A Reflection: The History of Thought

          In a book entitled THE SHAPING OF MODERN THOUGHT, the author Crane Brinton introduces his work with the following statement:

“This is a book about the world-views of men in our Western  
  tradition, the ideas they have held and still hold on the Big Questions
 - cosmological questions, which ask whether the universe makes
sense in terms of human  capacity to comprehend and, if so, what kind
 of sense; theological and metaphysical questions, which ask further
questions about purpose and design of the universe, and about man’s
place in it; and ethical and aesthetic questions, which ask whether
what we do and what we want to do make sense, ask what we really
mean by good and bad, by beautiful and ugly. The recorded answers
to these and similar questions - that is, most of our Western
philosophy, art, literature, theology [my addition], and in some senses,
 natural  sciences - fill millions of volumes.”

 

My point in this paper is that there is an important history of thought (ideas) which has shaped the culture in which we live, and that it has also been the medium in which Western Christianity has grown and flourished.  It is my thesis that it is critically important for the student of systematic theology to have at least a basic grasp of the history of thought. Let me put it this way: it seems to me to be important for people to have in their minds an elementary cartography (map) of Western intellectual history.

Why is this important?  Look at the times in which we are living!  In my own lifetime, I have observed an enormous shift from a strong sense of community in the 50’s to the highly individualistic and materialistic society of the 80’s and 90’s, a trend of increasing self-absorption which has continued into the 21^st century.  This shift has dramatically affected society in general and the church in particular.  American society has moved from a strong sense of the sacred to being highly secular.  A noted contemporary theologian named Douglas John Hall states flatly that, in North America, we are witnessing, what he calls: “the end of Christendom.”  It would be difficult to argue with his observation because the evidence is everywhere.  As a simple, obvious example, consider what has happened to the Christian Sabbath.  In fifty years I have seen Sunday evolve from a day of almost complete business inactivity (a day of rest) to just another day of business as usual (Sunday morning soccer leagues).  Church attendance patterns today are appalling! How do we account for these changes?  Could we find reasons for these dramatic changes in the history of thought?  I think so!  If we are to understand why we are where we are today, it is critical that we understand the history of thought which has led up to this moment. 

Since I have introduced the subject of shifts in thought, let me say at this point that it will be my contention in this brief reflective paper that enormous developments in Western culture have been preceded by dramatic shifts in the history of thought. In other words, there is a causal relationship between lived history and the history of thought!  In this paper I will mention two such moments.  My concluding emphasis will be on the Enlightenment which stirred to life c.1500 C.E and reached its height in the 18^th century. To trace these fluctuations, we need to begin at the beginning of Western Culture? 

 It is generally agreed that Greek thought is the foundation of European culture and society.  When we say “Greek thought” we are talking roughly about the fifth century B.C. (The age of Pericles (495-429 BC), the golden age of classical Greece.  The observation has been made that we had in Athens from c 480 to 380 B.C.E., “the most civilized society that has ever existed.” (The Greeks, H.D.F. Kitto, p. 96)  Both Plato and Aristotle lived within that time frame. The Greek mind in general was characterized by a sense of the wholeness of things and a firm belief in reason.  The Greeks looked through the external aspects of nature (the world of the senses) to an assumed reality and unity underneath.  They held the conviction that the universe is a logical whole.  For them, the universe was ruled by law and therefore based on reason. It was rational, simple, and knowable.  This is one reason why Greek thought is foundational to Western culture. The thought of Plato dominated Western thinking from Augustine to c.1000 AD. Then, gradually, the metaphysics of Aristotle - woven in the 13^th century by Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologia into the masterful scholastic synthesis of faith and reason - were dominant until the Enlightenment. The Greek emphasis on reason and order would powerfully re-emerge in the Enlightenment and shape the modern society we know today.

            The history of thought is an enormous subject.  What I am attempting to encourage is for students of theology to gain a basic grasp of the major influences.  One often encounters statements in theology books about subjects like the Neo-platonic influence evident in Augustine’s Confessions.  If a student is not familiar with the fact that, fundamental to Platonism & the Neo-Platonism of Plotinus, is the idea of the distinction between the changing, imperfect, and ultimately unknowable world of the senses, and the unchanging, perfect, and knowable higher spiritual world of reality (Forms or Ideas), one finds oneself at a distinct disadvantage.

The major characteristic of the classical mind was secularism.  The issue for the Greeks was the achievement of well being in the world. What must I do to be happy? They believed that human beings had the intellectual and moral capabilities to solve this problem by their own efforts. Most of us are aware that the Romans controlled the civilized West from c 100 B.C. to 450 A.D.  However, Greek philosophy was still dominant because the Romans were soldiers, administrators, and engineers, not philosophers. In the late classical period (c 4^th century A.D.., one of these major shifts in thought, mentioned earlier, was beginning to take seed.

