I. Christian culture
The reasons for the formation of Christian culture
The reason for the formation of Christian culture in Western Europe in the Middle Ages, or the monopoly of Christian churches on culture and education, is very simple. In the early Middle Ages, Germans were illiterate from kings to civilians. This primitive state of their culture makes it impossible for them to absorb all the achievements of ancient Greek and Roman culture at once. The popularization and improvement of higher culture among barbarians required a process. At that time, the only literate people were Christian priests. This led to the cultural monopoly of the Christian church in the Middle Ages. It should be noted that the culture of western Europe began to decline in the third century, and the formation of Christian culture was the result of its decline, not the cause.
In the first few hundred years of the Middle Ages, Christian priests were the only inheritors of western European classical culture. In the high wall of the monastery, under the dim light, only Christian priests are still studying the achievements of classical culture Pythagoras' mathematical works, Euclid's geometry and Archimedes' physics all depend on them to be preserved. It can be said that they "keep the light of learning burning". At this time, the historical works "Gothic History" and "Archimedes Physics" were all preserved.
The Art of Caroline Dynasty
With the spread and deepening of Christianity, Caroline art was formed in western Europe from the middle of the 8th century to the end of the 9th century. It is a large-scale imitation and study of Christianity, Byzantium, ancient Greece and Rome by Germans, and its promoter is Charlemagne. He built palaces and church buildings, set up court colleges, required churches and monasteries to set up schools, and offered courses such as grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music. Naturally, they are all related to religion, but for these subjects, they have at least played a role in carrying on the family line. On this basis, Christian culture developed in11~13rd century.
3. Literary poetry
(1) Latin literature Latin was a common language in medieval western Europe. The main form of Latin literature is "hymn", which is profound and dignified. For example, the format of the hymn is as follows: "I believe in the Holy Spirit and the Holy Catholic Church …" The young students improvised in Latin: "I believe in the pleasant manna and the reward of the restaurant owner …"
(2) Oral creation of dialect literature, such as Robin Hood in Britain, Song of Roland in France, Song of Nybrann Roots in Germany, and aristocratic lyrics. The integration of dialect epic and dialect lyric poetry forms knight literature. Chivalry literature praises "gentle love" and chivalry: polite manners, gentle words and gentle ladies. Worship and respect ladies. Knight literature often describes the conflict between loyalty and love. All of the above are noble literature. For citizens, there are urban dialect literature, mainly story poems and fables, such as the story of Lena the fox in France. Often the theme is satirizing priests seducing businessmen's wives, and cleverness will overcome violence.
4. Architectural art
Mainly church buildings. Romanesque architecture appeared in the early11~12nd century, and Gothic architecture was formed in the middle12nd century ~14th century, all of which are stone structures. Romanesque architecture is characterized by thick walls, round arches and small windows, which show majestic and powerful ideas, but it is also dark. It also shows a mysterious and transcendental artistic conception. The typical Gothic building is Notre Dame de Paris, which belongs to the whole skeleton type, with columns, pointed arches, small minarets and stained glass windows. The whole building is high, but the Romanesque style can't reach it. Gothic architecture has been divorced from the influence of ancient Roman art, and the towering spires lead people's eyes to the illusory sky, making people forget this life and fantasize about the afterlife. Gothic art is the development of western European culture centered on Christian thought in the Middle Ages.
The rise of universities
Since 12 century, some universities have been established. Universities established at this time are generally related to Christian churches. The earliest Paris University in Europe was developed on the basis of cathedral school. The University of Bologna in northern Italy, Oxford University in Britain and the earliest universities in other European countries were established with the approval of bishops. The tradition of medieval universities was to wear priest's clothes (square hat and black coat) when they graduated. College students in medieval western Europe lived in poverty. At that time, as now, the common way was to write home and ask for money. A French poet drafted such a letter: "Dear father, I have no money, and no one has given me a penny except you. All the expenses in college are really too high ... I'm in debt for drinking, eating bread, seeing a doctor and studying. I wrote a note for washing clothes and getting a haircut. I wrote to you to pay off my debts, and I asked you to send money to say hello. " A university degree is originally a teacher's license, and the winner can get honor or the right to be a guild craftsman. In form, the university is also an association and guild institution that can own property, and then gradually get rid of the control of the outside world such as the church. Therefore, when reviewing this period of history, the church repeatedly mentioned its contribution to modern human education and the development of schools and universities.
In short, the whole medieval western European culture, including the early Renaissance, was based on Christianity and Christian thought. It can be said that the main body of Western European culture in the Middle Ages was Christian culture. The foundation of modern western culture has been firmly established.
Second, the godfather philosophy and scholasticism
Medieval is the century of faith, and medieval philosophers are very concerned about the major issues of human existence: human instinct, the purpose of life? The existence and symbol of god, and so on. On the contrary, modern philosophers are noncommittal about these issues. For example, existentialism holds that life is existence and the pursuit of life is the process of existence. ...
1. Godfather philosophy
The so-called godfather is the honorific title of some theologians who contributed to the formulation or interpretation of Christian doctrine and the interpretation of the Bible after the 2nd century A.D.. The godfathers absorbed the philosophical thoughts of Greece and Rome, wrote a lot of works, explained the Bible, expounded doctrines, further philosophized and theorized Christianity, and formed a set of systematic theological thoughts. Among these godfathers, Augustine (354 ~ 430) made an important contribution to the establishment of Christian theological system.
