Okay, good morning. So today, this morning, we are doing the Renaissance. Specifically, we are asking the question, how the Renaissance? How did the Renaissance start? Because the Renaissance was an intellectual revolution in Europe that would ultimately change the fate of Europe. Okay, guys? The Renaissance was a reimagining of classical Greece. In a Christian European context. Okay, so what the Renaissance is going to do is combine classical Greece with Christian Europe. And it's going to create modernity. Alright, so the ideas, the values that underpin modernity, the world we live in today, starts with the Renaissance. Okay, so the question we are looking at this morning is, how did the Renaissance start? Okay, and there are lots of very different theories. And what scholars today believe is, it was a perfect storm of cultural, historical, economic trends. Okay, so let's look at the main factors. The first is the decline of Constantinople. So, for hundreds of years, Constantinople was the epicenter of European culture.
Civilization #41: Dante's Quiet Revolution
Source-synced transcript for the compressed reading. Spans keep the original chronology, timestamps, and audit trail behind the public interpretation.
It is here to the Roman, Greco -Roman legacy. It is here to the Roman, Greco -Roman legacy. But, as the Ottoman Turks start to encroach on Byzantium territory a lot of the scholars, a lot of the major thinkers, the Byzantine Empire, they start to shift back to Europe. And they bring with them Plato, Aristotle, okay? So that's one major factor. The Crusades! The Crusades, remember we discussed last class, it was a time when Europeans encountered the Muslim world at mass. And as a result, they absorbed a lot of� of the culture and politics of the Islamic Golden Age. Then there was the fact that in Italy, you had many different city -states in competition with each other. And as we discussed in many classes before, when you have that, you have something called open cooperative competition, which leads to innovation. Also, what's really important for us to remember
is that because these city -states were always at war with each other, everyone was a participant in history. Remember, if you are in an imperial bureaucracy, if you're a bureaucrat, you can sort of stand outside of history and observe history. But if you're a participant in history, then you are fighting wars. You're a participant in politics. You're always thinking about the relevance of your theory to reality. The three major city -states of Italy that will give rise to renaissance are Florence, Venice, and Genoa. Venice and Genoa are known for their slave trade. So they're trading slaves with the Muslim world. And through this trade, they're bringing back the books, the ideas, the values of the Islamic world into Europe. As well, because of this trade and commerce, these three city -states become extremely wealthy, and that allows them to patronize, recognize the arts. So you have the rise of a merchant elite in Florence. The family is called the Medici's.
Why this is important is previous elites were either of the warrior class or the priest class. If you're a warrior class, you win your legitimacy by fighting the battlefield. If you're a priest, your legitimacy comes from God or the gods. But if you're a merchant elite, the question then is, where does your money come from? And the answer is, you have to have a legitimacy come from and so because of this question the Medici's are forced to patronize a lot of the arts they will patronize the individuals including da Vinci Raphael Michelangelo basically the major artists of the Renaissance okay at this time from 1305 to 1378 there are actually two popes in Europe there's the crisis of legitimacy and authority in the Catholic Church the Pope moves to Avignon and therefore the Pope doesn't really have authority over Italy you also have the rise of universities and monasteries universities
and monasteries are places of theological debate and discussion and they store the classics and this is where a lot of new ideas will come from you And then the last factor to think about is in 1440, around then, a man named Gutenberg, he will invent the printing press. And the printing press allows for the rapid dissemination of literacy and knowledge, okay? So what scholars believe is these various factors will coalesce into the Renaissance and mark an intellectual revolution in Europe, right? Now, the thing that you will remember about my teaching in this class is I disagree with scholarship. I think there's one factor that they're missing out, and it's the main factor in the creation of the Renaissance. I believe, I will argue to you today, that Dante, the Divine Comedy, is what ultimately sparked the Renaissance. Without Dante, the Renaissance, this revolution, would not have been possible, okay? So this class, I'm gonna present
you the scholarly, mainstream argument, and then I will present my argument, which is that Dante is most responsible for the Renaissance, okay? So, a basic fact that we need to remember. If you look at all the major figures of the Renaissance, okay, including Dante, and Raphael, Galileo, Boccaccio, Michelangelo, okay? The person who was born the earliest is actually Dante, okay, in 1265. So that is a good clue to suggest that perhaps it was Dante that sparked the Renaissance, that he's the secret sauce that made the Renaissance possible, okay? And throughout this class, I will make you this argument. But first, let's just go over through the scholarly, mainstream argument, okay? So, first thing to remember is that, before the Renaissance, Europe was connected with Africa, Asia, and the Middle East through these dense trade networks. As we discussed previously, the three main city -states that are involved in global trade are Venice, okay, Genoa, and Florence.
Venice and Genoa are the ones who benefit the most from this trade because they are by the coast, and they are the ones that are most strategically located to benefit from this trade, okay? And this trade, mainly slave trade, actually, so Genoa and Venice will engage mainly in slave trade. Florence will not engage in slave trade. It will engage mainly in wool, okay? Wool. So this is Venice, and the slave trade made Venice extremely prosperous. This is Florence in around the 15th century. Okay, so one thing to remember about Italy at this point is that it is divided into warring city -states, okay? And as a result, they're always in competition with each other, they're always at war with each other. And as we discussed previously, this scenario will drive innovation in Europe, okay? Mainly commercial innovation. By about the year 1000, as we discussed in the last class, Europe is now prosperous, and they are engaging in commercial trade.
