Christian humanism established both the dignity of the human and the dignity
of nature. This is the origin of the careful synthesis of reason and faith that
enabled the intellectual life of Christianity and its inherent respect for all
sources of truth. Moreover, in departing from Greek thought, Christianity
valued not merely the rational mind but the whole human being. Gnosticism
gave way to true humanism.
Second, Christian humanism established the idea of‘secularity’as the world
shared by all in the time span between Christ’sfirst and second coming. As the
scholar Robert Markus correctly argues, Christians and non-Christians share
what Augustine had called thesaeculum, a common world, running according
to the laws of creation until Christ returns and renews all things. In the
saeculum, the heavenly and earthly cities are intermixed, and their respective
citizens can strive towards a common good, even if they do so ultimately from
two different visions of reality. To Augustine, at least, pluralism was not a
completely novel idea, as long as there was a shared core of social ethics that
‘[bound] people together in a nation community while leaving them free to
adhere to their own various beliefs’.^47 Augustine, himself a great Christian
humanist, demonstrates that the very idea of the secular is a Christian idea.
FROM PATRISTIC TO RENAISSANCE HUMANISMThe subsequent medieval and Renaissance periods were shaped profoundly by
patristic anthropology. Contrary to a common misconception, medieval and
Renaissance humanism were deeply indebted to the inherited patristic educa-
tional impetus of restoring human beings to the true image of God.^48 Any such
overview must begin with Augustine, this theological giant of the Western
tradition, whose vision of Christian education as formation in Christ-likeness
is captured in his influential workDe doctrina christiana, an educational
programme that decisively shaped the medieval curriculum. Let us not forget
thatDoctrinacan also be translated‘teaching’. For Augustine, Christian education
(^47) R. A. Markus,Christianity and the Secular, Blessed Pope John XXIII Lecture Series in
Theology and Culture (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2006), 67.
(^48) Research in the humanities no longer adheres to the outmoded view, inspired by the
secularist subtraction narrative, that especially Renaissance thinkers are crypto-secularists. I am
principally drawing on the scholarly effort spearheaded by Paul Kristeller, Charles Trinkaus, and
Albert Rabil, among many others, to show the continuity of Renaissance humanism with
patristic and (despite many differences) even with scholastic nominalist theology. See, for
example, Paul Oskar Kristeller (ed.),Studies in Renaissance Thought and Letters, 2 vols (New
York: Harper & Row, 1965). The three-volume collection of conference papers on the relation of
the patristic, medieval, and Renaissance periods edited by Albert Rabil also provides a solid
overview of this trend: Rabil,Renaissance Humanism: Foundations, Forms, and Legacy, 3 vols
(Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988).
148 Jens Zimmermann