Papers by H Darrel Rutkin
Early Science and Medicine, Aug 25, 2018
Astrology is a complex, multifold and long-lived subject that has been approached from many diffe... more Astrology is a complex, multifold and long-lived subject that has been approached from many different perspectives in a broad range of scholarly disciplines. In order to understand its many roles within the history of science, theology, and culture, one needs a well-articulated historically and conceptually sound interpretive framework. In this article, a framework is proposed based on the curricular structures at medieval universities by which fundamental conceptual patterns and practices were passed down from generation to generation. It is argued that this will be helpful both for framing answerable questions, and for approaching their solutions. This goes particularly for the complex long-term patterns of astrology's marginalization from the domain of legitimate knowledge and practice during the Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment.
International journal of divination and prognostication, Nov 14, 2019
What is the relationship between astrology and divination? In particular, is astrology a type of ... more What is the relationship between astrology and divination? In particular, is astrology a type of divination, as is often asserted or assumed? In both astrology and divination, knowledge and prediction of the future are primary goals, but does this warrant calling astrology a form of divination? I approach these questions by exploring the response of Thomas Aquinas, which was to be extremely influential for many centuries. First I analyze in some detail Thomas's answer in his Summa theologiae 2-2.92-95; then I discuss two significant 16th-century examples of its influence: the 1557, 1559, 1564, and later indexes of prohibited books; and Pope Sixtus V's anti-divinatory bull, Coeli et Terrae Creator (1586). In this way, we can explore some of the complex historical dynamics at play in the construction of a legitimate astrology in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
Early Science and Medicine, 2021
Brepols Publishers eBooks, 2022
Ptolemy’s Science of the Stars in the Middle Ages
Nous signalons une nouvelle publication à la Sismel Edizioni del Galluzzo dirigée par Jean-Patric... more Nous signalons une nouvelle publication à la Sismel Edizioni del Galluzzo dirigée par Jean-Patrice Boudet, Martine Ostorero et Agostino Paravicini Bagliani. Dans l’Occident médiéval, au moins depuis le XIIe siècle, et dans l’Europe de l’époque moderne, les cours ont été des centres de production, de conservation et de diffusion des textes concernant les sciences de la nature. En rapport direct avec cet extraordinaire intérêt, des savoirs situés à la frontière entre le licite et l’illicite – v..
Archimedes, 2019
In this chapter, I first sketch out the broader structures of astrology’s place within the premod... more In this chapter, I first sketch out the broader structures of astrology’s place within the premodern Aristotelian-Ptolemaic map of knowledge ca. 1250–1500. Then I reconstruct the central structures of astrology's natural philosophical foundations by exploring Albertus Magnus's translation-comentary on Aristotle's De generatione et corruptione and related texts.
Archimedes, 2019
We will begin Chap. 7 by exploring the influential Speculum astronomiae, whose treatment of talis... more We will begin Chap. 7 by exploring the influential Speculum astronomiae, whose treatment of talismans I will then compare with relevant material in Albertus Magnus’s authentic works and then with Thomas Aquinas. Once again, the patterns—both their harmonies and tensions—will provide the structural foundations for later views on the subject, as we will see in volumes II and III. Natural causal analysis and demonic intervention vis-a-vis legitimacy will continue to be central themes encountered here.