The problem is, how do you facilitate trade, right? So for example, if England has a lot of cotton, and then France has a lot of, and then France has a lot of bananas, what if England doesn't want bananas? Well, England and France cannot trade with each other. So the only way to get around this is by creating a currency that everyone wants, and the currency that everyone wants is gold. So in Florence, they create something called the gold florin, which is a currency of Florence. But because it is so prestigious, because it's mainly gold, everyone wants it. And so the gold florin becomes the currency of European trade. And the family that most benefits from the status of the florin is the Medici family. So this is Cosomo, basically the founding patriarch of the family. And so what he will do is he will pool the resources of rich people in Florence to create a bank.
Meaning, if you're a merchant, you can borrow from this bank. And what he will do is he will set up branches all throughout Europe in order to facilitate and underwrite European trade. And obviously, he gets a cut of all this trade. And as a result, the Medici family become tremendously wealthy. And they create the Medici dynasty. From this family, four popes will emerge. Okay? Four popes will emerge. They will eventually take over Florence and create their own monarchy. As we discussed, if you're a merchant family, you have a legitimacy problem. You didn't win the title. You didn't win your wealth on the battlefield. You don't represent God. All you have is a lot of money. So in order to legitimize themselves, they will go on a massive spending spree in order to make Florence the cultural capital of Europe. Okay? So they will... First of all, fund these massive agricultural projects.
The most famous church in Florence is called the Santa Maria dei Fori. It's still there. You guys can still visit it. It's the fourth largest church in the world. It's absolutely stunning. Okay? Here's another view of the church and the city of Florence. And it's still there today. If you fly to Florence, you will still see this picture. Okay? It is incredibly well preserved. This is what... Inside... The church looks like. All right? They will also patronize artists. The most famous artists of this time were patronized by the Medici family. So Michelangelo actually lived with the Medici family for a while. And of course, he's most famous for a painting called The Creation of Adam, which we will discuss. Okay? The Creation of Adam is also famous for the statue of David. You also have Da Vinci, who is considered the archetypal Renaissance man. When you think of the Renaissance, you think of Da Vinci.
So these are some of his paintings. He is a remarkable genius. He is what we call a polymath, which means that he dabbles or he's interested in every single field of human history. He has a lot of knowledge. The sciences, philosophy, poetry, art, music, everything. And he takes all these different disciplines and combines them into his art. Okay? This is one of his most famous paintings, The Last Supper. And this painting I will show you is a work of genius. Okay? So later on, we will actually discuss The Last Supper. But first, I introduce it to you here. This is the School of Athens by Raphael. One of the most famous paintings in the world. You also have Botticelli, Donatello. And again, these are the most famous artists of the Renaissance. And the Medici has patronized every single one of them. Later on in this class, we will actually discuss these paintings.
But as the Medici are patronizing art and culture in Florence, the printing press is being invented by Gutenberg in Germany. And the printing press, it marks a revolution of literacy in Europe. This is a picture of what a printing shop looks like. So think about this. So the printing press first arrives in Venice in 1469. Only 30 years later, there are 417 printing presses in a city. Think of these as publishing houses. All right? In the first 50 years, there are 20 million volumes of books that are printed in Europe. So the printing press is a revolution of literacy and knowledge in Europe that democratizes knowledge. Everyone now has access to Plato, Aristotle, the Bible. And what they're reading are some of the major thinkers. So now, we're going to look at some of the great writers of the Renaissance. So in terms of poetry, there are three major poets. There's Dante, there's Petrarch, and there's Boccaccio.
All right? You also have Niccolo Machiavelli, who we still read today. His most famous work is called The Prince. And The Prince is really one of the first political treatises in the world. The question then is how do you best govern a state? And today we remember the prince for its strategy, for its almost amoral strategy on how to rule a state. What we need to remember is that Machiavelli himself, during this time, he was a startant Democrat. He believed that the people needed to have a say over the affairs of Florence. And, as a result, he came into contact with the Medici's who tortured him. But he wrote the prince in order to raise awareness about politics. He believed that if we are to have a well -functioning republic, then everyone needs to understand how politics works. And then you also have, from Florence, Galileo, who we will discuss next week. He is the father of science.
So these are the major thinkers. The philosophy, the value system that underpins all this artistic production is the idea of humanism. So what is humanism? And how is it different from Christianity? So these are the three major differences, guys. So let's look at them. If you're a Christian, the Catholic Church for the longest time struggled with what is the nature of humanism. What is the idea of God? And humanists concern themselves with what is the story of humans. Do you guys understand? This is the major revolution in the intellect brought on by the Renaissance, a transition from a focus on ideas to a focus on stories. The second major difference is Christians always ask, what is the history of humanism? They ask, how do I save my soul? How do I ensure that I go to heaven? But humanists ask, how do I flourish? How do I make the most out of my talents?
How do I have the best possible life on earth? So the Greek word is eudaimonia. So humanism is actually a return to the values and belief systems of classical Greece. Now the last major difference is Christianity. The last major difference is Christianity. Christians always ask, how can we best serve God? How can we best obey God? But humanists ask, how do we achieve goodness? How do we make the world we live in today beautiful and truthful? So these are the three major differences that separate Christians from humanists. And what humanism will represent is a radical reorientation. Reorientation. Reorientation. Reorientation. Reorientation. Reorientation of focus from the after world into the here and now. Christians care about what happens in heaven, humanists care about what happens today, how do we make the most out of today, how do we make the world a better place. Does that make sense to you guys? So having said that, let's understand concretely how this transition happened.