  In the late 4^th and early 5^th centuries, obvious signs of the decay of the Roman Empire had appeared.  A sense of helplessness and world-weariness had infected society.  People’s interests turned to religion and otherworldliness.  This could be seen in Stoicism, a philosophy which emerged in the Roman Empire c. 300 A.D. This “otherworldly” trend had a strong representative in the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121-180 C.E.)  The seeds for the medieval period had been sown.  A movement from secular to sacred concerns had begun. In a vast empire that was going to pieces, it was natural for people to turn to belief in a personal Deity strong and benevolent enough to guide their affairs.  Christianity was made for success in such a world. The medieval world - a period of about 1000 years following the collapse of the Roman Empire - was the time of the hegemony (dominance) of the Christian Church. Christianity had the transcendent message the ancient world was hungry to hear! 

The second important issue which I would put before you is a brief discussion of the importance of the Enlightenment, mentioned earlier in my discussion of some aspects of Greek thought.  The Enlightenment is the name given to the development in Western thought which created what we know as the modern world.  I cannot emphasize strongly enough the importance of an understanding of Enlightenment thought.  It created the world in which we live and its influence on Christianity has been profound.

As good a date as any to pinpoint the movement from the forms of the ancient, medieval world to the modern world would be 1500 C.E. The change in world history after this date is without precedent.  It marks the beginning of the explosion of European culture. 

 

At the end of the fifteenth century, the great Age of Exploration began

for Western man.  Between the fifteenth and nineteenth centuries,
 explorersadventurers, administrators, soldiers, and emigrants moved
out physicallyacross the seas to the Americas, to Australia, into
Africa.  Meanwhile scientists, inventors, and engineers set out on a
 intellectual  form of exploration, and investigated the heavens, the
motions of the planets, the measurement of time, the laws governing
repetitive events.  The geographical New World as well as the
mechanical New World of mathematics, astronomy, physics, and
technology became accessible to exploration.  In a sense, not

only the Americas but the whole planet became a New World. 

                                                   Lewis Mumford, The Megamachine

 

Columbus sails west in 1492, which is more or less the official date for the opening of the New World.  Magellan sails around the world in 1522.  As Mumford indicates, Europeans were hungry for new ideas and new worlds to explore.  By the end of the 18^th century, they had laid claim to half the world’s land surface. There was an explosion in other areas also.  Humanism was emerging!  Michelangelo (1475-1564) and Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) were both living and painting in the late 15^th and early 16^th centuries.  There was a rediscovery of classical Greek idealism and Michelangelo’s David still stands in Florence as a visible symbol of the greatness of that rebirth.  Change was everywhere.  The Renaissance and the Reformation were two major indicators of the cataclysm which would shake the “old world” and transform it to what we now call modernity. 

The intellectual revolution which began in roughly 1500 was really quite remarkable. There was no denying the sheer power of the changes which were emerging.  They were so powerful that people were discarding ideas which had dominated society and human thought for1000 years. Humanity was shaking off the inertia of the Middle Ages and nowhere was this more evident than in the life of the mind and the authority to which it paid allegiance. The modern period of Western culture differs from the medieval in countless ways, but the two most important are the diminishing authority of the Church and the increasing authority of science (scientific method).  This shift in authority is the key concept when we talk about the difference between the old and new worlds (old and new thought).  In the medieval world, the Church had hegemony.  In the modern world, the locus of authority moved to the reasoned perceptions of individuals.  I would emphasize at this moment in the story that, while the Renaissance and the Reformation were in many respects attempts to recapture the purity of the past - the Golden age of Classical Greece and the simpler period of the early Church - the Enlightenment, with its emphasis on the ability of reason to master all knowledge, was deeply committed to a philosophy of progress and to the future. 

The first serious eruption of science was the theory advanced by Copernicus in 1543 that the earth revolved around the sun, not the opposite as was being espoused by the Church (Ptolemy & Aristotle).  Thus began the long battle between science and dogma. The opening philosophical salvo in the battle could be said to have come out of the mouth of Rene Descartes (1596-1650) who, in his search for certainly began with his famous dictum: “I think therefore I am.”   Notice the shift of the locus of knowledge; the reasoned perceptions of the individual thinker.  The two greatest figures of the Enlightenment were Englishmen: Isaac Newton (1642-1727) and John Locke (1632-1704).   Newton perfected calculus and accomplished a mathematical formulation of the relations of the planets and the law of gravity.  His work enabled people to see the physical world as a unified mechanical system which human beings could not only understand but could manipulate to their benefit (Remember the Greeks).  Newton was the father of modern physics.  In his mind, modern science was born.   

                        Nature and Nature’s Laws lay hid in Night:

                        God said, Let Newton be! And all was light.

