Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T10:23:18.109Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Recent Narratives on Galileo and the Church: or The Three Dogmas of the Counter-Reformation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Rivka Feldhay
Rivka Feldhay
Affiliation:
The Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and IdeasTel Aviv University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article confronts an old-new orientation in the historiographical literature on the “Galileo affair.” It argues that a varied group of historians moved by different cultural forces in the last decade of the twentieth century tends to crystallize a consensus about the inevitability of the conflict between Galileo and the Church and its outcome in the trial of 1633. The “neo-conflictualists” — as I call them — have built their case by adhering to and developing the “three dogmas of the Counter-Reformation”: Church authoritarianism is portrayed by them as verging towards “totalitarianism.” A preference for a literal reading of the Scriptures is understood as a mode of “fundamentalism.” And mild skeptical positions in astronomy are read as expressions of “instrumentalism,” or “fictionalism.” The main thrust of the article lies in an attempt to historicize these three aspects of the Catholic reform movement. Finally, the lacunae in insufficiently explored historiographical landscape are delineated in order to tame the temptation to embrace the three dogmas, and to modify the radical conflictualist version of the story of Galileo and the Church.

Type
3. The Contexts of the Church, Patrons, and Colleagues: New Science and Traditional Power Structures
Information
Science in Context , Volume 13 , Issue 3-4 , Autumn-Winter 2000 , pp. 489 - 507
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2000

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

BlackwellRichard, J. Richard, J. 1991. Galileo, Bellarmine, and the Bible. University of Notre Dame Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
BlackwellRichard, J. Richard, J. 1998. “Could there be Another Galileo Case?” In The Cambridge Companion to Galileo, edited by Machamer, Peter, 348–366. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Fantoli, Annibale. [1994] 1996. Galileo for Copernicanism and for the Church. Translated by Coyne, George V., 2nd ed. Vatican Observatory Foundation.Google Scholar
Feldhay, Rivka 1995. Galileo and the Church: Political Inquisition or Critical Dialogue? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Finocchiaro, Maurice 1989. The Galileo Affair: A Documentary History. University of California Press.Google Scholar
Jedin, Hubert [1957] 1991. A History of the Council of Trent. Translated by Graf, D. Ernest, 2 vols. London: Thomas and Sons.Google Scholar
LangfordJerome, J. Jerome, J. 1966. Galileo Science and the Church. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Mayaud, Pierre and Noël, S. J. 1997. La Condamnation des Livres Coperniciens et sa Révocation. Rome: Pontificia Universitas Gregoriana.Google Scholar
McMullin, Ernan 1998. “Galileo on Science and Scripture.” In The Cambridge Companion to Galileo, edited by Machamer, Peter, 271–347. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pera, Marcello 1998. “The God of Theologians and the God of Astronomers: An Apology of Bellamive.” In The Cambridge Companion to Galileo, edited by Machamer, Peter Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Shea, William R. 1986. “Galileo and the Church.” In God and Nature, edited by Lindberg, David C. and Ronald I Numbers. University of California Press.Google Scholar