HOPOS: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science, 2021
In the early twenty-first century, we often ask whether there is life (intelligent or otherwise) ... more In the early twenty-first century, we often ask whether there is life (intelligent or otherwise) in the cosmos, but almost never whether the heavens themselves are actually alive or animated, that is, infused somehow with a soul, the anima mundi, or some such entity. This was not the case in the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, or the early modern period. Although Aristotelians normally answered no to this question, Marsilio Ficino (1433-99) took a decidedly Platonic turn when he answered the question positively, insistently, and consistently in a broad range of works over his entire philosophical career. By contrast, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-94), Ficino's younger contemporary, began by embracing the new Platonic position but joined the Aristotelian fold in his later works. In this essay, I will briefly compare and contrast Ficino's solid and consistent position with the changing trajectory of Pico's views over the course of his short but intense career. This essay is an exploration of central themes and some preliminary reflections thereon. These essentially Platonic views of a living universe provide the conceptual and literary foundations for understanding this issue in the early modern period. Contact H. Darrel Rutkin at the Università Ca' Foscari Venezia, Venice, Italy (drutkin2001@yahoo .com). This article was completed as part of a project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (GA n. 725883 EarlyModernCosmology), and as an honorary associate in History of Science in the School of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Sydney. I wish to thank Stephan Heilen for closely reading this essay and reviewing and revising my translations against the Latin, as well as two anonymous reviewers and the editors of this special issue for their valuable queries, comments, and suggestions.
Journal for the History of Astronomy, 2021
Essay review of Stephan Heilen, Konjunktionsprognostik in der Frühen Neuzeit, Baden-Baden: Verlag... more Essay review of Stephan Heilen, Konjunktionsprognostik in der Frühen Neuzeit, Baden-Baden: Verlag Valentin Koerner, 2020
Archimedes, 2019
Having just explored three facets of astrology’s relationship to theology/religion via the rich c... more Having just explored three facets of astrology’s relationship to theology/religion via the rich conceptual structures articulating the central themes of fate, divination and providence in influential works by Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas, we will now examine Roger Bacon’s quite different expression of astrology’s relation to theology/religion. As we will see, Roger’s analysis in Opus maius IV is much more engaged with astrology’s practical dimensions.
Archimedes, 2019
Now that I have established the fundamentally similar structures of astrologizing Aristotelian na... more Now that I have established the fundamentally similar structures of astrologizing Aristotelian natural philosophy in the works of Albertus Magnus and Roger Bacon, and analyzed how they both provided the natural philosophical foundations for the practice of nativities or birth horoscopes and for elections, I would now like to develop our understanding of Albert’s views further by discussing some related sections from the companion text to his commentary on De natura loci, namely, his De causis proprietatum elementorum (On the Causes of the Properties of the Elements) which will help us fill in and sharpen the picture, and thereby complete my reconstruction of the basic structures of Albert’s brand of astrologizing Aristotelian natural philosophy.
Archimedes, 2019
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this p... more The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 2004
This is an essay length review of Ovanes Akopyan, Debating the Stars in the Italian Renaissance: ... more This is an essay length review of Ovanes Akopyan, Debating the Stars in the Italian Renaissance: Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s Disputationes adversus astrologiam divinatricem and its reception, Brill, Leiden, 2021.
nderstanding the history of astrology accurately as 20and 21century historians of science, philos... more nderstanding the history of astrology accurately as 20and 21century historians of science, philosophy, religion, politics and culture poses a complex range of challenges—conceptual and contextual—some of which will be explored in what follows. Many more will be explored in my soon to be forthcoming monograph, Reframing the Scientific Revolution: Astrology, Magic and Natural Knowledge, ca. 1250-1800, volume I of which, Structures: 1250-1500, will soon see the light of day. The twenty some-odd years of
Astrologers and their Clients in Medieval and Early Modern Europe
Uploads
Papers by H Darrel Rutkin
Depuis le XIIe siècle et à l’époque moderne, au sein des cours
princières et ecclésiastiques, des savoirs situés à la frontière entre
le licite et l’illicite, tels que l’astrologie, la divination et la magie,
ont occupé une place centrale dans les pratiques et les représentations
du pouvoir. De Frédéric II à Rodolphe II, les cours ont même
été des laboratoires d’experimenta en la matière, comme aussi
de rivalités multiples et de manipulations en tout genre. Cela n’a
pas empêché le développement d’une répression de ces “arts”,
dans les milieux de cour ou à leur proximité immédiate, liée à
l’extension réelle et imaginaire de ces savoirs suspects.