrix

of the Renaissance had issued forth two

distinct streams of culture,

two temperaments or general approaches to

human

existence characteristic of the Western mind.

One emerged

in

the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment and stressed rationality, empirical science, and a skeptical secularism.

complement, sharing

Greco-Roman

common

The

other was

roots in the Renaissance

its

and

polar

classical

culture (and in the Reformation as well), but tending to

express just those aspects of human experience suppressed by the Enlight-

enment's overriding

spirit

of rationalism. First conspicuously present in

Rousseau, then in Goethe, Schiller, Herder, and this side of the

and

Western

sensibility fully

early nineteenth centuries,

emerged

in the late eighteenth

and has not since ceased

Western culture and consciousness

force in

German Romanticism,

—from Blake,

to be a potent

Wordsworth,

Coleridge, Holderlin, Schelling, Schleiermacher, the Schlegel brothers,

Madame

de Stael, Shelley, Keats, Byron, Hugo, Pushkin, Carlyle, Emer-

son, Thoreau,

Whitman, and onward

in

its

diverse forms to their

many

descendants, countercultural and otherwise, of the present era.

To

be sure, the Romantic temperament shared

much with

its

Enlight-

enment opposite, and their complex interplay could be said to constitute the modern sensibility. Both tended to be "humanist" in their high estimate of man's powers and their concern with man's perspective on the universe. Both looked to this world and nature as the setting of the

human drama and the

phenomena

structures.

values.

the focus for

of

human

Both found

human

endeavor. Both were attentive to

consciousness and the nature of

its

hidden

in classical culture a rich source of insight

Both were profoundly Promethean

—

and

in their rebellion against

oppressive traditional structures, in their celebration of individual hu-

man

genius, in their restless quest for

human

freedom, fulfillment, and

bold exploration of the new.

But in each o{ these commonalities there were deep differences. In contrast with the spirit oi the Enlightenment,

the Romantic vision

perceived the world as a unitary organism rather than an atomistic

Romanticism and

Its

>h,

Ffltt

machine, exalted the mettabilitv lightenment life

ot reason,

ot

inspiration

rather than

and affirmed the inexhaustible drama

the en-

Whereas

rather than the calm predictability of statu abstractions.

the Enlightenment temperament's high valuation ot

unequaled rational

powers

emotional depths,

his

ot individual self»expression

his

On

tor the

both

Romantic

sides, the

artistic

his

it

was

a

Newton,

Goethe,

a

a

and

Creativity

mk\ self-creation. The genius

brated by the Enlightenment temperament was

Nietzsche.

on

and its power to comprehend and exploit the Romantic valued man rather tor his Imaginative and

aspirations,

an Einstein, while

rested

intellect

laws ol nature, the spiritual

man

human

of

cele-

a Franklin, 01

Beethoven, or

autonomous world-changing

will

a

and mind

modern man were apotheosized, bringing the cult ot the hero, the men and their deeds. Indeed, on many fronts at once, the Western ego gained substance and impetus, whether in the titanic

ot

history ot great

self-assertions o\ the

French Revolution and Napoleon, the new

awareness of Rousseau and Byron, the advancing scientific Lavoisier and Laplace, the incipient feminist confidence of

self-

clarities ot

Mary Woll-

and George Sand, or the many-sided richness of human

stonecratt

experience and creativity realized by Goethe. But for the two tempera-

ments, Enlightenment and Romantic, the character and aims of that

autonomous

Whereas tor

self

were sharply

distinct. Bacon's Utopia

for the Enlightenment-scientific

observation

and experiment,

was not

Blake's.

mind, nature was an object

theoretical

explanation and

tech-

nological manipulation, for the Romantic, by contrast, nature was a live vessel of spirit,

a translucent source of mystery

and revelation. The

scientist too

wished to penetrate nature and reveal

method and

goal of that penetration, and the character of that revela-

tion,

its

mystery; but the

were different from the Romantic's. Rather than the distanced

object of sober analysis, nature for the Romantic was that which the

human

soul strove to enter

existential

and unite with

in

an overcoming

dichotomy, and the revelation he sought was not

cal law but o\ spiritual essence.

While the

ot

of

the

mechani-

scientist sought truth th.it

was

Romantic sought truth that wai inwardly transfiguring and sublime. Thus Wordsworth saw nature as

testable

and concretely

effective,

the

ensouled with spiritual meaning and beauty, while Schiller considered the impersonal mechanisms of science a poor substitute foe the Greek deities

who had animated

nature tor the ancients. Both modern tempera-

ments, scientific and Romantic, looked to present

human experience

and the natural world for fulfillment, hut what the Romantic sought and

The Transjoiination

\6S

(bund

domains

in those

o/

Modem

the

Era

reflected a radically different universe from that

oi the scientist.

Equally notable was the difference in their attitudes toward the phe-

nomena the

o\

human

ot

awareness.

The

mind was empirical and

Enlightenment-scientific examination epistemological,

becoming

gradually

focused on sense perception, cognitive development, and quantitative behavioral studies. Bv contrast, beginning with Rousseau's Confessions the

modem Romantic

—

sequel and response to the ancient Catholic

Confessions of Augustine

— the Romantics'

interest in

human

ness was fueled bv a newly intense sense of self-awareness

the complex nature of the

human

self,

conscious-

and

a focus

on

and was comparatively un-

constrained bv the limits ot the scientific perspective. Emotion and imagination, portance.

rather than reason and perception,

New

were

prime im-

of

concern arose not only with the exalted and noble but

with the contraries and darkness

demonic, and the

irrational.

in the

human

soul,

with

death, the

evil,

Generally ignored in the optimistic, clar-

ified light of rational science,

these themes

now

inspired the works of

Blake and Novalis, Schopenhauer and Kierkegaard, Hawthorne and Melville,

and

Poe

Baudelaire,

Dostoevskv

and

Nietzsche.

Romanticism, the modern eve was turned ever more inward

To

the shadows of existence.

moods and motives,

With

to discern

explore the mysteries o{ interioritv. ot

love and desire, fear and angst, inner conflicts and

contradictions, memories and dreams, to experience extreme and in-

communicable

states

consciousness,

of

be

to

unconscious into consciousness, to

know

inwardlv

human

epiphanic ecstasy, to plumb the depths of the

grasped

in

soul, to bring the

the infinite

—such

were the

imperatives of Romantic introspection. In contrast to the scientist's quest for general laws defining a single

objective reality, the Romantic gloried in the

ot

complex

each object, event, and experience presented to

his soul.

Truth discovered

in

on

in

his subjective awareness,

perspectives

divergent

monolithic and univocal ideal reality

multiplicity ot

in the

realities pressing

uniqueness

unbounded

ot

and

was valued above

the

empirical science. For the Romantic,

was symbolically resonant through and through, and was therefore

fundamentally multivalent,

a

constantly changing complex of many*

leveled meanings, even ot opposite*. For the Enlightenment-scientific

mind, bv contrast,

reality

was concrete and

literal,

univocal. Against this

view, the Romantic pointed out that even the reality constructed and

perceived bv the scientific

mmd

was

at

bottom symbolic, but

its

symbols

Romanticism anJ

Its

wore exclusively

MW

haw

d

a specific

and were interpreted by

kind—mechanistic,

material, impersonal

scientists eu uniquely valid.

From the Romantic's

perspective, the conventional scientific view oi reality was essentially jealous

The

"monotheism"

literalism o\ the

new modern in

clothes, wanting

mind was

scientific

mvopicalh worshiping an opaque object recognizing that object as

The

a

no other gods hetore

as the

.1

it.

form of idolatry

only reality, rather than

mystery, a vessel ot deeper realities.

search tor a unifying order and meaning remained central tor the

Romantics, hut

in that task the limits ot

human knowledge were

expanded beyond those imposed by the Enlightenment, and

human

range ot tion.

.1

(acuities

were considered necessary

Imagination m^\ feeling

deeper understanding

now

tor

radically a

lamer

genuine cogni-

joined sense and reason to render a

ot the world. In his

sought to experience the archetypal

morphological studies, Goethe

form or essence of each plant and

animal by saturating the objective perception with the content of

his

own

imagination. Schelling proclaimed that "to philosophize about na-

ture

means

meaning could he

to create nature," tor nature's true

pro-

duced only from within man's "intellectual imagination." The historians \ ico ical

and Herder took seriously modes of cognition such

had informed the consciousness of other

that

eras,

mytholog-

as the

and believed that

the historian's task was to feel himself into the spirit oi other ages

through an empathic "historical sense," to understand from within by

means of the sympathetic imagination. Hegel discerned overarching rational

and

spiritual

meaning

in the vast data oi history by

"logic of passion." Coleridge wrote that "deep thinking

by a

man

of deep feeling," and that the

imagination" gave to the entirety, to create

human mind

artist's

is

means of

a

attainable only

"esemplastic power of the

the ability to grasp things in their

and shape coherent wholes out of disparate elements.

