On Greek Learning

July 27, 2022 timothywstanley@me.com

I have offered here three snapshots, each one of which could be expanded into very long and intricate histories. But my point is a simple one. In late antiquity, the Renaissance and the 19th century, the study of the Classical past was a fundamental and instrumental force in changing the shape of Christianity, and in revolutionary ways. For late antiquity, the study of Classics was integral to the formation of Christianity as a theological and critically sophisticated intellectual enterprise. For the Renaissance, the rediscovery of Greek learning fuelled the transformational violence – intellectual and physical – of the Reformation and the foundation of Protestantism. For the 19th century, Classical philology and critical history challenged the status of the texts of Christianity, and drove the doubts and transformations of secularisation, with continuing and profound purchase on contemporary culture.

Simon Goldhill, '“What Did Classics Do to Christianity?” - https://antigonejournal.com/2022/06/classics-christianity/