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Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Middle Ages by [Richard E. Rubenstein]

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Richard E. Rubenstein

Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Middle Ages 1st Edition, Kindle Edition

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A true account of a turning point in medieval history that shaped the modern world, from “a superb storyteller” and the author of When Jesus Became God (Los Angeles Times).

Europe was in the long slumber of the Middle Ages, the Roman Empire was in tatters, and the Greek language was all but forgotten—until a group of twelfth-century scholars rediscovered and translated the works of Aristotle.

The philosopher’s ideas spread like wildfire across Europe, offering the scientific view that the natural world, including the soul of man, was a proper subject of study. The rediscovery of these ancient ideas would spark riots and heresy trials, cause major upheavals in the Catholic Church—and also set the stage for today’s rift between reason and religion.

Aristotle’s Children transports us back to this pivotal moment in world history, rendering the controversies of the Middle Ages lively and accessible, and allowing us to understand the philosophical ideas that are fundamental to modern thought.

“A superb storyteller who breathes new life into such fascinating figures as Peter Abelard, Albertus Magnus, St. Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, William of Ockham and Aristotle himself.” —Los Angeles Times

“Rubenstein’s lively prose, his lucid insights and his crystal-clear historical analyses make this a first-rate study in the history of ideas.” —Publishers Weekly

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978-0156030090
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1st
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Mariner Books
Publication date

September 20, 2004
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English
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In 12th-century Toledo, in Spain, a group of Christian monks, Jewish sages and Muslim teachers gathered to study a new translation of Aristotle's De Anima (On the Soul). In Rubenstein's dazzling historical narrative, this moment represents both the tremendous influence of Aristotle on these three religions and the culmination of the medieval rediscovery of his writings. In the fourth century B.C., Aristotle fashioned a new system of philosophy, focusing on the material world, whose operations he explained by a series of causes. As Rubenstein (When Jesus Became God) explains, in the second and third centuries A.D., Western Christian scholars suppressed Aristotle's teachings, believing that his emphasis on reason and the physical world challenged their doctrines of faith and God's supernatural power. By the seventh century, Muslims had begun to discover Aristotle's writings. Islamic thinkers such as Avicenna and Averroes, in the 11th and 12 centuries, embraced Aristotle's rationalist philosophy and principles of logic. Christian theologians rediscovered Aristotle through the commentaries of the monk Boethius, who argued in the sixth century that reason and understanding were essential elements of faith. There resulted a tremendous ferment in the study of Aristotle in the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, culminating in the work of Thomas Aquinas, who used Aristotle's notion of an Unmoved Mover and First Cause to construct his arguments for God's existence. Aquinas, too, argued that reason was a necessary component of faith's ability to understand God and the world. Although the book purports to trace Aristotle's influence on Christianity, Islam and Judaism, it devotes more attention to Christianity. Even so, Rubenstein's lively prose, his lucid insights and his crystal-clear historical analyses make this a first-rate study in the history of ideas.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Review

PRAISE FOR ARISTOTLE'S CHILDREN
"A superb storyteller who breathes new life into such fascinating figures as Peter Abelard, Albertus Magnus, St. Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, William of Ockham and Aristotle himself." -Los Angeles Times

"[An] accomplished, entertaining history of ideas." (Alibi )

"Anyone who wants to understand where we are going in the great political struggles over religion, read this amazing story." (Marc Gopin author of Holy War: Holy Peace: How Religion Can Bring Peace to the Middle East )

"Christianity's 'rediscovery' of Aristotle through Muslim Spain...challenges generations today to reclaim the interrelatedness of reason, science and religion." (John L. Esposito author of What Everyone Needs to Know About Islam )

"With a lively, engaging style, ARISTOTLE'S CHILDREN is a remarkable book that illuminates the long-standing relations between faith and reason." (Edward Grant Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Indiana University )

"Relevant and captivating." (R. Scott Appleby Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame )

