Beyond the surface of history myths

[luiz]

Yes, they were protected... from Christians!

No, the Church protected them. The people who looted them were ordinary citizens, since temples (and the Colosseum and whatnot) were an excellent source for marble and other goodies.

By turning the pagan temples into christian ones the Church actually did a great service to mankind (well except to the pagans).

 

[Thorgalaeg]

In fact i cant think of many Pagan temples converted to chuches, excepting the Pantheon in Rome and a couple more.

 

[ironduck]

A few off the top of my head; Minerva temple in Assissi, Trajan's and Hadrian's columns, Mausoleum of Hadrian (connected into a castle for the pope)..

 

[Neonanocyborgasm]

What's interesting is that if the catholic church hadn't protected them, more of them would likely have been destroyed or fallen apart. The church actively restored them through the centuries. They did similar things with other things such as triumphal pillars, placing saints on top of them.

I wouldn't give them that much credit. Most of the stone left by the Romans was cannibalized for other building projects. Some temples were recycled as churches, but this was uncommon. The Pantheon is one, but it isn't even used as a church anymore. It's the tomb of Victor Emmanuel II.

 

[Verbose]

Why wouldn't the ancient building be re-used and canniblised? Antiquarian sentiments is a very recent phenomenon. Historically newer was always considered better. The way Christiansed Europe saw itself, it was a better upgrade of ancient pagan Rome. They felt no need to hold the bad old days in any particular awe.

 

[Plotinus]

Why, because anything the church has ever done has been bad, of course. You can't expect to evaluate the actions of the church in past ages by the standards of the time or put them into their proper ideological, intellectual, or cultural context or anything like that. That's just technicalities and rationalisation.

 

[ironduck]

I wouldn't give them that much credit. Most of the stone left by the Romans was cannibalized for other building projects. Some temples were recycled as churches, but this was uncommon. The Pantheon is one, but it isn't even used as a church anymore. It's the tomb of Victor Emmanuel II.

First of all, it's not about giving the church credit. I can't think of a single 2000 year-old Roman monument that stands perfectly today which the church didn't claim as its property. When the church didn't claim it, the materials were simply recycled for other projects.*

Second, the Pantheon is a church today. It also holds a number of tombs (including Vittorio Emanuele), just like most other catholic churches do. There are regular services held.

*edit - the other best hope for conservation was simply that the buildings disappeared or were forgotten, such as when houses were built upon older houses using them as foundations, or when some volcano buried everything.

 

[Dachs]

Why, because anything the church has ever done has been bad, of course. You can't expect to evaluate the actions of the church in past ages by the standards of the time or put them into their proper ideological, intellectual, or cultural context or anything like that. That's just technicalities and rationalisation.

No sarcasm here, folks...

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Of course not.

Most humans, for most of human history, have been far more concerned with living than with preserving the buildings and artifacts of their ancestors for the benefit of their descendants.

 

[scy12]

Anyway , the truth is that after destroying the ClassicalGreco Culture , or better the part of the Classical culture thad had anything to do with Polytheism , the Church did decide at a point to salvage some Ancient scriptures. In fact all of today's Classical Greek works where preserved due to Cristian Monks , And Arab scholars. That is because Classical Greeks and later ethnikoi always used Papyri that isn't preserved in time. On the other hand we have salvaged only a very small part of Classical Greek writings but anyway it is positive that they copied what they did.

Speaking as a Greek , Christianity also had a positive influence for the creation of a Greek-Roman empire. In fact i believe that is the reason they decided to create it , so that they could more easily control the Middle East Regions where there where many different religions. The Polytheistic Greeks and others where ready to adopt that Religion. .The question is , why did they use Jewish dogma to support it ? I believe we can find out the the answer... One is the truth whatever the initiative was , they were made to look as Evil , in that Religion in the end. So I believe it there was also an initiative to convert jews but they failed. Nevertheless in the long run it didn't matter. Creating Christianity was one of the most brilliant ideas.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

The Romans were doing fine with religious pluralism, and they managed to control every major Middle Eastern religion except the one (darned sense of national identity tied in with religion!), before Christianity.