It happened through art. So the main transition, to emphasize, is a transition from a focus on ideas to a focus on stories. So what do I mean by that? Let's look at some classical Greek sculptures. If you look at some Greek sculptures, the thing that stands out is the motion, the tension, the emotion in the sculptures. There's a story being told. You can almost feel that this person is alive and thinking. You can almost go into this person's character. It's a story. This sculpture is actually even more obvious. Within the sculpture, there's a story taking place. It's almost like you're watching a movie. And what your mind does when it's looking at the sculpture, when it is in conversation with the sculpture, it is... Imagine what happens before and after. You are making the sculpture alive with your imagination. So that's classical Greece. By the time we hit medieval Christianity, the very concept of art changes.
It becomes more of an idea. So this is from the Carolingian Renaissance, so basically the beginning of the Holy Roman Empire. And as you can see, the artwork, it's much more static. Okay? It's not really a story here. What's being conveyed to you is an idea. You don't really have to imagine what's going on because there's really no space for you to imagine what's going on.
Okay?
So the main artwork during the medieval Christian period are stained glass windows. So you go inside a church and you see pictures on the windows. And what these are, are almost like visual aids. So when the priest is talking about the stories of the Bible, he's using these pictures to illustrate his point. Because remember, at this point, most people are illiterate. Because of these stained glass windows, the effect that is created in the observer is blinding and awesome. Remember, these are windows and they're high up in the church. So the light is coming through. It makes the pictures wholly illuminated with light. It's awesome. You're forced to stand back. But it's also blinding. Blinding just means that it's hard for you to imagine what's going on. The purpose of this artwork is to make you submit before the power of God. For you understand the awesomeness of God. Okay? Does that make sense? You're not here to participate.
You're here to submit. Alright? So as you can see, this is a church. You can see how the light comes in. And it blinds you. Alright? And it's hard for you to really participate in the artwork. So this is the idea of medieval Christianity. The idea that you, through artwork, you are trying to represent the eternity. The awesomeness. The mystery that is God. Alright? By the time we hit the Renaissance, the attitude is completely different. Okay? This is Da Vinci's The Last Supper. And from blinding and awesome, we go to compelling and curious. What this means is, compelling means that you are drawn into the picture. Alright? Why? Because of depth. Okay? Meaning the picture moves backwards and it moves forwards. And because of this motion, you are drawn into the picture. Look at this table, right? Look at this table. It's not a complete table. It's too much too small for 13 people to eat.
It's much too thin, right? So what your eye believes is this table is expanding outwards. And so you are part of this picture. Does that make sense? Okay. And also it's curious because clearly within this picture there's a lot of tension. you see how these different groups are in discussion okay and they're all focused on Jesus so this is the picture the artwork of the Last Supper and the Last Supper which appears in the Bible Jesus reveals that someone has betrayed them there's someone his name is Judas Iscariot he has betrayed them and the next day Jesus will be arrested and he will be crucified and once Jesus announces this everyone becomes anxious is it me is it me am I the betrayer okay there's a lot of tension in this picture and as you can see it's a radical departure this very painting is radical departure from medieval Christian art
if you look at previous medieval Christian art okay below first of all it's much more static it's much more organized there's not that much tension in the picture and what's most important is the idea of holiness you see this hallow surrounding each person in the picture right it shows you that these are divine figures what Leo Leonardo da Vinci has done which is very important is he's seeing really he's really taking out of the human he's really taking out the humanity in the picture there no hallows what's left is the humanity okay these are first and foremost humans not divine figures okay so this is another picture previously so there's much more detail but as you again as you can see not as much tension not as much drama as in the Vint da Vinci's all right and this is the most recent okay this is the most recent now in this artwork Judas Iscariot
stands out from the rest and so that signals him as the betrayer but in da Vinci's work it's not obvious who is the betrayer everyone is afraid that he or she is the betrayer okay and then that this and what this does is it forces you to investigate it forces you the observer to observe the details in order to make the decision about a what he is doing regarding a person Jim what's amazing about this picture is the focus on human anatomy facial expressions right you see the tensions in the neck you see the hen gestures so what da Vinci believed is that the hands the hand motions there are a window into the hands okay and you can see how the hands are all in different motions which signifies different personalities different thoughts inside that person and again you're forced to investigate all right you can see the anxiety the stress the drama in
each of the faces da vinci was first and foremost an astute observer of emotions okay how emotions are expressed through the face through body tension through breathing through the eyes um the man who is who ultimately responsible for the betrayal is judas iscariot and you can see how dante subliminally sorry sub with subtlety emphasizes his betrayal right okay so you can see how he's darker than the other individuals so he's turning away from the light he's betrayed god by turning away from the light okay also in his hand he's clutching some silver coins okay and you can see his neck his neck is being emphasized why because all the tension in his neck okay he can't breathe everyone else is anxious you're talking but he cannot bring himself to talk so all the tension is captured in his neck all right so you see all the subtlety here right okay something really fun about the
Last Supper is becomes up the basis for a very famous book called the Da Vinci Code and then and the Da Vinci Code is a very popular book no scholarship it just meant for entertainment what it argues is that Jesus did not die sorry Jesus died but before he died he married his lover who is Mary you , Madeline okay and so this picture becomes one of the sources for the book so previously scholars have believed that this person is one of the Apostles but when you look at him okay it turns out she's it's almost a she right okay and if you look at how Jesus and this person is stationed it creates an M shape right and M can mean Mary but it stands for their closeness together so people speculate that these two are married and by doing this what Don is really emphasizing is the humanity of Jesus Jesus is first
and foremost a human okay so this is this is interesting guys okay scholars don't really agree with this analysis but becomes the basis of the Da Vinci Code which is a really fun book all right something that scholars do believe is the mathematics so if you look at where the hands and the bread are and you map it onto a music sheet you can actually play the music okay it's designed to be musical also look at the configuration it's a three three one three three configuration okay it turns out that the If you look at the Bible and you look for the passage 33, 1, 33, you get this quotation in Lamentations, okay, in the Bible. It says, For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. Though he brings grief, he will show compassion. So great is his unfailing love, for he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone. And so the idea here is that God will always love you.