"An intellectual thriller. The real-life adventure of how the great thinker was found again… told with zest and excitement." (Jack Miles Pulitzer Prize-winning author of God: A Biography )

"A compelling account of how the rediscovery of Aristotle changed the way the Western world looked at humans, God, nature." (School Library Journal )

"Stimulating and thought-provoking reading, overturning caricatures of scholastic philosophy while suggesting how its insights can be applied to the present." (The Christian Century ) --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

CHAPTER ONE

"The Master of Those Who Know"

ARISTOTLE REDISCOVERED

IT IS HARD NOT TO think of twelfth-century Spain as a scholar's paradise. The picture that comes to mind is that of a broad table, well lit by candles, on which are spread out dozens of manuscripts written in Syriac, Aramaic, Arabic, Hebrew, and Greek. Around the table, poring over the manuscripts, taking notes, or conversing animatedly, are bearded Jews, tonsured Christian monks, turbaned Muslims, and dark-haired Greeks. The setting is Toledo, a Spanish city long ruled by Islamic authorities but now under Christian control. The table occupies the center of a hall in the city's cathedral, whose archbishop, Raymund I, stands to one side, benevolently watching the polyglot scholars at their work. In his own hands, he holds a book written in Latin-apparently a Catholic missal or one of Saint Augustine's works. But close examination reveals its distinctly non-Christian authorship. The book that the archbishop holds so carefully, as if he were afraid it might once again disappear, is a new translation of De Anima-Aristotle's lost book on the soul.

How was this famous work-along with the rest of the Aristotelian corpus-rediscovered? The story really begins in the tenth century, when Christian knights launched the Reconquista (Reconquest)-a lengthy, on-again, off-again struggle to reclaim the Iberian Peninsula from the Muslims who had ruled it for more than three hundred years. The Christians would not drive the Muslims out of Spain altogether until the fall of Grenada in 1492, but by 1100, great centers of Islamic culture like Toledo and Lisbon were already under their control. The very length of this campaign, and the fact that the cities and peoples conquered were among the most civilized on earth, made it more "a work of co-penetration and synthesis" than a simple military crusade. One commentator justly calls it "a long-term, sensible, humane, even liberal process of fusion between different faiths and races, which does great honour to the people of medieval Spain and Portugal."1

In a way, the Reconquest resembled the "barbarian" takeover of Rome centuries earlier, for the society that the conquerors acquired was far more developed than their own. While Europe was just emerging from centuries of poverty and social strife, Muslim Spain-al Andalus, as the Arabs called it-was a land long enriched by international trade, brilliant artisanship, and a highly productive agriculture. The kingdom's rulers were literate men, heirs of the Roman tradition of rational-legal bureaucracy, and generous patrons of scholarship and the arts. Its world-famous poets anticipated and probably inspired the love songs of the troubadours. Its intellectuals were admired for their achievements in law, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, and the natural sciences, as well as chemistry, metallurgy, and the practical arts. At a time when learning in Europe was confined to a few monasteries and church schools, the scholars of al Andalus taught in publicly supported universities and did research in well-stocked libraries. In an era when most Christian healers were still brewing herbs and casting spells, Muslim and Jewish physicians practiced something akin to scientific medicine.2

As in other Muslim kingdoms, the authorities had permitted these secular activities to flourish, so long as they kept their distance from the mosque. And they had encouraged non-Muslims-Jews, in particular-to play significant roles in the kingdom's politics, trade, and intellectual life, on the sole condition that they pay the "minorities tax" and recognize the Islamic majority's supremacy. As a result, Spain's Christian invaders found themselves mixing with well-established, highly cultured Muslim and Jewish communities. This situation was to have fateful consequences for the future development of European thinking, for behind Christendom's armed knights marched its clergy-at this point, Europe's only literate class-and what they found in Spain left them astonished and perplexed. Not only were cities like Toledo and Cordoba clean and well-ordered; not only was life softened and beautified by fountains, flowers, music, and an architecture as imaginative as Europe's was stolid; not only did the Arabs live at peace with a bewildering assortment of minority communities, but scholarship flourished as in some dream of ancient Athens or Alexandria. One can only imagine what it must have been like for dazzled Christian churchmen to talk with Muslim and Jewish scholars about philosophical and religious issues that their coreligionists had been exploring with great insight and sophistication for the last three hundred years.