 

[Neonanocyborgasm]

Why, because anything the church has ever done has been bad, of course. You can't expect to evaluate the actions of the church in past ages by the standards of the time or put them into their proper ideological, intellectual, or cultural context or anything like that. That's just technicalities and rationalisation.

It is only in exceptional instances where the church has acted positively. Most of the time, the church abhorred reason and science, because they were seen to be from a pagan past that they wanted nothing to do with. Reason was antithetical to faith, and science was something those ancient pagan philosophers did.

It was not until the Renaissance that such attitudes diminished, and the church found itself in catch-up mode, rather than at the forefront, a position which it still finds itself in.

Why wouldn't the ancient building be re-used and canniblised? Antiquarian sentiments is a very recent phenomenon. Historically newer was always considered better. The way Christiansed Europe saw itself, it was a better upgrade of ancient pagan Rome. They felt no need to hold the bad old days in any particular awe.

Which is it? Cannibalization or preservation?

First of all, it's not about giving the church credit. I can't think of a single 2000 year-old Roman monument that stands perfectly today which the church didn't claim as its property. When the church didn't claim it, the materials were simply recycled for other projects.*

There are Roman monuments all over the once-empire. The Church didn't have access to them all. And I don't know what qualifies to you as "perfectly." The Pyramids are in pretty good shape and they're even older, and no one's been maintaining those.

Second, the Pantheon is a church today. It also holds a number of tombs (including Vittorio Emanuele), just like most other catholic churches do. There are regular services held.

My mistake.

*edit - the other best hope for conservation was simply that the buildings disappeared or were forgotten, such as when houses were built upon older houses using them as foundations, or when some volcano buried everything.

But that's by happenstance.

 

[Verbose]

The Pyramids are in pretty good shape and they're even older, and no one's been maintaining those.

No, they were actively quarried all through the Middle Ages.

Medieval Cairo was largely built using material from the pyramid complexes at Gizah. Of course, dismantling surrounding temples etc. was easier than having a crack at the acual pyramids. All the fine outer limestone casing disappeared though.

The pyramids may still look more or less ok, but that wasn't from piety, but because they're so huge they could take what was thrown at them. Roman monuments were rather puny, by comparison.

 

[luiz]

It is only in exceptional instances where the church has acted positively. Most of the time, the church abhorred reason and science, because they were seen to be from a pagan past that they wanted nothing to do with. Reason was antithetical to faith, and science was something those ancient pagan philosophers did.

It was not until the Renaissance that such attitudes diminished, and the church found itself in catch-up mode, rather than at the forefront, a position which it still finds itself in.

This is pure anti-catholic propaganda that you have been fed and has no basis in reality.
The Church placed an enormous value in reason and science, they made it a case to adapt aristotelian logic to christian principles. Just read St. Augustine, he tried to base all of his argumentation on sound logic (just because his logic might not seem that solid today doesn't mean that it didn't back in the day).

In fact christianity was far more adaptable to logic than paganism, a reason why so many philosophers converted. Popular Paganism, the one that believed in multiple gods waging wars and falling in love, was actually mocked by the intellectual elite of the Roman Empire, it has no basis whatsoever in logic or science and was regarded by noblemen and philosophers as superstition. The likes of Seneca, Horatio and etc believed in "the gods" and in some sort of divine providence, but not in what we call greco-roman mythology (even though they paid some lip service to it).

As Plotinus was trying to point out, the Church wanted to be logic and scientific because they figured that was the way to understand God. They did not, in anyway, condemn logc and science, at least not in their early years. In fact it can be said that only in some specific periods did the Church actually become hostile to science.

 

[ironduck]

There are Roman monuments all over the once-empire. The Church didn't have access to them all. And I don't know what qualifies to you as "perfectly." The Pyramids are in pretty good shape and they're even older, and no one's been maintaining those.

By perfectly I mean that it hasn't been smashed or the materials recycled. The outer layer of the pyramids was recycled (and most of them are in really poor condition). I've been to many monuments around the mediterranean region, and the ones seized by the catholic church are a rare sight to see in their almost pristine condition.

But that's by happenstance.

