As we continue our overview of what has been traditionally called “The Middle Ages,” but what I have chosen to call “The High Catholic Age,” we now come to the topic of the monastic movement and its impact on the culture, and the emergence of the university.
Perhaps the most impressive achievement during the supposed “Dark Ages” was the explosion of learning and technology that was brought about by the establishment of various monasteries and universities throughout Europe—thus proving beyond any historical doubt that the moniker of “Dark Ages” as applied to this time-period is nothing short of a complete and utter falsehood. Now, what laid the foundation for the establishment of universities throughout Europe were the monasteries.
The Impact of the Monastic Movement in Europe
Although properly belonging to what I call “The Byzantine Age” (313-1054 AD), St. Benedict (480-543 AD), as Daniel Boorstin declares, was not simply the father of monasticism in Europe, he also was “the godfather of libraries. The preservation of the literary treasures of antiquity and of Christianity through the Middle Ages was a Benedictine achievement” (The Discovers 723-724). Indeed, as we will see, it was the dedication of thousands of monks (despite the corruption of far too many popes) throughout the history of both the Byzantine Age and the High Catholic Age that laid the foundation for not only education, but also technology, innovation, finance, and charitable organizations. The Cistercians, for example, were innovators in farm techniques, wool production, iron making, and watermills, which in turn led to further advances in a variety of other areas (Vincent Carroll, Christianity on Trial, 65).
To be clear, the motivation of these various monastic orders (Benedictine, Cistercian, Augustinian, Franciscan, Dominican) was their devotion and love for Christ. They took to heart the divine ordination upon mankind as a whole to reflect God’s image and to be both priests and kings of God’s creation. Because of their devotion to Jesus Christ, the ultimate priest-king who opened the door to salvation of the world, they saw their vocation as proclaiming the Gospel Christ’s Kingdom, not simply in words, but in actions that affected all of life.
As St. Francis (and St. Basil before him) said, “Preach the Gospel at all times, and when necessary, use words.” What exactly does this mean? It means that Christians are called to reflect God’s image, that is the image of Christ, the risen Lord of creation, with their whole lives—not simply in what they say, but in what they do. As co-regents of creation, we are to rule over and care for God’s creation; and as priests, we are to offer up the fruits of creation to God, through Christ, as an act of sacrifice that leads to the reconciling of all things to God. The monastics orders of both the Byzantine Age and High Catholic Age knew this well, and their devotion changed history.
A word quickly must be said about the various monastic orders. As said before, the Benedictine order was founded by St. Benedict of Nursia in the 6th Century. The most famous Benedictine monastery was in Cluny, France. In 1098 AD, though, a group from that monastery set out to establish the Cistercian Order. St. Francis of Assisi (1181-1226 AD) established the Franciscan Order in 1209 AD). It was a monastic order that was devoted to the virtues of poverty and humility. A contemporary of St. Francis was St. Dominic (1170-1221 AD) who established the Dominican Order in 1215 AD. All these monastic orders contributed in their own way to the rebuilding of Europe and the establishment of countless innovations and advances in science, medicine, technology, hospitals, theology, philosophy, literature, music, the arts, architecture, and many other areas.
Hospitals…It Was a Christian Thing
Take the area of medicine and hospitals for the poor, for example. Throughout the pagan world, only the rich and wealthy had access to what medicine and hospital treatment was available at the time. The vast majority of plebeians (perhaps the original 99%?) were left to suffer. As we have already seen, during the years of the early Church, it was the Christians who stayed in the cities during times of plague to minister and care for the sick and the poor, while the rich fled the cities to their country villas in order to escape various plagues. And, as we have already seen, when Constantine became a Christian, one of the first things that was emphasized was that the Church set up hospitals throughout the empire to help care for its citizens, both the rich and the poor. That in and of itself was revolutionary to the culture.
Such a tradition of charity was carried on, particularly through the Benedictine monasteries. As A.C. Crombie tells us, “Medicine was studied in the earliest Benedictine monasteries, and the long series of medical works written during the Middle Ages, and continuing without a break into the 16th century and modern times, is one of the best examples of a tradition in which empirical observations were increasingly combined with attempts at rational and theoretical explanation, with the result that definite medical and surgical problems were solved” (Quote found in Christianity on Trial, 67). Crombie further points out, this concern for the poor that led to countless advances in the area of medicine was a distinctly Christian concern: “It was not the result of necessity…there is no compelling need to treat the sicknesses of the impotent poor—but of a theological vision” (68).
