2.2 A Vision for a Liberated Humanity
Chapter Two: The Seven Characteristics of a Classically Educated Christian (2.2)
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Read Part 1 of Chapter Two
2.2 A Vision for a Liberated Humanity
So far, we have established that a Classical Christian Education is fundamentally a humane education, by which we mean an education that cultivates the full dignity of a person created in the image of God.
But how is this accomplished practically? What are the tools for cultivating a liberated and humanized being? The answer can be found in an older name for Classical Christian Education, Liberal Arts Education.
In William Goldman’s, The Princess Bride, Vizzini gets into the habit of saying, “Inconceivable!” To which Inigo Montoya eventually objects, saying, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” In modernity, such is the case with this older expression, “liberal arts education.” It doesn’t mean what most people think it means.
David Goodwin illustrates this in an article he wrote for The Classical Difference where he likens his first encounter with the confusing expression unto finding a treasure in the mud that needed cleaning off. He writes, “My mind locked immediately on an unfortunate image: ‘liberal’ as opposed to conservative, ‘arts’ as a euphemism for joblessness, and ‘education’—a hoop-jumping, time-passing exercise that consumes the first quarter of your life.”1
Goodwin’s preliminary confusion about the expression shows just how far the treasure of the liberal arts has sunk in the mire of modern thinking on education. For all practical purposes, the credibility of the once venerable pursuit of goodness, truth, and beauty is barely recognizable—and to only a few. If one is familiar with the expression at all, it is usually in the context of a modern degree mill, or a STEM program where the “Gen Eds” (as they are often called) are the bothersome, but necessary, preliminary classes a student has to take to get on with the “important” courses.
It is not uncommon, either, to hear someone lament a liberal arts education as being a financial bust, an exercise in futility toward the goal of gainful employment. Cartoonist, Steve Breen, epitomized this modern cynicism toward the liberal arts in a frame for San Diego’s Union Tribune. The single frame pictures two young men apparently discussing their educational pursuits. The first, with a look of surprise on his face, says, “This fall I’m going to trade school to be a welder.” The other, wearing sunglasses, a university hoodie, and a smug, cool smirk, responds, “Loser.” (Thus the look of surprise on the face of the first young man.)
The caption goes on to point out that the starting salary of the future welder is $50,000 per year, and the starting salary for a graduate with a liberal arts degree from a pricey four-year school is $25,000 per year (if he’s lucky). For the modern working class, a liberal arts education is typically seen as a waste of money, an institutional scam aimed at the arrogant elite, or a path forward for those who have been duped into believing they need to have a bachelor’s degree to get a job in the real world.2
So what exactly is a liberal arts education? With such a bad rapport—one ranging from obscurity to inconceivability—why should anyone care about a course of study with dubious potential to secure employment for the pursuant? To distinguish the expression from uses that are foreign to the classical understanding, it will be helpful to define a liberal arts education, etymologically.
The word art is derived from the Greek word, technē, meaning craft or trade.3 Art implies the possession of a certain skill set—either endowed by nature, attained by practice, usually both. While “craft” and “trade” are accurate definitions of an art in the classical sense, they are inadequate to qualify our meaning without employing the adjective liberal.
Contrary to popular assumptions, the word liberal in “liberal arts” does not mean politically progressive. The word, derived from the Latin root libere, means freely; and more specifically the Latin adjective līberālis means freedom, of free citizens, gentlemanly, honourable, generous, liberal, handsome.4 As can be seen from the etymology of the adjective, liberal refers to that which pertains to freedom, like a free person, or a free society.
In his book, The Life of the Mind, James Schall, Professor of Political Philosophy in the Department of Government at Georgetown University, aptly points out that “Certain disciplines, particularly what is known from Aristotle as ‘metaphysics,’ are called freeing subjects. Such ‘liberal’ discipline is undertaken ‘for its own sake,’ that is, the purpose of the knowledge gained is not to ‘do’ anything with it. Just to ‘know’ something is itself a pleasure.”5 To say it another way, liberal refers to the kind of knowledge that liberates the soul of those who find pleasure in knowing for its own sake.