Wordsworth recognized the numinous

vision of the natural child as pos-

sessing a deeper insight into reality than did the opaque, disenchanted

perspective of the conventional adult.

And

Blake recognized "Imagina-

tion" as the sacred vessel ot the infinite, the emancipator

human mind,

the

means by which

consciousness. Indeed, for

eternal realities

many Romantics,

came

imagination was

the whole of existence, the true ground ot bein^, the ties. It

the hound

ot

to expression

and

in

BOme sense

medium

ot all reali-

both pervaded consciousness and constituted the world.

Like imagination, the will too was considered

human knowledge, man and universe forward

the attainment of freely impelling

:

to

.\

necessary element in

receding knowledge and

new

levels ot creativity

370

The Transformation of

awareness. Here

was Nietzsche who,

it

Modern Era

the

in a uniquely powerful synthesis

of titanic Romantic spiritual passion and the most radical strain of

Enlightenment skepticism,

set forth the

concerning the relation of

paradigmatic Romantic position

will to truth

and knowledge: The rational

not achieve objective truth; nor could any perspective

intellect could

ever be independent of interpretation of some

which

halts at

phenomena

facts are precisely

—There

what there

"Against positivism,

sort.

are only facts'

—

I

would

No,

say:

are not, only interpretations." This

was true

not just for matters of morality, but for physics too, which was but a

and exegesis

specific perspective

to suit specific needs

way of viewing the world was the product

and

desires.

Every

of hidden impulses. Every

philosophy revealed not an impersonal system of thought, but an

in-

voluntary confession. Unconscious instinct, psychological motivation, linguistic distortion, cultural prejudice

—

human

Western tradition of

perspective. Against the long

these affected and defined every

unique validity of one system of concepts and scientific, or philosophical

—

beliefs

asserting the

—whether

religious,

that alone mirrors the Truth, Nietzsche set

There

forth a radical perspectivism:

exists a plurality of perspectives

through which the world can be interpreted, and there

is

no

au-

which one system can be

thoritative independent criterion according to

determined to be more valid than others. But

if

the world was radically indeterminate,

heroic act of will to affirm

The

life

and bring forth

its

it

could be shaped by a

triumphant fulfillment:

highest truth, Nietzsche prophesied, was being born within

through the self-creating power of the

knowledge and power would

fulfill

will.

itself in

man

All of man's striving for a

new being who would

incarnate the living meaning of the universe. But to achieve this birth,

man would have

to

grow beyond himself so fundamentally that

present limited self would be destroyed: is

a bridge

For

and not a

man was

a

goal.

way

to

compass oi the present life- impoverishing

.

.

Man

.

is

"What

And

great in

man

is

his

that he

something that must be overcome."

new dawns and new age.

is

horizons far beyond the

the birth of this

new being was not

a

otherworldly fantasy to be believed by ecclesiastical

decree, but was a vivid, tangible reality to be created, here and now,

through the heroic self-overcoming of the great individual. Such an individual had to transform forge his character,

life

embrace

protagonist of the world epic.

himself into being.

He had

into a

work of art, within which he could

his fate,

He had

and recreate himself

as heroic

to invent himself anew, imagine

to will into existence a fictive

drama

into

RomMKBm md

h\uc

Its

\71

which he could enter and

imposing

live,

meaningless universe without God.

ot a

i

redemptive order on the chaos

Then

projected to the beyond could he horn Within

could dance godlike

God who had long been the human >oul. hen man

the

the eternal flux, tree

in

1

ot

all

foundations and

all

hounds, beyond even metaphysical constraint. Truth was not something

one proved or disproved;

it

was something one created In Nieasche,

Romanticism generally, the philosopher became was fudged not as

terms

in

an expression

ot

ot abstract rationality or tactual verification, hut

sensibility

advanced new standards M\d values

human knowledge. Through the self-creating power will, the human being could body forth unborn invisible hut altogether real

and

levels ot

and the cosmos's unfolding

A

process ot creation.

And

ssary.

ot

tor

imagination and

realities,

penetrate

comprehend nature and

being,

— indeed,

participate

in

the

very

new epistemofogy was claimed both possible and

so the limits ot

knowledge established by Locke. Hume,

Kant were boldly defied by the

the posinvist side ot

Romantics

m

courage, beauty, and imaginative power.

Thus the Romantic

historv

as

poet: a world conception

Idealists

and

ot the post- Enlightenment.

The two temperaments rwo traditional

pillars ot

held similarly divergent attitudes toward the

Western

the Judaeo-Chnstian religion.

developed during the modern

culture.

As

era,

Greco-Roman

classicism

the Enlightenment-scientific it

and

mind

increasingly employed the thought

o\ the classical era only to the extent that

it

provided useful starting

points tor further investigation and theory construction, beyond which

ancient metaphysical and scientific schemes were generally perceived deficient

and of mainly was

historical interest.

the Romantic

tor

personalities, still

its

exalted models,

its

living realm

enable

in

it

general differed.

more

—one

modem

lines that their respective attitudes

While the

pregnant

tor the sake

the other CO revivify that past,

to live again in the creative spirit o\

was along such

still

Both viewpoints encouraged the

ery of the classical past, but tor different motives

.

accurate historical knowledge,

It

ot

imaginative and spiritual insights

with newly discoverable meaning.

ot

classical culture

By contrast,

Olympian images and still creations from Homer and Aeschylus onward a

artistic

as

rational scientific

CO

man.

toward tradition

mind viewed

tradition in

skeptical terms, valuable only to the extent ot providing continuity

and structure less rehellious

tradition

tor the gr

ow th

in character

ot

knowledge, the Romantic, although no

and often considerably more

something more mysterious

—

a reposif

so,

found

in

wisdom,

The

172

Modern

or motion of die

["rans/

the accrued insights ot a people's soul, a living, changing force with

own autonomy and ly

the empirical and technical knowledge of the scientific mind, but

spoke

deeper

ot

realities,

New

experiment.

Greco-Roman tive

.

but tor the spiritually resonant Middle Ages, tor

past,

Romanticism

mind not out

subsequent years by

their historical

now

the Renaissance

ot

new consciousness of the age

By contrast, such matters concerned the scientific

and anthropological

modern

civilization

in

its

ambivalence turned into antagonism belief

in

its

own

In

interest.

and

its

the Enlightenment'

values stood unequivocally

Romanticism maintained

predecessors, while

ambivalence toward modernity

the West's

a

tor

empathic appreciation or inspiration, but by virtue of

ot

scientific vision, its

in

itself

all sorts,

peoples, tor the Dionysian

culture.

ot

emerged, followed

all

And the primi-

tolk literature, tor the ancient

Germanic and other A new awareness

the Volksgeist ot the

above

sense and mechanical

Oriental and exotic, tor esoteric traditions of

tor the

wellsprings

common

hidden to

appreciation thus arose not only tor the classical

Gothic architecture and

ot

its

evolutionary dynamism. Such wisdom was nor mere-

many

Romantics

as

"progress."

in

its

a

profound

As time

expressions.

passed.

radically questioned

innate

civilization's

superiority, in rational man's inevitable fulfillment.

The part

issue ot religion

posed the same contrasts. Roth streams were in

predicated on the Reformation,

freedom

ot belief

were

common

individualism and personal

tor

each developed different

to both, yet

aspects ot the Reformation legacy.

The

spirit

ot

the Enlightenment

rebelled against the strictures ot Ignorance and superstition imposed by

theological

dogma and

belief in the supernatural, in favot of straightfor-

embrace

ot the

was either rejected altogether or maintained only

in the

ward empirical and rational knowledge and secular. Religion

a liberating

form of a rationalist deism or natural law ethics.

The Romantic's

attitude

toward religion was more complex. His rebellion too was against the hierarchies and institutions ot traditional religion, against enforced belief,

moralistic constriction,

and hollow

central and enduring element in the

ritual.

Romantic

Yet religion

spirit,

whether

itself it

was

a

took the

form of transcendental idealism. Xeoplatonism, Gnosticism, pantheism, mystery religion, nature worship. Christian mysticism. Hindu Buddhist mysticism,

Swedenborcianism,

theosophy.

esotencism.

religious

ex

Mother Goddess worship, evolusome syncretism ot these. Here the

istentiahsm. neopaganism, shamanism. tionary

human

dninization.

or

"sacred" remained a viable category, whereas in science

it

had lone since

Romanticism and

17

was rediscovered

deism but

01

not

process;

Fau

Ood

disappeared.

orthodoxy

Ici

ol

Romanticism

In

ineffably mysterious, pluralistic

human

Moreover,

mechank

musi
t

phenomena

to reach the ultimate reality, since mail's finite reason inevitably

caught

in

contradiction whenever

human reason as fundamentally Mind (Gcist), through the power be transcended

in a

it

attempted to do

an expression oi

which,

higher synthesis.

as

m

oi a

love,

10,

became

Hegel

ww

universal Spirit .ill

I

>pp
ng lines similar to Hegel.

