Religion
In reply to the discussion: The Problem with Religious Moderates [View all]JKingman
(75 posts)Certainly NOT someone with the knowledge we now possess.
Who were the "well educated"? At least 90% of Europeans in 14th century Europe did not know how to read. Only the clerics and the traders and the royalty had access to learning to read.
Of the estimated several millions of people living in Europe at the beginning of the fourteenth century, which do you consider "well educated"? There were probably tens of thousands of religious clerics, monks, and others of the Christian faith. Of those, probably most read Latin, and perhaps had access to some limited written material in their native language. Most of the lives of priests and other religious leaders, those that had been taught to read and write, spent most of their time devoted to the study of their religion, and to the propagation of their religious beliefs throughout the area.
I am saying that scientists (of that period) and engineers, those who built the churches, made the clocks, and did that math, we probably have a collection of, at most, several thousand. Is this the small number of those, whom you are considering "well educated"?
Remember that the concept of "well educated" in the fourteenth century Europe did NOT include any knowledge of the workings of the human body, and knowledge of disease or illness, a weakness that may have killed up to half the population in many areas of Europe, while the religious leaders spent time deep in prayer, bringing in the masses to their churches to pray, thus spreading the disease of black plague to more and more innocent victims. Religion had no positive effect on human suffering for millions. But it was believed and perpetuated, as the righteous thing to do.