Humanism, Enlightenment, and the Glory of Jesus Pt. 1

  Do you ever question the way that you perceive life?  It is pretty important since your perception is really going to affect your emotions, and even on a good day your emotions are going to dictate many of your decisions in life.  For example, how would you feel about having to go to the bathroom outside everyday for the next month?  Probably not great...neither would I.  Obviously, people did this for 6,000 years and never thought twice about it.  So, our worldview really determines the way we feel which really presses on us to make decisions to either get rid of negative feelings or to enhance positive ones.  That's just the way that we are.

  What I want to write about is a little about the development of the western worldview that we have.  It kind of came along in stages.  (please bare with me and forgive the over-generalizations!)  After the success of Alexander the Great (356-323 B.C.) in conquering most of the known world at the time, the world entered into a period of which Alexander dreamed of.  In fact, it was his primary motivation for conquest.  History marks this time as the beginning of the "Hellenistic Period".  It was the period in which the Greco-Roman empire was instilling 'Hellenism' or Greek culture into all of it's provinces.  The idea was more than ego-centrism.  The real thought was that if they could get this culture (arguably most fully developed by Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle) into the rest of the world that wars would cease and it would usher in a time of world peace, harmony, and and human advancement.  And based on the the way they were defining human advancement, they were successful in many regards.

  The next giant event was the fall of Rome.  This ushered in the "Dark Ages".  This period of 'darkness' came about when the police system of most of the planet fell apart and lots of chaos followed.  However, historically, it was viewed as a time of darkness because all of the potential of humanity under the Roman empire had vanished with it.  This created a vacuum which lasted for several centuries.

  Next, the Renaissance was the next big event to fill this void.  After the Crusades (which ended just before the beginning of the 14th century) many of the old Greek writings were brought back to European countries from the Arabic regions.  This launched a massive renewed interest in the Greek culture throughout Europe (starting in Italy).  This period was viewed as a 're-birth' of the hope, beauty, and potential for humanity.  Although this hope was primarily expressed through the arts, literature, and philosophy, it eventually made it's way into the Church.  Many old Greek texts of the Scripture were emerging and just as the world was rethinking the way everything was done, so many within the Church began to question tradition within the Church.  This wasn't all bad by any means, but much of what came from these questions actually affects the way that we think more than you probably realize.
  OK, enough for now.  More later...