Amos Funkenstein - Theology and the Scientific Imagination: From the Middle Ages to the Seventeenth Century

THEOLOGY AND THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION FROM THE MIDDLE AGES TO THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

AMOS FUNKENSTEIN

THEOLOGY AND THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION

from the Middle Ages to the Seventeenth Century

SECOND EDITION

With a new foreword by Jonathan Sheehan

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

Princeton and Oxford

COPYRIGHT 1986 BY PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

FOREWORD TO THE SECOND EDITION, COPYRIGHT 2018
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SECOND EDITION, WITH A NEW FOREWORD
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To my father and to the memory of my mother

CONTENTS

PREFACE

For many years, I have been occupied in trying to find a way of defining, as precisely as possible, the different points of transition from medieval to early modern modes of reasoning in different fields of knowledge. At first I pursued the themes of this book independently of one another. In the course of study, I became aware not only of the ties between theology and sciencethese have been recognized and studied beforebut also of the peculiar circumstance that, to many seventeenth-century thinkers, theology and science merged into one idiom, part of a veritable secular theology such as never existed before or after. The best way to capture both my original aims and the added insight was, I thought, to trace the change in connotations of three divine attributes from the Middle Ages to the seventeenth century. As an interpretative essay only, this book is not based on new texts or other materials. At times I had to venture into fields remote from my expertise, where I tried to follow reliable guides, and I hope that I found them. The fifth chapter is the most speculative; I hope to elaborate on the themes it touches upon in the future. Chapters two through four, the main part of the book, originate, in their present form, in three Gauss Seminars given at Princeton University in 1984.

Friends, students, and colleagues have encouraged me throughout the years. I owe special thanks to Yehuda Elkana, Richard Popkin, and Robert Westman: discussions with them throughout the various stages were invaluable, and even more so their emotional support. They also read the manuscript with a friendly yet critical eye. I thank Susannah Heschel for her constructive and critical support: without it, the God spoken of in this book would have remained a contented male, and man would have stood for both genders. Marilyn and Robert Adams, Jrgen Miethke, Katherine Tachau, Mary Terrall, and Norton Wise also read the manuscript and helped me to remove many ambiguities and embarrassing mistakes.

Many of my present and former students will find how much I have learned from our discussions and their works: from Susan Andersons analysis of the De mirabilibus, Stephen Benins study of the principle of accommodation, David Biales portrait of G. Scholems counter-history, Mati Cohens studies in seventeenth-century historiography, Andr Goddus interpretation of Ockhams physics as a reification of modal categories, Joshua Liptons account of the role of astrology, Steven Liveseys detailed history of the injunction against metabasis, Josef Malis reinterpretation of the concept of myth in Vico, Jehudith Naphtalis study of labor theories in Scholastic thought, Michael Nutkiewiczs work on the impact of natural science on political theory, Joel Rembaums studies on religious polemics, Lisa Sarasohns study of Gassendis ethical-social theories, Dorit Tanays insights into the relation of mathematics to musical theories in the Middle Ages. For the privilege and enjoyment of having been their teacher I thank them all.

Edward Tenner of the Princeton University Press was interested in the book long before its completion; without his encouragement I would not have completed it. Marilyn Campbell edited the manuscript, helped to erase many ambiguities and inaccuracies, and prepared it for print. In the typing, editing, and checking of the manuscript, I was aided by Neil Hathaway and Randy Johannessen. In the last and hardest year of work toward the publication of the book I was supported by a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation.

Thanks are also due to the publishers and editors of some of my previously published articles for the permission to incorporate passages and sections from them: the University of California Press; the Johns Hopkins University Press; Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science; Viator; Medievalia et Humanistica; Miscellanea Medievalia; Socit Internationale des Etudes de Philosophie Mdivale; The Israel Colloquium for the History and Philosophy of Science; the Herzog August Bibliothek Wolfenbttel.

My children, Daniela and Jakob, have borne with patience their fathers absence and absent-mindedness, and made my life always happier and sometimes easier.

Los Angeles

JULY 1985

ABBREVIATIONS