Education is...

Every nation which has reached a certain stage of development is instinctively impelled to practise education. Education is the process by which a community preserves and transmits its physical and intellectual character. For the individual passes away, but the type remains. The natural process of transmission from one generation to another ensures the perpetuation of the physical characteristics of animals and men; but men can transmit their social and intellectual nature only by exercising the qualities through which they created it — reason and conscious will. Through the exercise of these qualities man commands a freedom of development which is impossible to other living creatures… By deliberate training even the physical nature of the human race can alter, and can acquire a higher range of abilities. But the human mind has infinitely richer potentialities of development. As man becomes increasingly aware of his own powers, he strives by learning more of the two worlds, the world without him and the world within, to create for himself the best kind of life. His peculiar nature, a combination of body and mind, creates special conditions governing the maintenance and transmission of his type, and imposes on him a special set of formative processes, physical and mental, which we denote as a whole by the name of education. Education, as practised by man, is inspired by the same creative and directive vital force which impels every natural species to maintain and preserve its own type; but it is raised to a far higher power by the deliberate effort of human knowledge and will to attain a known end. ~ Werner Jaeger, Paideia, vol. I, Introduction

What is the process whereby the Church as a community preserves and transmits its spiritual character? From generation to generation humans pass on their biological life, their “genes”. At another level, we pass on intellectual and social life, and economic life. Education is necessary to that. But what about passing on the life of the Church from generation to generation? Surely some form of “education” is necessary to that as well. Does spiritual education reside on yet another level, higher than the intellectual? Or does spiritual education pervade the other kinds of transmission, both in body and in soul, as yeast in dough?

It is significant that Jaeger takes a “community” perspective on education right from the start. He doesn’t focus on the individual — how Mary or John is educated. But neither does he take a normative perspective: how to bring up responsible citizens, or good workers for the sake of the larger whole. He doesn’t seem to have “the general welfare” per se in mind. The transmission of character for Jaeger seems to be more a necessary fact of human existence, of human nature, than a moral or cultural imperative. Or perhaps it is both. A “creative and directive vital force impels every natural species” to “maintain and preserve its own type”. Yet there is “freedom of development” that man can “command” through reason and conscious will.

An analogous situation obtains in the Church, doesn’t it? In the Church there are the “vital forces” of both the “horizontal” (Holy Tradition) and the “vertical” (the Holy Spirit) varieties, but there is also freedom. Those vital forces move us, in our freedom, not only to survive, but to thrive, to be light unto the whole world. Since the Church has a “generational existence”, and the transmission of its spiritual character is not guaranteed by mere biological replacement, education (Christian paideia) must be a central concern, as large a concern as salvation itself.

Comments

[Jim N.]

Isn't the Liturgy itself a teaching tool? Both intellectual and also for the nuos? You mentioned Holy Tradition, I'm just drilling down a bit... :)

[Tracy]

Mmm, yes, the Liturgy has got to be "the" teaching tool of the Church, esp. for the community as a whole. We have spiritual fathers and mothers (and their writings) to work with us one-on-one. To form Church, though, we have to learn as a whole. I'm not sure which is more difficult!

So you vote for the yeast-in-the-dough model of Christian paideia, rather than adding yet another "level"? I.e. both intellectual and spiritual growth are happening at the same time? I think I like that better, too. Practically speaking, it's more difficult. You have to "coordinate". What do we do with all the intellectual stuff we have to learn these days that isn't connected up?

Thanks for visiting! :-)