English: Europe’s Decline of Knowledge and Economic Downturn Which Sinks Them in the Darkness

Source: www.philipkosloski.com

Today, Europe is unarguably rich, wealthy, prosperous, democratic, and free. It turns out, Europe ever experienced the gloomy days during the Dark Ages with poverty, disease outbreak, a high criminal rate, repression, and even intolerance. 

The Dark Ages or the Medieval started from 476 AD to 1453 AD. It began from the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the rise of the Eastern Roman Empire whose the capital city located in Constantinople. The Dark ages ended in 1453 when the Ottoman Empire led by Mehmet II finally conquered and seized Constantinople on 29 May 1453 and changed the city’s name to Istanbul which remains until today. Aftermath of the fall of Constantinople, the Age of Exploration and the Renaissance Era began, marked by the development of science or scientific methods and the return of humanism into the society.

During the Dark Ages, Europe was completely entrapped in the stagnation and the social decline. Furthermore, they lived in the grip of poverty and repression. Poverty and ignorance problems were also inevitably prolonged. During this period, the church authority was absolutely powerful and regulated almost every aspects of social life. In fact, anything that is not in line with the church or religion is always considered as being illegal and heretical. The church was also more powerful than the kings. Beside that, the church was really intolerant and ruthless to non-Christian community like Muslims and Jews. A considerable number of Muslims and Jews communities had experienced various discriminations and persecution as they were considered as unbelievers and heretics people by the church authority. In 1290, Edward I expelled almost all Jewish people from England.

The development of empirical knowledge and scientific method were also hindered because it was deemed as being against with the church values, so that it was considered as heretical and illegal. Many people did not dare to develop or learn science and criticize social problems due to the pressure from the conservative church. They all tended to have only lived according to the church dogmas and values. Common sense, reason, and critical thinking were totally curbed, however all of these things mentioned above are crucially important to humanity for a tremendous progress and advancement. Consequently, many people found it useless and no incentives to acquire new knowledge, instead they were only allowed to learn the knowledge and theories from the church authorities. They didn’t have a clear vision to build a more thriving civilization. The church believed that the human life had been determined by the Almighty God, so there were no needs to develop themselves and question it anymore. Consequently, the Ignorance and the illiteracy rate inevitably escalated among medieval Europeans. When the Black Death struck Europe between 1347-1351, a lot of people thought that it must have been the God's punishment. So all they did was just praying and taking refuge inside the church all day long without making any significant effort to improve their harsh condition. However, it could have worsen the spread of the disease due to the lack of sunlight and fresh air.

The economic system in this period was also really unfair and unequal. It unfairly made the king, noble families, and the church became richer. Most peasants were obliged to pay taxes in the form of harvests to their protective landowners. This discriminatory system had stipulated that only kings, aristocrats, and churches could own and benefit from agricultural land. Peasants or ordinary people almost had no rights other than the obligation to work and work. When the feudal lords and the church leaders are partying for a dinner with full of delicious food and luxury, meanwhile the ordinary people and the peasants are starving.

It has been widely believed if a power of a regime was unfair and discriminatory to certain groups of people, while the scientific methods and the empirical knowledge had been totally curbed, consequently, ignorance and acute poverty would have been inevitable. It would also lead to the stagnation of economy. During the dark ages, there were almost no any significant developments of science and new product innovations. In fact, these two things are absolutely important and crucial for the development of the economy and the prosperity of a nation.

When the Renaissance period ultimately emerged in the 16th Century, Europe was finally experiencing a rapid development and a tremendous progress. The domination of the church in people's lives began to be criticized or questioned and in particular gradually eliminated because the people were definitely unsure that the church had all answers. the feudal system which had only enriched the feudal lords and the church authorities began to be respectively abolished. Science and knowledge were beginning to be growing rapidly with the emergence of new scholars and intellectual society. Common sense, reason, and critical sense were beginning to be ultimately revived, so this period was often called as the enlightenment (Aufklärung). After the Renaissance era, many European countries eventually have separated religion from politics, because they no longer want to sink in the dark ages. 

After learning from the European dark ages case, this harmful event may have been affecting Indonesia today. Radicalism, intolerance, and irrational shallow thinking are haunting this nation. Religious intolerance always happens here especially during the election of governors in 2017. The illogical issue of religious difference is always exaggerated in order to win the election. As a result, many competent leaders have been eliminated simply because of their different religion. The social system is also far from justice especially for the poorer people. Unfortunately, our politics are still gripped by corruption, collusion, and nepotism. Our law enforcement is also weak, as a result, the poverty rate is still high because there is almost no equal opportunity between people. Only richer people, high officials, and certain people with close connections to higher officials who are more prosperous in this country. Of course, we do not want this nation to have been plunged into the dark ages like Europe. As people, there isn’t much we can do, but we, as humans have common sense, reason, and critical sense, and of course the rights to get a better life. All what we need to do is to thrive them all, so that it will make us more unwilling to accept anything unquestionably or obey a rule blindly. It is imperative for us to criticize or question anything and anyone if there is an impropriety. Ultimately, we no longer have a superficial mind or being close-minded, so that we can sharpen our analytical thinking to make a more logical reason or solution which is in line with the current condition. We would possibly become wiser and could accept any kind of differences in our life.