INS 280, Spring 2008: Faith and Reason (from Aquinas to Galileo)
Thought and Politics in the Renaissance
Seminar Assignments: 1) The average person at the time of Aquinas was not educated, had a vocabulary of only about 1000 words, and was unlikely to travel more than seven miles from his or her village. All knowledge was memorized, and villagers had memorized long histories, both village and familial, and the traveling minstrels who came to entertain and inform about news and gossip memorized long bits, which were memorized by the people of the various villages. Cathedrals seemed other-worldly and mystical, as did the monks who resided there. Life was not about accomplishment or improvement, but about achieving paradise in the afterlife. By the time Galileo was born, the printing press had led to increased literacy, travel had grown, and progress and development were replacing superstition. Life was more worldly, humanism was growing, the church on the decline. Write a bit about what life must have been like before the transition began, and how our very way of understanding life and the world changed due to the developments in this time period; 2) Compare art from the 13th through 15th centuries to art from the 16th and 17th. Do you think the change in how people thought is reflected in the art work?
Argument: St. Thomas Aquinas may be the most important person in western history. That’s a mouthful, and I don’t know how strongly I’d make that point, but by early in the second millennium the “West” had to choose between: a) a conservative, traditional faith; and b) a faith that could incorporate the new teachings being discovered from Greece and Rome.
The Roman Republic, with its forms of government, legalism, and early notions of individual rights began the West, bringing in Greek ideals it copied, and then with Christianity and especially Augustine, Platonic philosophical ideals. The Christian church was very influenced by Platonic thought originally, and thus was idealist and that fit with the monastic orders and the retreat from life that took place. It also was in line with St. Francis’ poverty – the world is nothing, the spirit (ideas) are everything. Why would you want wealth when you can’t take it with you? What good is transient fame or glory when at some point all that we do will be forgotten? If God wants you to feed the poor and serve his will in this horrid world of pain and suffering, is that not the path to true happiness?
This could have continued a long time. But let’s take an aside for a second, and consider what was going on in the Islamic world. From about 900 to 1100 a huge battle was raging between the rationalists and the traditionalists. The rationalists – led by scholars like Averroes and Avicenna – had been pushing to mesh Aristotelian and rational thought with Islam. For awhile, they were dominate, there was even an inquisition where those who denied that the Koran was invented (i.e., not an eternal part of Allah) were killed. Islam had found the great writings of the Greeks, as well as Hindu, Buddhist and other thought, and scholars were working to, essentially redefine Islam as a faith that was based on rational thought not just revelation and orthodoxy.
Alas, they failed. The result was that the Ottoman Empire, when taking over in the 14th century, give power to a conservative, traditional ulama which thought that the Islamic world should stay put, or better, try to be like Medina in 622. The failure of the rationalists to redefine the Islamic world meant that it went from being far ahead of Europe in science, philosophy, military and economy to falling behind Europe and becoming unable to embrace modern change. The current problems with Islamic extremism stem from that failure. If you looked at the world in 1200, it would have appeared the Islamic world was more likely to make the change, the Christian world was steeped in tradition and spiritual mysticism. Yet it didn’t. Perhaps driven as much by the internal divisions in Europe (the Islamic world was more unified), which led to competition and conflict, the Church faced two challenges.
1. Internal reform: The church had become political and decadent, but it was powerful, people truly believed in God and to question that was heresy and unthinkable (though a few, like Frederick II, seemed to have real doubts). But its political corruption was such that it veered from the faith.
2. The rise of reason as an alternative to faith.
While the age of reason won’t come for as many as four more centuries, St. Thomas opened the door for it by winning the first battle. The Catholic Church, despite a bitter conflict, and due in large part to St. Thomas’ efforts, embraced reason alongside faith, and accepted Aristotle’s teachings as the highest form of secular thought.
