Health And Education

[trencacloscas]

Just not to plague other topics with off-subjects...

trencacloscas wrote:
Sorry again. This is incorrect. Christians destroyed pagan universities and hospitals...

harvey1
I'd like to see some evidence of this, but I couldn't find anything along these lines. For example, the widespread introduction of hospitals seemed to take off when Christians came to power:


The adoption of Christianity as the state religion of the empire drove an expansion of the provision of care, but not just for the sick. The First Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. urged the Church to provide for the poor, sick, widows and strangers. It ordered the construction of a hospital in every cathedral town.


As for the university, there were schools (not universities), but I couldn't find any evidence that the Christians shut down any operating schools. If you can provide some evidence to back up your claim, then it would certainly be interesting information to know.

Well, ok, no problem in admitting that the terms "hospital" or "university" have Christian origins. But, of course, Christians did not invent 'centers of health care' or 'centers of high studies'. In fact, Christians did everything to destroy, loot and appropiate them out of envy to the pagan. The temples of Asclepius served as health centers in ancient times, pilgrims and common people alike were served and prescribed herbal remedies, baths and qualified medical attention. The victory of religious fanatics signalled the impending closure of the academies of secular study and with it, an end to the formal training of doctors. The decadence of medicine and hygiene, the sustitution of body studies with superstition and "spiritual healing". The magnificent temple of Asclepius in Egea was reduced to pieces by Constantine, the ones at Afaca (Lebanon), Heliopolis and Epidaurus at 375 a.d. followed, many temples dedicated to Apollo or the Dioscuri (medicine stations) were transformed en churches and abbeys, the ancient valetudinaria created by Marcus Aurelius for gladiators, slaves and soldiers were just abandoned or transformed in mere places where the plagues passed from one pacient to the next, etc. etc. etc.

Same goes to the study centers. Hypatia of Alexandria, philosopher, mathematician and head of the Neoplatonian School of Philosophy was brutally murdered by a mob of monks agitated by Bishop Cyril and led by Cyril's right-hand man, Peter the Reader. Dragged from her chariot and into a church, she was stabbed repeatedly with oyster shells. Her naked body was burned to disguise the crime. The school was duly looted afterwards. Hypatia was not made a saint nor honoured as a martyr. Saint Cyril, however, was declared a doctor of the Universal Church in 1882 and remains a luminary of the Coptic Christian Church to this day. Many libraries and schools around the Empire were looted and destroyed by Christians, none of them survived the Dark Ages.

For further information, sources more serious than Wikipedia are recommended. For instance, Karlheinz Deschner "Opus Diaboli", Edward Gibbon "Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire", Charles Freeman "The Closing Of The Western Mind" or even Jennifer Cochrane's "Illustrated History Of Medicine" at risk of being too specific.

[juliod]

For further information

I might also suggest The Begginings of Western Science by someone who's name escapes me right now. I'm currently reading it.

Although the author is quite biased in favor of christianity and defends their record in the early middle ages, he can't help but show that the knowledge of Greek medicine, astronomy, math, etc, collapsed to about zero in the christian era.

Meanwhile, in thr arab/islamic world, Greek learning acquired from refugees (Nestorians and Monophysites driven out of christendom) was retained, perpetuated, and expanded, at least until they had their own theist backlash.

And in christian europe about the 12th century, when some people started to recover bits and pieces of Greek knowledge, they were regarded as heretics for the the notion that anything about anything could be learned from sources other than the bible.

DanZ

[trencacloscas]

Oh, you must be referring to the book by David Lindberg. Thanks for the guide. I just saw it at Amazon but didn't have any comments yet.

[harvey1]

In fact, Christians did everything to destroy, loot and appropiate them out of envy to the pagan.

Motives are very difficult to assign to people unless they outright admitted that they were jealous and envious.

The temples of Asclepius served as health centers in ancient times, pilgrims and common people alike were served and prescribed herbal remedies, baths and qualified medical attention.

The poor may not have been as big a part of the patients as you suggest. Here's an interesting paper written by Hector Avalos (Iowa State Univ) that suggests that Christianity attracted converts from pagan religions by providing affordable health care (actually, free and accessible health care). It's quite conceivable that the poor were unable to get much health care from these temple facilities for the rich and the famous.

Of course, it's apparent that Christians did destroy these temples, so the health care centers would have also been destroyed. However, I think it is only fair to mention that these health care facilities were replaced in larger numbers with better access and at little or no cost to the patient. This doesn't justify the ruthlessness of destruction of those temples, but what it does say is that health care probably was not the target of their efforts to eradicate a pagan belief system in the Roman Empire.

