The More Precise Education: The Study of the Virtue and Nous
For a person to participate in eros, he or she must presuppose that one is part of the whole: one cannot step outside to some Archimedean point to survey the whole of reality; rather, one must acknowledge that one is part of something greater than oneself and attempts to understand the whole the best one can from that vantage point. The philosopher’s recognition that one is part of the of the whole is what Strauss has called the philosopher’s openness to the possibility of theology–an acceptance of the Homeric gods that checks reason from disintegrating into rationalism. By acknowledging and by following one’s eros, the philosopher preludes a Cartesian dichotomy of subject and object in his epistemology since a person is merely part of a greater whole (i.e., participates in a relational matrix of reality). The trick for the Athenian Stranger is to draw out of the atheist’s soul his eros so that he will recognize that his account of the cosmos is simply a rationalist explanation. Instead of accepting that he or she is just a “puppet” of the gods, the atheist, out of excessive thumos, views him or herself as the center of universe, demanding recognition from even his or her superior beings.
The end result is the atheist’s transformation of reason into a type of rationalism that cannot acknowledge a being superior to him or herself, a being whose superiority prevents reason fully comprehending its nature. Within this context, the omission of what constitutes nature and what constitutes the soul is not a fear out of persecution but an appreciation of the limits of reason’s ability to access the truth of beings who are superior to the philosopher. The expectation of a Kantian logos to prove the existence of the gods will always fall short as evident with the deficiencies in the Athenian Stranger’s argument about the priority of the soul (gods) over the body (material-temporal reality). The philosopher, in other words, should not confuse his search for the whole of reality with first causes.
Yet it is only the philosopher, not the common man, in the Athenian Stranger’s “second best regime” that can examine these first causes, specifically the idea of virtue as being both one and four beings at the same time (965c1-3; 964a1-12). Underlying this more “precise education” (965b1-2) is the assumption that the many are unable to reach a synoptic state to practice dialects in the study of virtue (964d4-9). This assumption would agree with the Athenian Stranger’s earlier argument about how the polis strives towards the divine and human goods: the existence of an ontological, hierarchal reality would seem to demand that a hierarchy exists within nature and the polis, but hierarchy (order) can only exist if there are superiors and inferiors in nature and society. Consequently, it makes sense that only a few would be able to reach a synoptic state to practice philosophy, as constrained by reverence, in the polis if an ontological, hierarchal reality exists. The Athenian Stranger therefore rejects both the communitarian’s and the liberal’s common presupposition of human nature that all men can be philosophers if they so desire.[26]
The need for this more “precise education” arises from the Athenian Stranger’s recognition that the polis requires an intellectual defense against poets and other educators who arrive into the city to espouse their own teachings, some of which may run contrary to the dogma of the gods (964b9-964d2; also see 960d1-7). This intellectual defense is not only aims at the muthos of the poets but also against the logos of the sophists, who had discovered reason and subsequently planted a new pedagogical foundation upon it. Mythical accounts of the cosmos are no match for the sophists’ logos, even if muthos portrays a more accurate picture of the gods, nature, and man: a superior logos is required to meet the sophists’ arguemtns.[27] Although the sophists’ aim, as best represented by Protagoras, was admirable in the cultivation of young men in a knowledge of ethics, politics, and rhetoric based on a rational instead of poetical ground, the foundation of this rational speculation was not God but humans themselves.[28] Since humans can neither know nor not know about the existence of God, “man” must become “the measure of all things,” the measure and the standard of all educational excellence.[29] In the realm of dialectics, then, muthos is unable to provide a sufficient challenge to logos (reasoned argumentation); thus, a “more precise” education about the gods is required to protect the customs and traditions of the polis in logos form.[30]
The Athenian Stranger’s response to the sophist’s search for a standard in education is the replacement of “man as the measure of all thing” with “God as the measure of all things” (716c1-716d5). If the great strength of the sophists was the creation of a formal, rational education system, then their great weakness was the absence of an intellectual and moral foundation (i.e., first principles) in their pedagogical theory.[31] The sophists’ neglect of studying first principles, which includes the study of the proper ends for man, not only led to a moral relativism among their students but equipped them with an arsenal of rhetorical weapons they could use to further their own self-interests. This oversight, and occasional contempt for, of first principles was the primary objection that Plato lodged against the sophists’ pedagogical theory (Republic 336a-354c; Gorgias 482-508c; 511b-526c). A recovery of these first principles in the polis’ educational system was of preeminent importance for Plato if one desired to know to what end humans existed (Republic 536d).[32] In this light, we must understand the Athenian Stranger’s (or Plato’s) introduction of a more “precise education” as the dialectical attempt to guide to the rational breakthrough of the sophists to a pedagogical ground rooted in first principles (i.e., the first mover).[33]
This first principle, the subject of this more “precise education,” is virtue and its leader nous, to which the polis should aim all its laws, customs, and manners (963a1-11). By gathering the young and the old in the polis to study how virtue can be both four and one, the polis will be able to take advantage of those who are sharpest in perception and prudent in thinking to formulate proofs of the existence of the gods (964e-965a8; 966c1-966d3; 951d-953e). However, the Athenian Stranger does not elaborate on the connection, if one exists, between the proof of the gods and the study of the first principles, virtue and its leader, nous; nor does the Athenian Stranger lends much credence in reason’s ability to grasp these principles and to prove the gods’ existence (965d7-965e6; 966c1-9).
