Customer Reviews

The Scholastic Culture of the Middle Ages, 1000-1300

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a basic introduction to this historical era at the undergraduate level.

The author starts with an explanation of the political context, the time when in England and France strong monarchs are consolidating power, creating stability and thereby an age of unprecedented prosperity in which far larger urban centers arose. These were the preconditions for an intellectual and artistic flowering known as the scholastic and Gothic age, and they were lost after the crises after 1300 (plague, economic decline).

Regarding the intellectual endeavor of the period, I was a bit disappointed in his coverage. I was looking for how the scholastics extended the philosophy of Aristotle's logic in a much more systematic manner, which arguably forms the basis of modern science: discovery and hypothesis, checking against the observations of colleagues (including the incorporation of their criticism), and then recording their conclusions in a definitive text that is accepted and later modified in light of new discoveries. Perhaps the most well developed example of this was Aquinis' Summa Theologica, which amoung other things attempted to logically reconcile every single reference in teh Bible. While Baldwin did describe the development of these methods for theology and law in this period, I was hoping for much more detail, which is why I got the book. The achievement was huge, and an invaluable intellectual precursor of the Renaissance and Enlightenment rather than an approach to be discarded as silly verbiage (the common image of counting angels on the head of a pin).

Baldwin does explain the conflict betweeen faith and reason that was one of the principal issues of the time - was God the primary source of everything, a supposition to remain unquestioned? Or could truth also be reached independently of God by logic and grammatical analysis? However, Baldwin does not offer enough, at least for me, on the limits that the scholastics came up against, i.e. that their long disputations were not sufficiently moored to real-world observation, but instead continued to rely on divine revelation in the Bible for final, irrefutable, proof as well as the authorities of antiquity (Augustine, Aristotle, Verroes, etc.) for the last word. But their mode of reasoning was well applied by later intellectuals in science, who added more stringent standards for verification that were not ultimately dependent on faith. (If any reader has a suggestion on where to find that in greater depth, I would love to hear from them - see e-address in my profile!)

Baldwin also covers the art of the time, Gothic cathedrals and their sculptures and windows. This too is somewhat light, but very interesting nonetheless. He sees the cathedrals as an integral part of the impulse to instruction and illumination of the times. He also gives the context from which the cathedrals sprung, i.e. comparing their differences from Romanesque churches and what they meant. Some detail is added on the architectural innovations of the period, in the flying buttress and vaulted arches, but again it is very light.

While I was hungry for more detail, this is indeed a splendid and clear introduction, expertly and elegantly written. Recommended with enthusiasm.

The book is a good introduction to learning, art, architecture, and the Catholic achievement in the "High Middle Ages." What is impressive with this book is that John W. Baldwin informs the reader of so much in a small book.

The best section of the book is Baldwin's discussion of teaching and learning during the Middle Ages. He introduces the reader to conditions under which students had to study. The book gives the reader an insight to spirited debates between students and masters.

The sections on the Scholastic scholars such as Peter Abelard, Peter Lombard and esepecially St. Thomas Aquineas are among the best this writer has ever read. Baldwin effectively explains how these men tried to build the "Church Intellectual" by using speculative philosophy and logical reasoning. The chapter titled Theology: Queen of the Faculties is a lucid explantion of the methodology used by these men to reconcile problems and apparent differences that the study of theology presented to very serious Catholics and serious men who could think.

This writer was also impressed with the chapter on Medieval architecture. The explanations of the transition from Romanesque to Gothoic architecture are imformative.

John W. Baldwin's THE SCHOLASTIC CULTURE OF THE MIDDLE AGES, 1000-1300 compares favorably with Henry Adams' MONT SAINT MICHEL AND CHARTRE. This book is that good. Balwin's book would obviously be useful in Western Civilization courses. It is so well written that graduate students and serious Catholics could learn from this book. This is a small book, but the research and clear writing style make this book very informative. This writer highly recommends this book.

Baldwin's text is a highly condensed, summative description of the educational processes at work in the Universities of medieval Europe, with particular focus on that famous educational movement we call "Scholasticism." At only slightly over 100 pages, the text can in no way serve as a definitive reference on the subject, but is rather designed to serve as a summary and introduction to the topic for those wishing such a treatment.

The strength of this book lays in the opening chapters, where the author provides an excellent, detailed summary of the historical setting in which Scholasticism arose. This introduction contains a vast amount of information all packed down into a handful of pages, but although the stated purpose of the introduction is to orient newcomers to the topic, in all honesty, those without a background in medieval political and religious history may find the read difficult to master. For those with some background, these opening chapters provide a marvelous introduction to the topic, with the content so detailed and yet summarized that the writing could be used in practically any medieval history course. Baldwin not only knows a great deal about his subject, but also has a knack for presenting all that knowledge in a highly condensed manner.

The remaining chapters of the text cover Scholasticism proper, and comprise the bulk of the volume. Baldwin includes chapters on "Schools and Universities," "Art, Medicine, and Law," "Theology," and an ending summary on "Gothic Art." The chapters containing good introductory information, and anyone wishing to build on this foundation with much greater depth should move onto more detailed works, such as A History of the University in Europe: Volume 1, Universities in the Middle Ages (Vol 1).

An excellent introduction to the topic (and don't miss those first two chapters if you are interested in any aspect of medieval Europe), Baldwin's work is an interesting and beneficial read.

Positive Qualities --- This book does have a lot of interesting information for the time period it talks about.

Negative Qualities --- There is no organization to the chapters (if thats what you want to call them) of any kind!!! It's hard to understand everything that happened within these 300 years when the author goes from talking about 1250 to 1113 and back to 1270 within 2 paragraphs. It's also hard to keep track of what year each event happened in. Then he goes from talking about one specific person to talk about a whole new person, but 4 pages later drops the new person and returns to the other person again for a few more pages... NO ORGANIZATION OF ANY KIND!!!

I was hanging out with my parents a couple of weekend's ago, and they asked, "Who do you talk about these history books with?" And I was like, "nobody." I literally don't have a single friend or acquaintence remotely interested in the subject of the history of the middle ages. No one. IN fact, I don't thing I've ever met a... midevialist? I guess that's why I like to review these books on line. It's really the only chance I get to write about them, let alone talk about them.

I picked up "The Scholastic Culture of the Middle Ages" because it's a topic I'm interested in. I find the university/monk culture of the middle ages to be both foreign and familiar. Sometimes I kind of sort of fantasize about being a monk- even though I'm jewish. Ha ha.

Baldwin writes a clean, concise summary of the subject that is accesible to anyone with a college degree. It's only 120 pages, with a list of books for further reading. Baldwin lays out the political scene (increadingly effective central authority), the setting (Paris, basically), the organization of the schools themselves and then spends a couple chapters on the cirriculum, emphasizing the impact that the discovery of Aristotle's full program of logic and philosophy in the 13th century (via the muslims).

Attempts to reconsile faith and reason occupied the best scholars of this period and their best representative was Thomas Aquinas. Scholasticism was a fairly rigorous style of intellectual inquiry and I could read more about it, though I felt the last chapter of this book- which delved into gothic architecture and style was kind of a bummer and unnecessary.