The Creation of the University By The Catholic Church
Many people when asked about the idea of the university has no clue where it comes from or its purpose in the first place. Today we are going to explore the roots of where universities derive from and what was it purpose in the first place. The average person assumed universities is are a place of teaching so they can better themselves financially, this is true but if we take a closer look we will find there are more to the idea of the university that meets the eye. Most of us assume the middle ages was one of ignorance, superstition, and intellectual repression. Nothing could be further from the truth—it is to the Middle Ages that we owe one of Western civilization’s greatest—unique—intellectual contributions to the world: the university system.
In the book named "How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization" by Thomas E. Woods, Jr he states "The university was an utterly new phenomenon in European history. Nothing like it had existed in ancient Greece or Rome. The institution that we recognize today, with its faculties, courses of study, examinations, and degrees, as well as the distinction between undergraduate and graduate study, comes to us directly from the medieval world. The Church developed the university system because, according to historian Lowrie Daly, it was the only institution in Europe that showed consistent interest in the preservation and cultivation of knowledge."(p.47)
The popes role in universities
"Aside from the Church’s intellectual role in fostering the universities, the papacy played a central role in establishing and encouraging them. Naturally, the granting of a charter to a university was one indication of this papal role. Eighty-one universities had been established by the time of the Reformation. Of these, thirty-three possessed a papal charter, fifteen a royal or imperial one, twenty possessed both, and thirteen had none. In addition, it was the accepted view that a university could not award degrees without the approbation of pope, king, or emperor. Pope Innocent IV officially granted this privilege to Oxford University in 1254. The pope (in fact) and the emperor (in theory) possessed authority over all of Christendom, and for this reason it was to them that a university typically had to turn for the right to issue degrees."(p.48)
"It became common for universities to bring their grievances to the pope in Rome. On several occasions, the pope even intervened to force university authorities to pay professors their salaries; Popes Boniface VIII, Clement V, Clement VI, and Gregory IX all had to take such measures. Little wonder, then, that one historian has declared that the universities’ “most consistent and greatest protector was the Pope of Rome. He it was who granted, increased, and protected their privileged status in a world of often conflicting jurisdictions.”"(p.51)
"What was studied at these great institutions? The seven liberal arts, for starters, along with civil and canon law, natural philosophy, medicine, and theology. As the universities took shape in the twelfth century, they were the happy beneficiaries of the fruits of what some scholars have called the renaissance of the twelfth century.18 Massive translation efforts brought forth many of the great works of the ancient world that had been lost to Western scholarship for too many centuries, including the geometry of Euclid; the logic, metaphysics, natural philosophy, and ethics of Aristotle; and the medical work of Galen. Legal studies began to flourish as well, particularly at Bologna, when the Digest, the key component of the sixth-century emperor Justinian’s Corpus Juris Civilis (a compendium of Roman law, much admired from its origins to the present day), was rediscovered."(p.52-53)
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How the catholic church built western civilization | Creation of the University Article
