UNVEILING
THE LIGHT OF THE SOUL
At one time,
transmitting useful knowledge to the young, to help them prepare for active
citizenship and the world of work, seemed the high goal of education. But now,
we must ask whether this can be enough, for our knowledge-based society has
placed us in the midst of multiple interlocking crises.
We normally
associate knowledge with the mind, and a common definition is "justified
true belief". Justification, or proof, is generally based on the evidence
of physical experience, or from mental reasoning about such experience. So,
what should be our attitude towards knowledge in a time when, by force of
pandemic circumstance, more work, education and leisure time has moved online,
and therefore away from one of the key ingredients of knowledge – shared
physical experiences? This highlights one of the major issues with knowledge in
a technologically advanced society, for the credibility of experience is itself
under attack, with the rise of 'deepfake' technology, which permits the
falsification of audio and video evidence.
Combined with this
potential erosion of trust in one's own eyes and ears, there is a general
erosion of trust in authority. Governments, religious institutions, media
organisations, and even scientists, must now expect to have their
pronouncements examined critically. More widespread critical thinking is an
important outcome of the mass education of the twentieth century. It is
essential in sifting truth from falsehood, and thus for being a responsible
citizen. Yet critical thinking can be pushed too far, at which point it may
transform into a corrosive scepticism that threatens collective trust, which is
the foundation of communal endeavour. A society in which the first instinct is
to doubt public information is one that is in peril of disintegration. Thus, it
is a dangerous time for knowledge, with people potentially becoming more
strongly motivated by feelings, a condition that some in politics and commerce
seek to actively exploit. All of this indicates that we ought to be much more
discriminating in our approach to knowledge. Perhaps, in addition to asking
"what is being shown here?" we should also add, "who is showing
it, and why?" Above all, we should seek to detect the note of goodwill in
what is being shared.
This concern
about knowledge also calls upon us to reflect very carefully about how
education of all kinds ought to change. Because of the pandemic, far more
education had to be delivered remotely. If the pandemic had taken place even a
few years earlier, it is doubtful that this could have happened, which shows the
importance of interconnectedness. Yet what is largely missing in this pervasive
electronic connection is 'the human touch' – that subtle combination of sensory
cues, body language, and energetic connection which give nuance and enriched
meaning to communication. This missing element means that students and teachers
will almost inevitably suffer a diminishment in their relations. Opportunities
for chance encounters and friendly guidance delivered in an informal manner,
which can happen in a physical place of learning, are also largely absent from
a screen-mediated experience.
As vaccination
programs proceed, and some societies begin to return to ways of working from
before the pandemic, it might be tempting to think that the world of education
need only learn the lesson that teaching should not be exclusively performed
through a screen. But, given education's current role in conveying knowledge,
which should equip students to actively face the future, the time is ripe for a
more profound re-assessment of that role. Knowledge may be fundamental to a
modern society – but is it enough?
Beyond Knowledge
The answer to
this question may turn upon our idea of 'citizenship'. Have we, as a species,
reached the point at which we can expand national identity, and truly step
forward into planetary citizenship? The idea that we now live in the
Anthropocene era, where the human species has global impacts upon ecology and
climate, is now commonplace. And our understanding of the human mind and heart,
informed by both spiritual traditions and modern psychology, is wider and
deeper than ever before. The moment seems ripe for a fundamental shift in
educational practice, a re-commitment to the quest to unearth the jewel of the
soul that dwells within each person. This process of discovery calls for
exploration beyond the boundaries of the concrete mind.
In Education
in the New Age, Alice Bailey emphasised two cornerstones of education – the
value of the individual and the fact of the one humanity. In our ecologically
conscious age, we can reword this idea as the value of the individual organism
and the fact of the one ecology – the great complex of ecosystems that has been
named Gaia. One directs us to values and the nature of the individual, and thus
to philosophy and psychology; the other to the factual unity of humanity and
all living species, underneath all apparent diversity, and thus to ecology,
history, anthropology, and all related fields of inquiry.
