The educational concepts of Plato and Clive Staples Lewis

Abstract

Plato and Lewis have similar views on education. They are based on a philosophical idea common to many thinkers who regard education as a tool and process of finding the truth. Plato’s views on education are reflected in the Allegory of the Cave where he compares education with an ascent from the cave to the sun. Lewis’ vision on education is a mirror allegory of the descent into the dungeon. These images emphasise a different ontological status of empirical and spiritual reality. Philosophers believe that spiritual reality determines the meaning and norm of empirical reality. They claim that receptivity to the spiritual is formed during upbringing which defines the direction of a person’s education. At this stage, the right feelings and ideas are formed, and the desire for knowledge is awoken. Teaching is the next step of education. For Plato, this step is associated with the study of various subjects: the science of numbers, geometry, astronomy, and music through which one learns to progress from the sensual to the intelligible, to the discovery of ideas behind things. For Lewis, the main thing at this stage is the harmonious movement of the soul to its main goal, to the acquisition of man’s true essence — the development of a holistic personality that seeks to learn and discover the reality. Both thinkers also agree on the main goal of education as the formation of a holistic personality, where the ideas of beauty, justice, order, Good, and other significant ideas reveal themselves through the contact with the sensual and become part of the human soul shaping a true image of a person.