Humanism
Understand humanism — the Renaissance intellectual movement that revived classical learning, celebrated human potential, and transformed European education and culture.
Humanism was the intellectual movement at the heart of the Renaissance, centered on the study of classical Greek and Roman texts — literature, history, rhetoric, moral philosophy, and poetry — collectively known as the studia humanitatis. More than a scholarly method, humanism represented a fundamental shift in how educated Europeans understood themselves and their relationship to knowledge, virtue, and the past.
Humanists did not reject Christianity (most were devout believers), but they argued that classical learning enriched rather than threatened faith. By studying the great works of antiquity — Cicero's rhetoric, Virgil's poetry, Plato's philosophy, Livy's history — individuals could develop their full potential as moral, eloquent, and civic-minded human beings. This was a departure from the medieval scholastic tradition, which had treated classical philosophy primarily as a tool for theological argument.
The movement's impact on education was revolutionary. Humanist educators like Guarino da Verona and Vittorino da Feltre created schools that emphasized rhetoric, history, and moral philosophy alongside traditional subjects. The humanist curriculum — centered on reading, writing, and speaking persuasively about classical texts — became the foundation of Western liberal arts education. Humanism also fostered critical textual scholarship, enabling scholars like Lorenzo Valla to expose forgeries (the Donation of Constantine) and Erasmus to produce a more accurate New Testament — work that inadvertently helped spark the Reformation.