The point is that these constructions were either forgotten or recycled. The few exceptions of the Roman monuments were pretty much the ones that the church made into holy symbols.

The temples that still remain and haven't been cannibalized or seized by the church were either forgotten or ended up too far away for anyone to bother with. The temple in Segesta, for instance.

 

[Plotinus]

I said before that I wasn't going to argue about this any more, but this time I really won't. Everything luiz says in the last post is exactly right, and there is far more that could be said on the same subject, but there is none so blind as those who will not see (etc). After all, saying that Riccioli was a secret Copernican, and that the complete absence of evidence for this is actually evidence for it (because it shows how scared he was of the church authorities!) is classic conspiracy theory stuff (claim that the lack of evidence is itself evidence of a cover-up, etc). It's not serious history, and neither are those sweeping statements about "reason" and "faith". Please bear in mind that the notion that "reason" and "faith" are antithetical - and that the one characterises science while the other characterises religion - is a very modern notion. Do not use it as an assumption or premise on which to base your arguments.

 

[thomas.berubeg]

Yes, but there's a big difference between saying "Some Christians burned some tens of thousands of supposed witches in early modern times," and "The church burned millions of witches in the Middle Ages." And there's a big difference between saying "Some church leaders rejected certain scientific ideas and promoted the attempt to disprove them," and "The church attempted to suppress all scientific investigation." The point is that what is popularly believed isn't true, even though it may have some vague similarity to the truth. Just like saying "Abraham Lincoln emancipated the slaves" isn't true, although it has some vague similarity to what actually happened.

Most witch burnings happened not in the middle ages, but rather in the Renaissance, in the 1600s.

Also, during the middle ages, women were much freer than they later were in the renaissance... they were allowed to own property, have thier own professions, etc. it is only in the renaissance that stricter roles for women were enforced and insisted upon.

(both of these bits of knowledge come from the book Sacre Moyen Age)

 

[Neonanocyborgasm]

The Church placed an enormous value in reason and science, they made it a case to adapt aristotelian logic to christian principles. Just read St. Augustine, he tried to base all of his argumentation on sound logic (just because his logic might not seem that solid today doesn't mean that it didn't back in the day).

That attitude did not (re)appear until the middle ages with theologians like Thomas Aquinas. For much of the intervening period, Christianity was openly hostile to science because it viewed it as tantamount to paganism. Even though this is undeserved, Christianity lumped philosophers, scientists, and pagan religion all into the same heap. Faith in God was seen as all that is necessary and any deviation from that was viewed as dangerous. Augustine of Hippo is a rare example of allowing reason to influence religion.

I should note that this hostility to science was not present in Islam, and explains why the Muslim world was far ahead technologically to the Christian for a long time. It is not that the Muslims necessarily invented new things. Mostly they just translated ancient Roman and Greek text that was likewise available to the Christians, and simply reused that knowledge.

In fact christianity was far more adaptable to logic than paganism, a reason why so many philosophers converted. Popular Paganism, the one that believed in multiple gods waging wars and falling in love, was actually mocked by the intellectual elite of the Roman Empire, it has no basis whatsoever in logic or science and was regarded by noblemen and philosophers as superstition. The likes of Seneca, Horatio and etc believed in "the gods" and in some sort of divine providence, but not in what we call greco-roman mythology (even though they paid some lip service to it).

That doesn't follow. The disdain for pagan religion was already evident in Greece in the 5th century BC, but that didn't stop ancient scientists from making discoveries all the way up until the Dark Ages. The Olympian and Roman Gods had no hold over scientific progress and no restrictions.

The Christianity that embraced logic that you speak of was later, in the Middle Ages.

 

[Plotinus]

Most witch burnings happened not in the middle ages, but rather in the Renaissance, in the 1600s.

Also, during the middle ages, women were much freer than they later were in the renaissance... they were allowed to own property, have thier own professions, etc. it is only in the renaissance that stricter roles for women were enforced and insisted upon.

Exactly - that's why I put in the "Middle Ages" bit as part of the myth. In fact, witches officially didn't even exist in the Middle Ages, because the church denied the possibility of magic at all. It was only with the redefinition of witches as satanists in the Renaissance that conceptual space was made for accepting their existence in the first place.