There was a religious rationale, of course, for studying the philosophy and science of the Arabs. In order to defend the faith and convert the unconverted, one had to know their language and thinking. Still, defensive strategy alone cannot explain the Christians' fascination with Muslim culture. How had the former horsemen of the Arabian Peninsula managed to develop such remarkable competence in science and philosophy? What were the sources of their wisdom? It had long been rumored that they were in possession of ancient documents long lost to the Latin West-priceless treasures of esoteric or forgotten knowledge. But the reality was more fantastic than anyone had imagined. Almost as soon as they began to talk with local scholars, inquisitive Christians discovered that the Muslims and Jews had long ago translated virtually every important work of Greek learning (as well as monuments of ancient Persian and Indian culture) into Arabic. Not only that, they had commented extensively on Aristotle, Plato, and the Greek scientists, and reinterpreted classical thinking in the light of their own commitment to monotheism.

Clearly the Muslims were creative thinkers in their own right. Their cultural achievements were the pride of Moorish Spain. But the warrior-kings who, centuries earlier, had conquered the great centers of classical learning in Syria, Egypt, and Mesopotamia had given them a head start by acquiring their subjects' cultural treasures along with their lands. Al-Kindi, the ninth-century founder of Muslim philosophy, acknowledged his people's debt to the Greeks. Without them, he wrote, "it would have been impossible for us, despite all our zeal, during the whole of our lifetime, to assemble these principles of truth which form the basis of the final inferences of our research." He also described the Arab scholars' method, which was "first to record in complete quotations all that the Ancients have said on the subject, secondly to complete what the Ancients have not fully expressed, and this according to the usage of our Arabic language, the customs of our age, and our own ability."3 This bold attempt to "complete" the work of the Greeks permitted al-Kindi and his successors to adapt classical ideas to the requirements of contemporary Muslim civilization. For the next three centuries, the Arab philosophy movement (falsafah) generated works of great originality by thinkers like al-Farabi, the founder of Muslim Neoplatonism; the Jewish mystic, Ibn Gabirol (Avicebron, to Latin-speakers); the brilliant Persian, Ibn Sina (Avicenna); Moses Maimonides of Cordoba, the Jewish sage; and his fellow Cordoban, the boldest of all commentators on Aristotle, Ibn Rushd (Averroës).

All these authors' writings could be found in the libraries of Toledo, Lisbon, Segovia, and Cordoba...and so could their original sources. There, to their amazement, Spain's new masters found Arabic translations of books that Europeans had long talked about but never read-legendary works like Ptolemy's Almagest, the lost key to astronomy and astrology. In one library, Muslim physicians could be seen consulting Galen's On the Art of Healing and On Anatomical Procedures, the first scientific medical textbooks. In another, mathematicians perused Euclid's Elements of Geometry and Archimedes' treatises on mathematical engineering, unread in the West for the past seven hundred years. Most remarkably, the Christian scholar-priests discovered that their new subjects were in possession of the vast corpus of Aristotle's works-not just the few books on logic that a sixth-century scholar named Boethius had translated into Latin but the mother lode. Here, in Arabic translation, were the Greek sage's great essay on the philosophy of Being, Metaphysics, and his treatises on methods of reasoning and the divisions of knowledge. Here were his scientific masterpieces: Physics, On the Heavens, History of Animals, and On Generation and Corruption. And here (one can imagine Archbishop Raymund gasping with wonder as the manuscripts were placed in his hands) were Aristotle's world-famous treatise on the soul, De Anima; his Nicomachean Ethics; and his Politics. Even mystical vision was represented by Theology of Aristotle and Book of Causes, works thought to have been written by the Peripatetic master, but actually produced by later Neoplatonists.