God is love. God is incapable of hating you. He will always find a way to forgive you. And if you remember from last semester, this is the very idea of the divine comedy. Leonardo da Vinci is getting this idea from Dante. And this idea is the backbone of the Last Supper. Jesus knows he's been betrayed by Judas Iscariot. But look at him, okay? Let's go back and look at him. He's called. He's reassured. He's already forgiven Judas Iscariot. All right? There's no hatred in him. There's no anger. The anger and the hatred is everyone else. All right? So that's the Last Supper. And as you can see, it is heavily influenced by Dante. All right. This is the most famous painting in the world, the Mona Lisa. It has captured the imagination of millions of people. Millions of people every year will go to France,
the Louvre, to stand in line just so they can spend 10 seconds to look at this picture, okay? What makes this picture remarkable is it's secretly alive. Dante spent 16 years crafting this in a way that by just talking with it, by moving around in conversation with it, it becomes alive. So when you just look at it directly, Mona Lisa isn't really doing anything. She's just smiling. Sorry. She's neutral in her expression, right? But if you turn away from her, what happens is this. What happens is she starts to have a smile. Okay? She starts to have a smile. So your eyes play tricks on you. When you move away from the picture, what happens is your peripheral vision still picks up the picture, but the expression is different. Okay? So this is the central version. We just look at her directly. But as you move further away from her, she smiles. Okay?
So what is this saying? What this is saying is the art is alive if you engage with it. Okay? Art is not meant to be blinding and awesome. It's meant to be here and now. Only if you participate in the art does it become alive. Only when it becomes alive does it exist. Only then does it achieve its true meaning. Okay? So this is the Mona Lisa. All right. Let's look at the School of Athens by Raphael. The actual name for this painting is actually not School of Athens. It's actually called Philosophy. And the reason why is it was commissioned by Pope Julius II of the Vatican in order to decorate his papal apartments. So we go inside his papal apartments today. There are four major frescoes, paintings. The first is called Philosophy. And then right beside Philosophy is called Religion. Okay? So Religion and Philosophy balance each other out. They are dependent on each other. And then across the wall are two more paintings, Poetry and Law.
All right? So that's the very ideal of the Renaissance, open -mindedness, exploration. And holistic learning. All right. So let's look at this painting. First of all, at the very center are two figures. Plato and Aristotle. How do we know? Because they're holding two books. This is the Timaeus by Plato where he discusses the realm of the forms. Remember before in class we discussed Platonic philosophy, right? And how Plato conceptualizes heaven. God is the form of the good. And then form of the good. What will emanate? Concepts. Truth, beauty, justice. Which will then give rise to perfect forms. Okay? And so this is argued in his book Timaeus. Aristotle, his most famous book is called Ethics. How to Lead a Good Life. What's amazing about this picture is you can see that these two are having a debate. So first thing is Plato is pointing upwards.
Okay? What he's saying is, the real world, what matters is heaven. And what Aristotle is saying is, no, what matters is down here on earth. Okay? Aristotle is concerned about earthly matters. Also, look at their colors. So Plato is wearing white and red. White symbolizes air. Red symbolizes fire. Right? These are spiritual. Virtual colors. But Aristotle is wearing blue, which signifies water. And then he's also wearing brown, which signifies the earth. Okay? So they're having this debate. And this debate is, as we discussed previously, it is what underpins the debate within Russian philosophy even today. Okay? Now, what's amazing is that as the two are walking, they're splitting the world into two. There are those philosophers who support Aristotle and they focus on earthly matters. And then there are people who support Plato who focus on spiritual matters, on discovering the secrets of the universe. Aristotle is concerned about everyday science, on uncovering the secrets of a reality.
So they're splitting the two. And as you can see, there's depth to this painting. Okay? There's a sky to the back. There are these arches. And so it's extending forward. And so we're being drawn into the picture. That's the power of depth and perception. This is Pythagoras. You will know him from Pythagoras' theorem. But he's first and foremost a spiritualist. He's concerned about mysticism. He's concerned about God. This is Euclid. Okay? Who is one of the inventors of geometry. All right? And here he's focused on using science, using logic, using deduction to teach his students. You also have in the picture many different personalities. You have Zoroaster who is the founder of Zoroastrianism. Okay? The religion of Persia. You have Ptolemy who investigated how the planets move. All right? And as you can see, Zoroaster, can you see this picture clearly? Okay. This is more clear. Zoroaster is concerned with the heavens, with spiritual matters.
Ptolemy is concerned with the earth, with all reality. All right? So this is Raphael acknowledging that there are two different realities. There's the material reality, but then there's also a spiritual reality. And they're both important. All right? Now what's amazing here is that Raphael, this is Raphael actually. This is a self -portrait of Raphael. He will actually engage in the conversation. He will listen in. He will insert himself in the painting. Okay? Now remember that Christianity focuses on the idea of humility, on self -negation, on removing yourself from the world. But Raphael is reinserting himself into the world and celebrating his curiosity, celebrating his humanity. Okay? And where does he get this idea from? From Dante. Right? Because Dante makes himself the hero of divine comedy. He makes himself the focus of the divine comedy. And to go back to the conversation between Plato and Aristotle, look at this. Okay?