Their eventual

although regarded by many

tare,

as brilliant

however, was also similar,

tor

and comprehensive challenges

to

the conventional scientific vision, tor others such speculations did not eSS a sufficiently

the case,

concepts

demonstrable empirical

Cuven the nature

basis.

as Bergson's

creatne elan

operating

vital

God who was

m

the evolutionary

process,

Whitehead's evolving

and

processes of becoming, or Teilhard's "cosmogenesis"

its

ot

there seemed to be no decisive means tor verifying such

human and world

evolution would be

interdependent with nature

an

fulfilled in

which

in

"Omega

point"

unitive Christ-consciousness. Although each ot these theories

i

t

a spir-

>t

informed evolutionary process gamed wide popular response

itually

began to influence

later

modern thought

in

often subtle ways, the overt

cultural trend, especially in academia, was otherwise.

The

decline of speculative metaphysical overviews signaled as well the

decline of speculative historical overviews,

Oswald

and epk

efforts

such

-is

Spengler's and Arnold Toynhee's, though not without admirers,

were eventually depreciated

now disengaged

itself

like Hegel's before

from the task

them. Academic

discerning

ot

gi

hi

warching

he Hegelian

patterns and comprehensive uniformities

in history.

gram of discovering the "meaning" cultural evolution was now regarded

of

history

as

impossible and misguided.

stead, profession.il hist

I

and the "purpose

in their competence

In-

mon

retully defined specialized studies, to methodological problem

rived from the social sciences, b

such

as

population levels and

was better directed their

economic and

1

[Tie hisi

in*

to the concrete details social

irable

statistical

t

people's

li

•

I

ntion Jly to

than to the

384

The Transformation of

Idealist

the

Modern Era

image of universal principles working through great individuals

to forge world history. Following the directive of the Enlightenment,

academic historians saw the need to remove history entirely from the

and metaphysical contexts within which

theological, mythological,

had long been embedded. Like nature, history too was

phenomenon,

examined empirically, without

to be

it

a nominalist

spiritual

precon-

ceptions.

modern era moved to its later stages, Romanticism would reengage the modern mind from another field altogether. The decline of Yet

as the

Hegel and of metaphysical and intellectual

environment

in

historical overviews

had originated

in

an

which physical science was the dominant

force in determining the cultural understanding of reality. But as science itself

began to be revealed, both epistemologically and pragmatically,

relative

and

fallible

as a

form of knowledge, and with both philosophy and

religion having already lost their previous cultural preeminence, reflective individuals

many

began to turn inward, to an examination of con-

sciousness itself as a potential source of

meaning and

otherwise devoid of stable values. This

new

focus

identity in a world

on the inner workings

of the psyche reflected as well an increasingly sophisticated concern with

those unconscious structures within the

mind of the

—

determining the ostensible nature of the object

Kantian project on

a

more comprehensive

level.

subject that were

a continuation of the

Thus it was that of all (if we except modern

the instances of a Romantically influenced science

evolutionary theory's complex debt to Romantic ideas of organic evolution in nature and history, of reality as a process of constant becoming),

the most enduring and seminal proved to be the depth psychology of

German

Freud and Jung, both deeply influenced by the stream of

Romanticism that flowed from Goethe through Nietzsche. In

its

concern with the elemental passions and powers of the un-

conscious

—with

imagination, emotion, memory, myth, and dreams,

with introspection, psychopathology, hidden motivations, and ambivalence

—psychoanalysis brought Romanticism's preoccupations

level of systematic analysis first

With Freud, hearing Goethe's Ode to Nature

and cultural

turned to medical science after

student,

and who throughout

religious

and mythological

his

to a

life

statuary, the

significance.

obsessively

collected

new who as a

archaic

Romantic influence was often

hidden or inverted by the Enlightenment-rationalist assumptions that pervaded his

became more

scientific vision.

But with Jung, the Romantic inheritance

explicit as Freud's discoveries

and concepts were expanded

Romanticism

arid Its Fate

\g$

and deepened. In the course and

cultural

scious

phenomena, Jung found evidence

common

archetypal locally

ot analyzing b wist

range ot

psychoid

of

collective uncon-

a

human beings and structured according to powerful principles. Though was dear that human experience was to

all

it

conditioned by

historical factors,

a

multitude

subsuming

certain universal patterns or

all

concrete biographical,

ot

these

modes

ot

at

a

t

ultuial.

and

deeper level appeared to

In-

experience, archetypal tonus that

human experience into typical collective human psychology dynamic

constantly arranged the elements ot configurations and gave to

.1

continuity. These archetypes endured as basic a prion symbolic tonus

while taking on the costume

each cultural

era,

moment

ot the

each individual

in

life

and

permeating each experience, each cognition, and each

world view.

The ly

discovers ot the collective unconscious and 1

extended psychology's range

perience,

creativity,

artistic

imagination were

now

interest

ot

and

archetypes radical' Religious ex-

and the mythological

systems,

esoteric

its

insight.

analyzed in nonreductive terms strongly reminis-

A

cent o\ the Neoplatonic Renaissance and Romanticism.

new dimen-

sion to Hegel's understanding ot historical dialectic emerged with Jung's insight into the collective psyche's tendency to constellate archetypal

oppositions in history before moving toward a synthesis on a higher level.

A

host of factors previously ignored by science and psychology were

now

recognized as significant to the psychotherapeutic enterprise and given vivid conceptual formulation: the creativity and continuity o\ the col-

unconscious,

lective

the psychological

and potency

reality

t

spon-

taneously produced symbolic forms and autonomous mythic figures, the

nature and power o^ the shadow, the psychological centrality

^\

the

search for meaning, the importance ot teleological and self*regulating

elements

phenomenon

in the psyche's processes, the

Freud and Jung's depth psychology thus ottered

—

between science and the humanities o\

human

ot

a fruitful

sensitive to the

experience, concerned with

art

synchronkities.

and

middle ground

many dimen

religion

and

interioi

realities,

with qualitative conditions ve

was

am

way

emerged the leemingl)

self-

1

epresentative theology

r

oi

and given ah

leculai age,

theologian

sensibility: thus

contradictory but singular^

God."

(

r

subjectively * rhino's-

196

The rvmsformatkm

/

ihc

Modern Era

in-themselves, arc neither accessible nor positable; and that the value of all

The

ing. ity

and assumptions must be continually subjected

truths

critical search for

and pluralism, and

rmrh

outcome

its

to direct test-

constrained to be tolerant of ambigu-

is

will necessarily

he knowledge that

is

relative 7

All hum, m understanding

a priori certain.

is

no interpretation

The

prevalence

Line

the

oi

Kuhnian concept

highly characteristic

is

awareness

critical

Interpretation, and

la

final

is

"paradigms"

postmodern thought,

cuneni

In

reflecting

mind's fundamentally interpretive nature.

ol the

awareness has not onl\

ol

ol

aflfe

— philosophical,

religious, scientific

ot

any

— must he aban-

theories and universal overviews cannot he sustained

without producing empirical falsification and intellectual authoritarianism. ot

To

assert general truths

phenomena. Respect

for

is

to

is

at best

a

dogma on

spurious

contingency and discontinuity

edge to the local and specific. outlook

impose

Any

no more than

the chaos

limits

knowl-

alleged comprehensive, coherent

a temporarily useful

fiction

masking

chaos, at worst an oppressive fiction masking relationships ot power, violence, and subordination.

Properly speaking, therefore, there

is

no "postmodern world view," nor

The postmodern paradigm

the possibility ot one.

damentally Subversive of all paradigms, reality

as

being at once multiple,

tor at

local

its

is

core

by is

[is]

the chief intellectual characteristic

of

modern mind

in

the superiority ot

the

r
ward met.marr.irives."

Here, paradoxically, we can recognize something

its

tewey

the present age," has been

Leotard's definition of postmodern as "incredulity

the

I

the century, that "despair ot any integrated outlook and attitude

enshrined as the essence of the postmodern vision,

of

ol

and temporal, and without

demonstrable foundation. The situation recognized by John start of

nature fun-

if^

the awareness

how

little

ot

superiority

derives from

knowledge can be claimed

Yet precisely by

virtue n

OT

field, i.e.,

the child

found,

is

forced to distort his or her perception ot both outer and inner realities,

with serious pgychopathological consequences.

