The Dark Age Myth: An Atheist Reviews “God’s Philosophers”
黑暗时代神话：一位无神论者评《上帝的哲学家》

作者：Tim O‘Neill @ 2009-10-17
译者：Ghost（@ Ghostmarine）
校对：Drunkplane（@暂时只看书不旅行了-zny），慕白（@李凤阳他说）
来源：Strange Notions，http://www.strangenotions.com/gods-philosophers/

My interest in Medieval science was substantially sparked by one book. Way back in 1991, when I was an impoverished and often starving post-graduate student at the University of Tasmania, I found a copy of Robert T. Gunther’s  Astrolabes of the World – 598 folio pages of meticulously catalogued Islamic, Medieval and Renaissance astrolabes with photos, diagrams, star lists and a wealth of other information. I found it, appropriately and not coincidentally, in Michael Sprod’s  Astrolabe Books – up the stairs in one of the beautiful old sandstone warehouses that line  Salamanca Place on Hobart’s waterfront.

我对中世纪科学的兴趣其实源于一本书。早在1991年时，我还在塔斯马尼亚大学读研究生，生活穷困潦倒，过着有一顿没一顿的日子。算不上多么机缘巧合，就在霍巴特（Hobart）河岸边萨拉曼卡广场（Salamanca Place）一间优美古老的砂岩建筑二楼，Michael Sprod的星盘书店，我发现了一本Robert T. Gunther的《世界星盘》（Astrolabes of the World）。实际上，我认为在这家书店发现这本书真是再恰当不过了。这本书足有598页，细致地将伊斯兰、中世纪，以及文艺复兴时期的星盘收集编目，配有图片、图表、星表，以及丰富的相关信息。

Unfortunately the book cost $200, which at that stage was the equivalent to what I lived on for a month. But Michael was used to selling books to poverty-stricken students, so I went without lunch, put down a deposit of $10 and came back weekly for several months to pay off as much as I could afford and eventually got to take it home, wrapped in brown paper in a way that only Hobart bookshops seem to bother with anymore. There are few pleasures greater than finally getting your hands on a book you’ve been wanting to own and read for a long time.

非常不幸，这本书要价二百，相当于我那时一个月的开销。好在Michael经常卖书给穷学生，所以我没吃午饭，放下十块定金，接下来几个月，每周过来一趟，付上一笔钱，有多少就付多少，最终，把它裹在棕色的包装纸中搬回家。现在想来，好像只有霍巴特的书店愿意在卖书时那么劳烦地用纸把书包好。手抚摸在长久以来日思月想、梦寐以求的一本书上，那种乐趣，世间少有。

I had another experience of that particular pleasure when I received my copy of James Hannam’s God’s Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science a couple of weeks ago.

几周前，收到手头这本James Hannam的《上帝的哲学家：中世纪如何为现代科学奠基》（God’s Philosophers: How the Medieval World Laid the Foundations of Modern Science），我又一次体验到了这种独特乐趣。

For years I’ve been toying with the idea of creating a website on Medieval science and technology to bring the recent research on the subject to a more general audience and to counter the biased myths about it being a Dark Age of irrational superstition. Thankfully I can now cross that off my to do list, because Hannam’s superb book has done the job for me and in fine style.

很多年来，我一直想着要建个网站，关注中世纪科学与技术，向普通读者介绍有关这一主题的新近研究，同时反驳各种偏颇的神话，认为中世纪是个迷信横行的“黑暗时代”。现在我终于可以不再操心这项工程，因为Hannam这部杰出的作品已经完成了这个任务，而且完成得非常漂亮。

The Christian Dark Age and Other Hysterical Myths
基督教黑暗时代以及其他歇斯底里的神话

One of the occupational hazards of being an atheist and secular humanist who hangs around on discussion boards is to encounter a staggering level of historical illiteracy. I like to console myself that many of the people on such boards have come to their atheism via the study of science and so, even if they are quite learned in things like geology and biology, usually have a grasp of history stunted at about high school level. I generally do this because the alternative is to admit that the average person’s grasp of history and how history is studied is so utterly feeble as to be totally depressing.

作为一个流连于各大讨论版的无神论者和世俗人文主义者，“职业危害”之一就是会遇到数不胜数的历史盲。我时常宽慰自己，这些讨论版上很多人通过学习科学知识成为了无神论者，因此即使他们在地质、生物这样的领域相当精通，但在历史方面的教育却没有跟上，也不过就是高中生水平。我如果不这样安慰自己，那就要承认，一般人对历史相当缺乏理解，对历史的研究方法几乎一无所知，这种情形非常令人沮丧。

So, alongside the regular airings of the hoary old myth that the Bible was collated at the Council of Nicea, the tedious internet-based “Jesus never existed!” nonsense, or otherwise intelligent people spouting pseudo historical claims that would make even Dan Brown snort in derision, the myth that the Catholic Church caused the Dark Ages and the Medieval Period was a scientific wasteland is regularly wheeled, creaking, into the sunlight for another trundle around the arena.

