"Boya Reading Time -- Creating the City of God: The Darkness and Elegance of the Middle Ages

Author: Wang Pingli
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-03-01
Features: After the glorious Greece and Rome, Europe was brewing a new temperament. It was said to be cold and cruel. This temperament was so different from that of Greece and Rome that later generations regarded the next thousand years as a deformed era and gave it a fixed name, the "Dark Ages." This cannot be called anything but a irony: since the Middle Ages, God has ruled the minds of Europeans. Wasn't it in the beginning of the Book of Genesis that God said, "Let there be light"? Yet this devout thousand years was later called the "Dark Ages." Where did the light God brought go? This is a simple question. However, this question exposed the flaw in the term "Dark Ages": the term "Dark Ages" was a slander or at least a misunderstanding of the entire Middle Ages, especially its art. If it was a slander, it wasn't surprising. The thinkers of the Enlightenment harbored an excessive aversion to everything about the Middle Ages. They longed to portray all the bishops of the Middle Ages as a bunch of greedy little men and all the monks as a group of ignorant fools, fabricating many stories to that effect. This practice began with Boccaccio's Decameron. Modern scientists took it for granted that many concepts of the Middle Ages were foolish. For example, they believed that people in the Middle Ages insisted that the Earth was the center of the universe due to ignorance and the indoctrination of the Church. In reality, the idea that the Earth was round and revolved around the Sun was not shocking or strange in the Middle Ages, because the astronomical knowledge passed down from Greece was not lacking in admirers in the Middle Ages. The Greeks had long suspected that the Earth was not the center of the universe. However, ideas alone were not enough to spread them widely; they needed mathematical persuasion. In this regard, the mathematical model of Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) provided a relatively complete solution for the intellectual world of the entire Middle Ages. Aquinas's premise was that the Earth was the center of the universe, so monks and believers gradually accepted the geocentric theory. If Aquinas had taken the premise that the Sun was the center of the universe and had been able to explain it successfully with the same mathematical methods, it is likely that the astronomical concepts of the Middle Ages would have been no different from those of today. Once Aquinas's theory was widely accepted and regarded as orthodox, it would naturally require a struggle to overturn it, which is why Copernicus, Bruno, and Galileo were threatened and persecuted by the Church. This was not a flaw of the medieval Church but a flaw of all people and all societies. Modern society also has authority and orthodoxy, and anyone who wants to completely subvert it will face suppression no less severe than that faced by medieval heretics. If it was a misunderstanding, it also stemmed from a prejudice. Europeans, like the Chinese, suffer from a tendency to value the past over the present. The art of ancient Greece and Rome satisfied the romantic tastes of modern Europeans. It was older than the Middle Ages, and ancient things were said to radiate a natural simplicity, sublimity, and beauty. Although we know that the ancient world was far from lacking cunning, bloodshed, greed, and fraud, and that even today there are people who possess a natural simplicity, sublimity, and beauty by nature. Of course, medieval art was indeed very different from the art of ancient Greece and Rome. If we were to summarize it superficially with some words, it would be that the art of ancient Greece and Rome reflected confidence, positivity, brightness, and dignity, whether in the works themselves or in their creators. After all, the Greeks were bold enough to compete with the gods in skill, and the Romans established a world empire unprecedented in history. The spirit of Caesar's "I came, I saw, I conquered" permeated the ideology of his successors. Medieval art, on the other hand, was almost the opposite—it was the most humble art in history. Under the premise of original sin, people's confidence and dignity were absurd. Before the twisted body and tragic face of Christ, the naked beauty that the Greeks used to display or the grandeur of the temples that the Romans used to demonstrate did not seem arrogant. This was the starting point of the medieval artists. In their view, the forms and colors used in art were always imperfect means. To pursue realism like the Greeks was meaningless, because God could never be depicted by human hands. Therefore, shapes and colors could only be auxiliary, and people's eyes should not linger only on the artwork itself—this was "losing oneself in trifles"! Instead, they should experience deeper, more spiritual meanings through hints, metaphors, implications, and symbols in the artwork. The revelation and will of God were vast and profound, and they deserved the viewer's reverent and pious contemplation. This was the support behind all medieval artworks. Therefore, medieval art was a reflective art, constantly reminding the viewer of their status and faith. Before God, humans were humble, but they lived in God and were always connected to Him. Artworks became a medium between humans and God, making them more philosophical and emphasizing the spiritual. Medieval artists achieved this effect through many methods. For example, painting and sculpture did not realism but pursued a symbolic, flat, and decorative effect, aiming to create an atmosphere. Churches increasingly created an interior effect that was lofty, profound, full of changing light and shadow, and ethereal. All of this was intended to move the viewer's soul, as if the touch came from the effusion of a hidden sacred radiance. Yet, for such a spiritual pursuit, for hundreds of years, we have been naming it "dark and ignorant." How cruel is that. Artworks inevitably face such a dilemma: the more concrete, realistic, and sensory they are, like the Greek Venus or Poseidon, the more they trap people in the cage of the eyes. People cannot transcend visual pleasure and intoxication, neither wanting nor able to say anything. Any description or praise is redundant, because it has already exceeded the limits of positive depiction in language. That is why modern aestheticians often mention that beauty cannot be analyzed and cannot be mixed with concepts. The more abstract, expressive, and rational, like medieval art, the more it allows people to directly pass through the artwork itself to face what it symbolizes, and this kind of beauty can be analyzed and contemplated. These were the two artistic styles in Europe before the emergence of modern art, and they were not particularly superior or inferior to each other. "Dark" is more of a description of the style of medieval art than a criticism. Deep within the lofty and profound Gothic cathedrals, there were stunning sculptures, paintings, stained glass windows, and chandeliers. Perhaps the cathedral itself was a microcosm of medieval art. The cathedral was the "spiritual box" of the Middle Ages, and its stunning aspects lay in its dark interior, just as human beauty lies in its depths—the love for God it contains—the desire to be saved that all people in all ages share. This book has a relatively wide practical value and can serve as a reference book and practical material for Western architecture and culture researchers, students and teachers of architecture, practical art workers, travel enthusiasts, and the general public interested in Western culture.