Now human

if

we

substitute in these tour premises world tor mother.

being tor child,

The human

we have

the

modern double bind

being's relationship to the world

therebv making

it

world accurately

human The human mind

critical tor the

(2)

compatible information about

its

is

being

one

in

,i

of vital

I

receive*

situation with respi

nutshell:

(

1

)

depend©

'he nature lictory

«»t

t

that in-rid,

420

The Passion of

whereby

its

the

inner psychological and spiritual sense of things

is

Western Mind

incoherent

with the scientific metacommunication. (3) Epistemologically, the hu-

man mind cannot

achieve direct communication with the world.

(4) Existentially, the

The

differences

human

being cannot leave the

field.

between Bateson's psychiatric double bind and the

modern existential condition are more in degree than in kind: the modern condition is an extraordinarily encompassing and fundamental double bind, made less immediately conspicuous simply because it is so universal. We have the post-Copernican dilemma of being a peripheral and

and the post-Cartesian

insignificant inhabitant of a vast cosmos,

dilemma of being

and personal subject confront-

a conscious, purposeful,

ing an unconscious, purposeless, and impersonal universe, with these

compounded by the post-Kantian dilemma of there being no possible means by which the human subject can know the universe in its essence. We are evolved from, embedded in, and defined by a reality that is radically alien to our

own, and moreover cannot ever be

directly con-

tacted in cognition.

This double bind of modern consciousness has been recognized in one

form or another since

at least Pascal: "I

of these infinite spaces."

Our

am

terrified

by the eternal silence

psychological and spiritual predispositions

are absurdly at variance with the world revealed by our scientific

We

seem

two messages from our

to receive

one hand,

strive,

fulfillment; but

substance

we

existential situation:

are derived,

is

not. If

The we follow

condition,

its

effects.

We

it

whose

are at is

once aroused and

inhuman, yet we are

profoundly unintelligible.

modern what kinds of response the modern

Bateson's diagnosis and apply

should not be surprising

psyche has made to

spiritual

that the universe, of

crushed. For inexplicably, absurdly, the cosmos is

on the

entirely indifferent to that quest, soulless in

character, and nullifying in

situation

meaning and

give oneself to the quest for

on the other hand, know

method.

this situation as

it

it

to the larger

attempts to escape the double

bind's inherent contradictions. Either inner or outer realities tend to be distorted:

inner feelings are repressed and denied, as in apathy and

psychic numbing, or they are inflated in compensation, as in narcissism

and egocentrism; or the outer world reality, or

it

is

slavishly submitted to as the only

is

aggressively objectified

and exploited. There

is

also the

strategy of flight, through various forms of escapism: compulsive eco-

nomic consumption, absorption

in

the mass media, faddism, cults,

ideologies, nationalistic fervor, alcoholism, drug addiction.

When

avoid-

Epilogue

41

ance mechanisms cannot be sustained, there chronic hostility, suspect

feeling of

a

meanings,

all

an

helpless

fragmenting

tull-blown

d

victimization,

the extreme, there

at

reactions

psychopathological

to

ten*

a

Inesolvable inner contradic*

o(

And

Consciousness,

paranoia,

tendency

a

toward self*negation,

impulse

purposelessness and absurdity, a feeling tion, a

anxiety!

is

1

the

ot

the

.ire

schizophrenic:

self*

destructive violence, delusional states, massive amnesia, catatonia, au-

tomatism, mania, nihilism. The modern world knows each reactions in various combinations and social

And

political

Nor should

life

brought

we now

see*

intellectual

and

situation, but by

modem

Of cdurse

large the

M\e-compulsi\e

on

sitting

and Hegel and Aquinas

one

is

right—while

way

crucial

activity

—

in

and pursued

nature.

The modern mind

Promethean project

o( the world:

nomena

that

are

method has

concretely

mechanistic, structural.

To

the

what these explanations to

suggest,

is

a

We can

required explanations ot phe-

and

modern

it

that world

i-

words,

th.it

i^

the

spiritual

all

>>t

the world

is

u

be certain only that the world ot

recognizes

to

this

I

is

interpretation.

the one

the hum. in

hand it mind, on the

impersonal and SOuUeSS WOfld ot

not necessarily the whole K

'her,

the only kind (A story that tor the past three centuries the

Western mind h ner's

1

*>n

scientific cognition

impersonal.

therefore

way

appears to place the world beyond the

other hand

ot

type ot interpretation

a specific

be certain

susceptible

that

and mode

from and controlling

itself

sword that cuts two ways. Although

an indeterminate extent

Kant's insight

but has

helpless child,

a

not

their purposes, these cxplanati.

Of course we cannot

qualities.

their hike,

the tact that the

is

a specific strategy

predictive,

fulfill

this

the uniyerse ha\'e been systematically "cleansed*

human

as a severe

meantime So^ rates

mountain on

and

o\ freeing

demanded

has

scientific

its

much

new and unexpected vistas. which the modern situation is

modern human bein^ has not simply been actively engaged the world

post-

seeing

air,

identical to the psychiatric double bind,

a

m

are already high up the

breathing the bracing alpine

But there

it

the

to

responses

bed repeatedly tying and untying his

his

because he ne\er quite gets

philosophy has

philosophy that has dominat-

ed our century and our universities resembles nothing so

i

its

notoriously SO determined.

is

some courageous

forth

these

be surprising that twentieth-century philosophy finds

ir

itseU in the condition

Copemkan

ot

compromise formations, and

"It

:ered intellectually justifiable.

was Kant's merit

-

thai

this

In Ernest

(

compulsion

Sell|t»>r

422

The Passion of

mechanistic impersonal explanation]

Weber's to see that

it is

is

the

Western Mind

in us, not in things."

And "it was

kind of mind, not

historically a specific

human

3

mind as such, that is subject to this compulsion." Hence one crucial part of the modern double bind

is

not

airtight. In

the case of Bateson's schizophrenogenic mother and child, the mother

more or

holds

less

all

the cards,

she unilaterally controls the

for

communication. But the lesson of Kant

—

that the locus of the

is

com-

human knowledge of the human mind, not in the world as such. Therefore it is theoretically possible that the human mind has more cards than it has been playing. The pivot of the modern predica-

munication problem

world— must

ment

is

first

the problem of

i.e.,

be viewed

as centering in the

epistemological, and

here that

it is

Knowledge and

When

for

an opening.

Unconscious

Nietzsche in the nineteenth century said there are no

interpretations, critical

the

we should look

facts,

only

he was both summing up the legacy of eighteenth-century

philosophy and pointing toward the task and promise of twentieth-

century depth psychology. That an unconscious part of the psyche exerts decisive influence over

human

perception, cognition, and behavior was

an idea long developing in Western thought, but tively

brought

it

into the foreground of

modern

it

was Freud

who

effec-

intellectual concern. Freud

played a fascinatingly multiple role in the unfolding of the greater Coper-

nican revolution.

On

the one hand, as he said in the famous passage at

the end of the eighteenth of

his Introductory Lectures, psychoanalysis

represented the third wounding blow to man's naive pride and self-love,

the

first

being Copernicus's heliocentric theory, and the second being

Darwin's theory of evolution. For psychoanalysis revealed that not only the Earth not the center of the universe, and not only privileged focus of creation, but

is

man

is

not the

even the human mind and ego, man's

most precious sense of being a conscious rational

self, is

only a recent and

precarious development out of the primordial

and

by no means mas-

own house. With his epochal minants of human experience, Freud ter of

its

lineage of

modern thought

human

being.

gether

new

And

level,

id,

is

insight into the unconscious deter-

stood directly in the Copernican

that progressively relativized the status of the

again, like Copernicus

and

like

Kant but on an

alto-

Freud brought the fundamental recognition that the

apparent reality of the objective world was being unconsciously deter-

mined by the condition of the

subject.

Epilogue

4j

wm

But Freud's insight too

modem

a

sword that cur both ways, and

Freud represented the crucial turning point

significant sense

trajectory. For the discovery ot the

boundaries or interpretation. As Descartes empiricists Had noted, the primary

human

timately

experience

sensors transforms

d

itself

human

the

human

in

the

human

With

this

background, and with rhe further iteps taken

logical

in a sense ineluctable.

The modem

task established by

psychological imperative, to

modem

the unconscious, precisely coincided with rhe

er

Hume, and

modern epistemology had depended on rhe role played by the human mind in the

hopenhauer, Nietzsche, and others, rhe analytic Freud was

begun the

experience and cognition,

ot

increasingly acute analyses or act ot cognition.

ul-

is

and not

world,

psyche. From Descartes tD Locke, Berkeley, and

then to Kant, the progress

a

the

in

experience

material

that world; ,\nd with psychoanalysts was

systematic exploration or the sear of all

in

unoonsckxM collapsed the old and the post*( artesian British

datum

— nor

)

eptStemo-

imperatiye— to discover the ux^r principles of mental organization.