Taken together, these books represent the most important documentary discovery (or "rediscovery") in Western intellectual history. One historian calls the recovery of Aristotle's works "a turning point in the history of Western thought...paralleled only by the later impact of Newtonian science and Darwinism."4 If the spirit of inquiry in Europe had not already begun to flower, the discovery's true significance might not have been recognized. But by the mid-twelfth century, Christian thinkers were already displaying a new interest in natural processes, human reason, and the natural world's relationship to a supernaturally creative, powerful, just, and omniscient God. That is, they had already begun to ask the questions to which Aristotle and his Arab interpreters offered answers: How does the natural universe work? Did it have a beginning in time, or is it co-eternal with God? Does nature obey certain laws? If so, how can humans exercise free will? What does it mean to say that our individual souls are immortal? The unexpected, almost miraculous appearance of anci... --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From the Inside Flap

This book documents the intellectual explosion that transformed Europe in the Middle Ages and follows a set of ideas as they course through the West. These ideas triggered student riots and heresy trials, prompted Pope Innocent III to recognize the Franciscan and Dominican orders, and set the stage for today's rift between reason and religion.

The ideas came from Aristotle. His work, like the rest of Greek culture, had been lost in the centuries after the fall of Rome, when the Greek language was forgotten. But in the Muslim world, the wisdom of the Greeks was never lost and contributed to the flowering of Islamic culture.

Then in the twelfth century in Toledo, Spain, groups of Muslim, Christian, and Jewish scholars collaborated on translating the ancient classics; and ideas long forgotten galvanized Europe, turning Western thinking away from the supernatural world and toward the world of nature. With their optimistic view of human nature, these ideas sparked fierce controversies in the universities and caused major changes in the Catholic Church.

Rubenstein, author of When Jesus Became God, takes the reader back in time, to the translation center in Toledo and to the great universities in Paris, Padua, and Oxford. He shows how the Catholic Church adopted these new ideas and struggled to reconcile science and religion and how Western thinking was set on the path it has followed ever since.

This is a feast for readers who are fascinated by medieval history, and a treat for all who want to understand the ideas that are fundamental to modern thought.
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Review

"An intellectual thriller. The real-life adventure of how the great thinker was found again… told with zest and excitement." (Jack Miles Pulitzer Prize-winning author of God: A Biography)

"With a lively, engaging style, ARISTOTLE''S CHILDREN is a remarkable book that illuminates the long-standing relations between faith and reason." (Edward Grant Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Indiana University)

"Anyone who wants to understand where we are going in the great political struggles over religion, read this amazing story." (Marc Gopin author of Holy War: Holy Peace: How Religion Can Bring Peace to the Middle East)

"Christianity''s ''rediscovery'' of Aristotle through Muslim Spain...challenges generations today to reclaim the interrelatedness of reason, science and religion." (John L. Esposito author of What Everyone Needs to Know About Islam)

"Relevant and captivating." (R. Scott Appleby Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame)

"A compelling account of how the rediscovery of Aristotle changed the way the Western world looked at humans, God, nature." (School Library Journal)

"[An] accomplished, entertaining history of ideas." (Alibi) --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

About the Author

Professor of Conflict Resolution and Public Affairs at George Mason University, Richard Rubenstein is an expert on religious conflict in both its historical and modern manifestations. He has appeared on many talk shows in the aftermath of the September events. A graduate of Harvard University and Harvard Law School, he was a Rhodes Scholar and studied at Oxford University. He lives in Fairfax, Virginia. His most recent Harcourt book , WHEN JESUS BECAME GOD, was a Publishers Weekly top religion book and also honored by the ALA.
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From the Back Cover

"A superb storyteller who breathes new life into such fascinating figures as Peter Abelard, Albertus Magnus, St. Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, William of Ockham and Aristotle himself." --Los Angeles Times

The intellectual explosion that transformed Europe in the Middle Ages and coursed through the Western world, triggered student riots and heresy trials, and set the stage for today's rift between reason and religion. The ideas came from Aristotle. His work, like the rest of Greek culture, had been lost in the centuries after the fall of Rome, when the Greek language was forgotten. But in the Muslim world, the wisdom of the Greeks was never lost and contributed to the flowering of Islamic culture.

