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Ch 1c: pp 10-12 (end of chapter)

PostPosted: February 13th, 2007, 4:46 pm
by Stanley Anderson

PostPosted: February 13th, 2007, 10:36 pm
by girlfreddy

PostPosted: February 13th, 2007, 11:51 pm
by Leslie
On page 10, I had an “aha!” moment. Lewis has a great gift of being able to put into a few words what would take me many fumbling, roundabout sentences. He says “At his most characteristic, medieval man was … an organiser, a codifier, a builder of systems.” In these few words, Lewis managed to distill my vague notions of medieval thought into something clear and solid. It now seems so obvious, I can't think why I couldn't quite put it into words before.

I haven’t studied the Middle Ages systematically or to any great (or even middling) degree; most of what I know of medieval thought and culture comes from reading about the history of science and philosophy, theology, and a few novels. So if someone had asked me to describe the medieval mind, I would have talked about the elaborate models of the pre-Copernican solar system, or the complex structure of feudalism. And it seems to me that there is much theology, Roman Catholic especially, that derives from the medieval penchant for classification and organization: the detailed catechism; the calendar of saints, each with their own area of patronage; the list of sins mortal and venal; and so on.

The day after reading chapter 1 of TDI (and saying aha!), I was reading The Name of the Rose. Umberto Eco has his medieval monk Adso say “The list could surely go on, and there is nothing more wonderful than a list, instrument of wondrous hypotyposis.” A couple of pages earlier, Adso had described the design of a monastery library, pointing out such things as the symbolism of the number of windows, being derived from multiplying the ten commandments by the four cardinal virtues. Having been instructed by Lewis, I was able to nod sagely and appreciate Eco’s depiction of the medieval mind, which is an integral part of the story.

PostPosted: February 14th, 2007, 1:11 am
by Stanley Anderson

PostPosted: February 14th, 2007, 6:22 pm
by Stanley Anderson

PostPosted: February 14th, 2007, 9:18 pm
by girlfreddy

PostPosted: February 14th, 2007, 10:00 pm
by Stanley Anderson