This is a visual representation of the divine comedy. Because remember, in the divine comedy, Virgil and Dante are engaged in a vigorous debate about the nature of love, the nature of sin. Right? Okay? So this is representing the divine comedy. The structure is the same as the divine comedy. They're also, as they walk from Purgatory, from Inferno to Purgatory, they're also talking to other historical figures as well. All right? So this is directly inspired by Dante. Does it make sense to you guys? Okay? Okay, so this is Raphael. Okay? So not only does Raphael insert himself into the picture, he also inserts his friend into This is Michelangelo. This is Michelangelo. Michelangelo is known for being reclusive. He's known for not enjoying the company of others. And Michelangelo here, he's conflated with another historical figure, a philosopher named Heraclitus, who is also known for not enjoying the company of others. Okay? So this picture just shows you the immense diversity of human thought and human personality.
It's a celebration of what it means to be human. Okay? So these paintings leave us with a fundamental question. All right? We can now see the radical differences between Christian art and Renaissance art. So now the question then is, how did Dante spark the confident self -exploration and triumphant self -expression of the Renaissance? If you look at the art, it is confident. It is triumphant. Okay? It's celebrating what it means to be human. Okay? And what I will show you now is, what he will do is, he will reimagine our relationship with God, which is the fundamental question of Europe at this time. Okay. So most people, they're grappling with three major questions, especially intellectuals. The first question is, what is God? Okay? What is the idea? What is the nature of God? The second question is, what is the nature of the relationship between God and humans?
What did God create us? What is our responsibility to God? Okay? And the last question is, how can we best worship God? Meaning, how can we best ensure our divinity? How can we best ensure that we will rise to heaven? All right? So these are the three fundamental questions underlying Christian society at this point. All right? So, you can take these three questions and just ask one question, really, which is, why did Jesus have to die? Why was Jesus crucified? Okay? This is the crucification. Okay? Why is it that the Son of God, the Messiah, had to die? And this idea was first understood and discussed by Paul. Okay? And Paul's idea is this. God created us and gave us paradise. Okay? This is Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. But because we were arrogant, because we were proud, we wanted to become God, we wanted to eat that food from the Tree of Knowledge, which would make us like God.
And because we disobeyed God, God had no choice but to banish us from the Garden of Eden. Okay? And so, why did Jesus have to come to earth and sacrifice himself? Because... Because without God, we humans can only commit more and more sin. So, to redeem us and to beg for forgiveness from God, Jesus came down and sacrificed himself. Okay? And his sacrifice made God relent and forgive us. And so, now we are cleansed of our sins, and now we can begin anew. All right? That's the idea that Paul is presenting. Why Jesus? Why Jesus is the Messiah, and why he had to kill himself. The problem, though, is as Christianity grows and grows, the divinity of Christ, the divinity of Jesus, expands. Before, he was just a human who was favored by God. Then he became a son of God. But by the
time of a man named Tertullian, who lived about the second century, he argued for the Holy Trinity, which is that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are separate but equal. Jesus is God. Okay? Now you have a problem, though. If Jesus is truly God, then why did God have to kill himself? We can understand if Jesus is a son of God, Jesus kills himself to beg for his father's forgiveness. That makes sense. All right? But if Jesus is God, then why did he have to kill himself? Okay? This is now causing a lot of confusion. So, another Christian theologian by the name of Origen... Origen... Okay. So, this is the Trinity. By the name Origen, his explanation is something called the Ransom Theory. All right? And the theory goes like this. When we were cast off from the Garden of Eden, we became subject to Satan, the devil. We became slaves to the devil. Remember, it was Satan, the devil, who tempted Eve to eat that fruit.
Right? And when she ate that fruit, she now swears allegiance to the devil. We are now slaves to the devil. We are now his property. So, the only way for God to redeem us is by ransoming us from Satan. By offering something so valuable that Satan is willing to make a trade. Right? So, what did God offer? God offered his life. The trick, though, is that God cannot be killed because God is eternal and perfect. So, God tricked Satan. But what's really important to understand is this. Before, we were slaves to Satan. But because God made this trade, we are now slaves to God. Okay? We are now slaves to God. And this very idea will be expanded and elaborated by Augustine in order to create the intellectual blueprint for the Catholic Church. All right? This idea of the Ransom Theory. All right.
So, remember, it's the City of God. Augustine will say certain things. And it's really important for us to remember what he said in the City of God. Okay? The main idea is that because God ransomed us, we are now his slaves. And therefore, we must obey him. We must submit. All right? So, let's go over what he says. Augustine. First thing he says is, when man lives by the standard of man, when we trust ourselves, when we use our imagination, when we use our intuition, and not by the standard of God. The standard of God is to submit to him, to obey him. He is like the devil. Okay? You understand? When we use our imagination, when we use our intuition, we are like Satan. At our core is the essence of Satan. It is only by submitting ourselves to God that we are freed from the influence of Satan. Okay?
Could anything but pride happen at the start of the evil will? Why did we disobey God? Why did we eat that fruit? Because we wanted to become God. So, there's an arrogance. There's a pride to us that is the essence of Satan. Okay? Satan fell from heaven because of his pride. If we just trust our nature, we will also fall like Satan. His was a venial transgression when he refused to desert his life's companion, even though the refusal entailed companionship in sin. Eve was tempted by the devil. But Adam ate the fruit. Because of his love for Eve. Therefore, love can only misguide you. Love can only trick you. Love can only lead you to an evil path. Okay? Do not trust your intuition. Do not trust your imagination. But most importantly, do not trust your love of others, especially women. Okay? The will derives its existence as a nature from its creation by God. Its falling away from its true being is due to its creation out of nothing.