我们都听说过一些传言，比方说《圣经》由尼西亚会议（Council of Nicea）编修，互联网上“耶稣从未存在！”这样的胡说八道甚嚣尘上，还有一些本来挺聪明的人却胡诌出连丹·布朗（Dan Brown）都嗤之以鼻的伪历史断言，与这些耳熟能详的老套神话相提并论的，还有人说天主教会引发黑暗时代、中世纪是科学荒漠，这种神话时不时被人花样翻新之后重新拉回论战的舞台。

The myth goes that the Greeks and Romans were wise and rational types who loved science and were on the brink of doing all kinds of marvelous things (inventing full-scale steam engines is one example that is usually, rather fancifully, invoked) until Christianity came along. Christianity then banned all learning and rational thought and ushered in the Dark Ages. Then an iron-fisted theocracy, backed by a Gestapo-style Inquisition, prevented any science or questioning inquiry from happening until Leonardo da Vinci invented intelligence and the wondrous Renaissance saved us all from Medieval darkness.

这种神话大概是说，希腊人、罗马人聪明理性热爱科学，基本上已经快要发明出各种奇观壮举（通常会梦呓似地举出发明完整蒸汽机这样的例子），直到基督教降临。基督教随后禁绝了所有学问和理性思考，开启了黑暗时代。接下来，在盖世太保般的宗教裁判所支持下，神权实施了铁腕统治，杜绝任何科学或者质疑的出现，直到达芬奇发明智慧，伟大的文艺复兴将我们从中世纪的黑暗中拯救。【译注：话说我中学时候就是这样觉得的。】

The online manifestations of this curiously quaint but seemingly indefatigable idea range from the touchingly clumsy to the utterly shocking, but it remains one of those things that “everybody knows” and permeates modern culture.

这种观点稀奇古怪，但同时颇有生命力，其在网上的表现时而让人觉得粗陋不堪，时而又让人深感震惊，然而它终究取得了“众人皆知”的地位，渗透进现代文化的方方面面。

A recent episode of Family Guy had Stewie and Brian enter a futuristic alternative world where, it was explained, things were so advanced because Christianity didn’t destroy learning, usher in the Dark Ages and stifle science. The writers didn’t see the need to explain what Stewie meant – they assumed everyone understood.

最近一集《恶搞之家》（Family Guy）里，Stewie和Brian进入了另一个未来主义的异次元世界，那里一切非常先进，因为基督教并没有摧毁学问，开创黑暗时代，扼杀科学。剧集中没有解释Stewie的观点，因为在编剧看来，大家都懂。

About once every 3-4 months on forums like RichardDawkins.net we get some discussion where someone invokes the old “Conflict Thesis“. That evolves into the usual ritual kicking of the Middle Ages as a benighted intellectual wasteland where humanity was shackled to superstition and oppressed by cackling minions of the Evil Old Catholic Church.

类似RichardDawkins.net这样的论坛，每隔三四个月，就会有人提起这个老生常谈的“冲突论”（Conflict Thesis），令大家纷纷卷入讨论之中。一般习惯上会将中世纪看成蒙昧的智识荒漠，邪恶的古代天主教会下属走狗们一脸阴笑，肆意欺压，人性受到束缚，沉溺于迷信之中。

The hoary standards are brought out on cue. Giordiano Bruno is presented as a wise and noble martyr for science instead of the irritating mystical New Age kook he actually was. Hypatia is presented as another such martyr and the mythical Christian destruction of the Great Library of Alexandria is spoken of in hushed tones, despite both these ideas being totally untrue. The Galileo Affair is ushered in as evidence of a brave scientist standing up to the unscientific obscurantism of the Church, despite that case being as much about science as it was about Scripture.

这种时候，一些霉迹斑斑的旧旗帜又会被扛出来。布鲁诺被推为睿智而尊贵的科学殉道者，而非新时代让人恼火的神秘主义傻瓜，要知道后者才是他的本来面目。希帕提娅成为传说中的另一个悲情殉道者，是基督徒焚毁了亚历山大大图书馆的故事也在低声流传，然而，这二者都是彻头彻尾的不实之词。伽利略事件，也被看成是勇敢的科学家抵抗教会蒙昧主义的证据，尽管那起案子中，牵扯到的科学纷争并不比《圣经》纷争来的少。

And, almost without fail, someone digs up a graphic (see below), which I have come to dub “The Most Wrong Thing On the Internet Ever”, and to flourish it triumphantly as though it is proof of something other than the fact that most people are utterly ignorant of history and unable to see that something called “Scientific Advancement” can’t be measured, let alone plotted on a graph.

而且，几乎无一例外，总有人会挖出一张图（如下），趾高气昂地挥舞，好像它能够证明点什么似的。这张被我称作“互联网有史以来错得最离谱的东西”，只不过证明了绝大部分人对历史一无所知，根本没有意识到所谓“科学进步”这种玩意根本无法度量，更别说像这样有模有样地标在图标上了。

It’s not hard to kick this nonsense to pieces, especially since the people presenting it know next to nothing about history and have simply picked up these strange ideas from websites and popular books. The assertions collapse as soon as you hit them with hard evidence.

将这种胡说八道彻底击碎并不困难，尤其是因为，能够亮出这张图的人，往往对历史一无所知，仅仅从某些网站或者通俗书籍中摘下这些千奇百怪的观点。只要亮出强有力的证据，这些看法便会分崩离析。

I love to totally stump these propagators by asking them to present me with the name of one – just one – scientist burned, persecuted, or oppressed for their science in the Middle Ages. They always fail to come up with any. They usually try to crowbar Galileo back into the Middle Ages, which is amusing considering he was a contemporary of Descartes.

