Exploration of the interface between mystical theology and continental philosophy is a defining f... more Exploration of the interface between mystical theology and continental philosophy is a defining feature of the current intellectual and even devotional climate. But to what extent and in what depth are these disciplines actually speaking to one another; or even speaking about the same phenomena? This book draws together original contributions by leading and emerging international scholars, delineating emerging debates in this growing and dynamic field of research, and spanning mystical and philosophical traditions from the ancient, to the medieval, modern, and contemporary. At the heart of which lies Meister Eckhart, perhaps the single most influential Christian mystic for modern times. The book is organised around significant historical and contemporary figures who speak across the intersections of philosophy and theology, offering new insights into key interlocutors such as Pseudo-Dionysius, Augustine, Isaac Luria, Eckhart, Hegel, Heidegger, Marion, Kierkegaard, Deleuze, Laruelle, and Žižek. Designed both to contribute to current trends in mystical theology and philosophy, and elicit dialogue and debate from further afield, this book speaks within an emerging space exploring the retrieval of the mystical within a post-secular context.
From Ricoeur to Action engages with the thinking of the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur (1913-200... more From Ricoeur to Action engages with the thinking of the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur (1913-2005) in order to propose innovative responses to 21st-century problems actively contributing to global conflict. Ricoeur's ability to draw from a diverse field of philosophers and theologians and to provide mediation to seemingly irreconcilable views often has both explicit and implicit practical application to socio-political questions. Here an international team of leading Ricoeur scholars develop critical yet productive responses through the development of Ricoeur's thought with respect to such topics as race, environmental ethics, technology, political utopia and reinterpreting religion. Representing a new generation of Ricoeur scholarship that attempts to move beyond an exegetical engagement with his philosophy, this collection of original essays examines key problems in the 21st-century and the ways in which Ricoeur's philosophy understands the subtleties of these problem...
Brill Research Perspectives in Religion and Education, 2019
This publication makes the case for ‘religion and education’ as a distinct, but cross-disciplinar... more This publication makes the case for ‘religion and education’ as a distinct, but cross-disciplinary, field of inquiry. To begin with, consideration is given to the changing dynamic between ‘religion and education’ historically, and the differing understandings of religious education within it. Next, ‘religion and education’ is examined from methodologically specific perspectives, namely the philosophical, historical and sociological. The authors outline the particular insights to be gleaned about ‘religion and education’ on the basis of their commitment to these methodological standpoints. Overall, this publication is concerned with demonstrating the scope of the field, and the importance of having a range of disciplinary, and interdisciplinary, perspectives informing it.
culminates in the suggestion that educational theory is too often presented with a false dilemma:... more culminates in the suggestion that educational theory is too often presented with a false dilemma: either accept the need for a contrived educational experience disconnected from the experiences and concerns of life, or react against this flattened educational aspiration by seeking something authentic and progressive that meaninglessly conflates education and life. Understanding the proper place of reduction in education, Lewin concludes, is vital in mediating this dichotomy.
Resonances between Heidegger's philosophy and Eastern religious traditions have been widely discu... more Resonances between Heidegger's philosophy and Eastern religious traditions have been widely discussed by scholars. The significance of Heidegger's thinking for education has also become increasingly clear over recent years. In this article I argue that an important aspect of Heidegger's work whose relevance to education is relatively undeveloped, relates to his desire to overcome Western metaphysics, a project which invites an exploration of his connections with Eastern thought. I argue that Heidegger's desire to deconstruct the West implies the deconstruction of conventional views of learning because both aim to undercut the representational nature of thinking in order to recover thinking as a form of contemplation. Consequently education should not be conceived as the acquisition of a more or less correct mental picture, but suggests the opposite: the relinquishing of all images in a contemplative aporia.
This chapter provides readers with an understanding of some basic principles of selected Eastern ... more This chapter provides readers with an understanding of some basic principles of selected Eastern traditions and their relation to philosophy of education. The attempt to characterize such diverse traditions and understandings of education raises numerous hermeneutical issues which can only be addressed through a pedagogical reduction as a vehicle for understanding. In this case, we have employed Plato’s cave allegory as that methodological and pedagogical vehicle. We explore aspects of the ontology, epistemology, and ethics of Buddhist, Hindu (focused on classical yoga), Daoist, and Confucian traditions, interpreting elements from Plato’s allegory in order to throw light onto the educational ideas and implications of those Eastern traditions. The chapter begins with an account of Plato’s cave and its general themes that are relevant to interpreting educational theories. We then move into an examination of the particular ideas and practices that reveal pedagogical concerns within the...
