Medieval philosophy a new history of western philosophy volume 2 ( PDFDrive ) 128

THE SCHOOLMEN

the Turks in 1453 led to an inXux of refugees, bringing with them not only
their own knowledge of classical Greek but also precious manuscripts of
ancient authors. These were welcomed both in Rome and in Florence.
Cosimo de’ Medici commissioned his court philosopher, Marsilio Ficino, to
translate the entire works of Plato. The work was completed around 1469,
when Cosimo’s grandson Lorenzo the MagniWcent succeeded as head of the
Medici clan. Lorenzo collected Greek manuscripts in his new Laurenziana
library, just as Pope Nicholas V and his successors had been doing in the
refounded Vatican library.
Marsilio Ficino gathered round him, at Careggi near Florence, a group of
wealthy students of Plato, whom he called his Academy. He translated, in
addition to Plato, works of Proclus and Plotinus, and the Corpus Hermeticum, a
collection of ancient alchemical and astrological writings. He wrote commentaries on four major dialogues of Plato and on the Enneads of Plotinus.
He also wrote a number of short treatises himself, and one major work, the
Theologia Platonica (1474), in which he set out his own Neoplatonic account of
the soul and its origin and destiny. His aim was to combine the Platonic
element in the scholastic tradition with a literary and historical appreciation of its origins in the ancient world. He regarded the pagan Platonic
tradition as itself divinely inspired, and believed that its incorporation in
theological teaching was essential if the Christian religion was to be made
palatable to the new humanistic intelligentsia. Thus he equated the charity
which St Paul speaks of in 1 Corinthians with the Eros of the Phaedrus, and
identiWed the Christian God with the Republic’s Idea of the Good.
The most distinguished of Ficino’s Platonic associates was Giovanni Pico,
count of Mirandola (1463–94). Well educated in Latin and Greek, Pico
learnt Greek and Hebrew at an early age, and in addition to the Hermetic
Corpus he made a serious study of the Jewish mystical cabbala. He wanted
to combine Greek, Hebrew, Muslim, and Christian thought into a great
eclectic Platonic synthesis. He spelt this out in 900 theses and invited all
interested scholars to discuss these with him in a public disputation in

Rome in 1487. Pope Innocent VIII forbade the disputation, and appointed a
committee to examine the theses for heresy. Among the propositions
condemned was ‘there is no branch of science which gives us more
certainty of Christ’s divinity than magic and cabbala’.
The oration which Pico prepared to introduce the aborted disputation
survives under the title On the Dignity of Man. Pico draws equally on Genesis
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