我倒挺喜欢刁难这些大话家，请他们举出中世纪一个因为从事研究而被烧死、被迫害或者被压迫的科学家的名字，一个就好。他们总是一筹莫展，常常会把伽利略拽回中世纪，可只要一想到其实他和笛卡尔处在同一时代，就让人觉得好笑。

When asked why they have failed to produce any such scientists given the Church was apparently so busily oppressing them, they often resort to claiming that the Evil Old Church did such a good job of oppression that everyone was too scared to practice science.

再问问，既然教廷这么忙于压迫科学家，为什么他们却举不出这样的例子，他们通常会这么辩称，邪恶的古代教廷压迫工作做得实在太好，每个人都吓得瑟瑟发抖，不敢从事科学研究。

By the time I produce a laundry list of Medieval scientists – like Albertus Magnus, Robert Grosseteste, Roger Bacon, John Peckham, Duns Scotus, Thomas Bradwardine, Walter Burley, William Heytesbury, Richard Swineshead, John Dumbleton, Richard of Wallingford, Nicholas Oresme, Jean Buridan and Nicholas of Cusa- and ask why these men were happily pursuing science in the Middle Ages without molestation from the Church, my opponents usually scratch their heads in puzzlement at what just went wrong.

这时，我会列一个中世纪科学家清单——例如大阿尔伯图斯（Albertus Magnus）、罗伯特·格罗斯泰斯特（Robert Grosseteste）、罗吉尔·培根（Roger Bacon）、约翰·佩克汉姆（John Peckham）、邓斯·司各脱（Duns Scotus）、托马斯·布雷德华（Thomas Bradwardine）、沃特·伯利（Walter Burley）、赫特斯柏立的威廉（William Heytesbury）、理查德·斯韦恩斯赫（Richard Swineshead）、约翰·登布尔顿（John Dumbleton）、沃灵福德的理查德（Richard of Wallingford）、尼古拉斯·奥里斯姆（Nicholas Oresme）、让·布里丹（Jean Buridan），还有库萨的尼古拉斯（Nicholas of Cusa），然后问道，为什么这些人能够在中世纪快乐地追求科学，而没有受到教廷的摧残，我的对手们通常会困惑地挠挠头，不知道哪里出了问题。

The Origin of the Myths
神话的起源

How the myths that led to the creation of “The Most Wrong Thing On the Internet Ever” is well documented in several recent books on the the history of science. But Hannam wisely tackles it in the opening pages of his book, since it would be likely to form the basis for many general readers to be suspicious of the idea of a Medieval foundation for modern science.

“互联网有史以来错得最离谱的东西”到底是如何产生的，在近期好几本科学史作品中都有很好的展现。既然很多大众读者对中世纪为现代科学奠基这种理念持普遍怀疑态度，Hannam明智地在这本书开篇就解决这个问题。

A festering melange of Enlightenment bigotry, Protestant papism-bashing, French anti-clericism, and Classicist snobbery have all combined to make the Medieval period a by-word for backwardness, superstition and primitivism, and the opposite of everything the average person associates with science and reason.

启蒙主义的固执盲从、新教对天主教的攻击、法国人的反教权运动，以及古典主义者的势利，所有这一切杂糅在一起并不断发酵，将中世纪描述成一个落后、迷信、原始的时代，从一切角度来说都是普通人所认为的科学和理性的反面。

Hannam sketches how polemicists like Thomas Huxley, John William Draper, and Andrew Dickson White, all with their own anti-Christian axes to grind, managed to shape the still current idea that the Middle Ages was devoid of science and reason. And how it was not until real historians bothered to question the polemicists through the work of early pioneers in the field like  Pierre Duhem,  Lynn Thorndike, and the author of my astrolabe book,  Robert T. Gunther, that the distortions of the axe-grinders began to be corrected by proper, unbiased research. That work has now been completed by the current crop of modern historians of science like David C. Lindberg, Ronald Numbers, and Edward Grant.

Hannam描述了像Thomas Huxley、John William Draper以及Andrew Dickson White这样能言善辩的旗手，如何融入自己的反基督观点，扭曲地构建了科学和理性在中世纪寸步难行这类当前通行的观点。书中还记录，直到正牌历史学家开始利用自己的作品不厌其烦地对这些雄辩家们进行质疑，别有用心者的歪曲才开始被不带偏见的恰当研究所纠正，该领域早期开拓者包括Pierre Duhem、Lynn Thorndike，以及我的那本星盘书作者Robert T. Gunther。目前，David C. Lindberg、Ronald Numbers以及Edward Grant这样的现代科学史学家业已完成这项工作。

In the academic sphere, at least, the “Conflict Thesis” of a historical war between science and theology has been long since overturned. It is very odd that so many of my fellow atheists cling so desperately to a long-dead position that was only ever upheld by amateur Nineteenth Century polemicists and not the careful research of recent, objective, peer-reviewed historians. This is strange behavior for people who like to label themselves “rationalists”.

