Dr. Crain's Classical Comments
Why do our students read non-Christian literature?
Posted by Administrator (admin) on Jul 09 2007 at 8:55 AM
Introduction
In the course of their studies here, especially in the upper grades, our students read non-Christian literature. It is literature that may be technically excellent but lacks a Christian worldview. For instance, in Ancient Literature, a 9th grade class, our students read Homer’s Odyssey. Homer was a great poet but he was a great pagan poet. So, why do our students read “bad” literature?
How a Christian School should relate to the world
To answer this question we have to step back and ask a more fundamental question: How should the Christian school relate to the world? Basically there are three options:
Option 1: Christian schools should try as much as they are able to insulate their students from the corrosive effects of the world.
Option 2: Christian schools should try as much as they are able to help students become like the world.
Option 3: Christian schools should try as much as they are able to equip students to engage the world without students becoming like the world.
We can eliminate option 2 because it is clearly not biblical. In 1 John 2:5, the Lord says, “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” We certainly do not want our students to love the world in any way.
Option 1 is certainly attractive and in some respects is our ideal. At Covenant Christian School we teach everything from a Christian worldview. We provide a God-honoring environment where teachers love Christ and want to show forth His love. We have chapel where God’s Word is plainly taught. We follow a Biblical model of discipline. We do all these things because we believe that this is what God calls us to do and so, in that respect, we insulate our students from the corrosive effects of a world where subjects are taught according to false philosophies, where teachers who do not know God offer an untrue interpretation of the world, where God’s Word is maligned and thought of as just an example of ancient literature, and where students are allowed to act without consequence.
But if option 1 means that our students never read non-Christian literature then it is not the mindset of Covenant Christian School. Instead, Covenant Christian School believes option 3 is what God is calling this school to do: Christian schools should try as much as they are able to equip students to engage the world without students becoming like the world. Why does Covenant Christian School believe this to be our calling before God?
Five reasons to read non-Christian literature
I’d like to present five reasons why our students read non-Christian literature:
Reason 1: Great works of literature should be read simply because they are great works of literature. But what is a great work of literature? Francis Schaeffer, a profound Christian thinker, set forth four standards of judgment for artistic excellence: 1. Technical excellence, 2. Validity, 3. Worldview, and 4. Medium and Message.
Technical excellence refers to the skill a literary artist has. Does the artist use all of the various tricks and tools of the writing trade to craft a coherent, compelling, and creative work? Non-Christians may write a story or essay that is technically excellent or well-argued and since all human beings are made in the image of God Christians should appreciate finely crafted literary productions.
By validity Schaffer means “whether an artist is honest to himself and to his worldview or whether he makes his art only for money or for the sake of being accepted.” Great literature embodies the worldview of the author and when it does so authentically it is better art than when it doesn’t.
But a work of art should also be judged on its worldview. Is the worldview true or not? While a great work of art may do very well on the other three criteria it could fail on this one because it is not a Christian work of art. This criterion alone does not a bad piece of literature make. Mark Twain was not a Christian—and it shows in his works—but Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer are nonetheless two classic American novels.
The last criterion, medium and message, judges a work on whether the medium is suited to the message. If you want to write a love song you would not set the lyrics to the music of a funeral dirge. If you want to write a lab report so that someone else can reproduce your chemistry lab results, you wouldn’t write a poem. Some mediums are better than others for conveying a message. Although I wish I could give my wife hunting gear on Valentine’s Day, I’m sure that she would appreciate roses and chocolate so much more.
The works that we read at Covenant Christian School meet at least three of the four criteria above. Some of the works may have a false worldview. Others may come from an author whose overall worldview is false but who, nonetheless, makes many valid points in the work our students read. We try to make sure that all the works that our students read meet criteria 1, 2, and 4 and when criterion 3 is not met (i.e., the worldview is false) we engage the false worldview from a Christian point of view to sharpen our students’ critical thinking skills and to teach them the Word of God more.
Reason 2: Great works of literature help students understand history and make them historically literate. The non-Christian works we read have been studied for many generations. Many of them are representative works for a particular time period, giving a taste of what an epoch was like. When our students read these works they are entering into what some people call the “great conversation.” The founding fathers of America were well-read in the Greek and Roman classics and expanded the conversation in particular on what makes for a just government. Their understanding of what makes for a just government was informed by classical conceptions of law.
Reason 3: Great works of literature engage the mind. They force us to ask questions, to learn, to grow. At Covenant Christian School we want students to grapple with three questions: What is true? What is good? What is beautiful? Great literary works enable students to do this. They help students develop critical thinking skills. Students learn better vocabulary. As Samuel Clemens (a.k.a. Mark Twain) said, “The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.” Great literary works also force students to compare differing worldviews, especially the Biblical worldview with the worldview of whatever is being read.
Reason 4: Because all truth is God’s truth students should read great the great books. In many “bad” books we find “good” insights. Since all truth ultimately comes from God we should seek for it wherever we can find it. Non-Christians may have a sliver of the truth; they may even have more than that. God’s image in humankind, though broken, still sometimes shines through as non-Christians discover scientific truths, or express lyrically universal concepts such as love for neighbor, or theorize about what makes for just government. Thomas Jefferson was not a Christian but he knew a thing or two about what makes a good government and he contributed to the founding of our nation (see “The Declaration of Independence”).