Okay? So, why are we like the devil? Why can't we trust ourselves? Because we were created out of dust. We were created out of nothing. Alright? If we're an angel, we're created by God. And therefore, we are perfect. But because we're created out of dust, we are inherently flawed. Okay? So, we must not trust ourselves. We must refuse who we are. We must deny who we are and submit ourselves to the glory that is God. Alright? We see the two cities were created by two kinds of love. The earthly city was created by self -love, reaching the point of contempt for God. When we love ourselves, we disobey God. And that's what explains the world we live in today. This world is evil because of our pride, because of our self -love, because of love for others. But the heavenly city, by the love of God, carried as far as contempt of self.
When we deny who we are, when we submit fully to God, we can create a perfect world. We can achieve heaven. Okay? So, again, this is the very idea for the Catholic Church. Self -denial, self -negation. Okay? Now, you can think about this and understand now why the Islamic world raced ahead of Europe. Because in Europe, people were paralyzed. People were afraid to do anything because they couldn't really trust themselves. Okay? But eventually, the contrast between the Islamic world and the European Christian world was so great that even the Catholic Church had to admit there were problems with the theology of Augustine. Okay? If you ask people to deny who they are and to submit themselves completely to the power of the church, it leads to corruption, stagnation, and inequality. Okay? So, there are some major reasons. There are some major reforms undertaken by the church in response to this.
One major reform are the creation of the university system. So, this is the University of Paris, which is chartered in 1200. This today is called the Sorbonne, okay? Which is the most famous university in France and in Europe, basically. One of the most famous professors of theology at the University of Paris is Thomas Aquinas. Now, Thomas Aquinas, he's a saint in the Catholic Church. His importance is he's trying to revise Augustine for a Europe in conflict with Islam. Okay? What he's really trying to do is he's trying to take the pure platonic world of Augustine and combine it with Aristotelian science and logic and reason. He's trying to combine faith and reason. Okay? And so, he's trying to update the Catholic Church. But ultimately, he doesn't succeed. And the reason why is people don't really understand what he's trying to do. Also, Augustine has been in power for like centuries. And so, he's really become part of the culture, the milieu of Europe.
Okay? He's in the air. You breathe. That's the power of culture. The man who will ultimately free Europe from the grasp of Augustine is actually Dante. And Dante will do so forever. He's going to do that for his poetry. For his poetry, he's going to reimagine the human relationship with God. Okay? So, in Divine Comedy, he will make certain assertions. The first major assertion is this. Okay, guys? Let's read together. The greatest gift to the magnanimity of God as He created gave the gift most suited to His goodness, gift that He most prizes was the freedom of the will. Okay? So, what this is saying is this. When God created us to show His generosity, to show that He is perfect, to show His goodness, He gave us the gift that only God can give us, the gift that He most prizes, which is the freedom from Him.
All right? You are of God, but now you are free of God. You can do whatever you want. All right? So, that's one of the central ideas of the Divine Comedy. That what makes us fundamentally human is freedom of the will. That we can choose the life we lead. All right? All right. So, let's study the Divine Comedy. This is going to be canto seven of Paradise. And in this canto, Beatrice—remember, they're both in heaven—Beatrice and Dante are engaged in an intellectual discussion. The question that they're trying to figure out is, why did Jesus have to kill himself? Okay? Remember, before, Paul suggested it was to redeem us from the original sin, and then Origen suggested the idea of the ransom theory. Okay? God had to redeem us, ransom us, from Satan. Now, what Dante is going to do is he's going to propose a new theory, and this new theory is going to radically reimagine our relationship with God.
Okay? So, let's look at this now. Let's look at this very closely. You say—this is Beatrice talking to Dante—what I've heard is clear to me, but this is hidden from me. Why God wield precisely this pathway for redemption. Okay? Okay, God wants to save us, but why did God have to kill himself? That's the question here. That makes no sense. Okay? If you're not—if you're non -Christian, it's almost impossible to explain to someone else who is not a Christian why Jesus had to die. All right? It makes no sense. Brother, this ordinance is buried from the eyes of everyone whose intellect has not matured within the flame of love. Okay? This is—and Beatrice is making this argument, which is like, you can only understand this if you truly love someone. It's only through love that you can acquire wisdom. You can acquire empathy and imagination.
All right? The godly goodness that has banished every envy from its own self burns in itself and sparkling so it shows eternal beauties. Remember, last semester we discussed the nature of God. God is love itself. There can be no hate. There can be no envy. There can be no blemishes within the nature of God. Okay? All that derives directly from this goodness is everlasting, since the seal of goodness impresses an imprint that never alters. So, God, when God creates, what he creates is also perfect. Only man's sin and all man's liberty makes him unlike the highest good so that in him the brightness of his light is dim. Okay? So, God is in us. God is the light that burns in us and allows us to love others. When we love others, the brightness burns brighter. The light burns brighter. Okay? That's how we celebrate God, by loving others. We also have the freedom of the will.