When scholars in the twelfth century collaborated on translating the ancient classics, they resurrected ideas that turned Western thinking away from the supernatural world and toward the world of nature. With their optimistic view of human nature, these ideas sparked fierce controversies in the universities and caused major changes in the Catholic Church. Rubenstein shows how the Church adopted these new ideas and struggled to reconcile science and religion and how Western thinking was set on the path it has followed ever since.

This is a feast for readers who are fascinated by medieval history, and a treat for all who want to understand the ideas that are fundamental to modern thought.

Richard E. Rubenstein, a professor of conflict resolution and public affairs at George Mason University, is the author of When Jesus Became God, a Publishers Weekly Best Religion Book. A graduate of Harvard College, Oxford University (Rhodes Scholar), and Harvard Law School, he lives in Fairfax, Virginia.
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From School Library Journal

Adult/High School--This is a challenging, intricate book for mature students who are fascinated by the paradox of the Middle Ages: How was the knowledge of Greece and Rome lost, and how was it found again? To set the scene, Rubenstein provides an introduction to the lives and works of Plato and Aristotle, and to the collapse of the Roman Empire in the West. He then shifts his focus to the year 1136, when a group of Muslim, Jewish, and Christian scholars working together in Toledo began translating the philosopher's forgotten works. The dissemination of those translations sent shock waves through Europe as religious leaders tried to reconcile Aristotle's scientific theories with Church doctrine. The struggles between secular rulers and the Church hierarchy, and the development of the medieval universities, are presented with rich detail and feeling. The author shows readers the similarities between those conflicts and the Darwinist/creationist clashes. Students researching topics on the Middle Ages will find this title a useful reference source. Multiple pages are devoted to the lives and works of important figures, such as Abelard, Aquinas, and Innocent II, but the author does not neglect the less well known, such as William of Ockham or Siger de Brambant. Religious orders, heretical movements, and philosophical works are equally well covered. This is a compelling account of how the rediscovery of the writings of Aristotle changed the way the Western world looked at humans, God, and nature.--Kathy Tewell, Chantilly Regional Library, VA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Book Description

Published in hardcover by Harcourt, 2003, 0-15-100720-9
--This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* In today's sterile disputes between dogmatic religionists and chop-logic rationalists, political scientist Rubenstein sees evidence of cultural amnesia: we have forgotten how the Aristotelian thinkers of the late middle ages once reconciled faith with reason. To reverse this amnesia, Rubenstein resurrects the complex personalities who first delved into the treasure trove of Aristotelian manuscripts made available to European scholars by the Spanish reconquest of Toledo in the late fifteenth century. Without wearying general readers with excessive detail, Rubenstein chronicles the daring work that reshaped Aristotelian philosophy into a cogent Catholic synthesis of metaphysics, morality, and science--a synthesis dispelling the doubts of the pious and silencing the sophistry of the heretic. But the Christian-Aristotelian synthesis proved volatile: a canny historical sleuth, Rubenstein exposes the political calculations behind papal strategies for managing the Aristotelian revolution, and he probes the private ambitions of the incendiary scholars who subverted or defied these strategies. Rubenstein mourns the eclipse of Aristotle and the consequent divorce of religion and reason, which he blames for the vacuity of modern debates that pit superstition against desiccation. Perhaps like manuscripts recovered long ago in Toledo, Rubenstein's book will rekindle interest in a thinker who promises wholeness. Bryce Christensen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From Library Journal