至少在学术界，科学与神学之间的“冲突论”历史之争早已被推翻了。所以这就显得很奇怪，为什么那么多无神论者如此热切的执着于一种早已死去的信条，这种信条本来只有十九世纪的业余辩论家们才会承认，而不应被现代客观、经过同行评议的历史学家所信奉。对于那些热衷于为自己贴上“理性主义者”标签的人们来说，这种坚持倒真是一樁咄咄怪事。

Speaking of rationalism, the critical factor that the myths obscure is precisely how rational intellectual inquiry in the Middle Ages was. While writers like Charles Freeman continue to lumber along, claiming that Christianity killed the use of reason, the fact is that thanks to Clement of Alexandria and Augustine’s encouragement of the use of pagan philosophy, and Boethius’ translations of works of logic by Aristotle and others, rational inquiry was one intellectual jewel that survived the catastrophic collapse of the Western Roman Empire and was preserved through the so-called Dark Ages. Edward Grant’s superb God and Reason in the Middle Ages details this with characteristic vigor, but Hannam gives a good summary of this key element in his first four chapters.

谈及理性主义，这些神话遮盖了这样一个至关重要的问题：中世纪智识方面的理性探索究竟处于何种状态？像Charles Freeman这样的作家还在抱着这堆破烂，说什么基督教让理性毫无用武之地，而事实却是，亚历山大的克莱门特（Clement of Alexandria）和奥古斯丁对异教哲学的运用多有鼓励，波伊提乌（Boethius）翻译了亚里士多德和其他人的逻辑学作品，理性探索一度是智识的明珠，于西罗马帝国崩溃之后幸存下来，在所谓的黑暗时代得以流传。对此，Edward Grant的杰作《中世纪的上帝与理性》花了极大的力气详加阐述，而Hannam在书中的前四章便给出了绝佳的概述。

What makes Hannam’s version of the story more accessible than Grant’s is the way he tells it though the lives of key people of the time – Gerbert of Aurillac, Anselm, Abelard, William of Conches, Adelard of Bath etc.

Hannam的故事之所以比格兰特更加通俗易懂，原因在于他利用那个年代关键人物的生平阐释其观点，其中包括奥里亚克的吉尔伯特（Gerbert of Aurillac）、安塞姆（Anselm）、阿伯拉尔（Abelard）、康奇斯的威廉（William of Conches）、巴斯的阿德拉德（Adelard of Bath）等人。

Some reviewers of Hannam’s book seem to have found this approach a little distracting, since the sheer volume of names and mini-biographies could make it feel like we are learning a small amount about a vast number of people. But given the breadth of Hannam’s subject, this is fairly inevitable and the semi-biographical approach is certainly more accessible than a stodgy abstract analysis of the evolution of Medieval thought.

一些评论家认为Hannam作品的这种处理方法甚至令主题略有分散，的确这些姓名和小传数量之多让人颇有目不暇接之感。然而考虑到Hannam所论主题之宏大，这种做法也是在所难免，而且半传记的处理方式也确实比对中世纪思想演变的呆板而抽象的分析更为引人入胜。

Hannam also gives an excellent precis of the Twelfth Century Renaissance which, contrary to popular perception and to “the Myth”, was the real period in which ancient learning flooded back into western Europe. Far from being resisted by the Church, it was churchmen who sought this knowledge out among the Muslims and Jews of Spain and Sicily. And far from being resisted or banned by the Church, it was embraced and formed the basis of the syllabus in that other great Medieval contribution to the world: the universities that were starting to appear across Christendom.

Hannam还对十二世纪复兴（Twelfth Century Renaissance）进行了绝佳的概括，与通行的认知和前述神话不同的是，那是一个古代学识如洪水般涌回西欧的岁月。真相远远不是教会扼杀知识，恰恰是神职人员从西班牙和西西里的穆斯林和犹太人中间发掘出这些知识。知识也远远没有被教会禁绝，知识在基督教世界刚刚兴起的大学中构成了基本教学大纲，而大学，恰恰是中世纪对世界的另一伟大贡献。

God and Reason
上帝与理性

The enshrining of reason at the heart of inquiry, combined with the influx of “new” Greek and Arabic learning, launched a veritable explosion of intellectual activity in Europe from the Twelfth Century onwards. It was as though the sudden stimulus of new perspectives and new ways of looking at the world fell on the fertile soil of a Europe that was, for the first time in centuries, relatively peaceful, prosperous, outward-looking, and genuinely curious.

将理性置于探索的核心，与纷至沓来的“新”希腊和阿拉伯知识相融合，推动了欧洲自十二世纪以来真正的智力活动大爆发。仿佛突然之间，观察世界的新视角和新方法被播撒到旧欧洲这片沃土上，那么多世纪以来第一次，出现了相对和平、繁荣、外向以及真正求知的一段时期。

This is not to say that more conservative and reactionary forces did not have misgivings about some of the new areas of inquiry, especially in relation to how philosophy and speculation about the natural world and the cosmos could affect accepted theology. Hannam is careful not to pretend that there was no resistance to the flowering of the new thinking and inquiry but, unlike the perpetuators of “the Myth”, he gives that resistance due consideration rather than pretending it was the whole story.

这并不是说，较为保守、反动的势力对于新领域的探索安之若素，尤其在关于自然和宇宙的哲学和思考对普遍接受的神学可能会产生何种影响方面，他们更是疑虑重重。Hannam行文小心谨慎，没有对全面开花的新思潮新探索所遭遇的抵抗视而不见，然而与上述“神话”死忠信徒们不同的是，在深思熟虑之后，他对这种抵抗予以剖析，而非简单认定，遭遇的抵抗就是故事的全部。

In fact, the conservatives and reactionaries’ efforts were usually rear-guard actions and were in almost every case totally unsuccessful in curtailing the inevitable flood of ideas that began to flow from the universities. Once it began, it was effectively unstoppable.