Values reach
beyond the intellect into the intuitive sense of wholeness and rightness. We
normally think of the branch of philosophy called ethics as concerning
intellectual reasoning about values, but if we interpret 'philosophy' more
broadly as the love of wisdom, it can become a vehicle through which we can
live those values into being. This is the core of the spiritual life. In the
past, organised religion has, for many, given a context for this vital field of
healthy human functioning. As organised religion wanes in influence, it is
critical that this essential dimension of human life is reinforced in the
educational field. This is not to suggest that one specific spiritual doctrine
should hold sway. Rather, there should be an acknowledgement that, as a
fundamental aspect of being human, spirituality should be at the heart of every
educational curriculum.
Putting the same
thought in slightly different terms, we could say that education concerns two
fundamental questions – 'What is happening?' and 'Why is it happening?' The
latter question, the ceaseless 'why' of childhood, speaks to something deep
within the human spirit – the quest for meaning and significance. How can we
design an education that keeps this divine flame of curiosity alive and
nourished, as the child grows into adulthood? The 'What' question, of acquiring
information, is also important, and when rightly nurtured, leads to the grand
architectures of factual knowledge that science provides. Finding the right
balance in education between 'What' and 'Why' is difficult, and there are good
grounds for suggesting that humanity has recently given too much priority to
'What' over 'Why': valuing physical understanding of the world, with the
consequent ability to predict and manipulate it, over the question of whether
such manipulations are wise, and serve the common good.
The arts, another
field that reaches beyond the purely intellectual into the intuitive realms,
are also somewhat neglected in education. In a recent letter issued by the
Arcane School, (1) the educationalist Gert Biesta is quoted as saying that art
is disappearing from education, as it becomes viewed less in terms of its own
intrinsic worth, and more in terms of its impact on other areas of the
curriculum, such as academic achievement, and the development of creative
skills, discernment and pro-social attitudes.
Biesta suggests
there is an over-emphasis on the role of the arts in providing the young with
opportunities for expressing their own unique voice, creativity and identity;
rather than asking the more important and difficult question, of what should be
the right quality of these expressions, and by implication, how those
expressions should contribute to the wider culture.
In Biesta's
words: "The arts…provide unique existential possibilities for encountering
the resistance of the world, material and social, and for 'working through'
such resistance…which is at the very same time about encountering and 'working
through' the desires we have about the world and our existence in and with it
…Just as art is the dialogue of human beings with the world, art is the
exploration and transformation of our desires so that they can become a
positive force for the ways in which we seek to exist in the world in grown-up
ways. And that is where we may find the educative power of the arts." (2)
In this approach,
the educative experience of actually doing art receives greater attention – an
exploration by the artist of the qualities that he or she is seeking to express
through an act of creation, and the resistance that is encountered to that
appearance. This not only includes the resistance of wood, clay, paint and
metal, sound in the creation of music, gravity and the body nature in dance
etc., but also, more crucially, the resistance of the subtle materials of mind,
emotions and physical nature to being coordinated in such a way that an idea
'for good' is expressed in the objective world. Thus, making art becomes about
the formation of character, under the inspiring influence of the soul.
So the challenge
for educators everywhere is to step beyond their role as purveyors of relevant
knowledge, towards true mentors who can point the way for learners beyond
knowledge, to meaning and purpose, sensed through the intuition, and given form
through the creative imagination. And the challenge for wider society is to
place educators and education at the centre of re-building; including placing a
higher value on their physical well-being. As Helena Roerich remarks in Fiery
World I "...the nation that has forgotten its teachers has
forgotten its future. Let us not lose an hour in directing thought toward the
joy of the future. And let us make sure that the teacher be the most valued
member of the country's institutions." (s.582)
In the articles which follow we reflect on how the programmes of the United Nations are helping to foster the spirit of inclusiveness in education, and prepare students for an unknowable future; and on an innovative implementation of the "World Core Curriculum", proposed by the former Assistant Secretary-General of the UN, Robert Muller, and described by our guest contributor, the founding President of the Robert Muller School, Gloria Crook.
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