But while

it

was Freud who penetrated the

veil,

it

was Jung who 9

grasped the critical philosophical consequences of depth psychology !

more

Partly this was because Jung was

discoveries.

sophisticated than Freud,

having been steeped

episte

mologically

Kant and

in

critical

philosophy from his youth (even in the 1930s Jung was an informed reader ot Karl Popper

— which comes

as a surprise to

many

Jungians).

temperament Jung was less bound than Freud by nineteenth-century scientism. Bur above all, Jung had the more profound experience to draw upon, and could see the Partly this

was also because by

intellectual

!

context within which depth psychology was operating. As Joseph bell

used to say, Freud was fishing while sitting on

realize

what he had before him. But of course who

depend on our successors to overleap our

Thus it,

it

was Jung who recognized that

"the mother of

that

human

own

critical

or us does,

modern psycho) g)

inevitably too narrow and simplistic.

mind had been

Hume

sive experiences oi rhe

human

i

ill

pur hi

9

Kant ! formulation

at

Newtonian ph

In a sense,

psyche, both h;

are

had thought, bur

by

9

just

his

ai

Freud ! un-

Darwinian

suppositions, so was Kant's understanding limited by hi

presuppositions. Jung, under rhe imp

and

limitations.

in

limited

didn't

philosophy a

instead was permeated by a prion structures; yet

those structures, reflecting his complete behet

amp-

(

whale— he

Kant was correct when

experience was not atomistic, as

derstanding of the

a

pre-

nian

424

The Passion of

the Kantian and Freudian perspectives

kind of holy

grail

archetypes in

all

the

all

way

the

until

Western Mind

he reached a

of the inner quest: the discovery of the universal

power and rich complexity

their

human

determining structures of

as the

fundamental

experience.

Freud had discovered Oedipus and Id and Superego and Eros and

Thanatos; he had recognized the instincts in essentially archetypal terms.

But

at crucial junctures, his reductionist presuppositions drastically re-

stricted his vision.

With

Jung, however, the

full

symbolic multivalence

of the archetypes was disclosed, and the personal unconscious of Freud,

which comprised mainly repressed contents

resulting

from biographical

traumas and the ego's antipathy to the instincts, opened into a vast archetypally patterned collective unconscious which was not so

the result of repression as itself.

With

much

was the primordial foundation o( the psyche

it

progressively unfolding disclosure o{ the unconscious,

its

depth psychology radically redefined the epistemological riddle that had first

been posed by Kant

—Freud doing

so narrowly

and inadvertently

as

it

were, and then Jung doing so on a more comprehensive and self-aware level.

Yet what was the actual nature of these archetypes, what was collective unconscious,

and how did any o{

this affect

the

this

modern

world view? Although the Jungian archetypal perspective

scientific

and deepened the modern understanding oi the psyche,

greatly enriched in certain

ways

it

too could be seen as merely reinforcing the Kantian

As Jung

epistemological alienation.

repeatedly emphasized for

many

years in his loyal Kantian way, the discovery of the archetypes was the result o{ the empirical investigation o{ psychological

therefore

phenomena and

had no necessary metaphysical implications. The study of the

mind rendered knowledge

of the mind, not of the world beyond the

mind. Archetypes so conceived were psychological, hence in a certain

way

subjective. Like Kant's a priori forms

human

experience without giving the

of reality beyond

preceded

human

itself;

and categories, they structured

human mind any

direct

knowledge

they were inherited structures or dispositions that

experience and determined

not be said to transcend the

most fundamental of the

its

character, but they could

human psyche. They were perhaps only many distorting lenses that distanced

human mind from genuine knowledge of the world. They were only the deepest patterns of human projection. But of course Jung's thought was extremely complex, and of his very long intellectually active

life

his

the the

perhaps

in the course

conception of the archetypes

Epibgue

42

went through widely

known view

ot

Jungian archetypes,

Jung's middle-period writings

K

The conventional and

a significant evolution.

just

5

most

still

described, was bated

on

when

his thought was still largely governed Cartesian«Kantian philosophical assumptions concerning the nature

o\ the

psyche and

its

separation from the external world.

work, however, and particularly ties.

Jung began to move toward

mous

conception

i

ot

synchronic!*

archetypes

.is

meaning thai appear to structure and inhere

patterns ot

psyche ^nd matter, thereby

dichotomy. Archetypes categories

In his later

in relation to his study of

— more

in effect dissolving the

in

their oncological status,

stricted to a specific dimension,

Neoplatomc conception

more

ot archetypes.

development have been pressed

both

in

subjectrobject

were more mysterious than

in this view

ambiguous

modem

autono-

i priori

less easily

re-

like

the original Platonic and

Some

aspects of this late-Jungian

further, brilliantly

and controversially,

by lames Hillman and the school of archetypal psychology, which has

developed o\ the

a

"postmodern" Jungian perspective: recognizing the primacy

psyche and the imagination, and the irreducible psychic

and potency

metaphysical psyche in

reality

o\ the archetypes, hut, unlike the late Jung, larger) avoiding

all

m

or theological statements its

endless and

favor of a

full

But the most epistemologically significant development history ot depth psychology,

embrac

rich ambiguity. in

the recent

and indeed the most important advance

in

the field as a whole since Freud and Jung themselves, has been the work o\ Stanislav Grot,

which over the

past

three decades has not only

revolutionized psvchodvnamic theory hut also brought forth major implications for

many

other

fields,

including philosophy.

Many

readers will

already he familiar with Grot's work, particularly in Europe and California,

but tor those

who

are not

I

will give

here

a

bnet summary/

hoanalvtic psvchiatnst, and the original background

HI

l

ot his ideas

Freudian, not Jtmgian; vet the unexpected upshot ot his uork was to Jung's archetypal perspective

on

a

new

level,

and hrm^

it

Bfl

was

r,itit\

into coherent

synthesis with Freud's biological and biographical perspect ive, though 00 a

much deeper stratum oi the psyche than Freud had recognised. The basis of Grot's discoveries was his observation of several thousand .loanalytic sei

first

in

Prague and then

National Institute of Mental Health,

in

which

in

Maryland with the

subje^

melv

I

potent psychoactive substances, particularly LSD, and then lac ety ot powerful nondrtlg therapeutic methods, which u

of unconscious processes. Grof found

th.it

' I

subjects involved in

JyStJ

d

426

The Passion of

the

Western Mind

sessions tended to undergo progressively deeper explorations of the un-

conscious, in the course of which there consistently emerged a pivotal

sequence of experiences oi great complexity and intensity. In the sessions,

subjects

moved back through

typically

biographical experiences and traumas training,

nursing,

intelligible in

to represent

early

infantile

—the

and

earlier

initial

earlier

Oedipus complex,

experiences

—which

toilet

were generally

terms of Freudian psychoanalytic principles and appeared

something

like laboratory

of Freud's theories. But after reliving

evidence for the basic correctness

and integrating these various memory

complexes, subjects regularly tended to

move

further back into

an ex-

tremely intense engagement with the process of biological birth.

Although most

explicit

was experienced on

this process

and detailed manner,

distinct archetypal

it

a biological level in the

was informed by, or saturated by, a

sequence of considerable numinous power. Subjects

reported that experiences at this level possessed an intensity and univer-

what they had previously believed was the

that far surpassed

sality

experiential limit for an individual

human

being. These experiences

occurred in a highly variable order, and overlapped with each other in very complex ways, but abstracting from this complexity Grof found visible a distinct

sequence

—which moved from an

undifferentiated unity with the maternal

sudden

fall

womb,

initial

to

and separation from that primal organismic

condition of

an experience oi unity, to a highly

charged life-and-death struggle with the contracting uterus and the birth canal,

and culminating

in

an experience o{ complete annihilation. This

was followed almost immediately by an experience of sudden unexpected global liberation,

which was

typically perceived not only as physical birth

but also as spiritual rebirth, with the two mysteriously intermixed. I

should mention here that

in Big Sur, California,

where

I

I

lived for over ten years at Esalen Institute

was the director of programs, and in the

course of those years virtually every conceivable form of therapy and personal transformation, great and small,

came through

Esalen. In terms

o{ therapeutic effectiveness, Grof's was by far the most powerful; there

—

was no comparison. Yet the price was dear

in a sense the price

was

absolute: the reliving of one's birth was experienced in a context of

profound existential and

spiritual crisis,

with great physical agony, un-

bearable constriction and pressure, extreme narrowing of mental horizons, a sense of hopeless alienation life,

and the ultimate meaninglessness of

a feeling of going irrevocably insane,

periential encounter with death

—with

and

finally a shattering ex-

losing everything,

physically,

Epilogue

42

7

psychologically, intellectually, spiritually. Yet aftei integrating this long

exponential sequence, subjects regularly reported experiencing ic

expansion

or reality, a

ot horizons, a radical

change

perspective as to the nature

oi

sense ol sudden awakening, a feeling

reconnected to the universe,

all

d

accompanied by

psychological healing and spiritual liberation. in

dramat«

i

1

ana

being fundamentally

profound sense

a

In these sessions

oi

and

subsequent ones, subjects reported having access to memories

o(

prenatal intrauterine existence, which typicalh emerged in association

with archetypal experiences

mystical union with nature o\

(A paradise,

with the divine or with the Great Mother Goddess, dissolution in

ecstatic unity with the universe,

One, and other forms

of

o\ th


build

.1

me

o

tabernacle t"t

months when I

ttolen the

m

•

from the

488

Notes for The Modern World View

bounds of Egypt.

you pardon me, I shall rejoice; if you reproach me, I shall and I am writing the book to be read either now or by posterity, it matters not. It can wait a century for a reader, as God himself has waited six thousand years for a witness." endure.