This paper provides a review of Reconstructing 'Education' through Mindful Attention: Positioning... more This paper provides a review of Reconstructing 'Education' through Mindful Attention: Positioning the Mind at the Center of Curriculum and Pedagogy by Oren Ergas. The review examines the central argument of the book, namely that present educational theory and practice avoids substantial self-inquiry, paying lip service to reflective practice but stopping short of any real encounter with the complex dynamics of the self. In Ergas' bold inquiry, we are invited to attend and to see for ourselves by considering perspectives and practices rooted in contemplative traditions. The educational context becomes clear as attention to the self entails formation of the self. However, I argue that it is not clear why contemplative traditions (or mindful attention defined by the text) are best placed to engage in such formation. I suggest that a central problem with the book is the conflation here of education and socialisation, and that more systematic treatment of educational questions might obviate some of the troubling issues around the failures of what is called the inner curriculum.
Mystical Theology and Continental Philosophy, 2017
Attention is a mysterious faculty. It seems to knit together experiences, attitudes, histories, s... more Attention is a mysterious faculty. It seems to knit together experiences, attitudes, histories, skills, dispositions, intuitions and manifold other aspects of lived experience such that discussions of it cut across a range of domains, from, for example, cognitive neuroscience and educational theory to ancient philosophies of Vedanta and Buddhism. Taking its cue from the title of the volume, this chapter examines attention by drawing together strands from mystical theology, particularly Meister Eckhart, and continental philosophy, that of Martin Heidegger. The argument will explore some difficulties of conceiving attention as a faculty of human agency. While these considerations will be, I hope, of general philosophical interest, I will apply them to concrete contexts of educational theory and practice. Educational contexts illustrate well the ways in which attention is both conceived and misconceived, as well as providing a strong practical motivation for needing to consider the extent to which attention can be managed and controlled, and the anthropological suppositions present in such considerations. The argument relies upon mystical theology insofar as it draws on negative strategies for undoing some of the conventional ways of framing attention. This is the kind of theological framing that the post-metaphysical Heidegger might wish to develop. I begin with 1 This chapter is based on my article 'Behold: Silence and Attention in Education' Journal of Philosophy of Education, 48:3, 2014, and I am grateful to John Wiley and Sons for permission to reproduce parts of that article. The argument is similar in places, though in this chapter the emphasis on Heidegger and Eckhart is drawn out and developed in greater detail, and the context in educational philosophy is less developed.
Philosophy of Education and Educational Philosophy and Theory. His book, Towards a Political Theo... more Philosophy of Education and Educational Philosophy and Theory. His book, Towards a Political Theory of the University: democracy, public reason, and higher education is published by Routledge.
This article examines the relevance of modern moral philosophy to education, with particular refe... more This article examines the relevance of modern moral philosophy to education, with particular reference to special educational needs. Where moral philosophers explore the tension between utilitarian and deontological reasoning, they often consider the balance between the rights of the individual and the benefits or costs for the majority. I argue that the debate is predicated on a false dichotomy between minority and majority which is best overcome by a return to virtue ethics. In exploring this ethical debate I draw on a case study from Australia of a student excluded from mainstream education on the basis that inclusion will not serve the greater good of the majority of students. My intention here is not to offer practical guidance in the complex day-today deliberations of educators dealing with issues of inclusion, but to elaborate the structure of the present thinking about inclusion. It is hoped that an appreciation of the deeper basis of ethical reasoning will itself lead to a greater recognition of the need for exploring the ethical grounds of teaching and learning. I will argue that any dichotomy between the utilitarian happiness of the many and the deontological commitment to the rights of the individual is based on a misconception of human identity. The false choice between the many and the one rests upon the assumption that morality is fundamentally about restricting personal preferences for that good of the majority, that there exists a fundamental conflict between what is good for the individual and what is good for society as a whole. This will lead me to argue that we need to reinterpret human identity as constituted by its social relations and that this reorientation is best achieved by reference to virtue ethics.