That attitude did not (re)appear until the middle ages with theologians like Thomas Aquinas. For much of the intervening period, Christianity was openly hostile to science because it viewed it as tantamount to paganism. Even though this is undeserved, Christianity lumped philosophers, scientists, and pagan religion all into the same heap. Faith in God was seen as all that is necessary and any deviation from that was viewed as dangerous. Augustine of Hippo is a rare example of allowing reason to influence religion.

But Augustine was hardly the only rational Christian philosopher of antiquity. Obvious other examples include Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Ambrose of Milan, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and many others. Augustine is just the most famous, and indeed he took some of his best ideas from the other figures mentioned. The thought of Marius Victorinus, for example, is much more philosophically sophisticated and difficult than that of Augustine (which is why he was read only by specialists even in his day, and remains little-known now). I'm sure you know that one of the first things Augustine did after becoming a Christian was to form a sort of Christian version of Plato's Academy and retire there, with the aim of spending the rest of his life in philosophical contemplation. Why did he do that? Because, by his day, the ancient philosophical ideals had become perfectly wedded to Christian thought. This was the work of Christian thinkers before Augustine, particularly the Cappadocians and the nascent monastic figures in Egypt influenced by them. For example, Gregory of Nazianzus used the word philosophia as a technical term for Christian contemplation of God. Evagrius Ponticus used the word theoria (which Aristotle had used to mean leisurely rational contemplation) to refer to the state achieved by a Christian monk through discipline and rational study, in which he could hope to encounter God. Augustine was just part of that tradition, not some amazing one-of-a-kind rationalist in an age of anti-intellectualism. And he was moderate compared to some of them - the Origenist tradition, especially after Evagrius, was far more rationalist and intellectualist (they believed that God is a mind, and that human beings are really minds, which means that coming closer to God is a matter of learning more).

And it is false to suggest that rational theology then disappeared and didn't reappear until the thirteenth century. What of Isidore of Seville, John of Damascus, Faustus of Riez, Alcuin of York, Eriugena, Agobard of Lyon, Anselm of Canterbury, Anselm of Laon, Adelard of Bath, Peter Abelard, etc etc etc...? These people were all perfectly rational and logical (and some, such as Agobard and Adelard, were far more "rationalist" than either Augustine or Aquinas). I don't believe that anyone could be aware of the work of, say, Leontius of Byzantium or Rabanus Maurus and claim that logic and reason had no place in theology in the period between Augustine and Aquinas.

These people weren't hostile to "science" - it would be far more accurate to say that science was hardly done at all during this whole period, and didn't really impinge upon their consciousness at all. The reasons why there wasn't much science to speak of then are various, not least the fact that the scientific method simply hadn't been developed, but I see no reason to list supposed hostility from the church as one of them.

I should note that this hostility to science was not present in Islam, and explains why the Muslim world was far ahead technologically to the Christian for a long time. It is not that the Muslims necessarily invented new things. Mostly they just translated ancient Roman and Greek text that was likewise available to the Christians, and simply reused that knowledge.

In fact, the classical texts available to the Muslims, such as the writings of Aristotle and Galen, were mostly translated by Persian Christians, not by Muslims at all. In any case, if the Muslim world was technologically ahead of the Christian world during this period, I don't think this had anything to do with familiarity with ancient texts, because technology was not transmitted in texts but through practice. For example, people knew about windmills not by reading about them in books but because there were actual windmills dotted around the place, having been developed by the Romans in late imperial times.

 

[1889]

In fact, the classical texts available to the Muslims, such as the writings of Aristotle and Galen, were mostly translated by Persian Christians, not by Muslims at all. In any case, if the Muslim world was technologically ahead of the Christian world during this period, I don't think this had anything to do with familiarity with ancient texts, because technology was not transmitted in texts but through practice. For example, people knew about windmills not by reading about them in books but because there were actual windmills dotted around the place, having been developed by the Romans in late imperial times.

Good point, I think that is something often lost sight of. The technological advancement of the east was due in large part because it was relatively much more peaceful that Europe. Things like watermills, aqueducts and farms weren’t constantly pillaged.