ABSTRACT
The spiritual and ideological climate of the Middle Ages differed from that of Antiquity. The Greeks’ notion of schole or the Romans’ otium contained a strong secular component. In the Middle Ages, at the socially approved level, leisure was expected to be devoted to God. The life on earth was a Vale of Tears (vallis lacrimarum). Blessedness and redemption were to be gained not in the earthly world but in the world to come. Manual work was considered a punishment for man’s original sin but was not despised. People had to work, but there were many holy days. People were forbidden to work on as many as 160 days a year. The 12th and 13th centuries saw a change. The University of Bologna in Italy opened its doors in 1088. It was followed by the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and Paris. The interest in the philosophy of Antiquity was revived, and the relationship between vita activa and vita contemplativa became subject of renewed interest. The era marked by an almost absolute dominance of religious dogma was coming to an end, opening doors to human reason. Work ethic and the entrepreneurial spirit of bourgeois success entered the stage of history.