其实，保守反动势力的努力常常不过是防御性的行动，总体而言，绝大部分试图遏制源自大学、势不可挡的理念洪流都以失败告终。这种洪流一旦开始，便不可阻挡。

In fact, some of the efforts by the theologians to put some limits on what could and could not be accepted via the “new learning” actually had the effect of stimulating inquiry rather than constricting it. The “Condemnations of 1277” attempted to assert certain things that could not be stated as “philosophically true”, particularly things that put limits on divine omnipotence. This had the interesting effect of making it clear that Aristotle had, actually, got some things badly wrong – something Thomas Aquinas emphasized in his famous and highly influential Summa Theologiae:

实际上，神学家努力为“新学问”划定一条界线，规定某些事可以做，某些事不能做，这样的努力恰恰鼓励而非限制了探索。“1277大谴责”（Condemnations of 1277）力图主张某些事情不能被称为“在哲学上是真实的”（philosophically true），尤其是那些限制了“全能的神性”（divine omnipotence）的事情。这次事件产生了一种有趣的效果，让人们清楚无疑地看到，亚里士多德在某些方面其实错得非常离谱。而这些错误正如托马斯·阿奎那（Thomas Aquinas）在其极具影响力的、著名的《神学大全》（Summa Theologiae）中曾着重指出这一点。

“The condemnations and Thomas’s Summa Theologiae had created a framework within which natural philosophers could safely pursue their studies. The framework ….laid down the the principle that God had decreed laws of nature but was not bound by them. Finally, it stated that Aristotle was sometimes wrong. The world was not ‘eternal according to reason’ and ‘finite according to faith’. It was not eternal, full stop. And if Aristotle could be wrong about something that he regarded as completely certainly certain, that threw his whole philosophy into question. The way was clear for the natural philosophers of the Middle Ages to move decisively beyond the achievements of the Greeks.” (Hannam, pp. 104-105)

“大谴责和托马斯的《神学大全》创建出了一个框架，自然哲学家可以安然地在其中进行研究。该框架……主张，上帝颁布了自然律令，但上帝并不受自然律令的限制。最终，框架指明，亚里士多德在某些情况下是错的。世界并不‘因理性而永恒’，也不‘因信仰而有限’。总而言之，世界并不永恒。如果亚里士多德在自己确信无疑的问题上能够犯错，那么他的整个哲学体系就难免遭到质疑。对于中世纪的自然哲学家而言，果断突破希腊人业已取得成就的道路就得以扫清了。”（Hannam，pp.104-105）

Which is precisely what they proceeded to do. Far from being a stagnant dark age, as the first half of the Medieval Period (500-1000 AD) certainly was, the period from 1000 to 1500 AD actually saw the most impressive flowering of scientific inquiry and discovery since the time of the ancient Greeks, far eclipsing the Roman and Hellenic Eras in every respect.

超越希腊人正是哲学家们接下来做的事情。中世纪上半叶（公元500年-1000年）或许并不光明，而从公元1000年至1500年远不是一个黑暗停滞的时代，历史见证了自古希腊以来科学探索最为蓬勃发展的景象，方方面面远超罗马和希腊化时代（Hellenic Eras）。

With Occam and Duns Scotus taking the critical approach to Aristotle further than Aquinas’ more cautious approach, the way was open for the Medieval scientists of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries to question, examine, and test the perspectives the translators of the Twelfth Century had given them, with remarkable effects:

奥卡姆和邓斯·司各脱对亚里士多德的批判远比小心翼翼的阿奎那走得更远，这为十四、十五世纪的中世纪科学家开辟了一条坦途，他们得以对十二世纪传播者们的观点进行质疑、检查及测试，成绩斐然：

“[I]n the fourteenth century medieval thinkers began to notice that there was something seriously amiss with all aspects of Aristotle’s natural philosophy, and not just those parts of it that directly contradicted the Christian faith. The time had come when medieval scholars could begin their own quest to advance knowledge ….striking out in new directions that neither the Greeks nor the Arabs ever explored. Their first breakthrough was to combine the two subjects of mathematics and physics in a way that had not been done before.” (Hannam, p. 174)

“十四世纪的中世纪思想家开始注意到，亚里士多德自然哲学的方方面面都存在严重缺陷，不仅限于那些与基督教信仰直接冲突的部分。中世纪学者可以自行探索先进知识的时刻到来了……他们向无论是希腊人还是阿拉伯人都未曾探索过的新领域前进。他们取得的第一项突破是，以前所未有的方式将数学和物理这两门学科结合在一起。”（Hannam，P174）

The story of that breakthrough, and the remarkable Oxford scholars who achieved it and thus laid the foundations of true science – the “Merton Calculators” – probably deserves a book in itself. But Hannam’s account certainly does them justice and forms a fascinating section of his work.

那项突破，那些实现该突破的、名垂青史的牛津学者（他们因此为真正的科学奠定下基础）——“默顿计算者”（Merton Calculators）——的故事，本身就值得大书特书。然而Hannam行文对他们的刻画精准而恰当，构成了作品迷人的一部分。

The names of these pioneers of the scientific method – Thomas Bradwardine, Thomas Bradwardine, William Heytesbury, John Dumbleton and the delightfully named Richard Swineshead – deserve to be better known.

