What is the West? Is Greece part of the West?

[PDH]

The argument has been made that one of the factors which lead to the Enlightenment was the rediscovery of the Greek classics by the "West".

I think rather it was the ability for those classics to be printed and thus widely distributed.

A lot of blame gets taken by this whole printing thing.

[MadImmortalMan]

The Romans considered Greece eastern. IMO, the West descends from the Western Empire and the East from the Byzantine and Russia. The Far East is something else entirely.

[Valmy]

The Romans considered Greece eastern. IMO, the West descends from the Western Empire and the East from the Byzantine and Russia. The Far East is something else entirely.

Yeah that was basically what I was getting at with the Middle Ages being the point Greece stops being part of the same civilization.

But surely before then it was.  I mean surely the Romans did not consider their neighbors to the south, who they had lived next door to for centuries, to be some sort of weird eastern civilization.

[grumbler]

Yes, Thomas Aquinas and Peter Abelard started The Enlightenment back in the 13th century with their newly rediscovered Greek Classics. Reality never does fit on the back of an envelope.

No, The Enlightenment doesn't start until there are social, economic and political conditions permitting laymen to use philosophy. It's not the greek classics that start the reneissance, it is the inflow of really cool and hip greek artists, poets and authors into italy after the fall of the byzantine empire coupled with rich independent italian cities with cash to spend on art and culture. It's when the Reneissance Humanists realize that they can't use Aristotle to prove God (like they could with Plato) that the Enlightenment starts. First with courageous individuals who are not afrait to speak out despite the threats from theocrats or are protected by enlightened (note the lower case "e") rulers.

The Enlightenment starts when thinkers start trying to answer the questions that had religious answers without referring to God. During the reformation these people were in hiding or burned or made to recant. 200 years pass between the start of The Reneissance and the start of The Enlightenment.

I am sorta curious: where did you learn this concept that the Renaissance lasted until start of the Enlightenment (if not beyond)?  Was this something you were taught in a US school, or a European one?  I've not run across this concept before.

The italicized part also interests me.  It seems to imply that the first Enlightenment thinkers were protected by "enlightened" rulers, which would indicate that the enlightenment of the rulers preceded the development of the first Enlightenment thinkers.  I've not heard of that theory, either.

[PDH]

The Romans considered the Greeks "a people valiant in words rather than in deeds" (to my way of thinking, blowhards living in the past) than real outsiders.  Time and time again the Romans recognized their debt to the Greeks in many areas, but that the Greek time had passed.

[grumbler]

But surely before then it was.  I mean surely the Romans did not consider their neighbors to the south, who they had lived next door to for centuries, to be some sort of weird eastern civilization.

The Romans considered Greek to be the language of civilized people.  One of the damaging attacks made against Marius at his height of power was that he spoke Greek poorly.

[Razgovory]

Why would you expect such releases to happen before the enlightenment actually took political control of ancien regiemes? Stop being a dick.

You said  that it started with the excommunication of Spinoza, and then give a bunch of events that could only happen because of the enlightenment.  So it's fair to ask, why aren't they actually occurring in the time period you gave us?  And yeah, several of the ancien regiemes took the ideals of the enlightenment to heart.  Several monarchs tried to govern according to these ideals, which is why they are called "enlightened despots".  In fact, you see many of the opposite effects occurring during this period.  Such as strong centralized control, Royal Absolutism, and and increased use of slave labor.

[mongers]

But surely before then it was.  I mean surely the Romans did not consider their neighbors to the south, who they had lived next door to for centuries, to be some sort of weird eastern civilization.

The Romans considered Greek to be the language of civilized people.  One of the damaging attacks made against Marius at his height of power was that he spoke Greek poorly.

That's almost the inverse of the attacks on those republican candidates for speaking French and Chinese.

[crazy canuck]

Yes, Thomas Aquinas and Peter Abelard started The Enlightenment back in the 13th century with their newly rediscovered Greek Classics. Reality never does fit on the back of an envelope.

No, The Enlightenment doesn't start until there are social, economic and political conditions permitting laymen to use philosophy. It's not the greek classics that start the reneissance, it is the inflow of really cool and hip greek artists, poets and authors into italy after the fall of the byzantine empire coupled with rich independent italian cities with cash to spend on art and culture. It's when the Reneissance Humanists realize that they can't use Aristotle to prove God (like they could with Plato) that the Enlightenment starts. First with courageous individuals who are not afrait to speak out despite the threats from theocrats or are protected by enlightened (note the lower case "e") rulers.

