petrarch is known as the father of humanism.
petrarch is known as the father of humanism.
who is known as the father of humanism?
petrarch
in 1860 voigt was called by heinrich von sybel to the university of rostock as professor of history. 1866 he became professor of history at the university of leipzig, following the historian wilhelm wachsmuth. his research was into the topics of humanism in the 15th and 16th centuries and the history of the schmalkaldic war. unlike burckhardt, voigt described only the first century of a movement which came from renaissance florence and spread all through europe. burckhardt described all features of italian society of the renaissance. their research methods were very different. burckhardt was more a cultural historian with a historic-philosophical method. voigt, in the methodical scholarship of leopold von ranke, worked more with a philological method. voigt wrote "wiederbelebung des classischen alterthums oder das erste jahrhundert des humanismus" (revival of classical antiquity or the first century of humanism). in voigt's opinion francesco petrarca was the origin of italian humanism. what was very important to him was the new relationship of man in the renaissance to classical antiquity especially to cicero and his "humanitas" (humanity). cicero's "humanitas" is the terminological origin of humanism in general. despite the connection between dante alighieri and roman authors such as seneca and cicero, he is not, in voigt's opinion, a typical renaissance man like petrach and his successors, because dante stood in the late mediaeval world and the corporative structures. in recognizing his own self as a human in context with the studies of the classical authors, petrarch left the old mediaeval world and its structures behind. the consciousness of being a human was the new quality. in the tradition of ranke and johann gustav droysen, voigt used the term "humanism" for the description of a historical period.
georg voigt
whatever humanism may be, it has as its common principle, in simple terms, human value. the various humanisms may differ greatly in their interpretations of human value, but...such differences are merely as between one humanism and another...marx often used the expression "human value" in an approving sense, and it is certainly not exclusively bourgeois jargon. historically, humanism played not merely an antifeudal role, but also an anti-capitalist one; hence it cannot be said that humanism can never be other than bourgeois ideology. marx did indeed criticize the humanism of [ludwig] feuerbach, but far from utterly denying humanism, he brought it to a higher stage of development. marx and feuerbach both placed many in the highest position and recognized no essence higher than man's. but feuerbach only opposed ideological illusions of superhuman forces, whereas marx went further and opposed all the actual social relations that degraded man to the status of nonhuman. marx was able to reach this revolutionary conclusion because he grasped actual man, social man...the humanism we advocate is again marxist humanism and no other. the noun "humanism" expresses its genetic link with historical humanism; the adjective "marxist" expresses its difference from other humanism.
marxist humanism