The Means and Ends of Education - The ends of higher education are the acquisition of wisdom and virtue and the serious pursuit of knowledge and truth—these are the aims of the older model of education

Great Books, Higher Education, and the Logos

by Michael M. Jordan

Generally speaking, there are two major philosophies of education: an older model which addresses moral and spiritual concerns of the mind and heart of man, and a newer one which trains us to manipulate and control the material world for the good of the body. The older model prevailed in higher education from around 400 b.c. until the mid-nineteenth century, when it began to be replaced by the newer, utilitarian model. Since the 1960s, the utilitarian model has competed with a modern version of the older model, one that usually features either ideological or trivial studies.

The older model of education centers on the study of serious literature, essentially classical and Christian in content, and requires the acquisition of intellectual skills (critical reading, thinking, and writing skills) as a means to reach its moral and spiritual end: the acquisition of wisdom and virtue and the capability to pursue knowledge and truth seriously. The modern, utilitarian model cultivates the same skills to improve man’s physical estate. It generally applies these skills in service to professional and vocational interests in business, industry, and entertainment, in science, technology, and medicine. Both models intend to improve man’s estate, and both are worthy and important. Nevertheless, insofar as modern colleges and universities have narrowed their focus to vocational, technical, and professional training, they have yielded to the devil’s temptation. The devil challenged Jesus to turn stones into bread. Jesus’s reply (“Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God”—Matthew 4:4) indicates that man’s education should not concern merely his material well-being. Material well-being is not the chief or highest end of man; moral and spiritual development is more important.

The older model of education, designed to make us better and more complete human beings by tending to moral, spiritual, and epistemological realities, should not be abandoned or replaced by the newer model’s utilitarian aim of improving man’s physical estate. Indeed, we need the older model of education in order to orient modern utilitarian education properly.

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