Essay - Changing Concepts of Nature and Individual Differences in the Late...

Changing Concepts of Nature and individual Differences in the late Middle Ages

Explore the ways in which the humanities reflect changing concepts of nature and ***** differences during ***** Late Middle Ages. Select specific works to illustrate your view of the changes that have occurred and present explanation ***** how and why the ***** characterize the period. Make a connection ***** Ancient Egypt, ***** Greece and Ancient Rome ***** discuss the changes that are evident.

***** would be too easy to generalize that the ancient Greeks and Romans saw nature as 'good' and that early Christian medieval society did not. Greeks such as Hippocrates celebrated ***** need to c***** of the body, while Pla*****nists disdained the value ***** the material, bodily world in contrast to the heavenly sphere of the 'forms.' Roman Stoics stressed mastery of ***** ***** as a way of *****coming more harmonious with the natural ***** and strove ***** to counteract humanity's innate sense ***** balance with ***** but the ***** army mastered nature by constructing mighty aqueducts. Later, while Christian ascetics mortified their physical bodies, the natural world could not be rejected entirely ***** *****s as God had created ***** world, thus the world must be good, even if humanity w***** fallen. In fact, the stress upon physical relics that signified the miracles and presence of ***** saints in the ***** world were ***** unlike the religious significance given to ***** corporal body in Ancient Egypt. Of course, the body itself did not ascend to heaven in Christian belief, as it ***** according to the pagan, *****ian belief system. However, the stress upon creating beautiful tombs to enclose the physical remains of the dead is analogous to Egyptian attitudes.

Thus, the divide in human thought regarding the individual and nature is not ***** clear as one might be tempted to assume. Particularly ***** the late, as opposed to ***** early Middle Ages, there w***** a revivification in the interest s*****n *****wards the classical world, and learning which was part of a new respect for ***** ***** and an accept*****ce of the natural sciences. For example, the early Christian philosopher Augustine wrote that although God had created the universe "as nebulous matter, within which lay 'primal seeds'" ***** "grew and developed into the universe and its life *****ms, guided by ***** ***** laws that ***** had laid down...investigation ***** debate about ***** matters was ***** encouraged in the early Middle ********** ***** himself wrote, 'Seek not to understand that you may believe, ***** believe ***** you ***** understand'" (Waggoner, 1997). But later, Aquinas joined the two approaches ***** philosophy and *****ology ***** present a theory of the cosmos. "Reason was no longer conceived as the nemesis of Faith...Aquinas [claimed] that both were paths to a single truth: 'God exists'" (Kreis, 2000). Philosophy *****nd reason in general were ***** longer seen as hostile to faith.

The Late Middle Ages was characterized by *****terest in ana*****my, as is reflected in ***** more individuated re*****ations of the human form in