Reason 5: The Biblical example of engaging the world. When we examine the Bible we find that many godly people engaged the world rather than hiding from the world. They did not pretend they were on a desert island, insulated from all influences. They knew their world and sought to tear down the idols of their world. They knew that if you don’t critique your culture from an informed standpoint your culture will control you.
Moses was reared in the royal household and given a thoroughly Egyptian education. His literary education helped him write the Pentateuch (i.e., the first five books of the Bible). Daniel was trained in the best Babylonian schools and used his education to become, in effect, prime minister to the king.
But the two best examples are Christ and the Apostle Paul.
From Christ we learn what I’m going to call the “Incarnational Principle.” The Incarnation is the doctrine that the Son, the second person of the Trinity, took on flesh and became a human being (John 1:1). In short, God became a man. In becoming not only like us but one of us—sin excepting—Christ showed that he was willing to enter into our world and to engage us where we are. He did not lob theological truth bombs at us from heaven up above. He entered into the pain and suffering of this world and he showed a willingness to talk with people in ways that were relevant to them. For instance, when Christ met the woman at the well in John 4 he showed knowledge of her Samaritan tradition, which was theologically false. When he debated the Pharisees he did so with an understanding of their traditions and commandments (Matthew 23:1-36).
And so, we should imitate Christ. We should “incarnate” ourselves into the world in which we live and we should prepare students to engage the world even as Christ became man to engage the world.
The Apostle Paul also engaged the world. First Corinthians 9:19-23 expresses Paul’s general principles of relating to people: “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.”
In order to relate to people Paul had to understand them and to do that he became like them. How? Certainly not by engaging in their sins. To reach the drunkard you don’t have to become drunk! It would be useful, though, to know why people fall into drunkenness, how that addiction affects people, and why the particular person you are reaching out to succumbed to that sin.
In Acts 17 we have a specific occasion of Paul engaging the world in which he lived. In that passage Paul speaks to some Athenian philosophers in the Aeroapagus. These were the intellectuals of his day—highly educated men who were also skeptical of the Jewish faith, and by implication, Christian faith. To reach these men Paul builds a conceptual bridge to them. In Acts 17:28 he quotes two of their famous poets Epimenides, “In him we live and move and have our being,” and Aratus, “For we are indeed his offspring.” By quoting these poets Paul shows that he has knowledge of Greek culture. He has read some of their poets. He uses his knowledge of Greek culture to build a bridge to share the gospel.
And so, following Paul’s example, we should read literature that helps students engage culture. Sometimes such literature will be non-Christian.
Both Paul and Jesus approached people where they were. They sought to understand people and their beliefs so that they could speak the right word in the right way. People know we love them when we take time to understand them. By reading the classic books, some of which are non-Christian, our students show that they are attempting to understand what has been important in our culture and what for many continues to be important.
Some objections to reading non-Christian literature
Some Christians, however, argue against reading non-Christian literature.
They believe that non-Christian literature can tempt our children. Since non-Christian literature comes from a non-Christian source it may tempt students in a number of ways. Bad ideas could lead students to ponder and meditate on impure things. Reading Karl Marx’s The Communist Manifesto could lead a student to become a communist. Plus, doesn’t the Bible command us to think about “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable” (Philippians 4:8)? Doesn’t that verse forbid studying untrue, dishonorable, impure, unlovely things?
There is certainly a logical possibility that non-Christian literature could tempt students. But students do no live in a vacuum. There is a logical possibility that student drivers will get in car wrecks. Do we forbid driving?
Is quarantining students from all “bad” literature the right answer? Bad ideas exist in culture—on TV, in movies, in newspapers, and in people they meet and will meet. Insulating students from bad ideas will not solve anything because students will eventually encounter them anyway. Why not be prepared?
Thus, better than quarantining is inoculation. When doctors inoculate they inject a patient with a weakened virus that causes the patient’s body to develop antibodies against the virus. If the patient contacts the virus in life it has the necessary antibodies to fight it off.
We believe that preparation for facing the ideas of culture is better than isolation from those ideas. Our teachers, all committed Christians, inoculate by giving students a “weakened virus.” Students read non-Christian literature in a safe environment. The non-Christian work is compared to the Word of God. Hence, students learn more about the Bible and how its truth is better than the false claims of other worldviews. This inoculation prepares students for facing the viruses of the world, which in a secular college classroom, can be very powerful indeed.
If students merely focused on the untrue work then they would be guilty of breaking Paul’s charge in Philippians 4:8. By comparing untrue works to the Bible, however, students are led to think more about the truth. Paul’s command does not mean that we can never think about bad things. Otherwise a Christian could not serve jury duty on a murder trial or be a detective investigating a grisly crime. Life forces us to think about bad things sometimes. Or, put more forcefully, sometimes it is our duty before God to think about “bad” things. Paul’s point, in context, is to stop fighting (4:2) and to stop worrying (4:6). We are tempted to meditate on people’s supposed sins and real sins against us or about the problems in our life. In effect, Paul says, “Stop your imaginary fighting, fixation on old wounds and your incessant worrying—think about what is good.”
Conclusion
If we want to prepare students to face the realities of the world, if we are to equip them to know history, if we desire to pass on the cultural legacy of Western civilization, if we hope to inculcate a love for truth, goodness, and beauty, if we wish to teach them the supremacy of the Word of God against all other belief systems, then we must teach them using a variety of literature: Well-read, spiritually mature, world-transforming adults is our goal—and that means our students must read Christian and non-Christian literature.
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