This completed the greek connection: through Augustine (via Plotinus) Plato had been brought into the West, with Platonic ideas defining much of the dark age theology. Now Aristotle, Plato’s student – a realist, a budding scientist, and a pragmatist – would be added as well. To answer the question “what does Athens have to do with Jerusalem,” thanks to St. Thomas the answer seemed to be: A lot. He doesn’t modernize or secularize the West; indeed by 1600 Aristotelian scholasticism will be seen as a hindrance to science and progress – but it was an important step.
St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274): The writings of Aristotle had become known in the West before Thomas, and ironically, he was used by the church to counter those who were making a secular argument against religion using Aristotle. He incorporates Aristotle’s thoughts with church teachings, and develops would be the dominate form of inquiry before Galileo’s time. By the 15th century, Aristotelian scholasticism becomes the intellectual focus of the church. It emphasizes the validity of prior knowledge (the authority of the classics, and the presumption that past knowledge, having stood the test of time, is superior) and understanding the primary traits of things, their essences. It was not scientific, nor progressive (indeed, the emphasis on the authority of prior teachings makes it inherently conservative).
Aquinas as a product of something new in Europe. In 1060 the first modern University opened in Bologna Italy, and soon in Paris, Oxford and other centers universities sprang up. This was designed to train professionals, but really was the opening act in what would, in time, bring the renaissance and ultimately modernism to the West. Aquinas was a Dominican, from the Kingdom of Sicily. He got his degrees at the University of Naples, then the University of Paris. He wrote massive amounts in his 49 year life (he died March 7, 1274), and taught in Paris and Naples.
He learned Aristotle from the works of Averroes (Ibn-Rushd), Avicenna (Ibn-Sin) and other Muslim philosophers who had discovered and were not only spreading knowledge of Aristotle but expanding and creatively developing his philosophy.
Aquinas accepted the idea of logic from Aristotle. Our modern notions of logic come from Aristotle, often called the ‘inventor of logic.’ Like Aristotle he said we know the world through our senses, and we can explore and learn about the world, but we learn spirituality through our soul. Moreover he used Aristotelian logic to develop proofs on the existence of God, and his thought was teleological, concerned with the end or purpose of any being or any of its actions. Unlike Augustine, who saw the state as a ‘punitive consequence’ of original sin (more like Plato), Aquinas saw humans as political animals, and the state was necessary. He also had a vision of a kind aristocratic democracy very early on. Many who put the advent of democracy with the Greeks are only partially correct; Aquinas brings it to the western tradition in his own way, close to, but not exactly with Aristotle.
In law, he also made strides: The eternal law of God is first, then the natural law inherent in human nature; divine positive law for human conduct, and human custom. Laws humans make cannot be true laws if they deny natural law (note: Martin Luther King Jr. uses this to defend his breaking of laws in fighting for desegregation).
There was a battle in the Catholic church over the teachings of Aristotle. Many wanted to label Aquinas a heretic, and his teachings banned. The battle was won both due to the intellectual strength of his arguments, but also to the political power of the Dominicans. Although Thomist thought would evolve, overall the entry of Aristotle into the Christian tradition altered the theology and set the stage for further developments.
Neo-platonist spiritualism of the Augustinian sense was, at some level, contrary to progress. For Augustine, the material world was suspect; at best it was a symbol of God’s love, there to teach us and help us turn inward to God. But as with Plato’s notion of the contemplative philosophical life as the ideal, Aristotle’s emphasis on naturalism and pragmatism/realism would, through Aquinas, invigorate a drive for knowledge and progress. This marked the high middle ages, and started a transition which, in the next three hundred years, would bring about the renaissance, with its rediscovery of classics and start of new quests for science and knowledge, the reformation, and ultimately starting around 1600, modernism.
The west, however, remains this mesh of spirituality and logic, faith and reason. Its roots are specific, tied to thinkers like Plato, Plotinus and Aristotle. The work done by Aquinas and Augustine start it on its trajectory, and our minds are shaped in part by that today, even after the modern secular revolution. Indeed, Plotinus’ ideas sound very at home even with new age thinking, which seems as far removed from ancient philosophy as one could imagine. I think, whether we are religious or secular, more traditional or ultra scientific and modern, can see some of our own minds in the thought and directions begun by Aquinas and Augustine.
