The Vision and Principles of Christopher Dawson | David Knowles | Introduction to Christopher Dawson's The
Dividing of Christendom | Ignatius Insight
In the early years of his long life of study Christopher Dawson set
himself the task of surveying the history of European civilization in the light
of a master-idea: that religion is the dynamic force, the basic constituent and
the inspiration of all higher human activity, and that therefore the culture of
an era depends upon its religion, and not vice versa.
This task was to him a
very demanding one, for it presupposed an intimate and detailed knowledge of
the history—political, intellectual, social , aesthetic, and
economic—of the cultures he undertook to consider. His first major
writing, The Age of the Gods, was the
outcome of many years of research in the religion of primitive man, and the
early civilizations of the East. It remained in many ways his greatest single
achievement, and it received immediate critical acclaim. Forty years ago,
before the immense success of Arnold Toynbee's work, readers of world-history
had been gjven Spengler's sombre picture of the West in decline, and the
tendentious outlook of the History of the World by H. G. Wells.
Dawson's work was very learned, but
there was nothing difficult or esoteric about it. He did not impose patterns on
events nor did he create a vocabulary to express his ideas. The ideas he used
were those common to all human thought. His mind had the clarity of wisdom, not
the simplicity of the superficial, and his style was lucid and free.
The second instalment should have covered the civilization of the classical
world, and he would have been fully competent to present this, but he left it
aside, perhaps because he felt that generations of fine minds had made it
familiar, and wrote of what was then a less cultivated field, the twilight of
classical civilization and the dawn of medieval Christian culture. He called
the book The Making of Europe. This was a less attractive theme for many, but it was probably Dawson's most
influential book as it filled a gap that had long existed in general historical
knowledge, and set out persuasively and convincingly a twofold thesis: that
medieval and modern civilization derived a very large part of its human and
secular content from Greece and Rome, and that the spirit that gave life and
growth to what seemed to be a ruin was the spirit of Catholic Christianity.
It told the strange story of the transmission of Christianity to the West,
together with the basic ideas of ancient government and thought, by way of the
circumference of Christendom and back to Northern Europe. It was a book that
opened a new world to many readers, and though in the thirty-odd years that
have passed many have explored the archaeology and art of the Dark Ages, no
work has completely taken its place.
Read the entire Introduction...
Dawson is a forgotten treasure. It is an honor that Ignatius Press is able to publish some of his works. As we approach the 500th anniversary of the outbreak of the Protestant Reformation, it is crucial for Catholics and others to have an appreciation for both the formation of Christendom and its dividing. Dawson gives an unbiased treatment of both, even though he is not bashful about his Catholicism and Catholicism's vital role in western history.
Posted by: Mark Brumley | Friday, July 17, 2009 at 02:39 PM
> he is not bashful about his Catholicism and
> Catholicism's vital role in western history.
Would you say this is the primary reason why he's mostly forgotten? Any other reasons?
Posted by: Jackson | Saturday, July 18, 2009 at 09:41 AM
Any other reasons?
Well, as an independent scholar, Dawson worked outside the academy - which means he wouldn't have directed or supervised dissertations, etc. In other words, his works never became integrated into the academic world. He was a brilliant man but he didn't generate a school...
Posted by: Fred | Saturday, July 18, 2009 at 10:20 PM
Primary? I'm not sure. Like many notable preconciliar Catholic writers, Dawson fell into eclipse after Vatican II as a result, at least in part, of a false reading of the council and the collective amnesia to which large numbers of Catholics succumbed. In the 1980s, through the philanthropy of Chauncey Stillman, with the formation of the Society for Christian Culture and the work of John Mulloy, a disciple of Dawson, a Dawsonian revival occurred. For reasons I cannot go into here, this revival did not realize its potential. Let's hope and pray that circumstances today are such that Dawson will come to hold the place he deserves to hold and his work can have the influence it should.
Posted by: Mark Brumley | Sunday, July 19, 2009 at 09:31 AM