The

die

If

is

—

cast,

Here was perhaps the most fundamental distinction between classical and science: While Aristotle had postulated four causes material, efficient, formal, and final modern science considered only the first two empirically justifiable. Thus Bacon praised Democritus for removing God and mind from the natural world, in contrast to Plato and Aristotle who repeatedly introduced final causes into scientific explanations. See also the more recent statement by the biologist Jacques Monod: "The cornerstone of scientific method is the systematic denial that 'true' knowledge can be got at by interpreting phenomena in terms of final causes that is to say, of 'purpose' " (Jacques Monod, Chance and Necessity: An Essay on the Natural Philosophy of Modern Biology (translated by A. Wainhouse) [New York: Random House, 1972], 21). 1 1.

modern

—

—

.

.

.

—

This was the celebrated reply of the French astronomer and mathematiSimon Laplace to Napoleon, when questioned about the absence of God in his new theory of the solar system, which had perfected the Newtonian synthesis. Because of certain apparent irregularities in the planetary movements, Newton had believed that the solar system required occasional divine adjustments to maintain stability. Laplace's reply reflected his success in demonstrating that every known secular variation (such as the changing speeds of Jupiter and Saturn) was cyclical, and that therefore the solar system was entirely stable on its own account without divine intervention. 12.

cian Pierre

13. a

The

complex

character and composition of the

Church

clergy in France also played

The clergy's upper ranks were typically younger sons, who took the positions as sinecures,

role in these developments.

occupied by the aristocracy's and whose style of life was generally indistinguishable from that of nonclerical aristocrats. Religious fervor at this level of the Church was infrequent, and was distrusted in others.

The

interests of the institutional

Church seemed

to lie less

than in the enforcement of orthodoxy and the preservation of political advantage. Further complicating the issue was the growing embrace of Enlightenment rationalism by members of the aristocratic clergy itself, thus strengthening the secular forces from within the Church structure. See Jacques Barzun, "Society and Politics," in The Columbia History of the World, edited by John A. Garraty and Peter Gay (New York: Harper Row, 1972), 694-700. in the pastoral mission of religious salvation

&

out to serve both God and Pearsall Smith).

14.

"Those who

there

is

15.

Such

mand

as signifying "stewardship" rather

set

Mammon

soon discover that

no God" (Logan a

view was controverted by Christians who interpreted that comthan exploitation, the latter seen as

reflecting the alienation of the Fall.

Notes for The Transformation of

Part VI.

the

Modem

I

The Transformation

of the

Modem

I

1. On the basil oi Kant's second preface to the ( Antique of Rune Reason, it has often boon said that Kant called his insight a "Copernican revolution" (e.g., by Karl Poppor. Bertrand Russell, John Dewey, and the fifteenth edition of the

among many others). 1. B. Cohen has pointed out (in [Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985], Z37 243) that Kant does not appoar to have made that specific statement. On tlu- other hand, Kant explicitly compared his new philosophic.il Strategy to Copernicus'fl astronomical theory, and although strictly speaking the term "C bpemican revo lution" may postdate both Oopernicus and Kant, both the term and the COHV Encyclopaedia Bntomuca,

m

Revolution

ScJc'tuv

parison are accurate and illuminating. "I can Fevnman).

2.

3.

safely say that

Quoted

(W'heaton,

in 111.:

Huston

nobody understands quantum mechanics" (Richard

Smith,

Quest, 1989),

Bevorui

the

Post-Modem

Mind,

rev.

ed.

8.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1%2), outgrowth of significant advances in the study of the history of science made a generation earlier, notably the work of Alexandre Koyre and A. O. Lovejoy. Also important were major developments within academic philosophy such as those associated with the later Wittgenstein, and with the progress ot argument in the school of logical empiricism from Rudolf Carnap through W. V. O. Quine. The widely accepted conclusion of that argument essentially affirmed a relativized Kantian position: i.e., one cannot, in the last analysis, dry compute complex truths out of simple elements based in direct sensation, because all such simple sensory elements are ultimately defined by the ontology of a specific language, and there exist a multiplicity of languages, each with its own particular mode of construing reality, each one selectively eliciting and identifying the objects it describes. The choice of which language to employ is finally dependent on one's purposes, not on objective "facts," which are themselves constituted by the same theoretical and linguistic systems through which those facts are judged. All "raw data" are already theory-laden. See W. V. O. Quine, "Two Dogmas of Empiricism," in From a Logical Point of \'icu ed. (New York: Harper Row, 1961), 20-46. 4.

Kuhn's

wore

in part the

ideas, first set torth in

&

The

word through which Hegel expressed his concept of dialc meaning both "to cancel" and "to lift up." In the moment oi synthesis, the antithetical state is both preserved and transcended, negated and fulfilled. 5.

crucial

integration was aufheben,

Ronald Sukenick, "The Death of the N« >\ el." Other Stones (New York: Dial, 1969), 41. On a less may be said to epitomize the postmodern artistic 6.

postmodern identity generally,

in

The Death of

futile note,

for his or her reality

the

Sovel and

perhaps the

nd to personify the rem.uns deliberately

irreducibly ambiguous. Irony pervades action; performance

i-

.ill.

The

actor

is

490

Notes for Epilogue

never univocally committed to an exclusive meaning, to a thing 7.

is

"as

Every-

literal reality.

if."

Richard Rorty, Philosophy and

the

Mirror of Nature (Princeton: Princeton

University Press, 1979), 176.

Ihab Hassan, quoted in Albrecht Wellmer, "On the Dialectic of Modernism and Postmodernism," Praxis International 4 (1985): 338. See also Richard J. Bernstein's discussion of the same passage in his 1988 Presidential Address to the

8.

Metaphysical Society of America ("Metaphysics, Critique, Utopia," Review of Metaphysics 42 [1988]: 259-260), where he characterizes the postmodern in-

sometimes resembling Hegel's description of a self-fulfilling "which only ever sees pure nothingness in its result .[and] cannot get any further from there, but must wait to see whether something new comes along and what it is, in order to throw it too into the same empty abyss" (G. W. F. Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit, translated by A. V. Miller [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977], 51). tellectual attitude as

abstract skepticism,

9.

Arnold

J.

.

Toynbee,

in Encyclopaedia Britannica,

10.

Friedrich Nietzsche, The

York:

Random House,

11.

Max Weber, The

Talcott Parsons

(New

Gay

Science,

15th ed.,

translated by

s.v.

.

"time."

W. Kaufman (New

1974), 181. Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, translated by

York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1958), 182.

Carl G. Jung, "The Undiscovered Self," in Collected Works of Carl Gustav

12.

Jung, vol. 10, translated by R. F. C. Hull, edited by H.

Read

et al. (Princeton:

Princeton University Press, 1970), pars. 585-586.

Part VII. Epilogue 1.

John

stitute,

2.

McDermott, "Revisioning Philosophy" conference, Esalen

J.

In-

Big Sur, California, June 1987.

The double bind

theory was an application of Bertrand Russell's theory of

and Alfred North Whitehead's Principia Mathematica) communications analysis of schizophrenia. See Gregory Bateson et al., "Toward a Theory of Schizophrenia," in Bateson, Steps to an Ecobgy of Mind logical types (from Russell

to a

(New 3.

York: Ballantine, 1972), 201-227.

Ernest Gellner, The Legitimation of Belief (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer1975), 206-207.

sity Press,

4.

Vincent Brome, Jung:

Man

and Myth (New York: Atheneum, 1978),

14.

Commentary on 'The Tibetan Book o( the Great Works of Carl Gustav Jung, vol. 11, translated by R. F. C. Hull, edited by H. Read et al. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969), 5.