It would seem from the Athenian Stranger’s comments that reason is limited in its ability to know the whole of reality since an account of virtue will be contrived by some other means if reason is unable to fulfill this task (963e2-6). In fact, it is that divine part of man’s eros which needs to be activated towards the gods before he can even produce a philosophical proof of the gods’ existence (966c9-966d4). But this desire to know something outside of oneself, this sense of wonder, can be prompt by a more “precise education” (philosophical inquiry): the study of the motions of the orderliness in the cosmos brings into the soul a sense of wonder and amazement that man is merely part of a greater whole (966e1-967a6). Philosophy, therefore, can stir within one’s soul eros. However, philosophy requires reverence towards the gods (or postulates about the gods) so that mistakes about the priority of the soul and body are not made (967b1-967d3). Specifically speaking, it seems that philosophy requires a certain type of piety in the acceptance of two postulates: 1) the soul is the eldest of all things and 2) the soul is immortal (967d5-967e4).
Still, the Athenian Stranger has not made the connection between the gods and the soul (or the first principles of virtue and nous); instead, the Athenian Stranger describes the nature of this more “precise education” in the Nocturnal Council (968a7-968b1). Given our previous discussion of preludes and proofs of the divine, the Athenian Stranger’s silence about the relationship between the soul (or first principles) and the gods would seem to indicate reason’s inability to make this connection. Any attempt to bridge this gap between the soul and the gods would be nothing more than an exercise in rationalism as noted earlier by the Athenian Stranger (967b1-967d3). If philosophy does require limits to prevent it from collapsing into rationalism, then the Athenian Stranger’s silence about the equation of gods and souls make perfect sense since philosophy itself could not make this connection. In this context, the Athenian Stranger’s remarks about philosophical education, the absence of logos of the gods as souls, is an implicit statement about the limitations of reason. The reason why philosophy accepts philosophical postulates to circumscribe its reason (967d5-967e4) is that the philosopher may also require rational limitations, in addition to mythical ones. Since the philosopher relies mostly on his reason to participate in the world, muthos and preludes may be dismissed as being irrational; therefore, the presentation of limitations in logos form (philosophical postulates) may make the philosopher more receptacle to constraints on reason. In short, the connection between the soul and the gods must be accepted as a matter of faith, whether it is presented as a myth, prelude, or philosophical postulate.
This connection between the soul and the gods has to be accepted as a matter of faith because of the limited nature inherent in logos. Although rational argumentation can explain much of the cosmos, there might be some realities which are ineffable or, at best, can be articulated imperfectly. The Athenian Stranger’s warning that the discussion of certain matters in writing should be avoided because it would be impossible to determine whether the pupil had truly understood what he was reading would seem to indicate logos is limited in its ability to convey experiences and explain knowledge of the whole (968d1-968e). As a result, the Athenian Stranger recognizes that his two philosophical postulates must be accepted as a matter of faith because of reason’s inability to comprehend the whole of reality as well as its inability to articulate ineffable reality.
