"Wisdom communicates facts and not words; and it may be true that the memory is more to be depended upon when it has no support outside itself.
"Wisdom is a large and spacious thing. It needs plenty of free room. One must learn about things divine and human, the past and the future, the ephemeral and the eternal; and one must learn about Time.
"See how many questions arise concerning time alone: in the first place, whether it is anything in and by itself; in the second place, whether anything exists prior to time and without time; and again, did time begin along with the universe, or, because there was something even before the universe began, did time also exist then?
"There are countless questions concerning the soul alone: whence it comes, what is its nature, when it begins to exist, and how long it exists; whether it passes from one place to another and changes its habitation, being transferred successively from one animal shape to another, or whether it is a slave but once, roaming the universe after it is set free; whether it is corporeal or not; what will become of it when it ceases to use us as its medium; how it will employ its freedom when it has escaped from this present prison; whether it will forget all its past, and at that moment begin to know itself when, released from the body, it has withdrawn to the skies." . . .
--Seneca the Younger, Moral Letters to Lucilius, 88 (tr Gummere)
The liberal studies are not themselves wisdom or virtue, but they are the tools we must employ if we seek to become wise and virtuous. Consider that a man cannot do what is good if he does not know what is good, and know why it is good. The willingness and ability to understand Nature, and how we exist in harmony with that Nature, is essential if we are to live well.
I have long been very fond of the language Seneca employs here. Wisdom is large and spacious, and it needs plenty of room. The liberal arts are defined not so much by this or that specific subject, since the unity of wisdom touches on all subjects, but they are rather a method by which we come to understand for ourselves. We don't just memorize an answer blindly, but come to understand why it is true.
It isn't just what we learn, but how we go about learning it. Let us not simply acquire a narrow set of skills that will provide for the goods of the body, but let us rather train the mind to think critically about anything and everything it encounters in this life.
I am also amused that Seneca uses two examples to describe this process that I had also used since my earliest days of teaching in the liberal arts. Again, it isn't just about the topics themselves, but how we can learn to reason soundly by considering them. I would often spend extra time looking at St. Augustine's examination of time in the Confessions, and Plato's discussion on the soul in the Phaedo. I always found that each question could help a student build up some mental muscle.
Most inquisitive minds will begin to grasp that time is not itself a thing, but a measure of the change of things. On the few occasions when I have been able to keep students enthralled, they suddenly see the connection between Augustine and Einstein. Where there is no change, there is no time, and the flow of time is not itself a measure, but is rather measured relative to that change.
How might I define the passage of time more fully? Surely we understand it by the relationship of the past, the present, and the future. And here is where Augustine gives us a wonderful opportunity for the very liberal thinking we need in order to approach life. Recognize that the past no longer exists, that the future does not yet exist, and that even the present, that moment of 'now', itself has no duration. It is already past or still in the future as soon as I point it out. I can only even conceive of the present in relation to my memory of the past, and my expectation of the future, and therefore my very consciousness of time is only possible through the exercise of my rational awareness.
What, in turn, is this mysterious awareness that defines me? In our narrowly materialistic age, we assume that a man is nothing more than a combination of matter. But Plato asked us to consider what our very act of knowing truly is, and suggested that our ability to comprehend in a universal way indicated that man was far more than matter. That spark of reason, that very thing that makes me human, may not, after all, just be reducible to the firing of neurons.
I was once on an academic committee charged with approving new courses for the academic catalog. One of our chemistry faculty was deeply disturbed that a proposed syllabus made repeated reference to the concept of the soul.
"Doesn't the professor know that such a concept is outdated? Hasn't she studied any psychology?"
I don't think I made any friends that day by pointing out that the very term psychology meant the study of the soul. Thinking, perhaps, that we are more properly scientific than our predecessors, we assume that the very idea of the soul is imprecise.
But the Ancients, whatever school or system they subscribed to, understood the soul as the first principle of life in any living thing, and the human soul as the first principle of life in a rational being. To ask what we mean by soul is hardly a vague or superstitious question. If I am asking what defines the human soul, I am asking nothing less than what makes me a human being. That is hardly a useless question.
Scholars will sometimes quickly dismiss the intellectual practices of the High Middle Ages, the time, I would insist, when Western liberal arts learning was at its height. They may mock Scholastic questions, assuming they are without any practical meaning. Though I hardly know if these were real exercises, legend has it that students would be given certain dilemmas to resolve, where the answer did not matter nearly as much as the practice of open and free thought.
Whether or not they are myths, there are two I will always remember. And those teachers who inspired me the most would entertain us with their consideration:
First, how many angels can dance on the head a pin?
Second, can God create a rock so heavy that he cannot move it?
By all means, roll you eyes. But much like a Zen Koan, these can be incredibly helpful in training the mind. I have always recognized the sort of student who has the gift or inclination of thinking for himself, because he will not laugh or be dismissive. He will sit quietly, think the problem through, and while others bicker or ridicule, he will consider the question.
I think I knew I had reached the height of my time as a teacher when a young man, usually very shy and reserved, spoke up.
"How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? All of them, or none of them. All of them because angels are beings of pure spirit, and therefore don't take up matter or space. None of them, because angels can't dance if they don't have bodies."
"Can God create a rock so big that he cannot move it? If God is omnipotent and omniscient, then nothing is outside of his power. He can therefore create anything that is possible. An impossible thing, like a square circle, cannot exist. Therefore you are asking God to make something impossible, which is simply something that cannot be. That isn't outside God's power, it's just a nonsense term."
Those are the moments when one could cry for joy. I don't know what became of that young man, or whether he found 'success' in this world. But I can assure you that he was well on the way to being a free man. He may well never have had to face a Scholastic question again in his life, but his ability to think a problem through, any problem, with wisdom was already a merit to his character.
These are the skills the wise man employs, whether he is thinking about angels and pins, engineering, corporate finance, or how to love his neighbor. Wisdom is large and spacious, and it needs plenty of room.
Written 1/2010
No comments:
Post a Comment