From famine to rebirth
Aquinas died in 1247. And, though he’d opened the door to rationalism, for the next three centuries the church would adopt Aristotelian scholasticism as its primary focus. This essentially treated Aristotle like a great teacher; rather than using Aristotle’s logic to investigate the world, Aristotle was made an authority whom one did not question. In short, knowledge from the past was held to be true because it had withstood the test of time; if that knowledge had been wrong, surely we’d have realized it by now. So you did not think critically, you accepted past knowledge as authoritative.
While this bought the church a few centuries, implicit in Aristotelian thought was questioning reality; but it would take the printing press and a challenge to the church’s authority to bring that out.
The Papacy Declines
The Papacy was moving towards disarray. During the time of the 13th Century, the Papacy was at the height of its political/secular clout. It had created more taxation and control over the bureaucracy, and this increased its wealth. Yet this success contained the seeds of its undoing, in large part because of the fact it took away some of the spiritual authority of the church, and raised the stakes. Also, the rise of new ideas had the same kind of effect on politics as it had on literature, art, and theology. Thus the monarchs of Britain, France, and elsewhere in Europe started to resent the attempt by the Papacy to claim both secular and spiritual control.
This would ultimately result in the reformation, but first the focus was simply politics. Given the well known corruption and materialism of the Popes, it was easier for the princes of Europe to stand up to the Popes. One of the first was Frederick II of Sicily, who, with his proximity to the Muslim world, first tasted many of these changes and was a precursor of what would come in Europe.
From 1307 to 1378 the Papcy fled Rome. Rome was increasingly unsafe and not a very pleasant place to live. But also it reflected a touch of emerging nationalism – a French Pope, Clement V, made the move, and the Popes became much like the French court – debauched, corrupted, and kept in a kind of ‘gilded cage’ so that they could be more easily controlled by the French monarch. By the reign of Clement VI, the Popes really were under the control of the French monarch, and Rome was neglected. The Papacy was, it seemed, dying.
One reason Gregory IX moved it back was because of the increasing loss of property by the church in Italy as, with the Pope absent, there was less capacity to defend and govern properly. Even after he moved back, the French appointed “false” Popes in Avignon and it wasn’t until the 15th century the Papcy was unified after a series of councils back in Rome. That was the time of the Renaissance at its height, and the Church had lost much of its clout, and would never be the same.
Black death
Hit Europe by the 1340s, and would return over the next 400 years. It was in part a sign of what we might call ‘globalization.’ All of Europe lost between a quarter and two thirds of its population from 1342-1352. Florence went from 120,000 to 50,000 people.
Impact: Economic recession, but also weakened bonds of peasants to lords, cheaper food was available, wages could finally by the 15th century increase, old traditions weakened, and the stage set to make a complete break.
The 14th century was one of famine, pestilence and change. The Black Death, which spread from the east, or ‘the plague’ hit Italy in 1347. From the ports of Messina,Genoa, Pisa, and Venice is spread throughout the peninsula, bring the economy and normal life to a complete halt. While commerce had revived and in some places (like Florence) was even thriving, this was a huge push backwards. Wars grew in this chaos, as much as 40% of the Italian population was killed. Yet in this were also the seeds of the renaissance.
In 1397 Giovanni de Medici (1360 – 1429) set up the family bank, and ran it like banks are run today: loans, exchange, foreign interests, etc. The bank grew, and soon was strong even outside Florence. The bank would ultimately be in charge of Papal finances, and that would create strong politics links between the Vatican and the Medicis. The bank itself collapsed in 1494 as Florence was entering a difficult time with foreign invaders and internal strife. Yet the Medicis sponsored artists and helped nurture the Renaissance which had Florence as its core.