Jung, "Psychological

Liberation,'

par.

759.

"

in Collected

Notes for Epilogue

4^

The most comprehensive

6.

presentations

Grof's clinical evidence and

oi

i

its

theoretical implications can be found in Stanislas Grof, Realms of the Human Unconscious: Observations from LSD Research (New York. Viking, 1975) and

LSD

Psychotherapy (Pomona,

popular account

Hunter House.

Calif.:

Beyond

hi>

is

the

Brain:

Psychochera^ (Albany: State University

New

ot

York

A more

L980).

Death,

Birth,

and

Press,

receni

Transcendence

in

1985).

The clinical evidence from Orof's research concerning the perinatal ex 7. perience should not be misunderstood as suggesting the operation oi a Freud* kind oi causality, in which the individual birth trauma viewed as mechanically producing specific psychological and intellectual syndromes in the same, more or less "hydraulic* manner thai a childhood Oedipal trauma was seen by traditional psychoanalysts as producing specific ian, linear*mechanistic is

1

The evidence

pathological symptoms.

an archetypal form

ot

suggests, rather,

what might be called

causation, in which the individual's reliving

the birth

oi

mediate participation in a much larger, transpersonal, .uchetypal death-rebirth process, with the individual and collective levels ot the psyche radically interpenetrating. The perinatal sequence docs not seem to be

proee» appears

to

ultimately grounded in or reducible to the individual's original experience ot biological birth; instead, biological birth

compassing archetypal

reality

which

itself

appears to reflect

more en-

a

directly accessed by those undergoing

i^

the perinatal process, either spontaneously

(as in

personal experiences of "the

dark night of the soul"), in religious ritual, or in experiential psychotherapy. The birth experience is here viewed not as an ultimate root, a reductionist cause in a closed system, hut as an amplifying pivot, an experiential transduction point between personal And transperson.il realities.

Grot's evidence thus suggests

a

more complex understanding

of

causation

than that offered by the conventional modern scientific conception of linear* mechanistic causality, and, in agreement with recent data and theories emerging from several other fields, points toward a conception th.it incorporates participatory, morphic, and teleological forms ot causation closer in character

—

to classical Platonic

and Aristotelian notions

of archetypal, formal,

and

causation, as well as to the later Jungian archetypal understanding.

final

The

or-

ganizing principles of this epistemology are symbolic, nonliteral, and radically

multivalent in character, suggesting

a

nondualistic ontology that

is

metaphor-

patterned "all the way down"— an understanding developed in recent decades by thinkers as diverse as Owen Rarfield, Norman O. Brown, J. ui.es ically

Hillman, and Robert Bellah. 8.

James Hillman, ReAfatonmg Psychology (New York: Harper

c*

Row,

1975),

126.

Writers and editors toda) often comment on the difficult) they have in many sentence^ that were originally written with the traditional generic "man," which they seek to replace with a term rh.ir is not gender-hased. Partly

9.

revising

the difficulty

is

created by the fact that no other term simultaneously attempts to

denote both the

human

being.

human

That

is,

species (i.e.,

the word

all

"man"

metaphorically singular and personal entity

human i-

beings) and

uniquely capable

who

is

i

Single generic

of

indicating

constituting the dialectic that propels "history" (political, intellectual, spiritual). It is this dialectic that has driven the internal drama throughout llw 5,

146,

Ockham

estantism,

2 34,

psychological,

Z35,

2 37,

Sand. George (1804- 1876), J67, 459 Santayana, George (1863 1952), 463

Sarap.s,

318; universalism

of,

106,

Mary and. 162-64,

gin

>21; Vir-

166,

)rml6, 17

Roman

Li Rose (Meun), 173, 452 Romans, 74, 75, 87-88, 171, 283, 448-51; Christianity and. 89-91, 97-101. 146; conquest of Greeks

dt

by, 87; law o\\

74. 87. 99,

158; sci-

ence of, 114; Stoicism and, 76, 83 Romanticism. 243. 296. 313, 351. 36694; attempted synthesis of science and, 378-88; and divided world view, 375-78; existentialism and,

German,

389, 390;

366; participa-

tory epistemoK'U'v and. 436; of PlatO,

41; postrru>dern

mind and, 403,

407 Romantic

love, 173. 211 R.chard (1931- ), 399, 405, 467, 49:

Sapir,

•

),

kan-Paul (1905-1980), J89, 464 Satan, 110-11, 122, 131, 141, 147, Sartre.

166,

169,

193.

303

Saturn (god), 492-93nl0 Saturn (planet), 52, 65, 83, L94, 250,

488nl2 Saussure, Ferdinand de (1857-1913), 351, 398, 462

Savonarola, (urolamo (1452 1498), 229 Schellm^, Fnedrich NX'. J. von (17754),

351,

366.

369, 43

3

von (1759-1805). 366-67. 433, 458 Schle^cl, August Wilhelm von (17671845). M6, 458 Schlegel, Fnedrich von (1772-1829), Schiller. Fnedrich

458 Schleiermacher, Fnedrich P.

Roscellmus (c.l050-cll2

W), 458 Schoenberg, Arnold (1874-1951),

I

iciantsm.

Scholasticism,

Theodore (1933- ), 466 Rousseau, Jean-lacques (1712-1778),

(1768-

2

.

21,

I

I

192, 211, 302. Aristotelianism

Society of London. 270.

333,

lah

176-7-

I.

486-87n8

0-201, \ 275,

21.

:

l\

(1855-1916), 462

Ruether, Rosemarv Radford (1936-

408

EL

175-78, 198, 207.

-2, 290, 229 475n4; Aquinas and,

321 456,

447

110, 473n2, 475fl9

Rom,

•k.

Re

lution and, 253; secularism and, K)7, 3io, 121—22

192—93; sexual repressiveness

of,

137.

238, 241;

187; S< ientifk

Edward (1881 -1939), Sappho (/I. early 6th cent b.
5

Salvation. Christian.

in,

power

Samts,

),

280; Boethiu •

rni-

540

Index

280; evangelical

movements and,

482n3; Galileo and, 264; Humanism and, 209-13, 215, 216; Ideas in, 108; moving Earth in, 201, 484n7; naturalism in, 201, 220;

Ockham ics in,

in,

and, 202, 203, 205; phys-

201,

483-84n7; rationalism

205, 218, 220; Reformation as

329, 366; Darwinism and, 288; Greek philosophy and, 69, 291-97;

Humanism

and, 218, 219;

mathematization of physical world in,

230; philosophical revolution

resulting from,

272-81; printing

press and, 226; religious motivation in,

231; Scholasticism and, 178,

483-84n7; secularism

reaction against, 234, 236, 238,

208, 218,

240-41

and, 298-301, 308, 311, 319,

322

School of Athens, The (Raphael), 68,

228, 454

Scotism, 212

Schopenhauer, Arthur (1788-1860), 368, 383, 423, 459 Schrodinger, Erwin (1887-1961), 46364 Schumacher, Ernst (1911-1977), 467 Science, 48; alienating effect

of,

326—

331-32; Aquinas and, 180, 189-90; Arabic, 193; Aristotle's 27,

in-

fluence on, 55, 57, 62, 67, 68, 76; astrology and, 83; attempted synthesis of

humanism

and, 378-88;

Berkeley on, 336; Christianity and,

282-90, 298-323; classimodern, 488nll; faith in, 282, 320; Greek, 19-29, 32, 36, 46-47, 48-54, 69, 78; Hellenistic, 79; history of, 360-61, 407; Humanism and, 218; Kant and, 341-44, 346-51; medieval, 172, 175-78, 180, 189-90, 191 — 96, 200-1, 205-8, 483-84n7; metaphysics and, 383; modern, crisis of, 355-65; and modern world view, 282-84, 286; negative consequences of, 362-65; Ockham and, 200-1, 205-7; of phenome-

Scott, Walter Scripture. See

(1771-1832), 459 Holy Scripture

Second Coming of Christ. See Christ "Second Coming, The" (Yeats), 411, 462 Secular humanism, 25, 26, 30, 38, 286, 294, 307 .

Secularism, 366; Augustine's reaction

482-83n5; in Middle Ages, 191-93; postmodern mind and, 403; triumph of, 298-323 Semantics, 354 against,

106, 114,

Semele, 110

cal vs.