The victory of religious fanatics signalled the impending closure of the academies of secular study and with it, an end to the formal training of doctors. The decadence of medicine and hygiene, the sustitution of body studies with superstition and "spiritual healing".

As Avalos points out, there is no evidence that the health care of the pagans were more effective than the health care of Christians. If you read the paper, you will see that the items needed by the patients to be healed would seem to be ineffective at producing any cures that a Christian approach couldn't also produce with equal effectiveness.

Same goes to the study centers. Hypatia of Alexandria, philosopher, mathematician and head of the Neoplatonian School of Philosophy was brutally murdered by a mob of monks agitated by Bishop Cyril and led by Cyril's right-hand man, Peter the Reader. Dragged from her chariot and into a church, she was stabbed repeatedly with oyster shells. Her naked body was burned to disguise the crime. The school was duly looted afterwards. Hypatia was not made a saint nor honoured as a martyr. Saint Cyril, however, was declared a doctor of the Universal Church in 1882 and remains a luminary of the Coptic Christian Church to this day. Many libraries and schools around the Empire were looted and destroyed by Christians, none of them survived the Dark Ages.

Hypatia is thought by Maria Dzielska (Hypatia of Alexandria, Harvard University Press, 1995; you can see a review here) to have been entangled in a political dispute:

A second imporant point Dzielska makes is that Hypatia did not so much stand for paganism at odds with a new Christian tyranny, but as a supporter of one Christian political faction against another. The local prefect, Orestes, whom Hypatia supported, resisted incursions into his civil sphere by the new (religious) patriarch, Cyril. Dzielska goes further to say that Hypatia barely stood up for the pagan religion. Instead, unconcerned with the religious aspect, she offered her support to various Christian students.

However, it appears that there were three neoplatonist schools which taught philosophy. One school survived into the 7th century, long after the Roman Empire ceased to exist and the invasions were well underway which wrecked havoc on the remnants of the Empire. The other two schools, according to this Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia source, were more theological, hence they were in conflict with the theocracy that was formally established in 380 A.D..

[trencacloscas]

Thanks for the links, harvey, though to the Hector Davalos' one I'll have to take an extense look later. At first glance, it doesn't seem any reliable, the guy just make assumptions from the Gospels and makes assertions with no evidence presented, like this:

...Asclepieia, which were meant to cure the sick, may unintentionally caused the spread of illness in the larger community by concentrating large numbers of sick people in small places.

This is curious, to say the least, and he doesn't bother in pointing out the origin of this opinion. Evidence points that this was exactly the case of Christian hospitals, where cleanliness wasn't the rule at all and baths were discredited. Perhaps he mentions ahead the dramatically increased rate of leprosy, skin diseases and other sicknesses associated to filth that showed up during the Christian hegemony, I didn't arrive there yet. But I'm not sure he's mentioning the many Christian quotations against exercise, hygiene and medicine...

Hypatia is thought by Maria Dzielska (Hypatia of Alexandria, Harvard University Press, 1995; you can see a review here) to have been entangled in a political dispute:

Quote:
A second imporant point Dzielska makes is that Hypatia did not so much stand for paganism at odds with a new Christian tyranny, but as a supporter of one Christian political faction against another. The local prefect, Orestes, whom Hypatia supported, resisted incursions into his civil sphere by the new (religious) patriarch, Cyril. Dzielska goes further to say that Hypatia barely stood up for the pagan religion. Instead, unconcerned with the religious aspect, she offered her support to various Christian students.

This obscure scholar you mention may have her theory. If you go through internet you'll find many apologetic works about almost anything. But of course, this is just an opinion and as far as I can see, an unsupported one. Anyway, what are you trying to say here? That if Hypatia was a Christian, Cyril had the right to lynch her??????????????????? This is the kind of behaviour that Cyril, Shenute and other fanatic monsters showed back then, but I don't see the point. People like the poet Cyrus of Panopolis converted just to escape persecution by Christians, but as you put it, there were no difference since this mobsters were lethal for everybody without even looking at their beliefs.

[harvey1]

Anyway, what are you trying to say here? That if Hypatia was a Christian, Cyril had the right to lynch her??????????????????? This is the kind of behaviour that Cyril, Shenute and other fanatic monsters showed back then, but I don't see the point. People like the poet Cyrus of Panopolis converted just to escape persecution by Christians, but as you put it, there were no difference since this mobsters were lethal for everybody without even looking at their beliefs.

No, I'm not suggesting that at all. All I'm saying is that Cyril appears to be an evil dude who took revenge on somebody that he saw as conspiring against him. Cyril will be judged by the Judge of Righteousness accordingly.

[trencacloscas]

Cyril will be judged by the Judge of Righteousness accordingly.

You don't seem to care much for the Judgement of History...