The modern world of education is characterized by the opposites of integration: isolation and reductionism. Colin Gunton, in the 1992 Bampton Lectures at Cambridge, entitled The One, The Three and the Many: God, Creation and the Culture of Modernity, uses the terms, “disengagement” and “fragmentation” to describe the predicament of modernity. The term “disengagement” he attributes to Charles Taylor, and he describes “fragmentation” by stating “that the cultural disarray that is so marked a feature of our times derives from our failure to integrate or combine the different objects of human thought and activity: in brief, science, morals and art” (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993; 13-14, 114-115).
The modern and post-modern cultural project has abandoned God, has denied the reality of the transcendentals (truth, goodness and beauty) and forsaken the cultural heritage of wisdom. Because of this it has majored on the centrifugal (center-fleeing) forces of the mind, that is, the tendency to divide, distinguish, dissect, and deconstruct, without strong enough centripetal (center-seeking) forces—the power to unite, integrate, enliven, and edify—in order to balance them out. Analytical thinking is not bad in itself, but synthetic thinking is more primary and necessary. The modern and post-modern project has been an attempt to deny the primacy of synthetic thinking.
So much has been said before by many. A good example is the first chapter of Stephen Turley’s Awakening Wonder: A Classical Guide to Truth, Goodness and Beauty (Classical Academic: Camp Hill, PA, 2014; 1-8). Turley draws a strong contrast between “what we might call the moral age versus the modern age, or the sapient age versus the scientific age” (2). This is another way of explaining what I am getting at through the analogy of centrifugal and centripetal forces. Not so often recognized is the fact that the theology of wisdom in Proverbs provides the needed centripetal forces of integration.
Jews, and later Christians, developed a theology of wisdom from Proverbs in ways that made possible the classical-Christian synthesis of the patristic and medieval eras. Careful study of this theology of wisdom in Proverbs and later traditions thus provides scriptural foundation for the Christian appropriation of the classical liberal arts tradition.
The Need for Integration
Why was it right for Christians to adopt pagan learning, and to read Greek philosophy and myths? How were we able to get beyond the oft-quoted dictum of Tertullian, “What has Athens to do with Jerusalem?” and into St. Augustine’s call to plunder the Egyptians? I believe the answer can be found in the development of a theology of wisdom. In particular, for Augustine the Jewish book Wisdom of Solomon was likely instrumental in helping him make this move in the direction of a careful appropriation of the pagan liberal arts tradition (see particularly Wisdom of Solomon 7.15-8.8).
Tertullian’s rhetorical question comes from De praescriptione haereticorum 7:9 (“Quid ergo Athenis et Hierosolymis?”). The observation is often made that this quote, taken out of context, has been used to criticize Tertullian unfairly. However, the standard critique is justified given three factors:
- his sweeping dismissal of Greek philosophers using 1st Corinthians and Colossians out of context earlier in ch. 7,
- his strong discouragement of curiosity in 7:12-13, and
- his naïve take on the relationship of Solomon’s wisdom to that of the surrounding world in 7:10 (“Nostra institutio de porticu Solomonis est qui et ipse tradiderat Dominum in simplicitate cordis esse quaerendum.” “Our education is from Solomon’s portico, who also had passed on that the Lord must be sought in simplicity of heart.”).
In actual fact, both Paul and the Solomonic tradition drew from and engaged with sources of wisdom from outside the Hebrew tradition. Paul quotes from a Hymn to Zeus in Acts, and the Proverbs has many features and exact wordings in common with other ancient near eastern wisdom traditions. Augustine’s call to plunder the Egyptians (see Augustine’s De doctrina Christiana 2:40) calls for wise and careful integration with other sources of knowledge without compromising fundamental Christian beliefs.
