Conception of Education in Plato’s The Republic
In striving to progress and outperform the others, people have always attached great importance to accumulating their life experience so that future generations could benefit from it and learn from the mistakes and achievements of the past. Wisdom has been respected as a hallmark of age and experience, and those who possessed it stood high in the social esteem.
The issue of passing on experience from generation to generation was topical already in the ancient times, with Ancient Greece being one of the strongholds of first educational systems. Education was considered then in a broad philosophical context not only as passing on practical knowledge but also as shaping one’s mind and soul for philosophical contemplation and perception of life.
In this respect it is demonstrative to view the renowned allegory of the cave, provided by Plato in his fundamental Socratic dialogue The Republic, as a revealing conception of education. The latter is interpreted by Plato as enlightenment of uneducated mind that once informed should share the knowledge with the rest for the purpose of his/her homeland’s prosperity.
In his allegory, Plato draws a parallel between the general public and people who are imprisoned in a deep and dark cave. It is impossible to turn their heads towards the enlightened entrance to the cave as their necks have been chained since their childhood, so they only can see before themselves.
Behind the prisoners a fire is playing, so that they can see their own shadows and the shadows of one another thrown by the fire on the opposite wall of the cave — in fact, shadows are their reality. Supposing one of the prisoners is freed and let go to the real world, he would at first be struck by the light coming from outside; having overcome pain in his eyes, he then deliberately moves to the open air and at first perceives what he sees there as imaginary, as his only reality so far have been shadows in the cave.
But step by step he is moved forward, conceiving real life, until he is finally brought to the source of life itself, to the sun which would now be the essence of reality and the embodiment of the ultimate truth. Thus, thinking back to his former fellows in the cave, he pities them, for they do not know the truth and lead an existence in a world of imaginary things which they take for real. (Plato 219–221)
Such is the thought-provoking allegory, and the first and foremost association that is evoked by it is that of the process of education. Initially, people possess some basic knowledge relying on their first-hand experience of life. They consider their lives and ideas of it to be perfectly right and correct, since they do not know anything else to compare them with; there are no competing ideas which could shake their convictions.
As soon as additional information appears, either brought by someone else or acquired on one’s own, the old points of view are challenged, as they are compared to new ones and there emerges doubt as to the veracity and credibility of the old ones. The more information one gets, the more knowledge one accumulates, the more choice one has between multiple options, the more food for thought one receives, and as a consequence, the more doubt and vacillation one experiences.
In the painstaking search for the ‘one-and-only’ truth, one passes a long way through stages of first encounter with new facts or ideas, distrust to them, subsequent interest in them, their careful exploration and comparison to the previous ones, and their acceptance or rejection.
In order to pass through this way successfully and fruitfully without overlooking some important and valuable ideas, it can turn out beneficial to have a wise guide on that way — a person who is experienced and learned enough to help one separate the wheat from the chaff and to direct one’s steps in the right way.
There are multiple things to learn and the ways of learning them are countless, so are the possible interpretations of them and the value and importance one ascribes to the knowledge gained. Assuming that an unprepared mind can easily get lost in the jungle of available information, its guidance is vital for the purpose of shaping a reasonable and systematized outlook.
As such, education can be viewed as streamlining one’s mental energy in the right direction that benefits both the learner and his/her society. And it becomes the task and the social responsibility of philosophers (and, by analogy, educators) to ‘re-enter the cave’ and bring educational enlightenment to the broad public however resisting the latter may be.
Fairly enough, one may ask: why should an enlightened person return back to the cave and risk all the misunderstanding and rejection directed at him/her by the uneducated people? Plato reviews this problem in a patriotic key, claiming that the civil responsibility of anyone who is lucky enough to obtain proper education is to go back from where he/she came and apply the knowledge to enlighten the rest of the nation.
In order to acquire knowledge of higher degree, it is vital not to stop in one’s education and not to rest on one’s laurels but to proceed on the thorny path of wisdom that lies through returning back to the uneducated. Otherwise the once educated person is as useless and shallow as the uninformed ones (Plato 224).
If to someone it may seem unjust that those who have obtained enlightenment are forced to go back to the previous miserable existence, Plato motivates this necessity by the fact that education has been conferred on such people by the state, as a big favor. Therefore, it is the moral obligation and the civic duty to return the favor and sacrifice their own unconcerned existence for the sake of their state prosperity.
Moreover, it is the task of the state governors to oblige the educated people “to descend again among the prisoners in the den, and partake of their labours and honours, whether they are worth having or not” (Plato 225). He claims that good education is not an own merit of a person: it is provided by the state; therefore, the state has the right to claim devoted service and implicit obedience from those who have benefited from it.
Additionally to fulfilling one’s civic duty, the educated people get the chance of furthering their education by enlarging their knowledge. Brought back into the conditions of intellectual darkness, they are able — from the height of their wisdom — to approach such existence at a qualitatively new level, developing new skills and awareness.
Plato’s allegory of the cave is an unprecedented resource for educational inspiration, since together with discussing the importance of pure knowledge Plato emphasizes the necessity of sharing and distributing it among the uninformed. Such unselfish approach to the issue of teaching can be a good example for the modern educators, instructing them on the thorny path of their labor of love.
Works Cited
Plato. The Republic of Plato. Ed. and trans. Benjamin Jowett. Elibron Classics, 2002. Print.