Rubinstein's background as a professor of conflict resolution must have come in handy as he was crafting this tale of one of history's biggest conflagrations: the introduction of Aristotle's philosophy to the Churchbound Europe of the Middle Ages.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B003KK5DPO
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Mariner Books; 1st edition (September 20, 2004)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 20, 2004
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 1145 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 389 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #384,153 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #152 in History & Surveys of Philosophy
- #292 in Religious Studies - History
- #337 in History of Medieval Europe

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Clay Garner

“Meeting the great scholastics and reliving their stormy debates proved an unexpectedly moving and absorbing experience”

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 18, 2017

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“The historical materials seemed to contradict much of what I had been taught to believe about the emergence of the modern world from medieval backwardness. I knew—or thought I knew—that the High Middle Ages in Europe was an era of passionate religious faith and the bloody Crusades, inquisitorial terror, and fierce doctrinal dogmatism. I knew—or thought I knew—that Aristotle was the Father of Science, a thinker who believed that human reason, not tradition, revelation, or sentiment, could uncover objective truths about the universe.’’

Everyone knows this! So . . .

“Naturally, in bringing these volatile extremes together, I expected an explosion. The Aristotelian Revolution would no doubt be a drama like Galileo versus the Inquisition or Charles Darwin versus the Creationists: an earlier version of the modern morality play in which brave Reason suffers at the hands of villainous Superstition before triumphing in the sunny dawn of Science.’’

Religion and science are always, and always have been, irreconcilable, at war, and science has won!

“Wrong!’’ What???

“The story I found myself telling was far more complex and interesting than this stock scenario. . . . European Christians did not split into “rationalist” and “fundamentalist” camps, as I had expected. In a way that violated all of my modernist preconceptions, the leading force for transformative change in Western thinking turned out to be the leadership of the Catholic Church.’’

Why did these churchmen choose this path? How was this done?

“Rather than choose between the new learning and the old religion, the popes and scholars of the High Middle Ages tried to modernize the Church by reconciling faith and reason. This Herculean task generated one of the richest, most searching debates in Western history—a battle of innovative thinkers whose discussions ranged over a vast spectrum of disputed issues, from the nature of scientific knowledge and the basic structures of mind and matter to the hope of immortality, the problem of evil, the sources of moral value, and the basic criteria for living a good life.’’

Does this have any connection to our present - technological, intellectual, age? Haven’t we passed those - ignorant, unscientific, religious nuts?

“Meeting the great scholastics and reliving their stormy debates proved an unexpectedly moving and absorbing experience—so much so, that my friends and students claimed that I had “disappeared” into the Middle Ages. But it was not really an escape from the present, since the concerns of these medieval thinkers resonate so sonorously with ours.’’

‘Resonates with us’! This does not. . .sound. . .right!

“The civilization that we call modern, with its split between the cultures of the heart and the head, its sanctification of power, “privatization” of religion, and commodification of values, emerged out of a very different past, and is in the process of evolving toward a very different future.’’

Rubenstein returns later to these ‘modern’ beliefs - ‘sanctification of power’, etc.. Amazing insight!

“Late in the writing process, it dawned on me that this might account for the studied indifference that has all but erased the Aristotelian Revolution from our historical memory. Such blank spots are often the result of the semiconscious neglect reserved for stories that run counter to generally accepted notions of who we are as a people, and how we got that way. Even though they relate to events that happened long, long ago, these contrary tales still have an unsettling capacity to “rock the boat.’’’

Yes, Rubenstein’s explanation can ‘rock our boat’.

The Medieval Star-Gate
“The Master of Those Who Know”
The Murder of “Lady Philosophy”
“His Books Have Wings”
“He Who Strikes You Dead Will Earn a Blessing”
“Hark, Hark, the Dogs Do Bark”
“This Man Understands”
“Ockham’s Razor”
“God Does Not Have to Move These Circles Anymore”

Conclusion . . .