Near the train station (and one of the hotels) is the church Santa Maria Novella. Chapels in the church are named after families who commissioned the art work inside of them. The Medicis wanted to sponsor the greatest such work, so they supported the building of the Basilica di San Lorenzo.
The renaissance saw a grand awakening of knowledge, art and humanism as the famine and pestilence of the 14th century receded, and the need to rebuild meant that past traditions and limits were more easily pushed aside; so much had been destroyed that it was in some ways easier to move forward.
The Italian city state: Italian cities tended to be dominated by one family, and politics was often personal, involving marriages, partnerships, and even poisonings and killings. Some might compare this style with the Italian mafia, though Italians would point out that the politics of northern Europe was hardly that much different. This was the time of great strides in art, philosophy and thought. Mantova is another city with a strong support for the arts through the Gonzaga family. Many other cities had such strong families that both ran the politics (often brutally) and funded the arts. Yet violence was common as well, as different clans and families fought, and ultimately this weakness would lead to foreign interventions (mentioned in the Machiavelli notes).
ROME: Rome at this time was also expanding its support of the arts, as the Pope, political influence waning, still governed the Papal States of central Italy, around Rome.
SAVONAROLA: Girolamo Savonarola led a religious reaction to the material excesses of the renaissance. This wasn’t just the art, but the opulence, and the emphasis on the material over the spiritual. The rediscovery of humanism was, for Savonarola, the loss of Godfulness. His rule would be brief (1494-98), he was ultimately hung on May 23, 1498 at the Piazza Signoria, with his body burnt at the stake afterwards. This didn’t mark the end of the renaissance, but the times were changing.
One reason: the rise of the printing press, which was creating an opening for an information revolution that would change the Europe and ultimately the world. When the Pope decided to redo St. Peter’s basilica in Rome, and make it the marvel it is today, that cost a lot of money. One way to raise money was to increase the practice of granting papal indulgences to large donors of the church. Indulgences were in essence “time off” from pergatory, hastening the pace in which one would enter heaven. However, due to the printing press, it was easier than ever to print off indulgences, and the practice soon came to be less a grant of thanks to a large donor than a sale. And in Germany, one Terzel was essentially selling them and keeping a percentage, thoroughly corrupt.
This upset a Catholic monk who was convinced that this actually pushed people away from the gift of God’s grace and it made it more likely that people would be damned. This monk, a professor of Old Testament at the church university in Wittenberg, made a list of 95 complaints and nailed them to the door of his church – a door which acted in essence as a church bulletin board. He wrote these in Latin, wanting an academic debate about the issue. Instead, in 1517 Martin Luther in Germany started the Protestant reformation.
This would be an all out assault on the church from the North, and would lead to numerous wars (Machiavelli died in 1527 – he was also writing as this era began). The Church responded by reforming itself, but also with intolerance of more expressive and humanistic art and music, and focused on trying to strictly define and adhere to Catholic doctrines. The Council of Trent in 1563 began what would be called the counter-reformation as the church tried to fight back. Ultimately, this reaffirmed the power of the Catholic church in Italy, though it ended the kind of dynamism of the renaissance.
In the early 1600s, however, the weakened church could not stop the rise of science, as people started to question Aristotle and, as Galileo would claim, do more like what Aristotle would do, investigate and question nature. The rationalism that Aquinas opened the door for ultimately led to the questioning of the church, and the rise of the age of reason. Though it was 400 years later when Galileo undertook his experiments, the time frame saw a resurrection of knowledge from Rome, the rise of the printing press, the decline of the papacy as Italy, divided, became weaker than northern Europe. The black death helped bring changes in custom and tradition, further setting the stage for Europe’s transformation.
Ironically, this would propel Europe past the Islamic world. The irony is that if it wasn’t for the Muslim rationalists, who lost their battle to reform their faith, Aristotle would not have been brought to the attention of the Italians, and Thomas Aquinas could not have started this process. One has to wonder what would have happened if the Muslim rationalists had won their battle – for awhile it appeared they would – rather than having that faith end up with a very conservative interpretation.