Renaissance and Humanism
• STUDY QUESTIONS
1. Focus on the structure.
1. What does the term “Renaissance” mean?
– Renaissance is a term of French origin meaning “rebirth”. It signified
the rebirth of classical (i.e. Greek and Latin) literature after the
centuries in which it had been neglected, and partly lost, during the
middle Ages.
2. How did the “New Learning” spread through England?
– Humanism or the “New Learning” spread through England thanks to
both the network of the grammar schools, which were the most
common form of education, and the universities of Oxford and
Cambridge.
3. What role did humanists play in shaping the new Church of England?
– The rejection of traditionally accepted ideas in favour of individual
thinking led to the personal reading of the Bible in the spirit of the
Reformation.
4. What changes did the new scientific and philosophical ideas bring
about ? Consider:
a.
b.
c.
the model of the universe
Ideas of order and hierarchy
Individualism
4. As far as the model of the universe is concerned, the old
Ptolemaic theory of the universe claimed that the earth was at the centre of
the universe with the moon, the sun and all the other planets revolving
around it. This model had been used to justify the established hierarchical
order within society. In other words, the ruling classes (i.e. the monarchy, the
aristocracy and the church) had succeeded in persuading people that the
social order on earth reflected the order and hierarchy present in the
universe.
The Copernican theory, instead, stated that the earth was no longer at the
centre of the universe but just one of the planets revolving around the sun.
The revolutionary power of this new theory is quite evident because it
undermined the traditional ideas of order and hierarchy accepted by the
majority of the population In fact, if the order of the universe was not the one
stated by Ptolemy then a different social order was also possible on the
Earth.
4. Finally, the emphasis placed on individualism implied that individual
experience was more important than general ideas to understand reality so
the deductive method, which proceeded from a general truth to analyse
particular cases, was replaced by the inductive method which proceeded
from particular experiences/facts to reach a general truth.