“Propaganda that bombards us unremittingly is the message that we live in the age of science—a time when the methods of inquiry, modes of argument, and standards of proof used by “hard” scientists have become virtually universal, and all objective knowledge (as opposed to merely subjective belief) rests on an appeal to reason.’’

Who can deny it? Nevertheless, is ‘science’ really just a new religion?

“The origin myth of modern science tells us that this era was born out of the scientists’ struggle against dogmatic, obscurantist religion, and that its result was the replacement of faith by reason, at least in the sphere of public discourse. As one commentator puts it, “Science replaced religion as preeminent intellectual authority, as definer, judge, and guardian of the cultural world view.”’

‘Origin myth’?

“But, in a way not generally recognized, modern science was also forced to redefine itself. Scientific rationalism emerged from the wreckage of scholasticism strengthened in technique but greatly impoverished in scope—unable to command the fields of metaphysics, ethics, and politics as Aristotle had done; unable to answer the “why” questions about the universe that his doctrine of “final causes” had supplied; and unable to encompass philosophical issues like the eternity and intelligibility of the universe. Certain of these fields—metaphysics and theology, in particular—were left to be dealt with privately by people in their individual capacities. But others, including ethics, politics, and social relations, fell into a no-man’s-land claimed by both sides. The result has been continued conflict of a sort unforeseen by the celebrants of scientific “preeminence.’’’

Science is ‘unable to cope’, ‘unable to encompass’, the real questions humans need answered.

Rubenstein writing for educated reader. Clear, flowing and warm. Additionally, presents a mountain of information, making the hike enjoyable and the view from the top fascinating!

Over three hundred footnotes (links work great).

Thirteen page bibliography. No photographs.

Extensive index, with links. Wonderful!

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Thomas H. Lynch

Great book, but no "road map" to conflict resolution.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 2, 2004

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This book covers an enormous amount of intellectual history and is worth reading for its summary of thinkers from Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Boethius, Avicenna, Aquinas, Roger Bacon, Duns Scotus, to William of Ockham. The book sets out the theme that the intellectual turn that led to scientific understanding actually started, not with Copernicus and Galileo, but much earlier, at least by the 12th Century as Aristotelean works on natural phenomena began to flood the libraries of Europe's scholars. Aristotle's work on logic had been long known, thanks to Boethius' 6th Century translations. But this was all the West had until the Christian gradual retaking of the Iberian Peninsula made possible rediscovery of his other works. The libraries of the Muslims and Jewish scholars there had Aristotle's works, and Latin scholars eagerly translated them with help of the Jews and the Muslims.
The impact of Aristotle's natural philosophy derived from his outlook that human reason, not tradition, revelation or sentiment, is the road to uncover objective truths about the universe. This outlook regularly leads to conflicts with a faith-based outlook. So what were the Muslims doing with these time-bombs? Rubenstein traces the route that preserved Aristotle's work. The Nestorians translated much of Greek philosophy, not only Aristotle, into Syriac, and these got further translated to Persian, and therefore they fell into the hands of the Arabs with their 7th Century conquest of Persia. These treasuries, at least initially they were seen this way, resulted in the arabic translations and Muslim philosophy flourished. However, by the 11th Century the Muslim religious establishment banished Aristotle from the universities concluding his outlook was inimical to their faith, just before Aristotle was rediscovered in the West. Many religious scholars, both Muslim and Christian, were so fascinated with Aristotle's knowledge of the natural world that they tried hard to spiritualize or "correct" Aristotle's outlook in the hope that then it would not endanger faith. Both Muslim and Christian religious authorities were wary of Aristotle's outlook and in the long run both concluded his outlook could not be papered over. The Muslims were both quicker and more vigilant, the Christians more dilatory and divided and at the same time enthralled by Aristotle's knowledge. Attempts to ban his thought in the West were made in the 13th Century, but it was too late. Modern secular thought was let out of the bottle in the West; even though it still struggles to emerge for many Muslims and well as Christians. In the West, there are still many who would like faith to dominate reason. Currently, only 23 percent of Americans, for example, believe biological evolution to be correct. The story is far from over.
Another theme Rubenstein pursues is how Plato and Aristotle differ, even though they agree on many things. The Aristotelian Stance is one of "...unabashed admiration for the material and a distaste for mystical explanations of natural phenomenon..." plus an "optimism about human nature" (page 8). The Platonic attitude is that the "really real" are abstractions such as Beauty, Goodness, Justice -- Eternal Forms or Ideas. The sensate natural world Aristotle rejoiced in only reminded Plato "of a much better place" (page 29). Mystery was Plato's meat. Rubenstein feels some periods of history favor one stance over the other. In times of economic growth, political expansion, optimism and the like, the Aristotelian stance fits in. In times of discomfort and longing, where personal and social conflicts seen all but unresolvable, the Platonic stance kicks in. Plato, with mystery and supernaturalism, may be where many will cling to now. Rubenstein would like to go beyond these tendencies. He would like to restore a creative, rather than destructive, tension between reason and faith. They cannot be fused, but perhaps there can be a integration in which technology, using reason, is guided by a new, global morality based on a "mature and expanded" faith, a faith not threatened by reason. However he offers no road map for such startling developments, let alone any evidence that those of faith see any need to "mature." On the other hand we can see many road maps and much evidence for the outcome he fears, namely, that powerful elites will use both faith and reason for keeping and extending their power.