The Enlightenment starts when thinkers start trying to answer the questions that had religious answers without referring to God. During the reformation these people were in hiding or burned or made to recant. 200 years pass between the start of The Reneissance and the start of The Enlightenment.

I refer you back to the observation made by PDH that the change in thinking was a process.  He used bigger words.

[Razgovory]

The Romans considered Greece eastern. IMO, the West descends from the Western Empire and the East from the Byzantine and Russia. The Far East is something else entirely.

Yeah that was basically what I was getting at with the Middle Ages being the point Greece stops being part of the same civilization.

But surely before then it was.  I mean surely the Romans did not consider their neighbors to the south, who they had lived next door to for centuries, to be some sort of weird eastern civilization.

The thing is, Greece didn't make the change.  It was the West that changed.

[Valmy]

The thing is, Greece didn't make the change.  It was the West that changed.

Greece changed pretty dramatically.  Hordes of Slavs and Arabs overrunning your territory will do that.

[dps]

The thing is, Greece didn't make the change.  It was the West that changed.

Greece changed pretty dramatically.  Hordes of Slavs and Arabs overrunning your territory will do that.

I think his point was that Greece didn't go through the same changes that occurred in other countries that were heirs to Greco-Roman culture, such as France or Italy, not that it hasn't changed at all since Classic times.

[Valmy]

I think his point was that Greece didn't go through the same changes that occurred in other countries that were heirs to Greco-Roman culture, such as France or Italy, not that it hasn't changed at all since Classic times.

Where are you getting this from?  Syria was also a country that was an heir to Greco-Roman culture and it also had changes different form Greece.  I mean that is obvious.  But I do not get the distinction that the West 'make the change' whereas the changes elsewhere were not 'the change'.  Not 'a different change' but 'the change'.

And somehow this is a point that says something about Greece being part of the West prior to the Middle Ages.  What exactly I do not know.

[dps]

I think his point was that Greece didn't go through the same changes that occurred in other countries that were heirs to Greco-Roman culture, such as France or Italy, not that it hasn't changed at all since Classic times.

Where are you getting this from?  Syria was also a country that was an heir to Greco-Roman culture and it also had changes different form Greece.  I mean that is obvious.  But I do not get the distinction that the West 'make the change' whereas the changes elsewhere were not 'the change'.  Not 'a different change' but 'the change'.

And somehow this is a point that says something about Greece being part of the West prior to the Middle Ages.  What exactly I do not know.

I guess I should let Raz answer for himself, but I took his point to be that Greece (and other formerly Roman areas such as Syria) didn't go through (or share in) the Renaissance and Enlightenment.

[Razgovory]

My point was why should we assume that we are more "Greek", the the Greeks are?  If ancient Greece was indeed the cradle of Western culture, why is only Western Europe worthy to be heirs of this intellectual heritage?  Why not other areas that Greece influence like Egypt, or Bulgaria, or Syria or even Greece itself?  I'd say that Greece influence Syria far more then it influence the UK.  After all, the Greeks ruled Syria for quite some time.

What I think is that during the Renaissance Western Europe developed a sort of inferiority complex toward the Classical world.  Nothing they could do, or ever did would ever equal the accomplishments of the ancient world.  As such they started to define the history of Europe as one of a light civilized classical world, followed by a nasty dark middle age, followed by a rebirth of the classical culture.  Scholars who only had a handful of classical texts (which is still pretty much all we have), developed a somewhat skewed view of the classical world (which I also think we also still have), and craved to be part of this beautiful ancient society.  They would look at the solemn, majestic and sterile ruins of classical cities and temples and then to the garbage strewn cities of their present and decide that these ruined cities were what they liked much better.   It was this desire to make Greece ours that made people include ancient Greece as part of the West if not the source of the West.

Of course this causes a problem today.  Greece doesn't look much like the West.  You (Valmy), suggest this is because Greece went off on it's own direction at some point.  I think this view is silly and slightly chauvinistic.  Why assume that Greece shifted away from the culture they started? Especially when the other cultures influenced were influenced by Greece were closer to what the Greeks were doing at the time (and are to some extent still are).  The shift I would say, lies not in the Greeks.  But in western Europe and by extension, Greece was never part of cultural sphere we call "The West".