This philosophical education takes place in the Nocturnal Council, to which the polis should be handed over, to safeguard the laws of the regime 969b1-969c4). The Nocturnal Council therefore should not be viewed as a refugee camp for philosophers who live in fear of the opinions of the polis and seek rational bliss apart the many; rather, the Nocturnal Council is the institution designed to protect the polis’ laws by the few who are capable of philosophical thought (969c1-4). Restricting entry into the Nocturnal Council is a recognition that the many are incapable of philosophical inquiry: there exists only a capable few who are able to practice philosophy from dusk to dawn (951d8-11). The Athenian Stranger’s decision to practice philosophy is a prudential decision that recognizes the inherent need in human nature which demands equality. As Aristotle, has diagnosed, the root cause of political revolutions is a mistaken notion of equality (or inequality); thus, the Nocturnal Council gathers together at night to practice philosophy to prevent the un-philosophical many from becoming envious of the philosophical few.[34]
It could seem that the Nocturnal Council could be nothing more than a safe-haven for the philosopher in the polis to practice a philosophy that is unconcerned about politics. This scenario seems unlikely due to the purpose of the Nocturnal Council (to safeguard the laws) and the requirement of ritual for old men, a prerequisite from which not even the philosopher can be exempted. Since the Nocturnal Council is composed both of young and elderly men to gather knowledge of the whole of reality which is accessible to philosophy, the particulars and the generals become known to the polis. Hence, philosophy is able to formulate laws and protect them since philosophers possess this philosophical knowledge of the whole. If the Nocturnal Council were an institution designated only for the practice of philosophy, then young men would not be required as members for their sharpest perceptions: the elderly philosopher could become enraptured in his thoughts about eternal things. The Athenian Stranger therefore requires the young in the Council to assist the elderly men in their search for knowledge because the young can see the particularities of reality better than the elderly; and the Athenian Stranger requires old men to partake in rituals to remind them of their civic obligation to the polis when they formulate general laws. The Nocturnal Council is the philosophical institution that seeks philosophical knowledge of the whole, both generalities and particularities, and to legislate laws as required by their obligation to the state.
The Reminder of Eros and Duty: Choral Rites and Holidays in the Polis
The purpose of the choral rituals that the Athenian Stranger outlines in Book Two is to habituate the people in moderation both in the body (dance) and in the soul (music) (673e3-8). Like the Puppet Myth, the nature of these choral rituals is to be playful, a civic reinforcement of the idea that man is merely a puppet of the god. By stressing play throughout the first two books, the Athenian Stranger would seem to be indicating that there is something about play that encourages man’s eros, the orientation of his soul towards something greater than his individual self. It would seem that play precludes any attempt to cultivate man’s thumos, the desire to make man and his reason the center of the cosmos; rather, play seems to cultivate man’s eros because man does not take himself seriously but as part of something else (i.e., the polis, the gods). The Athenian Stranger’s emphasis on play suggests, then, that logos by itself is not enough to access man’s eros. Although the study of the planetary motions of the cosmos (philosophy) invokes wonder in man (967b1-967d3), this sense of wonder can either be directed at oneself, as in the case of the atheist’s thumos, or be directed towards something outside of oneself, as in the case of the philosopher’s eros. The choral rituals required by both the young and old alike, therefore, not only accomplishes this feat of accessing man’s eros but directing it towards virtue instead of vice (653b2-653c5).
The citizens of the polis participate in these choral rites on holidays (“holy days”) in honor of the gods as authorized by the legislator (653c8-653d6).[35] Since the citizen’s education in virtue as corresponding with pleasure weakens over time, the legislator must continually reinforce this education through choral activity on holidays. This reinforcement would seem to apply to the philosophers, too, especially given the Athenian Stranger’s special arrangements to coax the elder citizens to partake in choral dances and songs (665d12-663c3). One would think that the elder citizens would not need to participate in choral ritual because the passions within them would have been more controllable as one ages (Republic 329a-e) and that some of the elders would be philosophers, as alluded to in the composition of the Nocturnal Council, and therefore they would be able to control their desires.
However, the Athenian Stranger’s ruse of drinking banquets to cajole the elder citizens to participate in choral rituals suggests that philosophy and age alone are not sufficient conditions to remain virtuous. And later, the Athenian Stranger refers to all human beings possessing a perpetual desire of motion within them that needs to be tamed and directed towards virtue, a need that would also include the philosophers (643d6-654a6; 653a6-653c5). If human nature seems to require more than philosophy to be virtuous, the participation in ritual would appear to fill this void for a proper human flourishing.