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frank

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 4, 2015

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a wide ranging in-depth history of greek and medieval thought, uncovering the structure of the ground we stand on

Hollywood and Vine

How we almost lost Aristotle Again

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on June 21, 2022

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A lot of history even a philosophy major as I was in my youth missed out on.
How riots by students in Paris over tavern bills changed the course of history.
That Thomas Aquinas was born in Italy and was originally considered to be a dumb ox.
The fate of William of Ockham's Razor fame and his importance.
If you are not religious the arguments by different so-called heretics may seem as irrelevant as how many angels dance on the head of a pin but their views caused Dominicans to see the need to study all of Aristotle to counter their views. We were very lucky - it was a very near thing for us to lose Aristotle once again.

Gfanal

Fascinating piece of History

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on February 25, 2018

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The book retraces the fate of Aristotle's works and thought from classical Athenes to the end of the Middle Ages. As a former student of philosophy and a technological writer,I was fascinated by the relationships described between religion, philosophy and science, especially from late Roman era Ravenna and Alexandria to the Paris Sorbonne of Abelard and Aquinas. The last part, and the attempt to connect Aristotle with modern scientific thought, is somewhat less convincing to me, and I found the references to jewish esoteric thought (the Kabbal, etc.) somewhat thin compared to the treatment of Islam and Christianity -- thus the 4 stars instead of 5. But still, a worthwhile read.

Angela

Great bookstore

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on October 6, 2013

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Though clearly pre-owned, this volume is in excellent condition and is exactly as described.
I was worried when I first received it because the packaging was torn in several places and not up to Amazon's standard of packaging at all - just a plastic sleeve which was in no way strong enough for the weight of the book - but the corners only needed a small amount of smoothing out, so all is well.

triton

impressionné

Reviewed in France 🇫🇷 on January 12, 2018

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après "quand Jésus devint Dieu", une histoire de la chrétienté au moyen-âge, inspirée, ou révulsée par la philosophie d'Aristote. On découvre des débats dont l'auteur nous permet de saisir la teneur, à notre époque où tous ces thèmes nous semblent désuets et oubliés. J'ai ressenti un peu la même émotion qu'en lisant "le nom de la rose"' d'Umberto Eco, une plongée intellectuelle dans un monde englouti. Je ne sais pas si ce livre a été traduit en français, mais son auteur est un grand auteur.

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Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Middle Ages 1st Edition, Kindle Edition

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