Posted on 04/23/2010 12:41:55 PM PDT by WesternCulture
Pico della Mirandola was a thinker who lived in 15th century Florence.
The notion of the world he nurtured was somewhat differing to the one we favor today. Not to speak of the ideas of the unforgiving clerics of that time.
Despite this, Pico della Mirandola's ideas on the image of man are relevant.
This is how educated inhabitants of Renaissance Florence interpreted God's one and only message to man:
``We have given you, O Adam, no visage proper to yourself, nor endowment properly your own, in order that whatever place, whatever form, whatever gifts you may, with premeditation, select, these same you may have and possess through your own judgement and decision. The nature of all other creatures is defined and restricted within laws which We have laid down; you, by contrast, impeded by no such restrictions, may, by your own free will, to whose custody We have assigned you, trace for yourself the lineaments of your own nature. I have placed you at the very center of the world, so that from that vantage point you may with greater ease glance round about you on all that the world contains. We have made you a creature neither of heaven nor of earth, neither mortal nor immortal, in order that you may, as the free and proud shaper of your own being, fashion yourself in the form you may prefer. It will be in your power to descend to the lower, brutish forms of life; you will be able, through your own decision, to rise again to the superior orders whose life is divine.''
What does Christianity all mean? Renaissance Italy offers an idea...
And the New Testament offers complete instruction.
Mirandola was more properly remembered as a magician. His philosophy - judging by his spoken text above - bears no resemblance to Christianity.
It’s self-deification: the creed of magicians ever since Simon the Sorcerer.
“And the New Testament offers complete instruction.”
- What would you say is the difference of the spirit of the Renaissance and that of Christ?
Most religious paintings of the renaissance depict biblical scenes.
Scripture can be viewed in pictures as well as read. In fact, good education in scripture should encourage both methods of learning it, for the purposes of living it.
“Mirandola was more properly remembered as a magician.”
- He was interested in things like kabbala, but perhaps that was more a matter of an hobby.
“His philosophy - judging by his spoken text above - bears no resemblance to Christianity.”
- The obvious resemblance to basic teachings of Christ is that of what “Imago Dei” actually means. It has to do with the image of Man.
Religion is a strong inspiration for the arts. Some art is created to honor and show religious figures. Other art is created in retaliation to religion and its restrictions. Either way, religion is needed for artistic creation. That’s why Europe is nothing more than a tourist trap with no recent art of any significance. Thanks to Obummer, America is headed in that direction
“Most religious paintings of the renaissance depict biblical scenes.
Scripture can be viewed in pictures as well as read. In fact, good education in scripture should encourage both methods of learning it, for the purposes of living it.”
- Good points.
We act foolish if we wish to think we can do without Christ.
We also act foolishly if we think Christ can protect us from the freedom God has rendered upon us.
Not really. Remember the speech he puts in the mouth of God is addressed to the unfallen Adam. Although (as one might expect in Renaissance Italy) the speech is a bit too humanistic in places, the idea of Adam as neither mortal nor immortal in his own nature is the standard anthropology of Orthodox Christianity.
What goes unsaid in the speech as presented is that the choice which makes Adam, and with him all of humanity, like the brutes is disobedience to God, while the choice which would have (and since Christ’s saving death and resurrection once again) made him and us godlike is faith in God, the sort of faith that leads to trusting obedience to God, not mere assent to His existence or (in these latter times after the Fall and the coming of Christ) the fact that Christ died and rose again for our salvation. (cf. the Holy Apostle Peter’s remarks about becoming partakers of divine nature by grace).
Salvation in Christ is deification by grace, becoming Christ-like. As the Fathers put it “What He is by nature, we are to become by grace.”
Oh, by the way, the delusion of self-deification is a lot older than Simon Magus: Adam fell for it and so became brutish. “Ye shall be like God, knowing good and evil.”
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