Since the philosopher is not able to escape the common urges of men–food, drink, and sex–these passions must be moderated in such a way to direct them towards virtue (782d11-783b2). The participation of ritual not only directs the citizen’s passions towards virtue but makes a connection between virtue and pleasure: the more a person acts virtuously, the more pleasure he or she feels. As the Athenian Stranger had argued earlier, the sensation of pleasure is malleable (653a6-653c5); therefore, the task of the legislator is to make a connection between pleasure and virtue so his citizens will want to act virtuously because it feels pleasurable. And though the philosophers may be at the pinnacle of the polis, they are still creatures of desires and these desires demand regulation and reinforcement. Thus, the philosopher’s education is not just the study of the cosmos and the gods but it is also the installation of moral habits through the practice of ritual.
Furthermore, the philosopher’s participation in ritual reinforces the idea that a citizen is dependent upon the gods for his or her polis’ fortune. The health of the polis, according to the Athenian Stranger, depends on the gods, not humans; consequently, the faith in human ability of reason to order the polis is discouraged since it is the gods who will set human things right in the polis. The celebrations of the holiday are nothing short than the city’s supplication to the gods, a supplication which requires not thumos but eros. Recognizing that he or she is merely part of a greater whole, the philosopher acknowledges the limitations of his or her reason to understand the whole of reality and his or her ability to order the polis towards virtue. This recognition of the limitations of reason, the ability to organize society on purely rational ground, is a lesson worthwhile for those liberals who accept the Kantian premise of human nature. It through his or her philosophy as circumscribed by his eros that the philosopher is able to participate in communion with the divine.
Finally, the practice of ritual compels the philosopher not only to acknowledge his or her dependence upon the gods but to the polis, too.[36] In their study of virtue and the proofs of the gods’ existence, the philosopher may become enraptured in his study of these immortal things and thereby neglect his or her duty to the polis. Of course, the purpose of the philosopher, as a member of the Nocturnal Council, is to safeguard the laws of the polis, not to carve out for him or herself a private place of apolitical rational bliss. The requirement of ritual therefore compels the philosopher to recognize his or her obligation to the polis, to remind him or him of his or her civic duty, and to reinforce the idea that he or she is merely part of a greater whole not only among divine things but among human things, too.
According to the Athenian Stranger, this habitual education takes place in the polis every day since there will be three hundred and sixty-five festivals (holiday) without interruption throughout the year (828a9-828b4). Each tribe will have its own festival, making a monthly sacrifice to the gods and holding a series of choral, musical, and gymnastic contests (828b9ff). The regulation of these contests and festivals is under the supervision of the education guardian who knows which athletics, songs, and other activities best correspond to virtue. Since pleasure seems to be malleable, it is able to attach itself either to virtue or vice, the regulation of the polis’ rituals and games is critical for the education of its citizens (653a6-653c5). Generally speaking, innovation in the polis’ education tends to lead to unlicensed freedom as in the case of Athens where everyone believes that they themselves are the best judge of everything, a state of thumos, instead of obeying those who possess superior judgement about education and virtue (700a3-701b3). Hence, the legislator should copy the Egyptian custom where the polis’ rituals and games were written down so the poets could not deviate from them and thereby cause disorder in the city 656d5-657a1).
Though the rigidity of the Athenian Stranger’s education system may not seem relevant or practical to a liberal society, the Athenian’s conception of ritual and holidays does offer a serious contribution to the intellectual debate between communitarians and liberals. As stated previously, unlike both liberals and communitarians, the Athenian Stranger assumes the regime exists for the sake of education; therefore, the state regulation of education is the fundamental issue for the polis. The mandatory practice of communal ritual is not seen as a threat against the defenseless individual because the Athenian equates rights with virtue: the purpose of the polis is to make citizens free (virtuous). Likewise, the practice of ritual is not for the sake of propping up the state, as the communitarians implicitly claim in their desire of a common civic culture; rather, the Athenian Stranger comprehends politics as the practice of education, not the other way around. It is unlikely, then, that the Athenian Strange could support liberal democracy in any form since the modern state does not exist for the sake of virtue but for life, liberty (thumos), and private property.[37]
Conclusion
Although the applicability of Plato’s inversion of virtue and liberty to western, liberal democracies may seem limited, if feasible at all, an investigation into political orders that are oriented towards a common good but are not by nature totalitarian can assist political theorists to evaluate our regime. The return to classical political philosophy and classical political thought is critical for communitarians to understand empirically what community meant in the West and how it functioned: the benefits reaped from a sense of community and the limitations imposed upon individual liberties. Though we should not forget the insights of the communitarians–it is not only the arrangements of institutions that will determine a regime’s success but also its culture–we should recognize the consequences of the political choices that communitarians then to obscure or wish to avoid (e.g., the cost of civil liberties).
