Giovanni Pico della Mirandola was born in Florence on February 2, 1463. He is considered one of the great thinkers of the Renaissance. For the humanism of philosophy, Pico della Mirandola was called "divine". Contemporaries saw in him a reflection of the lofty aspirations of spiritual culture, and those close to the Pope persecuted him for his bold statements. His works, like himself, were widely known throughout educated Europe. Giovanni Pico della Mirandola died at a young age (November 17, 1494). During his life, he became famous for his pleasant appearance, princely generosity, but most of all for the unusual variety of his knowledge, abilities and interests.
Pico della Mirandola: Brief Biography
The Thinker was from a family of counts and seniors. She was associated with many influential houses in Italy. At the age of 14, Pico della Mirandola became a student at the University of Bologna. Subsequently, he continued his studies in Ferrara, Padua, Pavia and Paris. In the process of learning, he mastered theology, law, philosophy, ancient literature. In addition to Latin and Greek, he was interested in Chaldean, Hebrew, Arabic. In his youth, the thinker sought to know all the most important andhidden from the accumulated spiritual experience at different times by different peoples.
First works
Quite early, Pico became close to such people as the Medici, Poliziano, Ficino and a number of other members of the Platonic Academy. In 1468, he compiled Benivieni's Canzone Love Commentary, as well as 900 Theses on Mathematics, Physics, Morals and Dialectics for Public Discussion. The thinker intended to defend his works at a debate in Rome in the presence of famous Italian and European scientists. The event was to take place in 1487. A treatise prepared by Pico della Mirandola - "Speech on the Dignity of Man" was supposed to open the dispute.
Dispute in Rome
The work that Pico della Mirandola wrote on the dignity of man, in short, was devoted to two main theses. First of all, in his work, the thinker spoke about the special position of people in the universe. The second thesis concerned the internal initial unity of all positions of the individual's thought. 23-year-old Pico della Mirandola, in short, somewhat embarrassed Pope Innocent VIII. First, the young age of the thinker caused an ambiguous reaction. Secondly, the embarrassment appeared because of the rather bold reasoning, unusual and new words that Pico della Mirandola used. "Speech on the Dignity of Man" expressed the author's thoughts about magic, bondage, free will and other subjects that were dubious for that era. Following his reaction, the Pope appointed a special commission. She had to check the "Theses" that Pico della presented. Mirandola. The commission condemned a number of provisions put forward by the thinker.
Hunting
In 1487, Pico composed the Apology. This work was created in a hurry, which led to the condemnation of the Theses. Under the threat of persecution by the Inquisition, the thinker was forced to flee to France. However, there he was captured and imprisoned in the Château de Vincennes. Pico was saved thanks to the intercession of high patrons, among whom Lorenzo de' Medici played a special role. In fact, he was the ruler of Florence at the time, where the thinker, released from imprisonment, spent the rest of his days.
Work after persecution
In 1489, Pico della Mirandola completed and published the treatise "Heptaple" (on seven approaches to explaining the six days of creation). In this work, the thinker applied subtle hermeneutics. He studied the hidden meaning hidden in the book "Genesis". In 1492, Pico della Mirandola created a small work "On Being and One". This was a separate part of the program work, which pursued the goal of reconciling the theories of Plato and Aristotle, but was never fully implemented. Pico's other work, the "Poetic Theology" promised by him, did not see the light either. His last work was Discourses on Divinatory Astrology. In this work, he opposed its provisions.
Pico della Mirandola Key Ideas
The Thinker considered different doctrines as aspects of a single Truth. He supported the development of a common philosophical and religious contemplation of the world,begun by Ficino. However, at the same time, the thinker transferred his interest from the field of religious history to the field of metaphysics. Pico tried to synthesize Christianity, Kabbalah and Averroism. He prepared and sent to Rome his conclusions, which contained 900 theses. They touched everything that is "knowable". Some of them were borrowed, some of them were his own. However, they were recognized as heretical, and the dispute in Rome did not take place. The work that Pico della Mirandola created on the dignity of man made him famous in wide circles of his contemporaries. It was intended as a preamble to the discussion. On the one hand, the thinker integrated the key concepts of Neoplatonism, on the other hand, he offered theses that went beyond the idealistic (Platonic) tradition. They were close to personalism and voluntarism.
The essence of the theses
Man for Pico was a special world in the universe created by God. The individual was placed by the thinker at the center of everything that exists. Man is "middle-mobile", he can descend to the animal level and even to plants. However, along with this, a person is able to rise to God and the angels, remaining identical to himself - not different. According to Pico, this is possible because the individual is a being of an indefinite image, into which the Father has invested "the germs of all creatures." The concept is interpreted on the basis of the intuition of the Absolute. It was characteristic of the late Middle Ages. The concept of the thinker reflects a very radical element of the "Copernican revolution" of religiousmoral consciousness in the Western Christian world. Not salvation, but creativity is the meaning of life - this is what Pico della Mirandola believed. Philosophy formulates a religious and ontological explanation of the entire existing ideological and mythological complex of spiritual culture.
