> I see no change after Augustine, it was not until around the time of > Aquinas that there was a change in attitudes toward ancient knowledge. > While some Greek knowledge was preserved in the Eastern Empire you > are minimizing the importance of Toledo and Sicily when they fell from > Muslim hands. These both took place just before 1100 and most of > Aristotle's work in biology. the Arab knowledge of alchemy, as well as > much else arrived in Europe from these conquests.
I am not mimimizing these centers. However, again look at your dates. Spain did not fall until 711, and by the late 5th C or so was fully converted to Catholicism. Sicily not until more than a century later. For there to be a lively literary and scholarly environment there must have been something there to begin with. Irregardless, Europe was too busy trying to survive during this period to develop a lively literary or scholarly movement during this period (specifically the so-called Dark Ages). >From _The Oxford History of Medieval Europe: "Througout the early Middle Ages in both east and west scholars and writers set themselves the aim of emulating the literary canons and educational norms inherited from antiquity. To see the cultural history of this period in terms of the fragile survival of a classical tradition is in some ways misleading as it overlooks its limited but significant oral achievements, not to mention an immense oral tradition now virtually lost to us, but does reflect the priorities of early medieval intellectuals. "The start of our period was marked by an astonishing breadth and vitality in cultural life. Most partsof the Medditerrenean retained a degree of stability and prosperity and th senatoral aristocracy continued to cultivate the ideal of Otium (liesure) involving the composition and copying of traditional secular liturature... In the fourth century controversy had raged over the Church's policy towards classical learning, but with time MODERATE VIEW proposed by ST AUGUSTINE [emphasis mine] prevailed that 'pagan' learning should be tolerated as long as it was kept suborndinate to scripture and put to good Christian use... When Justinian closed down the Platonic Academy of Athens in 529 he did so not to eliminate a threat, but to advance his ideal of a uniform Christian community... The Neoplatonic notions which dominated Late Roman philosophy had already been absorbed into Christian thought... In education th standard curriculum of antiquity was systemized in a traties by Martianus Capella and then transmitted to the medieval west as the doctrine of the sevel liberal arts by Cassiodorus." So I believe this contends that indeed there was a break between the Late Empire > The point you are trying to make is that there was no Dark Ages, there > was no Renaissance, was no Enlightenment, and that the Church > preserved and spread knowledge and contributed to scientific > advancement? Yes, but more specifically, the point I'm trying to make is that after the collapse of Roman authority in the West (keep in mind that the Roman Empire per se did not collapse until 1453 when the Turks under IIRC Suleyman the Magnificent conquered Constantinople) the church served to preserve the cultural and intellectual traditions through incorporation into spiritual learning, that the term Dark Ages is overly pessimistic and negative view unfair to a period that was just as dynamic and important as the preceding periods, but in different ways (I could go into a discussion of the CULTURAL history of this period, and why it's just as important, but to summarize this period is important since it coaleced the ideals of classical, Germanic, and Judeo-christian culture to give us the foundations of the so-called Western Tradition). Morover, my point with regards to the Rennaisance and later periods is that this transition was in no way revolutionary (View 1 of the Rennaisance followers..those that believe it was revolutionary and unlike earlier periods), but rather evolutionary stretching back several centuries, with no clear break (View 3...View 2 would be the "moderates"). But I think the biggest problem I have with everything you've discussed is the fact that you are *non*-specific with your dates. I already know the dates; those come easy. FREX, when you talk about the period between the "fall of the Roman Empire" and the "rise of the Rennaisance," even if you do not give specific dates, both periods are firmly locked in or have a commonly accepted reference point for discussion. We know the Roman Empire in the West collapsed in 476 when Odoacar.The commonly accepted reference point for the beginning of the Rennaisance has always been around 1500. Although this date could change with regards to the country being examined, there is a concensus that after this period is the Rennaisance. So when you discussed repression of learning during this period you are clearly lumping Aquinas and others in with the adage of the Dark Age. It appears to me, then, that you are redefining what the Rennaisance was without providing a reference. > I do not blame the Church for the Fall of Rome but as a totalitarian > creation that survived the fall of Rome it preserved knowledge it > wanted, suppressed other knowledge, and let non-spiritual knowledge it > was not interested in lapse. And my point is that the Church could hardly be Totalitarian during this period since it was struggling to survive vs. invasions from the Muslims in the south, Scandinavians in the north, and the Magyars in Central Europe. If the church had difficulty imposing things such as a universal liturgy and ecclesiastical laws on its clergy, then I disagree that it could summarily repress knowledge. Damon. _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