Classical political philosophy, thus, helps clarify the communitarian’s critique of liberalism as well as provides an apparatus to critique communitarianism itself. By examining classical political philosophy and thought, like in Plato’s Laws, we can see a privileging of politics over education both by the liberals and the communitarians alike; consequently, both parties could benefit from a re-thinking of their paradigms of politics and education. A return to classical political philosophy can not only assist scholars in their re-conceptualization of these political ideas but can also suggest a third way, if one is possible, between rights and community.
Notes
[26] In fact, the metaphysical implications of the communitarian’s and the liberal’s common assumption of human nature could lead to a view of the cosmos that Kleinias had earlier suggested in Book One.
[27] Voegelin’s theory of differentiation of consciousness, again, is useful here to analyze how the discovery of reason requires rational instead of mythical clarification.
[28]Protagoras (318d; 319a); also refer to Werner, Paideia, 298-301.
[29]Theaeteus (152a); Cratylus (1926. 385e-386a).
[30] The question of the foundation of the polis; education (paideia) was the question during Socrates’ and Plato’s time: what type of education would lead to arête (human excellence in both mind and body as a unitary whole) since aristocratic training had become replaced with the sophistic endeavors in this new, democratic and commercial polis of Athens. Although the ideal of arête was still cherished among her citizens, Athens had not adjusted her educational system to the novel circumstances in which she found herself: Athens had become the preeminent trading center in Hellas, a capital of a great empire, and a democratic-bourgeoisie city-state. In short, the Athenian polis still relied upon the outmoded aristocratic system of paideia to educate its youth in service of the state, a pedagogical system that could no longer meet the demands of Athens as one of the leading poleis of Hellas. The problem of creating a new, deliberate education system for Athens, then, was not a problem for the state but a problem of the state (Werner, Paideia, 283-285; French, Alfred. The Growth of the Athenian Economy. London: Routledge & Paul Press, 1964).
However, the creation of a paideia aimed towards the aristocratic ideal of arête was hampered by the conditions within Athens herself: the polis’ accordance of full political rights to the citizens simply on the criteria of their status as free men, the insurance of payment for jury duty ad attendance to the assembly, and the filling of magistracies without respect to talent or virtue did not encourage the ethos of reverence, friendship, and shame of an earlier age. The unregulated life of Athens, a case of unmitigated freedom, soon dispensed the opinion that “everyone is wise in everything,” an opinion which could only lead to a state of shamelessness among the populace since nobody would be able to recognize or fear a superior’s “better opinion” about social, political, or cultural matters (Laws, 701a6-701b3). As Aristotle ascertained, this license to do “whatever one wants” ultimately is undesirable because “it is unable to guard against the paltriness that is in all human beings” (Politics, 1310a28-36). The political consequences of this unregulated life is the eventual repudiation of all parental, civil, and religious authority: the polis was now governed by the passions of the demos, resulting in such rash actions like the Sicilian expedition (Laws, 701b5-701c7). Athens eventually would fall into this state of shame by the time of the Peloponnesian War where piety towards the Homeric gods had lost much of its force, thereby opening the gap between the public and the private realm for the likes of the sophists and Socrates to fill (Rahe, Republics: Ancient and Modern, 194-195).
In spite of all these blemishes, democracy had proved to be the most advantageous to men like Socrates because it presented him the use of “free speech,” the opportunity to “organize his life privately in whatever way please him” and to examine the various types of citizens (e.g., democrats, tyrants, oligarchs) in a regime that permits undiscriminating taste (Republic. 557a-558a; 561a-d). In a state, which was portrayed by Socrates like the American Wild West, the democratic regime revealed the true nature of men’s souls as demonstrated by their various pursuits and discordant opinions; consequently, the democratic regime best enabled the philosopher to complete his task in his study of souls with their virtues, vices, and disposition (Crito. 51c-53a). But this study of manifold types of men’s souls did not affect the philosophers’ moral habituation and intellectual endeavors since democratic regimes provided an oasis to individuals who, in the words of the Athenian Stranger, are “alone without constraint are good by their nature (autophuos), by a divine dispensation (theia moira) are truly, and not at all artificially (outi plastos), good” (Laws, 642c9-462d4). The philosopher’s concerns as a citizen and as a philosopher per se would seem not, at times, one and the same: the conditions best suited for the philosopher might not be the best for the polis unless philosophers become kings or king’s philosophers (Republic, 473c-474a). This argument, as contended in this paper, is not entirely correct since political (ritual) duties required for the philosopher may actually benefit the philosopher qua philosopher. We must also keep in mind that this fabled prospect, philosophers as kings or kings as philosophers, is abandoned later by Plate when the Athenian Stranger condemns democracy. Since the democratic regime inevitably follows a course of atrophy in its reverence and fears towards its laws, thereby begetting excessive freedom and shamelessness, the polis would eventually collapse because the foundation of its friendship, i.e., its moral and cultural unity, will have been destroyed by the opinion “everyone is wise in everything” (Laws, 646e-649c; 698b-701e).
