Dr. Vess's World Civilization Virtual Library

The Twelfth Century Renaissance and Medieval Scholasticism

OBJECTIVES



1.  Be able to trace the monastic reform movement from Cluny

thought the thirteenth century mendicant movement.



2.  Be able to discuss the major achievements of the Cistercians

and of Bernard of Clairvaux.



3.  Be able to discuss the major characteristics of the twelfth

century renaissance and its major achievements, citing specific

works and authors to support your discussion.



4.  Be able to discuss the important achievements of the scholastic

movement, and its impact on the modern world.



FOOD FOR THOUGHT



Does the modern west still believe in the harmony of reason and

faith?  If so, why?  If not, why not?  



Why has science seemed to distance us from the realm of faith?





Were the scholastics at odds with science?  Would the twelfth

century scholastics have expected scientific arguments to pose

problems for the life of faith?



Here again, come to grips with the term "renaissance."  Is it

applied to the twelfth century in the same way as it was to the

Carolingian Age?  Why or why not?



     The humanist Francesco Petrarca referred to the Middle Ages as

the "Dark Ages, "  implying that the Age of Faith was a vast period

of intellectual darkness, in which nothing or little of note

occurred.  The term "Middle Ages" itself suggests that this 1000

year period was simply an era in between tow other great eras, the

world of Greco-Roman antiquity and its glorious revival in the

Italian renaissance.  Yet an examination of the scholastic movement

suggests that this view is far from the mark, for the scholastics

were among the last to harmonize the transcendent world of faith

with the immanent world of science and human reason.  For them, the

realm of faith, though mysterious, was approachable by the human

mind made in the image of God.  The world of science carried the

imprint of the truths of revelation and the proof of God's

existence.  For these medieval thinkers, the universe, whether that

of humans or of God, was a harmonious whole.  One hallmark of the

modern era has been to fragment this world view, and to separate

the world of human reason from the realm of faith.  The medieval

era thus emerges as the last great era to unite the mind of humans

with the hand of God.  It was the achievement of the medievals to

provide a foundation for the rational explorations of modern

humanity. 



Consider the following "scholastic" dichotomies between reason's

search for the Absolute and the beautiful heart-felt faith

experienced through love of nature of St.  Francis and St. 

Bernard:





Pro:

     God is that, the greater than which cannot be conceived.

               St.  Anselm, Proslogion



     Reason in man is rather like God in the world.

               St.  Thomas Aquinas, Opuscule 11, De Regno



et contra: (or are they????)



     You will find something more in woods than in books.  Trees

     and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from

     masters.            

          St.  Bernard of Clairvaux, Epistola 106.





     Praise to thee, my Lord, for all thy creatures,

     Above all Brother Sun

     Who brings us the day and lends us his light.

               St.  Francis of Assisi, The Song of Brother Sun and

               of all his Creatures



     I have sinned against my brother the ass.

               dying words



attributed to St.  Francis:



     Lord,

     Make me an instrument of Your 

          peace.

     Where there is hatred let me sow 

          love;

     Where there is injury, pardon;

     Where there is doubt, faith;

     Where there is despair, hope;

     Where there is darkness, light; and

     Where there is sadness, joy;

     O divine Master,

     grant that I may not so much

     Seek to be consoled as to console;

     To be understood as to understand;

     To be loved as to love;

     For it is in giving that we receive;

     It is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and

     It is in dying that we are born to eternal 

          life.



                  OUTLINE





I.  The Monastic Reform Movement of the Twelfth Century

     A.  The Cistercians:

          i.  Robert of Molesme and Citeaux 1098

          ii.  the Cistercian Carta Caritatis

               a) the structure of the Cistercian order:

                    i) definition of "order"

               b) the role of Citeaux

               c) the visitations and the General Council   

          iii.  the daughter houses

               a) Bernard of Clairvaux

          iv.  the achievement of Citeaux

               a) the reform of the liturgy and the novitiate and

                    other monastic practices

               b) agriculture and animal husbandry in England and

                    on the continent

               c) the mystical theology of St.  Bernard and William

               of St.  Thierry

     B.  Other "new Orders":

          i. The Premonstratensians

          ii. The Carthusians

          iii. Stephen of Grandmont

          iv. The Waldensians



     C. Subsequent monastic reforms of the thirteenth century:



          i. the new ideals of St.  Francis of Assisi and The

               Dominicans               

          ii. the mendicants

          iii. poverty





     D.  The Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 



          i.  the problem of new orders

          ii.  clerical celibacy

          iii.  simony and other problems



II. The Twelfth Century Renaissance

     A.  Hildegard of Bingen and Elizabeth of Schonau

     B.  Peter Abailard and the Cathedral Schools

          i.  scholasticism

               a) Sic et non and the dialectical method

          ii.  the Scito te ipsum (Ethics)        

                    "know thyself"

                    a) his concept of sin

                    b) the "discovery of the individual" in the

                         twelfth century

          iii.  Abailard and Bernard: Sens 1140



     C.  Other aspects of change in the twelfth century:



          i.  the cult of the Virgin Mary

          ii.  the new portrayal of the crucifixion

          iii.  the new vernacular literatures

               a) Chretien de Troyes and the Arthurian sagas

                b) Bulfinch's Legends of King Arthur

III.  The Achievement of the Middle Ages:

     A.  The Synthesis of Faith and Reason:

           i. Thomas Aquinas            

     B.  The Legacy of the Scholastics:

          ii. Galileo, Newton and the Scientific Revolution