Okay? So, these are the two things that God has given us. Freedom to choose, freedom to lead the lives we want to live, as well as the power to love and to imagine. But these things come into conflict when we choose to do bad. When we choose to disobey, when we choose to commit sin, we are turning away from God and therefore dampening the brightness in us. Okay? We are purposely stuffing out the flame in us. And so, when we commit sin, we are simply making amends. And man cannot regain his dignity, unless where sin left emptiness, man fills that void with just amends for evil pleasure. Okay? So, when we commit sin, you must make amends. You must force yourself. You must choose to go on the proper path and make amends. But, for when your nature sins so totally within it's seat, then from these dignities, just as from paradise that
nature parted okay sometimes you could commit a sin that's so terrible the light leaves you and that's when we disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden that sin the original sin was so terrible that Adam doomed all his progeny to darkness okay and they could never be regained if you consider carefully by any way that did not pass across one of these two forts okay so how do we forgive how do we ask for forgiveness okay there are two possibilities either for nothing other than his mercy God had to pardon man or of himself men had to proffer payment for his father okay so there are two ways for us to get that light back in us to redeem ourselves in the eyes of God the first way is if God just forgives us if God says I'm total I'm perfect I'm total perfectness I forgive you because that's what I do I forgive you
you to show mercy that's one possibility but when he does that the problem is we've learned nothing we haven't grown okay another possibility is if we figure out a way to redeem ourselves if we make amends if we give God all the gold in the world okay but because our crime was so great because we denied the love of God nothing we do never there's nothing we could give God that would redeem us from our sin okay that's a conflict here that's a paradox God cannot forgive us because if he did so we would not grow and learn and there's nothing we can do to redeem ourselves in the eyes of God because our crime was so great so that's the paradox man is limits could not recompensate for no obedience no humility he offered later could have been so deep that it could match the heights he meant to reach through disobedience men lack
the power to offer satisfaction by himself we want to kill God that was the original sin we wanted to eat that fruit become God and then kill God and become God itself that's the greatest crime so how do you redeem yourself are you ask for forgiveness if the crime is to kill God right for God so great a generosity in giving his own self that men might be able to rise then if he simply pardoned okay so for thousands of years God has been able to forgive us so if you have a of years god had to think of a way to redeem us to forgive us but at the same time ensure we would not do anything like this ever again okay and the path he chose was to sacrifice itself for every other means fell short of justice except the way whereby the son of god humbled himself when he became incarnate okay
so i'm going to use a metaphor to explain this idea it it's a very it's not a great metaphor but i think this will illustrate what beatrice is saying here about god let's just say i have a daughter named eve i have a favorite favorite dog named johnny i love johnny and i love eve i love both okay i say to eve johnny is my favorite um dog you're my favorite favorite daughter i love you both eve because she's young and she's stupid she decides i only want my father to love me so eve purposefully kills my dog johnny all right now what do i do i'm eve's father if i just say eve don't worry about it you're young it was a mistake eve is probably going to go hurt someone else right i have to teach her a lesson but if i hit her or i punish her then that might suggest to
eve i don't really love her it doesn't make sense that's a paradox here that's a conflict and so what i choose to do after many weeks of intense thinking is i choose to punish myself on behalf of eve okay i take a bat and i hit myself or i take a whip and i hit myself and my hand is bleeding and eve watches this you can see that when eve sees this she has to cry she has to cry and feel remorse for what she did and she also cries because she knows i truly love her okay that's what features is saying here god loves us so much that he's willing to do everything in order to teach us to be better human beings okay that's the power of god all right all right so the conversation continues and this story makes sense but it's also going to create a lot of problems okay one
major problem is if god created us and god loves us why are we making mistakes why are we dying why are we in pain okay and this is what beatrice says you say i see that water see that fire and ear and earth and all that they compose come to corruption and endure so briefly okay so in this world there is death there's dying there's pain there's suffering why is that and yet these two were things created if what has been said above is true then these things never should be subject to corruption if whatever if whatever god creates is perfect then things shouldn't die right brother the angels in the pure country where you are now these may be said to be created as they are in all their being okay yes it is true that god created everything in this world but there's a problem there's a difference whereas the elements that you
have mentioned as well as those things that are made from them receive their form from a credit power the matter contained had been created just as within the stars that wheel around them the power to give form had been created the rays and motion of the holy light draw forth the soul of every animal and plant from matter able to take form okay so what this is saying is this god did not create animals and plants god created the laws of the universe you create the atoms the essence that would give rise to animals and plants and so they're not perfect they're the laws are perfect the holy light is perfect but not the creation from the holy light and this creation was meant to die so that new creations can come out okay right when a animal uh dies the atoms break away and then a new form comes into being okay that's the
law of the universe so that's perfect but not the animals and plants are perfect but your life is breathed forth immediately by the chief good who so enamors it of his own self that it desires him always okay so another question then is if animals and plants aren't perfect what are humans then right so okay and this is what she says so reasoning you can also can deduce your resurrection you need but remember the way in which your human flesh was fashioned when both of the first parents were created okay so this is the trick you have to remember this animals and plants are created from the laws of the universe which god created angels are created by god himself and therefore the angels are perfect we humans have a dual nature we are both created from the laws of the universe we are both created by god itself all right because when god created
adam god created him from out of dust okay but then what god did was breathe life into him so the essence of god is with in adam and therefore us our bodies are mortal but our souls are immortal our souls have the essence of god which is love the more we love the more the light burns in us and as light burns in us it will allow for our resurrection okay because the matter will regenerate the soul is eternal okay so that's what we need okay now we're going to get back to where we said you know when it started, dante is saying here the best way to celebrate god is by loving others when you love others you're activating your imagination you're learning wisdom you're gaining experience and that will only cause the light to grow okay so even though going back to the story of eve and my dog even though i'm hurting