[31] Werner, Paideia, 305-328. Protagoras’ rejection of the ancestry causal theory of punishment in favor of the explanation of ignorance is a step forward in the rational endeavor to explain human actions and to establish a civic education on a rational foundation. However, Protagoras and the other sophists were never able to persuade the polis of Athens to institutionalize a civic for of education, much less able to systemize their own teachings in a coherent and complete pedagogical method. This gap between the sophists’ search for a rational foundation and the failure of the polis to implement that their ideas in its civic education can be accounted for by the practical orientation of the sophists’ pedagogical method: the absence of first principles (the theoretical science) in their teaching made it possible for someone like Callicles to despise knowledge for its own sake, thereby subordinating his sophistic techne to his political ambitions (Protagoras 324a-b).
[32] Since the proper ends of man cannot be known without an understanding of first principles, it is no wonder why an educated man like Callicles would mistake the good with the strong. Without a proper training to distinguish good and bad pleasures, i.e., between proper and improper ends, Callicles was not able to recognize that the theoretical science was the most important science of them all, i.e., knowledge for its own sake (Gorgias. 486d-522).
[33] Although Plato does not speak in his own voice in his dialogues, I contend that an understanding of the work as a whole speaks for him; consequently, I use the Athenian Stranger and Plato interchangeably. Also, refer to Klein, Jacob. A commentary on Plato’s Meno (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1965), 23-31; Strauss, The City and the Man, 50-60.
[34] Aristotle, Politics, Book V.
[35] The Athenian Stranger’s conception of ritual is compatible with modern understandings of ritual, though a person’s eros is not limited just to his community; rather, it can extend to the divine itself (something which modern scholars reject). Refer to Gluckman, Max. Essays on Ritual of Social Relations (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1965); Durkheim, Emile. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (New York: Free Press, 1995); and Kertzer, David. Ritual, Politics, and Power (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988). For a structural account of Greek rituals, refer to Burkert, Walter. Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979) and Vernant, Jean-Pierre. Myth and Society in Ancient Greece. Translator Janet Lloyd (New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1980)
[36]Crito 501-54c.
[37] Historically speaking, Athens was probably the closest realization of a polis that value civil liberties and maintained a sense of community. Although Athens in practice failed to completely subjugate the individual as part of the collective, she did create a paradoxical situation by granting liberties to citizens in certain spheres of their life while conserving rigidity in other areas to preserve a sense of community. On the one hand, citizens could make laws, examine the conduct of magistrates, and impeach and condemn generals to death while, on the other hand, citizens had to conform to the laws and customs of piety or face the consequences of ostracism. In this democracy of “excessive freedom,” the Athenian was free to engage in pursuits deemed by him as useful or profitable as long as he did not inspire public distrust since there were no effective institutional constraints to check the exercise of the popular will against the individual. In short, civic education was for the sake of the polis, not for the individual, though the individual did possess a certain amount of liberty in this regime if he were careful in his use of it (Rahe, Republics, 186-218).
This was originally published in VoegelinView on February 2, 2018.
Plato's use of education and ritual for the cultivation of virtue as the way to navigate between the Scylla of the freedom of the individual and the Charybdis of the common good is helpful as guidance to resolving the contemporary clash of neo-liberalism and communitarianism in democratic regimes. For, the law is made by human beings who must be trained in regulating their own freedom so that they can write regulations and rituals for the good of the greater wholes in which the exercise of those freedoms occur, such as family, city, state, world, and cosmos. The glaring problem still remains, however, that our educational systems have been corrupted by economic and cultural interests that serve individual freedoms ahead of communal solidarity.