Hypatia and St. Cyril or How to Read History

So I've been reading aloud from Mathematicians are People Too which is a very interesting book.  I read it long ago to my older kids.  However, I had completely forgotten about the Hypatia chapter.  I remember researching it a bit back then.  And I've only researched it a bit now, but I wanted to briefly talk about how important it is to never  swallow someone's recounting of history hook, line and sinker!  Especially if it has to do with Catholic history.  There is a whole lot of Catholic bashing going on.  It started with the Protestant Revolt or as history books like to call it, the Reformation.  The printing press came into existence about this time and those who were breaking away from the Catholic Church were very creative in recounting history from their own point of view.  The U.S. was founded by Protestants and our history is retold from a very Protestant perspective.  This is one reason why Catholic schools got established.  Protestants were using the public schools to evangelize Catholic immigrant children.

Lately Catholic bashing has got a resurgence among the New Atheists who like to reiterate the exaggerations that started with the Reformation and then add their own.

Now, I know very well that the Catholic Church has done bad, bad things.  It is a huge, very long-lived institution that is full of people.  And people are sinners, every single one of them.  I am living in the time of the s*x scandals.  It is awful!  The whole thing is disgusting and disheartening.  However, for example, many, many people jump to the conclusion that all priests are pedophiles.  You'll see this screed spewed all over the place.  That's the narrow-minded, mean-spirited, irrational exaggeration that I'm talking about.

Well, this kind of stuff can get put into kids books.  Nice, cleverly written, enjoyable children's books too.  Like Mathematicians are People, Too.
In the chapter on Hypatia, it is put forth that the Bishop of Alexandria had Hypatia murdered by a mob of monks in broad daylight on the steps of the Cathedral.  This just sounded so wackily far-fetched that I did a little research.

I found something here.  There's one contributor towards the end of this discussion who seems to want to blame the Jews.  Sigh.

 And here.

And here.

I don't know what the truth was.  Scholars are debating it.  It sounds like there was a real political struggle going on at that time.  But I am willing to bet any amount of dollars that the way this story is related in Mathematicians are People, Too book is just plain wrong.

So in approaching history with my kids I have adopted two principles:

1.  Question the author's interpretation.  Analyze the worldview being presented.  Read and learn critically.

2.  Learn history from different perspectives.  History is always told from a subjective point of view.  Learning it from various sources helps one realize this and hopefully counters the imbalance a bit.

I also want to say that there are plenty of Catholic history books that also present a one-sided retelling of history.  This is one reason why I don't care for the history books by Dr. Anne  W. Carroll that are so popular with Catholic homeschooling.  Same sin, different angle.