The situation of the early church is analogous to our predicament today. Teachers in classical schools are not unaffected by the fragmentation of the modern and post-modern world. Whether the teacher has an education background or not, there is no escaping the various movements, philosophies and techniques of the broader world of education. Everyone in classical education is concerned about not falling into the trap of simply recapitulating the problems of modern education. What is not so clear is how to go about doing that, and the extent to which this requires a refusal to engage with the world of modern education. We have enough to worry about with keeping our own catechumens faithful, not to mention the exhausting work of recapturing something of the traditions of the ancients. What has the classical school to do with modern pedagogy?
If we add to that the confusing array of ideas about teaching propagated within classical education—a wonderful and edifying array, to be sure, but confusing nevertheless!—then we should understand that there is perhaps even greater possibility for confusion for the average classical educator in how to make sense of it all. Not every expression of classical education is alike, and how am I to sift, how am I to integrate, how am I to synthesize all these ideas into a practical vision for my day-to-day realities as a teacher, into a conviction of priorities for my vocation as a teacher? The pressure on the classical teacher to integrate various ancient philosophies, modern pedagogy, and a holistic Christian vision of education is truly enormous. Only the power of a developed theology of wisdom can energize and guide such a task.
A Theology of Divine and Human Wisdom
In Proverbs and later Jewish texts like Ben Sira and the Wisdom of Solomon, particularly where Wisdom is personified as a figure mediating for God, we have been given some broad but nevertheless illuminating parameters for a philosophy of education or pedagogy. Moreover, the pedagogy that this theology of wisdom implies majors on the centripetal forces (integration, unification, edification), rather than the centrifugal forces (analysis, dissection, deconstruction) of the mind.
Because of this an understanding of the theology of wisdom can help the classical education movement in three key tasks:
- sustaining an ongoing dialogue with historical pedagogies,
- guiding the use of the many modern technical resources and quantitative assessments of teaching and learning through qualitative values, and
- involving a holistic and engaged account of morality and human formation.
The theology of wisdom developed in the Jewish and Christian traditions provides such an integrating power, and it does so through what I would call a traditional and transcending pedagogy.
By “traditional” is meant both its commitment to a continuing dialogue with historical sources of wisdom and its prioritization of qualitative concerns. This should be carefully distinguished from “traditionalism,” which would hold that all significant knowledge is derived from tradition.
The term “transcending” recognizes both the transcendent quality of Wisdom itself—as in the transcendental triad (truth, goodness, and beauty)—precisely because it is God’s Wisdom, while at the same time acknowledging the inability of humans to fully capture or contain its essence. For instance, consider Job 28:12-13: “But where shall wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding? Man does not know its worth. And it is not found in the land of the living” (ESV). We cannot master Wisdom, but we can participate in it.
Because of Wisdom’s immanent presence within the world and human culture, however, there is that real access to wisdom, without which we would search for it in vain: “Blessed is the one who finds wisdom, and the one who gets understanding…” (Prov 3:13ff.). The human educational endeavor is thus a continuous communal process of transcending in accordance with and development of the tradition of wisdom, as a response to God’s invitation to us through the immanent presence of his transcendent Wisdom.
Applying a Theology of Wisdom to the Problem of Technicism
As a test-case of the value of developing a theology of wisdom, and an illustration of what it might look like in practice, the rest of this article will develop how a theology of wisdom can address a problem within modern education, which plagues classical schools as well: the problem of technicism.
Technicism is not simply an over-fascination with technology as a means of stimulating learning out of students, though that problem plagues modern education as well. Instead, technicism refers to a broader ideological approach to education that has become captivated by quantitative measurements and the economic evaluation of success. In technicism education has been reduced to something that can be measured in numbers alone. Teachers are made into technicians, who simply pull the levers and push the buttons assigned to them by the ruling technocrats. Technicism focuses on quantities and techniques, rather than quality and values.