                                                                                                Alexander Pope

Incidentally, if one would like to see a local monument to the triumph of the Enlightenment, make a visit to Shaw’s Garden (The Missouri Botanical Gardens).  Henry Shaw was born in 1800 right at the peak of confidence about Enlightenment discoveries and abilities.  These gardens are symbolic of Shaw’s confidence in the ability of human beings to understand, manage, and enjoy nature.  There is a bust of Carl Linnaeus (1707-1778) there, the individual who developed the system for the classification of plants.  There is a small obelisk near there and inscribed on the base is the following: “IN HONOR OF AMERICAN SCIENCE.” In a small building in the gardens there is a classical statue titled The Victory of Science.  Inscribed on the base of the statue are these lines:  “Ignorance is the curse of God” and “Knowledge is the wings wherewith we fly to heaven.”  That in my mind says it all.  What a wonderful Neo-Platonic, enlightenment statement!

Locke took the same critical method which Newton had used and applied it to the study of human nature and the mind.  Newton had observed that there were laws which governed nature; Locke believed that the same principles could be applied to understand human nature. In other words, nature was reasonable and thereby revealed its unity.  Once reason became dominant in human nature (released from the tyranny of the church and superstition), then true happiness could become a reality in the nature of human beings. 

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) made a reasoned enlightenment statement when he wrote The Declaration of Independence (from old world authorities: Monarchs, the Church):  “We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights by their Creator, and that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”  The American Revolution is a perfect example of the triumph of Enlightenment thought because it involved the overthrow of old, established authority and upheld ideas promoting the rights of individuals.

The dictum of the Enlightenment was that the individual should be critical of all authority until that authority has been tested by reasoned experience (scientific method). Emancipation from the authority of the Church led to the growth of individualism.  Modern philosophy is both individualistic and subjective.  I would observe that the modern problem today with which the Church is faced is getting people to accept any authority for their lives other than their own needs and wants.

The ultimatum to subject every authority to the lens of “critical reason” continues today.  This is what is called “The Enlightenment Project.”   The historical-critical study of the Bible begun in the 19^th century by German scholars and which continues today is a manifestation of Enlightenment thought. The major shift which began in the 16^th century moving society from sacred to secular concerns continues. We see this in church attendance and membership figures.  What began in c.1500 was the destruction of Christendom.  Today that process is almost complete.

Before concluding, I should point out that Enlightenment confidence about progress and human ability to manage the future was dealt a serious blow in 1914 with the beginning of WWI.  The 19^th century was relatively free of war (in Europe) and it was also a time which saw the rise of a large, prosperous middle class in both Europe and the United States.   There was so much confidence in Europe about the accomplishments of human beings that many believed and preached that the Kingdom of God had become a reality on earth.  The guns of August in 1914 shattered that illusion.  WWI merely set the stage for WWII.  Out of the horrors of the first half of the 20^th century grew the existential philosophies of despair seen particularly in the literary work of the French philosophers, Albert Camus and Jean Paul Sartre.  Now in the 21^st century, we hear considerable discussion about Post-modernism, the phrase used by many to describe the current age.  There is a great deal which could be said about this development, but a simple definition would be that Post-modernism means a rejection of objective truth, no absolutes. All linkages have been dissolved.  No culture is dominant.  No immaculate perceptions! Subjective perceptions are everything.  Do we wonder why people today are so self-centered? Consider what all this means for the Church!

Hopefully, this brief reflection has convinced you wherever your interests might lie of the necessity of acquiring a basic understanding of the history of thought in Western culture.  From the Classical Greece of 2500 years ago to the present time, human beings have struggled to find basic principles to help them to understand the universe and their place in it.  They have struggled with cosmology: the form, harmony, and order of things.  (Cosmos is the opposite of chaos.)  In theology, we attempt to do the same thing.  We struggle with cosmology by crafting statements about what we believe the true reality of the universe to be - God centered! - in order to bring clarity, consistency, and system to our beliefs.

I will leave you with these observations: the ancient world found an end to anarchy (chaos) in the Roman Empire; the medieval world found an end to societal anarchy in the Church; the modern world has looked to reason and the autonomy of the individual (the Enlightenment) to lead it to the end of the intellectual darkness of the medieval period.  How successful has the Enlightenment project been? 

 

            At the beginning of the modern period the Thomistic synthesis was

            challenged by the new scientific methodology, along with a number

            of other developments which together comprise what we call the

            Renaissance and Reformation – just as, much earlier, the Greek 
            view succumbed under the impact of Christianity.  While few people

            today would be wholly satisfied with a simple return to either
            Thomas or to the Greeks, it would be absurd to ignore them. The  
            great modern problem, is how to do for modern man what Thomas
            did for medieval man; but to do this requires a study of history; and
            once again we have  evidence of the contemporary utility of
            historical study.

                                                            W. T. Jones

                                                            A History of Western Philosophy