Lastly, the word education is nearly as misunderstood as the word liberal because it is too often associated with job training. The English word comes from the Latin, educere. Schall points out that, “The word educere means to bring forth, or to complete something already begun by the very fact that one is a human being.”6 In platonic terms, education is the experience of being led out of, or delivered from, the cave of images so one is able to see reality by the light of the sun and order his soul with virtue.7
Moreover, education is not only being able to see and explain what is real, “but also [to be able to] explain the false views [and] to know “what it is to be unintelligent and vicious.”8 In other words, to know both what is and what is not is “a considerable part of being intelligent and virtuous.”9 Education, then, is not job training. Rather it is knowing the truth of things as they are; and knowing them to the end that one is not bound by ignorance, vice, or utilitarian aims—but liberated to pursue wisdom and virtue.
Putting it all together, a general definition of a liberal arts education can be stated as the pursuit and acquisition of that knowledge which is pleasurable for its own sake, and which frees the mind and prepares the soul to be wise and virtuous.
As the historic witnesses readily testify, such an education not only existed throughout the period that C.S. Lewis called Old Western Culture, it was the kind of education that was championed by educators and thinkers until the nineteenth century. A classical Christian student, then, is one who is preparing to participate fully and freely in human life: to govern himself, to serve others, and to contribute to the flourishing of his community. He is training how to be fully and gloriously human.
Next up will be:
2.3 A Foundation in the Seven Liberal Arts
2.4 Conversant in the Great Conversation
2.5 Some Proficiency in the Classical Languages
2.6 A Mastery of Rhetoric and Letters
2.7 A Personal Pursuit of Virtue and Wisdom
David Goodwin, “The Unfortunate ‘Liberal Arts Education’: What’s in a Word?”, The Classical Difference, Fall 2016, 4.
When the courses that satisfy the requirements for the “liberal arts” or “humanities” portion of a degree from the typical American college or university be investigated, criticism is sometimes warranted. For example, course offerings such as “Gender and Sexuality Studies,” “Women’s Studies,” and “Contemporary Literature” make regular appearances in the core humanities requirements of college catalogs. In his book, Real Education, Charles Murray, the W.H. Bradley Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C., offers
samples of actual courses that, as of 2004, fulfilled humanities and literature requirements at major schools…“History of Comic Book Art” (Indiana University), “History and Philosophy of Dress” (Texas Tech University), “Love and Money” (Bryn Mawr), “Survey of the World Cinema” (University of Illinois), “Ghosts, Demons, and Monsters” (Dartmouth), “Rock Music from 1970 to the Present” (University of Illinois), “American Pop Culture and Folklife” (Penn State University). At Duke, you could fulfill a social science requirement with “Campus Culture and Drinking.”
With such course offerings being the modern equivalent of humane studies, one need not wonder why so many misinformed inquirers find a liberal arts education inconceivable. These sample course offerings, gleaned from fifty colleges across the country—including several prestigious schools—hardly resemble anything that could be called demanding or rigorous education in any sense of the word. Charles A. Murray, Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing America's Schools Back to Reality (New York: Crown Forum, 2008), 86.
τέχνη. Robert L. Thomas, New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries:Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, Inc., 1998).
Collins Latin Dictionary Plus Grammar (Glasgow: HarperCollins, 1997).
James V. Schall, The Life of the Mind: On the Joys and Travails of Thinking (Wilmington, DE: ISI Books, 2008), 27.
James V. Schall, The Life of the Mind, 32.
Plato and Allan Bloom, The Republic of Plato (New York: Basic Books, 1991),514a- 521d.
James V. Schall, The Life of the Mind, 40.
James V. Schall, The Life of the Mind, 40.
Great thoughts. The word "Liberal" has been hijacked for sure.