Smoller Laura Ackerman
Department of History, University of Arkansas, Little Rock, AR 72204-1099, USA.
Stud Hist Philos Biol Biomed Sci. 2010 Jun;41(2):76-89. doi: 10.1016/j.shpsc.2010.04.003. Epub 2010 May 6.
In the 1480s Dominican humanist Filippo de' Barbieri published an illustration of a supposedly ancient female seer called the 'Sybilla Chimica', whose prophetic text repeated the words of the ninth-century astrologer Abu Ma'shar. In tracing the origins of Barbieri's astrological Sibyl, this article examines three sometimes interlocking traditions: the attribution of an ante-diluvian history to the science of the stars, the assertion of astrology's origins in divine revelation, and the belief in the ancient Sibyls' predictions of the birth of Christ and other Christian truths. Medieval authors from the twelfth century on began to cite these traditions together, thereby simultaneously authorizing the use of astrology to predict religious changes and blurring the categories of natural and supernatural as applied to human understanding. This blending of astrology and prophecy appears notably in works by such authors as John of Paris, John of Legnano, Johannes Lichtenberger, and Marsilio Ficino. Ultimately the trajectory that produced Barbieri's astrological Sibyl would lead to a wave of astrological apocalyptic predictions in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, as well as to the harnessing of astrology for the defense of the faith in the form of an astrological natural theology, sacralizing science as well as nature.
15世纪80年代，多米尼克人文主义者菲利波·德·巴比耶里出版了一幅据称是古代女预言家“化学西比拉”的插图，其预言文本重复了9世纪占星家阿布·马沙尔的话。在追溯巴比耶里占星西比拉的起源时，本文考察了三个有时相互关联的传统：将星辰科学的历史追溯到洪水之前，断言占星术起源于神的启示，以及相信古代西比拉对基督诞生和其他基督教真理的预言。12世纪及以后的中世纪作家开始将这些传统放在一起引用，从而同时认可使用占星术来预测宗教变革，并模糊了应用于人类理解的自然与超自然的范畴。占星术与预言的这种融合尤其明显地出现在约翰·巴黎、莱尼亚诺的约翰、约翰内斯·利希滕贝格和马尔西利奥·菲奇诺等作家的作品中。最终，产生巴比耶里占星西比拉的轨迹将导致16和17世纪一波占星术的末日预言浪潮，以及以占星术自然神学的形式利用占星术来捍卫信仰，将科学和自然神圣化。