Own "I"
Its formation explains anthropocentrism. Pico della Mirandola substantiates the freedom and dignity of the individual as the sovereign creator of his own "I". An individual, absorbing everything, can become anything. Man is always the result of his efforts. While maintaining the possibility of a new choice, he will never be exhausted by any of the forms of his own being in the world. Pico thus argues that man is not created by God in his likeness. But the Almighty gave the individual to independently create his own "I". Due to its central position, it has the proximity and influence of other things created by God. Having accepted the most important properties of these creations, man, acting as a free master, completely formed his essence. So he rose above the rest.
Wisdom
According to Pico, she does not mess with any restrictions. Wisdom flows freely from one teaching to another, choosing for itself the form that suits the circumstances. Various schools, thinkers, traditions, previously mutually exclusive and opposed to each other, become interconnected and mutually dependent in Pico. They show a deep relationship. Whereinthe entire universe is created on correspondences (hidden or explicit).
Kabbalah
Interest in her in the Renaissance increased precisely thanks to Pico. The young thinker was interested in learning the Hebrew language. On the basis of Kabbalah, his "Theses" were created. Pico was friends and studied with a number of Jewish scholars. He began studying Kabbalah in two languages. The first was Hebrew, and the second was Latin (translated by a Jew who converted to Christianity). In the era of Pico, there were no special differences between magic and Kabbalah. The thinker used these terms often as synonyms. Pico stated that the theory of Christianity is best demonstrated through the Kabbalah and magic. The scriptures with which the scientist was familiar, he attributed to the ancient esotericism preserved by the Jews. At the center of knowledge was the idea of Christianity, which could be comprehended by studying Kabbalah. In his reasoning, Pico used post-biblical works, including midrash, the Talmud, the works of rationalist philosophers and Jews who interpreted the Bible.
Teachings of Christian Kabbalists
The presence of various names of God and beings that lived in the sky became a discovery for them. Transmutation of the Jewish alphabet, numerological methods have become a key element of knowledge. Having studied the concept of the divine language, adherents of the doctrine believed that with the correct pronunciation of the names of the Almighty, reality can be influenced. This fact determined the belief of the representatives of the Renaissance school that magic acts as the greatest force in the universe. In the end, everything that wasbanal in Judaism, has become a key in the worldview of adherents of Christian Kabbalah. This, in turn, was coupled with another theory derived by humanists from Jewish sources.
The Hermetic Concept
It has also been interpreted in a Christian way. At the same time, Ficino's hermeticism had a strong influence on Pico. This concept explained salvation through the gathering of particles of light presented as truth. Along with this, cognition as a memory unfolded. Hermeticism indicated 8 circles (lasso) of ascent. Based on the Gnostic-mythological interpretations of the origin of man, the concept describes the special divine abilities of the individual. They contribute to the autonomous implementation of memory-resurrection actions. At the same time, Hermeticism itself changed somewhat under the influence of Christianity. In the concept, salvation through individual knowledge was replaced by the idea of finitude, the sinfulness of the individual, the good news of redemption, repentance, the mercy of God.
Heptaplus
In this essay, the thinker used Kabbalistic tools to interpret words. The work speaks of the harmony of the human principle, fire and mind. We are talking about three parts of the big and small world - macrocosm and microcosm. The first consists of the divine or angelic mind, the source of wisdom, the sun, symbolizing love, and the sky, acting as the beginning of life and movement. Human activity is similarly determined by the mind, sexual organs,hearts that give love, mind, continuation of life and kind. Pico does more than just use kabbalistic tools to validate Christian truths. He includes the latter in the ratio of macro- and microcosm, which is explained in the Renaissance way.
Harmony
Certainly, Kabbalah strongly influenced the formation of the Renaissance concept of macro- and microcosm. This was reflected not only in the works of Pico della Mirandola. Subsequently, the influence of Kabbalah is also noted in the works of Agrippa of Nostesheim and Paracelsus. The harmony of the big and small worlds is possible only as an active interaction between man and God. When comprehending the interpreted ideas of consent within the framework of the Kabbalistic concept, one should pay attention to the fact that for the Renaissance, man as a microcosm acted as the subject of knowledge. He was the harmony of all the viscera and parts of the body: blood, brain, limbs, abdomen, and so on. In the medieval theocentric tradition, there was not enough meaningful adequate conceptual apparatus to comprehend such a living, bodily agreement between the different and the single.
Conclusion
Vivid interpretations of the harmony of the macro- and microcosm are noted in the Zohar. In it, worldly and heavenly clarity is comprehended, a sympathetic understanding of cosmic unity unfolds. However, the relationship between Renaissance concepts and theosophical images of the Zohar cannot be called unambiguous. Mirandola could study only some excerpts from the teaching, which was supplemented and rewritten in the 13thcentury, and spread around 1270-1300. The version published during this period was the result of the collective research of many thinkers over the course of centuries. The distribution of excerpts from the Zohar was distinctly pantheistic, theocentric and ecstatic. They were consistent with the requirements and customs of Judaism and in everything should have been at odds with the philosophy of Mirandola. It should be said that in his "Theses" the thinker did not pay special attention to Kabbalah. Mirandola tried to form Christian syncretism with the help of Jewish sources, Zoroastrianism, Orphism, Pythagorism, Averroes' Aristotelianism, the concept of Chaldean oracles. The thinker talked about the comparability, multiplicity, consistency of Gnostic and magical teachings with the Christian idea, the writings of Cusa and Aristotle.