这些科学方法的先驱——托马斯·布雷德华、赫特斯柏立的威廉、约翰·登布尔顿，以及名字极为喜庆的理查德·斯韦恩斯赫（Richard Swineshead）【译注：理查德·猪头，确实够喜庆～】应该被更多的人知道。

Unfortunately, the obscuring shadow of “the Myth” means that they continue to be ignored or dismissed even in quite recent popular histories of science.Bradwardine’s summary of the key insight these men uncovered is one of the great quotes of early science and deserves to be recognized as such:

不幸的是，由于“中世纪神话”造成的影响，即使在较为新近的科学史大众读物中，他们也一直被忽略和无视。布雷德华对于这些先驱在智识方面洞见的总结，是早期科学领域的名言之一，配得上“伟大”这个两个字：

“[Mathematics] is the revealer of every genuine truth … whoever then has the effrontery to pursue physics while neglecting mathematics should know from the start that he will never make his entry through the portals of wisdom.” (Quoted in Hannam, p. 176)

“（数学）是所有真理的揭示者……无论哪个胆大妄为之徒，胆敢忽略数学而去探索物理，从一开始就应该知道，他将永远不会在智慧的圣殿登堂入室。”（Hannam书中的引文，p.176）

These men were not only the first to truly apply mathematics to physics but also developed logarithmic functions 300 years before John Napier, and the Mean Speed Theorem 200 years before Galileo. The fact that Napier and Galileo are credited with discovering things that Medieval scholars had already developed is yet another indication of how “the Myth” has warped our perceptions of the history of science.

这些人不仅仅是第一批真正将数学应用于物理领域的学者，还早于约翰·纳皮尔（John Napier）三百年推演出对数方程，早于伽利略二百年发现平均速度定理。纳皮尔和伽利略发现了中世纪学者已经发现的现象，从而获得殊荣，这就是“黑暗中世纪神话”如何蒙蔽我们对科学史认知的又一例证。

Similarly, the physics and astronomy of Jean Buridan and Nicholas Oresme were radical and profound, but generally unknown to the average reader. Buridan was one of the first to compare the movements of the cosmos to those of another Medieval innovation – the clock. The image of a clockwork universe which was to serve scientists well into our own era began in the Middle Ages.

与之类似，让·布里丹和尼古拉斯·奥里斯姆的物理学和天文学博大精深，普通读者对此却一无所知。布里丹是最早将宇宙的运动比拟为时钟的几个人之一，而时钟则也是中世纪的产物。直到现在，科学家们还认为，宇宙像时钟一样运行，这种观点实肇始于中世纪。

And Oresme’s speculations about a rotating Earth shows that Medieval scholars were happy to contemplate what were (to them) fairly outlandish ideas to see if they might work – Oresme found that this particular idea actually worked quite well.

奥里斯姆关于地球旋转的猜测则表明，中世纪学者是多么乐于思索各种天马行空的观点，并验证其是否有效——奥里斯姆发现地球旋转这个猜想其实相当有解释力。

These men are hardly the products of a “dark age” and their careers are conspicuously free of any of the Inquisitors and threats of burning so fondly and luridly imagined by the fevered proponents of “the Myth”.

很难说这样的人会是“黑暗时代”的产物，他们的工作也显然不像“黑暗中世纪神话”热情拥趸们所持有的天真而骇人听闻的想象那样，受到宗教裁判所的法官（Inquisitors）的压迫，也没人威胁要把他们统统烧死。

Galileo, Inevitably
伽利略，绕不过去的伽利略

As mentioned above, no manifestation of “the Myth” is complete without the Galileo Affair being raised. The proponents of the idea that the Church stifled science and reason in the Middle Ages have to wheel him out, because without him they actually have absolutely zero examples of the Church persecuting anyone for anything to do with inquiries into the natural world.

如前所述，“中世纪神话”总是与伽利略事件如影随形。坚持认定中世纪教廷扼杀科学与理性的论者们一定会抛出伽利略，因为要不是伽利略，他们对于教廷迫害探索自然世界的科学家连一个例子都举不出来。

The common conception that Galileo was persecuted for being right about heliocentrism is a total oversimplification of a complex business, and one that ignores the fact that Galileo’s main problem was not simply that his ideas disagreed with scriptural interpretation but also with the science of the time.

通常的观点认为，伽利略是由于日心说而遭到了迫害，这是一个对复杂案例的过分简化，常常被忽略的事实是，伽利略的主要问题并非仅仅是其观念与经文的诠释不符，当时的科学现状也是问题。

Contrary to the way the affair is usually depicted, the real sticking point was the fact that the scientific objections to heliocentrism at the time were still powerful enough to prevent its acceptance. Cardinal Bellarmine made it clear to Galileo in 1616 that if those scientific objections could be overcome then scripture could and would be reinterpreted.

与通常所讲述的故事不同，事情真正的症结在于，当时科学对于日心说的反对依然强大，阻碍了这一学说被广为接受。红衣主教贝拉明（Cardinal Bellarmine）在1616年向伽利略说得很清楚，如果这些科学反对意见能够被克服，那么经文就可以重新诠释。

But while the objections still stood, the Church, understandably, was hardly going to overturn several centuries of exegesis for the sake of a flawed theory. Galileo agreed to only teach heliocentrism as a theoretical calculating device, then promptly turned around and, in typical style, taught it as fact. Thus his prosecution by the Inquistion in 1633.

