Christian Humanist appears an oxymoron under the ordinary definition of those words. Are there historical examples of Christian Humanists? Where any of the Saints Christian Humanists?
I would be interested to win the history of how humanism became considered something secular, but historically, it was associated with the Renaissance and classical learning.
In the Christian tradition, it usually refers to thinkers who integrated classical and existential thinking with Christian theology. Justin Martyr and Augustine could be considered early Christian humanists. Aquinas’ appropriation of Aristotle could be considered a kind of humanism. Erasmus and then several Reformation figures could be considered humanists. And many of the modern Christian philosophers would be Christian humanists (Bacon, etc.).
In the 21st-century Tolkien and Lewis certainly count, as well as TS Eliot. In America, the tradition has been overshadowed by fundamentalism and evangelicalism, though both Catholic and Protestant intellectuals have been in the habit of pushing in a Christian humanist direction. (I.e., First Things magazine)
All my friends and I who arrived at Wheaton College loved CS Lewis. But it is the work of decades to adopt his intellectual approach and gain some fraction of his breadth of wisdom!
Well, a humanist is a scholar of a certain kind, generally. So there’s certainly IQ and experience thresholds for that.
Not to say that a kind of Christian humanism couldn’t be popularized, for example, with a greater emphasis on Christians engaging with and learning from culture.
I think Lewis is very popular among evangelicals, but in my experience very few agree with what I take to be his actual views. Most cannot even imagine some of them as Christian views.
Perhaps you haven’t, but a primary stream of evangelical culture is anti-intellectual, to which Tolkien and Lewis provide a corrective.
Many evangelical parents are wary of secular culture, more often viewing it as a source of corruption, than a source of secular wisdom. Christian intellectuals engaging on the Internet probably skew in the humanist direction, but comments sections can be filled with rather fundamentalist vitriol.
Popular culture, yes, but not non-Christian sources generally! Tolkien to Lewis had the opposite attitude of many evangelical Christians toward classical and secular literature
Yeah? Is that the problem at Wheaton? evangelicals are trying to ban Homer? Didn’t seem that way from the people I talked to from that world, but I am just coastal shit-lib.
Christian Humanism often in academic circles refers to the northern renaissance which in many ways gave birth to the Reformation. It’s a name that they used among themselves, and had to do with recovering certain aspects of the humanities that had been less emphasized in the scholastic schools—language study and rhetoric, as well as ad fontes reading the sources in their context. The sources in the scholastic schools were present but often in quotes in collections (like the famous lombard sentences, Abelard’s sic et non, or Thomas’ catena)
Christian Humanist appears an oxymoron under the ordinary definition of those words. Are there historical examples of Christian Humanists? Where any of the Saints Christian Humanists?
I would be interested to win the history of how humanism became considered something secular, but historically, it was associated with the Renaissance and classical learning.
In the Christian tradition, it usually refers to thinkers who integrated classical and existential thinking with Christian theology. Justin Martyr and Augustine could be considered early Christian humanists. Aquinas’ appropriation of Aristotle could be considered a kind of humanism. Erasmus and then several Reformation figures could be considered humanists. And many of the modern Christian philosophers would be Christian humanists (Bacon, etc.).
In the 21st-century Tolkien and Lewis certainly count, as well as TS Eliot. In America, the tradition has been overshadowed by fundamentalism and evangelicalism, though both Catholic and Protestant intellectuals have been in the habit of pushing in a Christian humanist direction. (I.e., First Things magazine)
If Aquinas and Augustine and Tolkien and Lewis were all Christian humanists, I am wondering if I’ve ever men a Christian non-humanist.
Btw most evangelicals I have met have agreed with Lewis’s theology.
All my friends and I who arrived at Wheaton College loved CS Lewis. But it is the work of decades to adopt his intellectual approach and gain some fraction of his breadth of wisdom!
So your just demanding an experience and IQ threshold. Not sure I take that theologically very seriously.
Well, a humanist is a scholar of a certain kind, generally. So there’s certainly IQ and experience thresholds for that.
Not to say that a kind of Christian humanism couldn’t be popularized, for example, with a greater emphasis on Christians engaging with and learning from culture.
I think Lewis is very popular among evangelicals, but in my experience very few agree with what I take to be his actual views. Most cannot even imagine some of them as Christian views.
Perhaps you haven’t, but a primary stream of evangelical culture is anti-intellectual, to which Tolkien and Lewis provide a corrective.
Many evangelical parents are wary of secular culture, more often viewing it as a source of corruption, than a source of secular wisdom. Christian intellectuals engaging on the Internet probably skew in the humanist direction, but comments sections can be filled with rather fundamentalist vitriol.
I think not acknowledging the corrupting qualities of popular culture IS itself anti-intellectual. Tolkien and Lewis would agree.
Popular culture, yes, but not non-Christian sources generally! Tolkien to Lewis had the opposite attitude of many evangelical Christians toward classical and secular literature
Yeah? Is that the problem at Wheaton? evangelicals are trying to ban Homer? Didn’t seem that way from the people I talked to from that world, but I am just coastal shit-lib.
Christian Humanism often in academic circles refers to the northern renaissance which in many ways gave birth to the Reformation. It’s a name that they used among themselves, and had to do with recovering certain aspects of the humanities that had been less emphasized in the scholastic schools—language study and rhetoric, as well as ad fontes reading the sources in their context. The sources in the scholastic schools were present but often in quotes in collections (like the famous lombard sentences, Abelard’s sic et non, or Thomas’ catena)