Indeed, it was that very theological vision shared by the various monastic orders of this time that led to so many cultural advances that we in the modern world just take for granted.
Universities…It Was a Christian Thing
The monks were the farmers, innovators, inventors, doctors, writers, and teachers of the age. And when it came to education, particularly the establishment of the university, it must be said loud and clear: without Christian monks, there would be no universities. Again, in complete contrast to the false narrative stemming from the so-called Enlightenment, the historical facts of both the Byzantine and High Catholic Ages prove that, far from keeping society “in the dark” and in a state of ignorance, the Church was the shining beacon of knowledge in a devastated post-pagan world. It was the Church that fostered the arts, literature, medicine, science, and philosophy. The advances in all these areas were seen as, not somehow separated from the Christian Gospel, but rather the natural and logical outgrowths of the Christian Gospel itself.
The apostle Paul said, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God– what is good and acceptable and perfect” (Rom 12:2). He also said, in II Corinthians 3:18, that Christians “are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” This emphasis on “transformation” is central to the Christian conviction regarding how not only to live our individual lives, but also how such individual transformation leads to cultural transformation. Perhaps no other institution has effected so much cultural transformation like the Christian university. St. Paul no doubt is proud.
It was the rise of the university that led to intellectual, scientific, and philosophical progress that the world as ever seen—and all of it stemmed from the theological vision of the various monastic orders who established the universities. Now, given that fact, it may be surprising to find that the typical curriculum in the universities was not primarily theological. As Ronald Numbers points out in his book, Galileo Goes to Jail, the majority of university students never got close to meeting the requirements for studying theology (usually a master of arts degree). Rather, the majority of students studied “only nonreligious subjects, including logic, natural philosophy, and the mathematical sciences” (22). In fact, theology faculties were not even the largest ones in the northern universities (23). Furthermore, Numbers writes, “By 1500, about sixty universities were scattered throughout Europe. …About 30 percent of the medieval university curriculum covered subjects and texts concerned with the natural world. This was not a trivial development” (21).
Let that fact sink in for a moment: universities were first established during the High Catholic Age by monastic orders, and almost 1/3 of the university curriculum was devoted to the study of science. Given the seemingly never-ending “war between science and religion” that we hear so much about in our day and age, how could this be? We’ve been told for the past 200-300 years that the Christian Church was militantly anti-science, and fought to suppress science. Well, the facts of history tell us otherwise. In fact, it was only in Christian Europe that modern science took root. That is not to say that a certain amount of scientific inroads were made in places like China or the Islamic world, but the simple fact is that nothing compared to the explosion of scientific inquiry that happened in Europe during the High Catholic Age in the universities that were largely run and taught by scores of Christian monks and scholastics. And consequently, many, if not the majority, of early scientists were not simply Christians—they were monks, and deacons, and friars, and priests.
As Rodney Stark has said: “Real science arose only once: in Europe. China, Islam, India, and ancient Greece and Rome each had a highly developed alchemy. But only in Europe did alchemy develop into chemistry. By the same token, many societies developed elaborate systems of astrology, but only in Europe did astrology lead to astronomy. Why? Again, the answer has to do with image of God” (The Triumph of Christianity 14).
Now, why was there so much interest in the natural world during this time? The answer is obvious. Alfred North Whitehead perhaps said it best when he stated, “The greatest contribution of medievalism to the formation of the scientific movement [was] the inexpugnable belief that…there is a secret, a secret which can be unveiled. How has this conviction been so vividly implanted in the European mind?…It must come from the medieval insistence on the rationality of God, conceived as with the personal energy of Jehovah and with the rationality of a Greek philosopher. Every detail was supervised and ordered: the search into nature could only result in the vindication of the faith in rationality.”
Simply put, because one of the fundamental Christian convictions regarding the nature of God is that He is a thoroughly rational God who has created a good and orderly creation, it only made sense to assume that the created order was, in fact, orderly and logical, and could therefore be explored, studied, examined, and made sense of by the very creatures God had created to be in His image, and who therefore had the God-given rational and intellectual capacity to understand what God had made. Or more simply still: (A) God is a rational and orderly God; (B) His creation runs rationally and orderly; and (C) Man, who is made in God’s image, has the ability to comprehend the rationality and order in nature. Christianity teaches that God is good, His creation is worth exploring and understanding, and therefore part of Man’s vocation as being created in God’s image is to, in fact, explore and understand the world that God has made.
Conclusion
But it wasn’t just science that the universities of the High Catholic Age championed, it was also philosophy. And that will be the topic of the next post.