It is not only classical educators that view technicism as a problem. For instance, in a leading educational journal David Carr and Don Skinner note the wide influence of technicist models on theory about learning and the professional role of the teacher, and then bemoan how “their baleful influence—on, for example, latter day talk of learning objectives, attainment targets, performance indicators and curriculum delivery—is everywhere apparent in the contemporary ‘audit culture’ of educational theory and policy….” (“The Cultural Roots of Professional Wisdom: Towards a Broader View of Teacher Expertise,” in Educational Philosophy and Theory 41:2 (2009), 144). Now let’s not get this wrong. An ‘audit culture’ is a very fine thing, if what we are concerned with is factories, markets, money and products. But it is at least a questionable theoretical assumption that schools should be modelled on this plan. Inevitably, such a pattern turns the focus away from many of the things that really matter in education, like the cultivation of wisdom and virtue. A government bureau of education can hardly be concerned with such things, when handy charts and graphs stand before them emphasizing the bottom line and the achievement gap.
If there is a defense for a technicist model of education, it rests on the assumption that education is an applied science, like the medical practice. In this line of thinking teachers themselves need not be concerned with the theory behind the practices they employ (Who cares for all that heady stuff, anyway?), only with efficiently employing them in order to get results, measured, of course, in high test scores. After all, the average doctor only needs to be able to diagnose and treat patients, rather than understand all the detailed scientific theory that may undergird such practices. It is hard to argue against an analogy with so revered a profession as medicine, but here the analogy must fail. Who will be a better teacher? One who has been given five ways to manage behavior in the classroom and eight types of lesson plans, or one who has refined and honed teaching practices over years of seeking the truth in the tradition of educational philosophy? How can an unreflective teacher impart and embody wisdom?
The theology of wisdom in Proverbs 1-9 provides an antidote to the technicist over-fascination with techniques and quantitative assessment. The Hebrew concept of ḥokmâ or wisdom likely grew out of the idea of skillful expertise in some craft, i.e. technical skill (for instance, see Bruce K. Waltke, The Book of Proverbs: Chapters 1-15, NICOT; Eerdmans: Grand Rapids, 2004; 76-77). Yet in Proverbs we see the concept broadened and deepened into the masterful understanding for life that the English word ‘wisdom’ evokes for us today. The roles of parent and sage are fused within this holistic and value-laden passing on of the tradition. In Proverbs the prototypical son is being educated for life, the royal son is being educated to rule, and the noble’s son to carry out his official duties in the royal court. This training in technical proficiency is carried out by the father/sage in a heavily value-laden context. The student is to love wisdom and to seek it above riches; he is to reject folly in both his princely duties and his personal life.
A theology of wisdom does not reject technē, all the techniques and quantitative measures. It simply puts them in the proper role of subservience under qualitative values and ideals for life. This will inevitably transform them, since all the techniques classical educators use must be fitted to wisdom’s ends. Nevertheless, techniques, arts, and judgments themselves remain intact under the guidance of wisdom. After all, Wisdom herself rules over all technē as a master craftsman, who was with God at the beginning as he wisely ordered all of creation (Proverbs 8:22-31). Yet this holistic vision of education requires much of the teacher.
In classical education the teacher must be a magister of the arts, a sage, a philosopher; must be a participant in the Wisdom that comes from above (cf. James 3:17). Only then can the teacher cultivate wisdom in the young and simple. Only then will the teacher wisely order techniques, practices and assessments to the right ends. The theology of wisdom thus helps us avoid the trap of technicism through its integrative vision, in which qualitative values rule quantitative measures. Moreover, the traditional and transcending pedagogy that a theology of wisdom implies prevents us from reducing education to modern technicism, even as it provides us with a way of integrating the valuable techniques it has birthed.
In this way a modern book of teaching techniques, like Doug Lemov’s Teach Like a Champion 2.0: 62 Techniques That Put Students on the Path to College, can be mined for its wisdom and then integrated into a classical vision of education that has broader aims than students’ mere economic success in life. Wisdom cries aloud in the educational marketplace, “You who are simple, seek wisdom!” Her path of wise integration is hard, but all other by-ways and shortcuts represent the easy roads of Folly.