Augustine put Plotinus and others (205? From 270 to 270, Neo-Platonism combined with the Bible, which further demonstrated the Godfather's creationism and Trinity theory, and put forward the original sin theory and the voter theory, thus laying a relatively complete theoretical system of Christian theology.
The view of human nature in ancient Greece holds that man is a rational animal, and anyone who is good at using rationality can make his life successful. Augustine abandoned the classical rationalist view of human nature, and thought that the most important factor in human nature was the blindness of human actions, which was not due to the accidental blindness of individuals who lacked foresight, but an eternal factor inherent in human nature. This is what Augustine called original sin. According to the theory of original sin, everyone brings the degenerate nature into this world, and it is impossible for this nature to get better by itself. Therefore, all mankind needs redemption, but people are unable to save themselves and must rely on God and Christ. In this way, the relationship between man and the outside world is replaced by the relationship between man and God, and the theory of original sin becomes the basis of Christian redemption theory.
The center of Augustine's salvation theory is the church, which is a tool appointed by God to save mankind. If a person cannot become a member of the church, he cannot be saved. The church is the medium between God and believers. At the same time, the church is a unitary belief, (this is unprecedented! ) It is different from other social groups, because they are all related to earthly things, and only the identity of Christian faith has opened the way to eternal happiness. The radical representative of the isomorphism of Christian belief is the abstinence movement and monastery system that began in Europe in the early 4th century. Some monks are determined to give up all social contacts and social responsibilities in order to pursue a pure group of believers. However, the problem is that most Christians still live in the world. As an official, a soldier and a farmer, should they still bear the responsibility to the world society? This leads to a more general question: the respective properties of belief isomorphism and secular isomorphism, and what is the relationship between them. Augustine answered this question in The City of God, and his view later became the orthodox principle adhered to by the whole medieval church.
Augustine's godfather philosophy reflects people's illusory ideals caused by disappointment on the eve of the demise of the Western Roman Empire. In the Middle Ages, Christian godfather philosophy ruled until 1 1 century.
2 the formation of scholasticism
If the social trend of thought in the late Roman Empire was from rationality to mysterious belief, then the formation of scholasticism marked the revival of rationality, because the foundation of scholasticism was to "combine belief with reason as much as possible". Known as the last godfather and the first scholastic philosophy, Anselmus, Archbishop of Canterbury (1033 ~ 1 109). I don't seek understanding for faith, I believe for understanding, which shows that he believes that human reason has the power to clarify the mystery of Christian faith, and the truth of Christian righteousness should and can stand scrutiny.
The development and maturity of scholasticism is related to the rise of western European cities and the development of commodity economic relations after 1 1 century. Social life is stable, people have confidence and begin to believe in their own rationality. At the same time, it is also closely related to the revival of Aristotle's philosophy in western Europe in the 12 century. Due to the Crusades, Aristotle's major works, Metaphysics, Physics and Theory of Soul, which have been lost in the West for many years, have been translated into Latin one after another, and the notes of Arab scholar Avicenna and others have also been circulated in Western Europe. Faced with Aristotle's unparalleled natural science and philosophy at that time, the Christian church was afraid at first, then banned it, and then absorbed it into Christian theology. Thomas, the master of scholasticism, completed this absorption.
Aquinas demonstrated Christian theology with Aristotle's theory, and combined faith with reason, Bible and science, thus establishing a huge Christian Aristotle theological system. His major works are aptly called the theological encyclopedia. The main feature of Aquinas' scholasticism is that he attaches importance to rationality and logical reasoning, but he doesn't believe in senses and experience and thinks that the senses can't reach the highest truth-the Bible. In this way, Aquinas' Aristotle theological system was replaced.
3 Nominalism and Realism
Thomas Aquinas' philosophy is classified as "realism" in scholasticism. Realism holds that general concepts are more "realistic" than individual concepts, that is, "people" are more "realistic" than this man or woman. This theory emphasizes the superior realism of various abstract concepts, so that people in the Middle Ages can still firmly believe in the church when attacking individual priests, and can still believe in the pope's rule when condemning successive popes as villains. Therefore, things like bread and wine can be regarded as real internal entities and Christ entities without any difficulty. The opposite of realism is nominalism, which emphasizes that the individual takes precedence over the general.
4 the concept of scholasticism
Because of their concern for human existence, medieval philosophers continued to care about a central question: should people live by reason or by faith? What is the relationship between faith and reason? These problems are the core issues of scholasticism. Therefore, scholasticism is a philosophy that demonstrates and infers Christian theology and serves theology. It combines reason and faith. This is the philosophy of medieval church schools and monasteries. Philosophy stresses rationality, while theology stresses faith. Theologists emphasize rationality, and philosophy will certainly make philosophy serve theology, so some books say that medieval philosophy is the handmaid of theology from a critical point of view.
5. Evaluation of scholasticism.
Scholasticism is not very conducive to the growth of natural science, because it emphasizes the inner reality, does not believe in sensibility and experience, and diverts people's attention from the actual details and situations of specific things. On the other hand, scholasticism also laid the foundation for later European thoughts, and made Europeans develop an extremely rigorous and meticulous style, even to the point of finding fault. It needs well-trained thinking, so that the world does not damage reasoning and is not afraid of reasoning. Because of this,
For modern people, the greatest enlightenment left by scholasticism is that people need reason and belief, and reason and belief cannot conflict with each other.
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