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Campbell continues to discuss the issue of the rise of Islam in some detail noting that there is an assumption of the infallibility of the group or community (Page 436), and also that the Mind of the Community and the Mind of God are identical. To be clear, this is not in the Socratic spirit of seeking justice in the soul writ large (in the polis,) but rather something more radical, something more in line with Marxist Culture which denies the existence of the philosophical , transcendental and metaphysical realms, whilst simultaneously claiming a form of transcendence for the words of Marx-the prophet. Islamic poets/philosophers such as Mohammed Iqbal also expressed a criticism of Europe in the following words:
“Believe me, Europe today is the greatest hindrance in the way of mans ethcal achievement. The Muslim, on the other hand, is in possession of these ultimate ideas on the basis of a revelation, which, speaking from the inmost depths of life, internalises its own apparent externality……and in view of the basic idea of Islam, that there can be no further revelation binding on man.” (Pages 438-9)
We now know that for a number of Islamic societies there are radical conseqences for the freedom of the individual citizen of such Republics, but there are also consequences for an entire segment of the Islamic community, namely women, who are not treated equally in the spirit of European democracies. The birthplace of democracy, Ancient Greece, provided us with institutions and laws that grew naturally and organically from the lives of the citizens. These institutions and laws became part of the matrix from which both equality and freedom grow. The meanings of the terms arché, areté, diké, logos, psuché, aletheia,and epistemé were also critically interpreted in terms of many Aristotelian principles including the principle of the Golden Mean.
Campbell notes the challenges to Islamic logic from both the ShiÃtes and the Whirling Dervish Order. The former became prominent in the drama-filled attempts to find a successor for Mohammed after his death. Other significant events in the growth of the power of Islam included the shift of the Capital from Mecca to Baghdad, the city of pleasure, in 750AD, when the Umayyadi were removed from power. This period of Persian influence lasted until 1258 AD when the Mongols put the city to the sword brutally, allowing a resurgence of European influence.
Campbell discusses St Patrick of Ireland and his controversial contemporary Pelagius, who confronted the Church with the uncomfortable doctrine of the free will which probably had its origin in Ancient Greece, in particular, the work of “The Philosopher” of the period, Aristotle. This doctrine seriously questioned the thesis of Original Sin, which saw the will only in terms of the disobedience of Satan. The Neoplatonism of Erigena (815-877AD) was also condemned by Rome (Page 467).
The Celts, Cambell argues worshipped the mother of God, Mother Earth, and in the North the Vikings were roaming much of Europe and beyond, but especially harassing the Christians of Europe, embodying the hero-type of the warrior, at home in the killing-fields of war.
Pope Innocent III(1198-1215), the “greatest of the Popes, according to the Historians and Campbell, reinforced the opposition to Pelagianism and other heresies attributed to the Gnostics and Donatism. Pope Innocent himself became an object of suspicion but was never formally charged with any offence until he was moved by his own people into a state of retirement. In the context of this discussion, Campbell, referring to the avarice of the clergy, claimed:
“It is hardly to be wondered, then, why, in the course of the 12th century there should have developed throughout Europe a deep trend not merely of anti-clericalism but of radical heresy.”(Page 495)
Manichaeism, a form of Gnosticism, was also subject to the scrutiny of the Church authorities, and its leaders were burned at the stake. Campbell claims that these heresies were signs that European individuals had begun to think for themselves and cast off the yoke of the Church, refusing to believe in an “absolute Levantine consensus”. Anti-Papal polemics began to circulate and were promoted by various individuals, including Joachim of Flores, who appealed to many of the Fransciscan order who had postulated “The Age of the Holy Ghost” which involved amongst other things, a reduction in the role of the Church in everyday affairs. The Papacy entered a “time of troubles” when in 1377 there were suddenly two Popes because of a dispute between Italy and France, each excommunicating the other (Page 503), until the council of Pisa elected a third Pope. In the wake of these events John Huss (1373-1415) was burned at the stake for suggesting “Reforms of the Church”, thus preparing the way for Luther and the “Reformation”,one century later (Page 504)
Cambell has the following to say on the issue of the rise of the influence of the Europeans:
“In the broadest view of the history of world mythology, the chief creative development in the period of the waning Middle Ages and approaching Reformation was the use of the principle of individual conscience over ecclesiastical authority. This marked the beginning of the end of the reign of the priestly mind, first over European thought, and then as today, we see, in all the world.” (Page 504)
One could also characterise this period of European History in terms of a reawakening of the critical spirit and love of freedom that came down to us from the Ancient Greeks. This is a possible reading emanating from the History of world Philosophy. There would then be a possible continuous cultural thread leading to both the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. An Ancient non-European spiritual system based on revelation and miraculous happenings was never going to undermine the fundamental theoretical and practical rationalism of the Ancient Greeks. Rationality, moreover, could be widely communicated in a University system searching for the Truth, the Good, and the Beautiful, provided that the principle of specialistaion did not play the leading role in the organisation of university faculties. The University, then, was the institution best equipped to provide a life of eudaimonia, a life in which ruin and destruction could be overcome if ones knowledge was broad and deep enough and if one could also achieve the awesome task of “knowing” oneself.
Campbell also notes that a number of troubadours were connected with the Allbigensian heresy. These “popular” people spoke of Amor and the mystical rapture associated with such passion. This popular movement of course competed with the calm, collected contemplative life of the University, which appeared to concern itself more with matters of the soul than matters of the justice of the polis. Campbell notes,, however, the following:
“There is, in short, between the pagan past and High Middle Ages of Europe an impressive continuity of spirit and development. over which, for a time, the overlay of an Oriental type of spiritual despotism was heavily spread only to be disintegrated, assimlated and absorbed. In courtly and poetic circles the ideal of individual experience prevailed over that of the infallible authority of men whose character was supposed to be disregarded.” (Pages 509-510).
Such a state of affirs eventually resulted in three interesting European ages in Europe, Firstly, the Renaissance, secondly the Enlightenment and thirdly, the Romantic period in which even the authority of the rationality of the Classical and Enlightenment ages was questioned. We are now entering the “Modern Age” which, according to Arendt, began already with the Philosophers Hobbes and Descartes, who both in sceptical mood, raised doubts about the work of Aristotle which Kant attempted to dismantle in his critical Philosophy, only to have his own work partially dismantled by the “Spiritual” Philosophy of Hegel, which concluded with the Age of Romanticism that, in turn, detached us from our anchors in a stormy sea. The 20th century, according to Arendt was a “terrible century, with two world wars, the use of weapons of mass destruction upon civilian populations, a cold war, and the threat of mass-extinction hanging over us like a dark atomic cloud. All that is now needed is for a number of tyrannical “new men” to acquire power in power centres for this story of humanity to end mythologically instead of rationally.