Semiotics, 398, 418

nal, 339; philosophy of, 353,

61, 395, 404, 407,

360-

436-40,

488nll; postmodern, 404-5; reductionist, 331, 357, 388; Reformation and, 241-43, 245; religion and, 53,

282-90, 298-323; Renais-

sance, 226, 229, 230 (see also Scientific Revolution);

Roman,

88;

Romanticism and, 377; Scholasticism and,

see Science,

medieval;

secularism and, 192, 301-8, 311,

321; utilitarian value

of,

311

Scientific Revolution, 48, 223, 224,

247-71, 282, 283, 285, 325, 326,

Seneca (c. 3 b.c. -a.d. c. 65), 76 Sense perceptions: Aquinas on, 182, 185, 186, 242; Aristotle on, 61;

59-

Bacon on, 273-75; Berkeley

on, 335; Descartes on, 276;

Hume

on, 336-37, 339-40; Kant on,

342, 343, 345, 346; Locke on, 309, 333-34; Ockham on, 204; Plato on, 6, 8, 107 Septuagint, 78, 106 Seventh Letter (Plato), 11, 42

Sextus Empiricus

{fl.

early 3rd cent.

b.c), 77, 276, 293, 297, 450 Sexuality: Christian view of, 138, 141, 144-45, 480nl7; secularism and,

317-19 Shakespeare, William (1564-1616), 224, 455 Shamanism, 372, 443 Shaw, George Bernard (1856-1950), 462 Sheldrake, Rupert (1942- ), 404, 432, 467 Shelley, Percy Bysshe (1792-1822), 366, 459 Sic et Non (Abelard), 177, 452

v*l

Iruii'x

Sideretu Suncius (The Messengei of the Star,)

Sigei oi Brabant

1240

(
,

21,

110; in Epi< ureanism,

on.

oi

*70; of

204; ot Pascal.

61, 101

c

365; of

J61,

$47,

I

66; preordained fate of,

77; empiri-

cism and, $34, J36; in French Enlightenment, KJ9-10, \\ )\

Sol,

120

lav

78, 276, 293, 294, 448, 486n4; of Augustine,

Kant,

116,

Humanism,

Skepticism, 69, 77 .

113,

of,

Mount. 217

Sistine Chapel, 228,

tine on,

.

Aquinas on,

107.

cal

M Sinai,

>.

Week conception of, 70. fes cartes on, 278; Enlightenment vie*

235,

remission oi punishment

l

482n4; Aristotle on, 60

158; physical bod) and,

vie*

I,

L91, 482n4; in Christianity,

(see also Origi-

nal Sin); in Judaism,

147.

l

18

:

atomism,

144.

Adam,

169; of

12

it

Sophocles (496 26, 71. 447 Soul:

Signs,

14,

Sophianic Judaeo-Christian d 443

.).

i

151

5J

449

23

David Friedrich (1808

446 Stravii

-2-1971).

^rnte, prin.

Sukenick, Ronald (1932

),

-

1874),

542

Index

Summae, 175, 190, 201, 220, 452

Summa

Thales (c.636-c.546 b.c), 19-20, 23,

Theologica (Aquinas), 193, 201,

220, 299, 452

Sun, 42, 51, 52, 64, 80-81, 194; Apollo as god of, 110; as center of universe, see Heliocentric universe; of

divine Logos, 113; Kepler on, 255, 256; light

of,

27, 51, 62, 71,

Theaetetus (Plato),

213; in Neoplaton-

108, 446,

471n3

12

Theodoric (454-526), 481nl Theodosius (c. 346-395), 451 Theogony (Hesiod), 17, 446 Theologica Platonica (Ficino), 214, 232 Theology: of Aquinas, 179-82, 187-90;

ism, 250, 291, 292, 295; observa-

archetypes

tions of, 258; revolution of planets

fluence on, 55; astrology and, 193,

around, 79-80; sacralization

of,

218-19

Suso, Heinrich

(c.

1295-1366), 197

107; Aristotle's in-

196; Augustinian, 144, 145; dual-

ism

Superego, 328, 424 Superman, Nietzschean, 322

in,

in,

121, 141; existentialism

and, 389; faith as basis

of,

113;

Greek influences on, 101, 102, 105, 140, 152; Hegel and, 381;

Suzuki, D. T. (1870-1966), 462

Holy

Swedenborg, Emanuel (1688-1772), 457 Swedenborgianism, 372 Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745), 457 Syllogism, 60, 212, 273 Symbol formation, 396, 406 Symposium (Plato), 11, 13, 41-42, 216, 473n7 Synchronicities, 385, 425

131; liberation, 403; medieval,

Syncretism, 214, 216, 219, 233, 297; postmodern mind and, 403; Romantic,

372

Tacitus (c.55-c.ll7), 449 Taliaferro, R. Catesby, 473nl Tauler, Johann

(c.

1300-1361), 197

Technology, 388; medieval, 173, 220; philosophy and, 281; postmodern mind and, 404; Renaissance, 225 — 27; science and, 355, 357, 362 — 64, 377; secularism and, 321, 322 Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre (18811955), 383, 465, 480nl5

Teleology, 45, 306; Aristotelian, 45, 58, 59, 62, 67, 181, 184, 274, 278,

289; Hegelian, 381; Neoplatonic, 86;

and participatory epistemology,

435; psychology and, 385, 491n7; secular, 321

Telescope, 358-59, 366, 439, 455 Telos,

61, 443

Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), 229, 246, 455 Terrestrial dynamics, 263, 268, 483-

84n7 Tertullian

(c.

Tetzel, 233

160-C.230), 153

Spirit in,

157; Johannine,

166-67, 172, 173, 176-78, 185; modern, 316; natural, 274; Ockham on, 204, 206; of Paul, 89, 101, 143; philosophy and, 309; pre-

Christian, 216; Protestant, 233,

235-37, 240-43, 304; puritanism and, 119; redemptive, 92; Renaissance, 228; revelation in, 100; Scholastic, 178, 236, 238, 241; sci-

ence and, 298, 299, 301, 306, 327; Scientific Revolution and, 253, 254, 260; secular thought and, 191, 192; Sophianic, 443; speculative,

Mary in, 163, 166 Theophilus (/I. c.385-403), 475n9 Theosophy, 372 Thermodynamics, second law of, 327, 460 275; Virgin

Thirty Years' War, 311,

455-56

Thoreau, Henry David (1817-1862), 366, 460

Thucydides (c.460-c.400 b.c), 26, 447 Tillich, Paul (1886-1965), 464 Timaeus (Plato), 11, 14, 50, 173, 214 Time: breakdown of category of, 377; clock and relationship to, 225; continuum of space and, 356, 358; end of, 133; notion of, 338, 343-44; patterns of, 50 Tiresias, 109 Tocqueville, Alexis de (1805-1859), 459 Tolstoy, Leo (1828-1910), 313, 46061 Totalitarianism, 389

S-M

Index

Totalization, 401. i

trovert)

Tower

Ockham

94

oi Babel,

Toynbee, Arnold |. (1889 1975), 411. 463, 490n9 Tragedy, Greek, 18, 19, 24, 472n5

mind,

TransubstantiatJon, doctrine

405

260

Trinity,

92*.

an J. Triumph of

238, 4^4

of,

108,

110,

lodern

J7,

,

Wittgenstein on,

\9\

'mu'iMiav

I

Iniversities:

7

1

*

medieval,

archctvpc

L

79-80, 185 102,

111-15, 117-19, 172.

177.

U

103,

L52,

191,

159,

loo.

Dw

KM;

192,

Scientific

>

t.on and, 251,

fnmoved Mover, 63, 65 Urban 11. Pope (< 1035 1099), 451 Urbanization,

(62

Urbino, 227 Ussher, Archbishop lames (1581

Enlightenment view Hegelian dialectic

Utilitarianism. 314

in

Humanism.

J IS.

Ockham

382;

humanly

216;

Utopia, 322

on, 205. 206, 208; in

participator* perspective. 4^5; post-

Valerian

modern view

Valla, Lorenzo

of,

J96,

197,

*99,

409; in Protestantism. 238, received. 400; in Romanticism, icientific,

282, 283, 360.

itic

of,

32-40; Sophist view

of,

27-29 Tudors.

:

Turing, Alan (1912-1954), 464 Turks, 225; m\asion of Constantinople by,

c.

230-260), 450 (1407-1457), J30

Greek, 4, 7, 17, 31; Platonic, 44. postmodern, 400; Sophist skepticism toward,

31

30,

Van Gogh, Vincent (1853-1890),

J62; self-evident,

281; Skeptics' view

(fl.

Values: Christian, 146, 168, 318;

240, 242-43; or pure reason. 338;

pursuit of,

1656),

134; in

71; mathematical,

.

342;

In,

I

cartel on, 277; in education. 4^; of,

1

'1.

twentieth-century philosophy 421

B8;

41; Aristotle on, 61;

of,

in Christianity.

91,

I

193, 200, 207,

RenaissaiM

Truth: Aquinas on.

167,

fniversal

I

Church, The (Raphael),

the

Inl;

lympathy, doctrine

I

155; heresies

118,

16V

.

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iti