Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Dark Ages: Amazon.ca: Richard E. Rubenstein: Books

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From Publishers Weekly

In 12th-century Toledo, in Spain, a group of Christian monks, Jewish sages and Muslim teachers gathered to study a new translation of Aristotle's De Anima (On the Soul). In Rubenstein's dazzling historical narrative, this moment represents both the tremendous influence of Aristotle on these three religions and the culmination of the medieval rediscovery of his writings. In the fourth century B.C., Aristotle fashioned a new system of philosophy, focusing on the material world, whose operations he explained by a series of causes. As Rubenstein (When Jesus Became God) explains, in the second and third centuries A.D., Western Christian scholars suppressed Aristotle's teachings, believing that his emphasis on reason and the physical world challenged their doctrines of faith and God's supernatural power. By the seventh century, Muslims had begun to discover Aristotle's writings. Islamic thinkers such as Avicenna and Averroes, in the 11th and 12 centuries, embraced Aristotle's rationalist philosophy and principles of logic. Christian theologians rediscovered Aristotle through the commentaries of the monk Boethius, who argued in the sixth century that reason and understanding were essential elements of faith. There resulted a tremendous ferment in the study of Aristotle in the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, culminating in the work of Thomas Aquinas, who used Aristotle's notion of an Unmoved Mover and First Cause to construct his arguments for God's existence. Aquinas, too, argued that reason was a necessary component of faith's ability to understand God and the world. Although the book purports to trace Aristotle's influence on Christianity, Islam and Judaism, it devotes more attention to Christianity. Even so, Rubenstein's lively prose, his lucid insights and his crystal-clear historical analyses make this a first-rate study in the history of ideas.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Rubinstein's background as a professor of conflict resolution must have come in handy as he was crafting this tale of one of history's biggest conflagrations: the introduction of Aristotle's philosophy to the Churchbound Europe of the Middle Ages.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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THERE ARE FEW stories more appealing than tales of ancient knowledge long lost, then astonishingly found. Read the first page

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting biased, Nov 20 2003

By

Seth J. Frantzman (Jerusalem, Israel) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Dark Ages (Hardcover)

This interesting account tries to weave a tale of preservation of learning from Spain to Oxford to the Renaissance. This book, while interesting and entertaining, has several flaws. Its largest flaw is the authors subconscious hatred of Catholicism and love of Islam. The author tries to make the argument that 'enlightened' Islam(the same people that were circumcising women and importing slaves from Africa) was actually far superior to the western states of the Catholic world. And that learning was loved in Spain where 'Jews and Muslims' preserved the works of Plato and Aristotle. The basic fallacy here is that this is simply incorrect. The Muslim governors win Spain had no interest in learning, they only had interest in conquering lands for Allah and they did not support these efforts, by many Jews who were translating the documents. The Islamic hysteria with persecuting 'non believers' led them to destroy many Greek texts that seemed polytheistic. It was the Jews of Spain, who would later give birth to Maimonadies, that preserved the works of Plato and Aristotle and transported these works along trade routes to Christendom, where they were eventually adopted at Oxford and Florence. This is where the author does the story justice, in describing the men and schools of learning that worked to preserve essential western works from the intolerance of the Church. The book should have been called 'between Cross and Crescent: how enlightened men preserved the essential works of western civilization'. An interesting account but historically flawed.

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very good but with flaws, Jun 16 2004

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tom jeffords (Selma AL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Dark Ages (Hardcover)

Let make it perfectly clear I throughly enjoyed this book and highly recommend it. That said I will go against custom and list what I liked about it first and disliked second. What I liked about it was the author has an excellent writing style that takes what can be (trust me I know) a very dry subject and render it interesting and accessible without dumbing it down. Further Mr. Rubentstein works in both the details of Aristotle's philosophy and its growth in the west and the lives of the characters involved superbly. This is different than most histories of the time period involved which have covered the spread of Aristotle's thought without really explaining it and have more or less ignored the lives of the people involved. Also Mr. Rubenstein to his credit has noted that he started his work under the impression that the Catholic Church would be revealed as a hinderance to learning and discovered to the contrary that the Church after some considerable initial trepidation enthusiastically embraced the philosophy of Aristotle. Now on the flip side. Mr Rubenstein gives very short shrift to the times before and after the period of the 12th-13th centuries. Relegating the the time prior to them as the "Dark Ages" and simply ending his book around the dawn of the 14th century. This is a critical lack in that the time up to the time period covered in the book was hardly a time of intellectual ignorance (see the Church Fathers)and despite what Mr. Rubenstein seems to think, the use of Greek philosophical thought has continued to the present day particulary in the Catholic Church which he seems to think has abandoned it and adopted an antagonistic view towards science and reason. NB Virtually all Catholic priests have undergraduate degrees in Philosophy (or close to it) and Pope John Paul II has a Phd in Philosophy and but has written a reconciliation of faith and reason called Fides et Ratio. Further, although the book is incredibly well researched I get the feeling that Mr. Rubenstein just didn't know the subject very well before he started his research. This may explain his intial misconceptions about the Catholic Church and his giving such short shrift to the time periods before and after the events of the book. Overall very good, but for a more complete study of the subject I highly recomend The Thirteenth, the Greatest of Centuries by James J. Walsh along with Religion and the Rise of Western Civilization by the incomparable Christopher Dawson and Fides et Ratio by Pope John Paul II.

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4.0 out of 5 stars How Aristotle shaped, and still shapes, our world., Aug 27 2009

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James Gallen (St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A.) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Aristotle's Children: How Christians, Muslims, and Jews Rediscovered Ancient Wisdom and Illuminated the Dark Ages (Paperback)

"Aristotle's Children" provides the reader with an interesting blend of philosophy and history. Author Richard E. Rubenstein follows the European rediscovery and study of Aristotle's writings beginning in Reconquered Spain and continuing into modern times. As the reader goes through this book he or she is introduced to a succession of philosophers who studied Aristotle's teachings and applied them to the problems and thought of their days. We are introduced to the blend of Christianity, Judaism and Islam which transmitted the works that shaped Christendom in later centuries. Names that we recognize we begin to know, and understand their relationships to one another. Boethius, Sts. Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure and Roger Bacon are just a few who we meet along this journey. This book explains how the teachings of Aristotle were used to define and shape the interplay between faith and reason, philosophy and science. At the end, Rubenstein suggests a role that a proper appreciation of Aristotle could enrich our world today.

Although this book deals with philosophical thought, it is easy to follow, at least enough to obtain a better understanding of the importance of this philosophy in our world and to our own thoughts. Although philosophy is not a major interest of mine, this book has given me a better understanding of how it has affected the world view into which we were born and grow. I recommend it for anyone who ever ponders why our culture has developed the way it has and where it is likely to be going.

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3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting Comparison of World Views
I enjoyed the book and I recommend the book. His style is very readable. The first chapters are especially good. Read more

Published on July 10 2004 by Jeffrey A. Thompson

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book, but no "road map" to conflict resolution.
This book covers an enormous amount of intellectual history and is worth reading for its summary of thinkers from Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Boethius, Avicenna, Aquinas, Roger... Read more

Published on Feb 2 2004 by Thomas H. Lynch