A Theology for the Earth: The Contributions of Thomas Berry and Bernard Lonergan

CHAPTER ONE: THE METHOD AND TRADITION OF BERRY'S CULTURAL HISTORY

CHAPTER ONE THE METHOD AND TRADITION OF BERRY'S CULTURAL HISTORY Introduction Berry's first interest was cultural history, a designation he gave his own work and which remained significant. While on occasion he showed his awareness of political and social influences on the topic under discussion, it is clear throughout his work that his predominant focus was the influence of ideas and intellectual/spiritual movements in history. His penchant for tracing ideas across cultures and making syntheses of large amounts of data remained characteristic of his work. Berry wrote his dissertation on Giambattista Vico. Even a cursory look at the work on Vico is enlightening in clarifying the significance of Berry's self-designation as a cultural historian as well as placing him in a distinctive tradition of thinkers that can best be described as counter-Enlightenment. The historical context in which Berry's work is best understood begins with his interpretation of Vico's contribution and influence. Vico is seen by many to be at the beginning of a line of cultural historians with a distinctive flavour. While there are definite departures and developments in Berry's work, Berry shows a considered preference for both Vico's method and much of his interpretation of history. There are also consistent references in O A THEOLOGY FOR THE EARTH Berry's writings to a line of thinkers/ whom many consider to have inherited the ideas ofVico. Scholars consider Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) a humanist in the Renaissance tradition. He was a "Renaissance man" in his diverse interests and expertise, as well as in his positive approach to tradition and to the relevance of the classics to his time. He was anti-Aristotelian and looked to the Renaissance Platonists, Ficinus, Pico della Mirandola, Allessandro Piccolominia and Francisco Patrizi, for the metaphysical basis for his own work. Vico was a philosopher, historian , jurisprudent and philologist. Because of the breadth of his interests and also the perceived obscurity of his ideas, there has been a wide range of scholarship on Vico. Modern scholarship highlights Vice's diverse contributions to present-day concerns. Linguists and rhetoricians claim him for his use of language and rhetoric as an access to the mind of primitive humankind.1 In his theory of language as a carrier of the truth of tradition, he is seen as a forerunner of Gadamer. Psychologists and anthropologists study his theory of myth. Epistemologists differ over his theory of knowledge. Political philosophers, philosophers of history and theologians all find points of relevance to present-day concerns . This continued relevance serves Berry well insofar as his work finds resonance with many of Vice's ideas. Berry's interpretation of Vico, especially his most recurrent and insistent insights into Vico's theory of history, shows Vico to be a likely early source of Berry's own perception of cultural history. The stated purpose of his dissertation was to systematize Vico's thought on particular subjects. Berry's method (byhis own admission) was to collate all the more important texts of Vico that relate to particular problems or themes associated with Vico's work.2 The dissertation was divided into three parts, each of which identified one of these particular problems or themes. Part I dealt with "The Obscurity of Vico's Writings"; Parts II and III with his theory of history, under the headings, "Vico's Approach to History" and "Development and Corruption of History," respectively. Berry's Dissertation on Giambattista Vico The Obscurity of Vico's Thought In Part I, Berry declared that, on the one hand, some of the controversy over Vico's work could be overcome by attending to Vico's own words. On the other hand, however, the admitted obscurity of Vico's work had left him open to many interpretations. In accounting for THE METHOD AND TRADITION OF BERRY'S CULTURAL HISTORY 3 this obscurity, Berry placed particular emphasis on the general intellectual confusion of the times in which Vico lived. Europe's perennial and traditional quest for unity and uniformity was breaking up. It is noteworthy that Berry carried the significance of this theme of the break-up of a kind of Western unity into his later work. Europe [at the time of Vico] had not recovered and still has not recovered, from the shock involved in the transition from the Middle Ages to Modern Times. Informer times Western society, in its religious, intellectual and political life...