The Carolingian Renaissance and Christian Humanism

I WILL USE THE TERM CHRISTIAN HUMANISM will use the term Christian humanism in this article in the sense used by the "Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World" (Gaudium et Spes) of the Second Vatican Council. This use of the term includes cultural values

when a man applies himself to the various disciplines of philosophy, of history, and of mathematical and natural science, and when he cultivates the arts, he can do very much to elevate the human family to a more sublime understanding of truth, goodness, and beauty, and to the formation of judgments which embody universal values.

But most of all, it emphasizes social responsibility: "Thus we are witnesses of the birth of a new humanism, one in which man is defined first of all by his responsibility toward his brothers and toward history." ¹ In attempting to understand Christian humanism, it may be useful to go back to a time when there was a concerted attempt, perhaps for the first time, to implement this outlook on the thinking and practices of a society.

Threads of Culture

Clearly, the cultural roots of Western civilization—its arts and sciences—come from the Greek and Roman worlds. A sense of solidarity can be found in these societies, epitomized by Terence's famous statement: "I am a human being, so nothing human is alien to me." However, in the practice of these cultures, solidarity was seldom more than a philosophic or even an aesthetic concept. The true sense of sharing and taking care of one's neighbor is a Judeo-Christian contribution to society. These two currents of humanism came together during the first centuries of Christianity. As the Roman Empire became christianized, there were many attempts to harmonize Christianity and the Greco-Roman culture. There were notable efforts by Athenagoras and Minuncius Felix in the second century and Clement of Alexandria and Origen in the third century, culminating with Augustine in the fourth century. Some of the christianized Roman emperors attempted to use their power in the service of Christianity. Constantine, for example, convoked the Council of Nicaea to address doctrinal controversies. But these developments were disrupted by the chaos of the barbarian invasions. Rome fell first to the Visigoths in 476 and then to the Ostrogoths in 493, and the Western empire was dismembered among the waves of invaders.

One of the most persistent themes of hope in the Bible is the idea of a remnant, a small group that survives an upheaval, preserves hope, and goes on to form the basis of a rebirth called by God: "I myself will gather the remnant of my flock from all the lands to which I have driven them and bring them back to their meadow; there they shall increase and multiply" (Jer. 23:3). Like the people of Israel, the cultural remains of the Roman Empire scattered and survived in pockets and centuries later provided the leaven for resurgence.

One thread of the ancient Greek and Roman civilizations did remain in the center of the Western empire in the city of Rome and its environs. Some Roman officials offered their services to the new rulers, helping to restore order at the court. One such official was Cassiodorus, who became praetorian prefect under Theoderic the Ostrogoth in 533. When Cassiodorus retired from public service in 550, he founded a monastery, Vivarium, on his estate in southern Italy, which became an important center for copying manuscripts. Cassiodorus valued the classics of Latin Christian culture, and he felt that the skills of grammar and rhetorical analysis were necessary for the proper understanding of the Christian scriptures. ² The Vivarium monastery did not survive long after the death of Cassiodorus in 585 and the Lombard invasion of 568, but some of the books from its library found their way to the Lateran library in Rome.

The Lombard invasion of Italy delivered...