然而当时反对意见不屈不挠，教廷很难因为一个存在缺陷的理论而推翻几个世纪以来诠释，这倒也在情理之中。伽利略同意仅仅将日心说作为一种理论计算工具加以传授，可是一转身，他就以自己典型的风格背弃约定，将其作为事实四下宣扬。因此才有了1633年他被宗教裁判迫害的事件。

Hannam gives the context for all this in suitable detail in a section of the book that also explains how the Humanism of the “Renaissance” led a new wave of scholars, who sought not only to idolize and emulate the ancients, but to turn their backs on the achievements of recent scholars like Duns Scotus, Bardwardine, Buridan, and Orseme.

Hannam在本书的一节中将这件事情的来龙去脉一一道来，还阐释了“文艺复兴”的人文主义是如何引导了新一波学者，他们不仅崇拜古人，模仿古人，而且对邓斯·司各脱、布雷德华、布里丹，以及奥里斯姆等近代学者的成就视而不见。

Thus many of their discoveries and advances were either ignored and forgotten (only to be rediscovered independently later) or scorned but quietly appropriated. The case for Galileo using the work of Medieval scholars without acknowledgement is fairly damning.

因此中世纪学者们的很多发现和进展被忽视和遗忘（后来又被重新独立发现），更有甚者，中世纪学者的成就表面上被不屑一顾，但在暗地里被改头换面，成为“文艺复兴”学者们的功绩。伽利略使用中世纪学者成果但并不明确承认的例子相当令人齿冷。

In their eagerness to dump Medieval “dialectic” and ape the Greeks and Romans – which made the “Renaissance” a curiously conservative and rather retrograde movement in many ways – they discarded genuine developments and advancements by Medieval scholars. That a thinker of the calibre of Duns Scotus could become mainly known as the etymology of the word “dunce” is deeply ironic.

他们热切地将中世纪“辩证法”抛诸脑后，争先恐后地效仿希腊人和罗马人，这种做法在很多方面令“文艺复兴”成为一种奇妙的保守甚至倒退的运动，因为他们摒弃了中世纪学者真正的开拓和进步。邓斯·司各脱这种水准的思想家的名字（Duns）不过以傻瓜（dunce）之词源而闻名，这是多么深刻的讽刺啊。

As good as the final part of the book is and as worthy as a fairly detailed analysis of the realities of the Galileo Affair clearly is, I must say the last four or five chapters of Hannam’s book did feel as though they had bitten off a bit more than they could chew. I was able to follow his argument quite easily, but I am very familiar with the material and with the argument he is making. I suspect that those for whom this depiction of the “Renaissance,” and the idea of Galileo as nothing more than a persecuted martyr to genius, might find that it gallops at too rapid a pace to really carry them along. Myths, after all, have a very weighty inertia.

尽管这本书的最后部分同样精彩，尽管清晰而具体地分析伽利略事件相当有价值，我不得不说Hannam这本书的最后四五章有点过于贪心。我之所以能够轻松地跟上他的论证，是因为我对历史材料和他所进行的讨论相当熟悉。我猜，对于某些人来说，理解对“文艺复兴”的这种叙述，以及伽利略只不过是个受宗教迫害的天才这样的观点，就像拼命赶上一匹飞驰的骏马那样艰难。毕竟，神话有着巨大的惯性。

At least one reviewer seems to have found the weight of that inertia too hard to resist, though perhaps she had some other baggage weighing her down. Nina Power, writing in New Humanist magazine, certainly seems to have had some trouble ditching the idea of the Church persecuting Medieval scientists:

至少有一位评论者似乎认为这样的惯性非常难以克服，然而，这或许是因为她在某些方面的包袱过重。Nina Power在《新人文主义》（New Humanist）杂志撰文，似乎认为摒弃教廷迫害中世纪科学家的观点还颇为困难：

Just because persecution wasn’t as bad as it could have been, and just because some thinkers weren’t always the nicest of people, doesn’t mean that interfering in their work and banning their ideas was justifiable then or is justifiable now.”

仅仅因为迫害并没有那么严重，仅仅因为有些思想家并不总是那么和善，并不意味着对他们工作的干扰，对他们理念的禁止，就是合理的，无论是那时还是现在。

Well, no-one said it was justifiable, and simply explaining how it came about and why it was not as extensive, or of the nature, that most people assume is not “justifying” it anyway – it is correcting a pseudo-historical misunderstanding.

拜托，没人说那是合理的，这本书仅仅解释了这些迫害究竟是怎么回事，为什么并没有大多数人以为的那么严重，而不是为迫害正名。——这本书无非是要澄清一个伪历史炮制出来的误会。

That said, Power does have something of a point when she notes “Hannam’s characterization of [Renaissance] thinkers as “incorrigible reactionaries” who “almost managed to destroy 300 years of progress in natural philosophy” is at odds with his more careful depiction of those that came before.” This is not, however, because that characterization is wrong, but because the length and scope of the book really do not give him room to do this fairly complex and, to many, radical idea justice.