myself okay i am using my tremendous imagination in order to come up with this plan in order to redeem my daughter and because of this imagination i'm developing wisdom and this light in me grows stronger all right so that's the purpose of life the purpose of life is to celebrate god by celebrating god in you by loving someone else so wholeheartedly that your imagination your wisdom grows and grows so that your soul becomes eternal when it becomes eternal it becomes eternal when it becomes eternal it becomes eternal when it becomes eternal it will always be resurrected in the world and your soul will remember the love inside you and it will continue to grow and grow okay this is why god created us because if god if you're perfect okay if you're perfect you are incapable of imagination by definition right because you can make you can make no mistakes because we are we are
the dual nature we are both body and soul we can make mistakes we can ear and in this process we develop we develop experience and wisdom which allows us to love and have imagination and to have wisdom all right all right so let me use an everyday example that you've experienced in order to illustrate this point let's think of think about two teachers a teacher who loves his or her students and a teacher who does not love his or her students okay what's the difference all right so there are three major differences the teacher who loves students or is asking himself or herself are my students students learning in my class are they growing as people whereas another teacher might be like are my students getting good grades all he or she cares about our test scores right that's the first major difference the first teacher who loves you cares about what what is happening
inside you what the teacher who doesn't love you only cares about pleasing parents okay second difference is this if you loves you are asking are my students working hard okay because only by working hard can you learn the second teacher is asking students do students like me okay this teacher wants you to write a good good evaluation at the end of semester okay right and then if you had a good uh evaluation the teacher might get a race or some reward right and then the last difference and this is the most important difference is this a good teacher who loves you is always asking am i growing personally and professionally am i growing as a person all right because if you're growing then i'm growing i'm growing and if i'm growing then you're growing that's the power of love okay when you love others you're actually loving yourself and that's how god designed it but
if you're a teacher who does not love then you're always asking how much money am i making that's how you measure your success in life am i making a lot of money if if i'm making millions of dollars a year then that means i'm the best teacher in china okay but a really good teacher who's capable of love who loves teaching who loves his or her students is always asking am i growing because if i'm growing then i know my students are growing okay so that's so that's what dante is saying here about love meaning that we have the intuition we have the power to know truth for ourselves because god made it made us this way okay so um something i want you to remember from this class is the italian renaissance was really just another it's it's reimagining the greek civilization okay and as and these are the two major periods of tremendous
creativity in western europe all right so let's look at the similarities to understand how creativity happens in civilization okay so the first similarity is classical greece had open cooperative competition okay so ideas could flow freely that's the first major similarity second major similarity is in classical greece they transition from linear b which is very complicated um ideographic language to the alphabet okay the alphabet just transcribes the written the spoken word into the written word this allows for massive literacy and the transfusion of knowledge in greece and the idea here is if you are truly a creative society you must be egalitarian you must allow anyone to learn everyone to express his or her ideas which is what the renaissance did okay um the italian renaissance was supported by the fact that they transitioned from latin to the vernacular the spoken language it was dante who allowed this transition to happen okay dante purposefully chose not
to write in latin even though latin was the official language of the intellectual class in europe at the time he purposely chose to write in tuscan which is a local language and because he did that he made tuscan first of all the official language of italy they still speak it today but it also makes divine comedy accessible to common people which was the intention okay and the third similarity and this is most important is the perfect storm of factors don't really matter unless you have a great poet a great thinker a great intellectual to create the spark to ignite your civilization okay so in greece they had homer and we today we can think of homer as the father of civilization in it in the italian renaissance you had dante you can think of him as the father of modernity the values that he creates the values that he expresses in the vine comedy will
become the basis for modernity especially the idea of individuality of humanism right what's individual an individual is someone who celebrates himself and pursues his or her curiosity to explore the world and this process create goodness in the world to create truth and beauty this is the idea that will underpin the renaissance and which still underpins western modernity uh today okay so that is my argument to you okay great so um the ultimate message the ultimate secret of the universe i want you to remember okay and both homer and dante express this in the poetry is this love is the unifying force of the universe okay love is god god is love it's what unites everyone okay by loving someone else you can become that person that person can become you and the imagination is the animating force okay what gives life to the world is not god but our imagination by imagining the world the
world becomes alive so the greater our imagination the more alive our imagination becomes and this idea is most visually expressed in the painting the creation of adam by michael angelo okay this is michael angelo um the creation of adam and so this goes back to the story of how god created adam uh god created um adam out of dust and he breathed the essence of life into adam now there are two ways of looking at this painting okay there are two ways of understanding the title the creation of adam you can first understand it in the typical way which is that god created adam and that they are equals okay you can see that these two worlds the adam and god they're almost equal we are equal to god but they can change perspective and you can say the creation of adam really means god is adam's creation god is what we created from our
imagination right now you can see god um is surrounded by his angels okay but you take them away and what do you have behind them guys this is a picture of the human brain right do you see this okay this is a stem okay and this is the human brain okay you take them away and hidden behind is the human brain right which means what which means that god is an emanation from our imagination okay not the true god the true god is like light itself right love itself okay but this god has given us a capacity to imagine so we've imagined another god to um take place of the real god okay you understand so the real god is the human imagination the human brain the human mind that's what gives life to the universe okay so this if you think about it it is a radical revolution in human intellectual history okay do
you know where this painting is this painting is on the top of something called the sustained chapel in the vatican it's at the very heart of the catholic church so what donning has been able to do is destroy an empire peacefully for the power of poetry through subtlety for the power of love donna was able to influence michelangelo who was able to take his ideas and implant his ideas work them against one another so this figure of the human within the very heart of the Catholic Church and thus reinvent the Catholic Church. That is the power of love, that is the power of imagination, right? Great. Okay, any questions? Okay, so think of some questions. Next class, we will do the Protestant Reformation, okay?