不过，Power也的确注意到某些问题，她指出：“Hannam将（文艺复兴）思想家描述为‘不可救药的反动派’，‘几乎摧毁了自然哲学在三百年内取得的进步’，这与他描述文艺复兴到来之前所采取的小心翼翼的笔法大异其趣。”不过，这倒不是因为描述不准确，而是限于本书的篇幅和涉及范围，Hanman缺乏足够的空间，对他的这些较为复杂，且让很多人感到激进的观点展开论述。

My only criticisms of the book are really quibbles. The sketch of the “agrarian revolution” of the Dark Ages described in Chapter One, which saw technology like the horse-collar and the mouldboard plough adopted and water and wind power harnessed to greatly increase production in previously unproductive parts of Europe is generally sound. But it does place too much emphasis on two elements in Lynn White’s thesis in his seminal Medieval Technology and Social Change – the importance of the stirrup and the significance of the horse collar.

我对于这本书的批评无非就是吹毛求疵而已。第一章描绘了黑暗时代“农业革命”的概貌，马项圈、板犁之类的技术被采纳，水力和风力得到利用，在欧洲贫瘠的地区极大地提升了生产力，整体上比较合理。但是，文章过度强调了林恩·怀特（Lynn White）在他那本影响深远的《中世纪的技术和社会变迁》中提到的两项要素——马镫和马项圈的重要性。

As important and ground-breaking as White’s thesis was in 1962, more recent analysis has found some of his central ideas dubious. The idea that the stirrup was as significant for the rise of shock-heavy cavalry as White claimed is now pretty much rejected by military historians. Also, his claims about how this cavalry itself caused the beginnings of the feudal system were dubious to begin with.

怀特的观点在1962年极具开创性意义，然而近来很多学术分析在某种程度上削弱了他的核心观点。怀特宣称马镫对于重装骑兵的出现有着至关重要的影响，这种观点目前被很多军事史学家所反对。还有，他认为重装骑兵本身就是封建制的开端，这种观点也开始被怀疑。

Finally, the idea that Roman traction systems were as inefficient as White’s sources make out has also been seriously questioned. Hannam seems to accept White’s thesis wholesale, which is not really justified given it has been reassessed for over forty years now.

最后，本书认为罗马时代的牵引系统正如怀特所证明得那样低效，这样的观点也被严重质疑。Hannam似乎全盘接受了怀特的论点，考虑在四十年的时间里，学界已经对怀特的观点进行了重新审视，这种忠诚似乎并不可取。

On a rather more personal note, as a humanist and atheist myself, there is a rather snippy little aside on page 212 where Hannam sneers that “non-believers have further muddied the waters by hijacking the word ‘humanist’ to mean a softer version of ‘atheist’.”

就个人感受而言，作为一个人文主义者和无神论者，看到Hannam在第212页嘲弄道，“无信仰者劫持‘人文主义者’这个词，将其作为‘无神论者’的柔性表达，这进一步把水搅浑”，我感觉有点离题。

Sorry, but just as not all humanists are atheists (as Hannam himself well knows) so not all atheists are humanists (as anyone hanging around on some of the more vitriolically anti-theist sites and forums will quickly realize). So there is no “non-believer” plot to “hijack” the word “humanist”. Those of us who are humanists are humanists – end of story. And “atheism” does not need any “softening” anyway.

不好意思，就像并非所有的人文主义者都是无神论者（Hannam自己就清楚地知道这一点），也并非所有的无神论者都是人文主义者（只要有人乐意浪费时间在那些反宗教网站和论坛转转便能很快发现这一点）。因此，并不存在“无信仰者”别有用心地“劫持”“人文主义者”这回事。我们这些人文主义者就是人文主义者，仅此而已。而且“无神论”用不着“柔化”。

That aside, this is a marvelous book and a brilliant, readable, and accessible antidote to “the Myth”. It should be on the Christmas wish-list of any Medievalist, science history buff, or anyone who has a misguided friend who still thinks the nights in the Middle Ages were lit by burning scientists.

除此之外，这是一部令人叹为观止的作品，是“黑暗中世纪神话”一剂绝妙而易读的解毒剂。任何中世纪研究者、科学史爱好者，或者你有位误入歧途、依然相信在中世纪教廷靠焚烧科学家来照亮夜空的朋友，都应该把这本书放在圣诞礼品单上。

Tim O’Neill
作者简介

Tim O’Neill is an atheist blogger who specializes in reviews of books on ancient and medieval history as well as atheism and historiography. He holds a Master of Arts in Medieval Literature from the University of Tasmania and is a subscribing member of the Australian Atheist Foundation and the Australian Skeptics. He is also the author of the History versus The Da Vinci Code website and is currently working on a book with the working title History for Atheists: How Not to Use History in Debates About Religion. He finds the fact that he irritates many theists and atheists in equal measure a sign that he’s probably doing some good. Follow his blog at Armarium Magnum.

蒂姆·奥尼尔是一位无神论博客作者，专注于古代史、中世纪史、以及无神论和史学领域的书评创作。他毕业于塔斯马尼亚大学，获得中世纪文学硕士学位，是澳大利亚无神论者基金会（Australian Atheist Foundation）和澳大利亚怀疑论协会（Australian Skeptics）的会员。他还是History versus The Da Vinci Code 网站的作者，目前正在撰写一本名为History for Atheists: How Not to Use History in Debates About Religion的书。他的观点常常在有神论者和无神论者之间造成相同程度的轩然大波，这或许表明，他的工作起到了一些良好的作用。请关注他在Armarium Magnum的博客。

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