Is physical presence an essential aspect of a rich educational experience? Can forms of virtual e... more Is physical presence an essential aspect of a rich educational experience? Can forms of virtual encounter achieve engaged and sustained education? Technophiles and technophobes might agree that authentic personal engagement is educationally normative. They are more likely to disagree on how authentic engagement is best achieved. This article argues that educational thinking around digital pedagogy unhelpfully reinforces this polarising debate by failing to recognise that digitalisation is, as Stiegler has argued, pharmacological: both a poison and a cure. I suggest that Biesta's critique of learnification can be applied to online learning, but that any such application does not sufficiently acknowledge the pharmacological nature of modern technology. While Stiegler has something important to contribute on the relation between technology, attention and education, I suggest his account is rather too bound up with critical theories of technology. In the end I turn to philosophers of religion, such as Eliade and Smith to suggest different ways of conceiving the role of attention in education that does set technologies up over/ against the formation of attention essential to education.
This special issue draws attention to an emerging field of study, combining the philosophy of tec... more This special issue draws attention to an emerging field of study, combining the philosophy of technology and information theory, with critical pedagogy and educational philosophy. It builds upon a conference sponsored by the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain: Humanising Online Pedagogy hosted by Liverpool Hope University (Liverpool, UK) in May 2014. The conference brought together educational practitioners and philosophers to explore the pedagogical, epistemic, social, and philosophical implications of technological change for educators. Papers included perspectives from adult education, learning disabilities, information theory, and global perspectives on the ethics of technology. As well as including versions of some papers presented here, the special issue also includes invited contributions from authors across the philosophy of educational technology debate. This issue also features an interview with Bernard Stiegler, a leading figure in contemporary philosophy of technology, whose recent work locates him directly among debates within educational theory and practice. The debates developed in this issue demonstrate the ongoing significance of philosophy and educational theory to practical, even apparently 'technical' issues, calling to mind long-standing concerns raised by figures such as Jacques Ellul, Martin Heidegger, Herbert Marcuse and other so-called 'classical philosophers of technology' (Achterhuis 2001), that questions of technique are seldom only technical, but bear upon wider practical, philosophical, ethical and spiritual matters.
Exploration of the interface between mystical theology and continental philosophy is a defining f... more Exploration of the interface between mystical theology and continental philosophy is a defining feature of the current intellectual and even devotional climate. But to what extent and in what depth are these disciplines actually speaking to one another; or even speaking about the same phenomena? This book draws together original contributions by leading and emerging international scholars, delineating emerging debates in this growing and dynamic field of research, and spanning mystical and philosophical traditions from the ancient, to the medieval, modern, and contemporary. At the heart of which lies Meister Eckhart, perhaps the single most influential Christian mystic for modern times. The book is organised around significant historical and contemporary figures who speak across the intersections of philosophy and theology, offering new insights into key interlocutors such as Pseudo-Dionysius, Augustine, Isaac Luria, Eckhart, Hegel, Heidegger, Marion, Kierkegaard, Deleuze, Laruelle, and Žižek. Designed both to contribute to current trends in mystical theology and philosophy, and elicit dialogue and debate from further afield, this book speaks within an emerging space exploring the retrieval of the mystical within a post-secular context.
From Ricoeur to Action engages with the thinking of the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur (1913-200... more From Ricoeur to Action engages with the thinking of the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur (1913-2005) in order to propose innovative responses to 21st-century problems actively contributing to global conflict. Ricoeur's ability to draw from a diverse field of philosophers and theologians and to provide mediation to seemingly irreconcilable views often has both explicit and implicit practical application to socio-political questions. Here an international team of leading Ricoeur scholars develop critical yet productive responses through the development of Ricoeur's thought with respect to such topics as race, environmental ethics, technology, political utopia and reinterpreting religion. Representing a new generation of Ricoeur scholarship that attempts to move beyond an exegetical engagement with his philosophy, this collection of original essays examines key problems in the 21st-century and the ways in which Ricoeur's philosophy understands the subtleties of these problem...
Brill Research Perspectives in Religion and Education, 2019
This publication makes the case for ‘religion and education’ as a distinct, but cross-disciplinar... more This publication makes the case for ‘religion and education’ as a distinct, but cross-disciplinary, field of inquiry. To begin with, consideration is given to the changing dynamic between ‘religion and education’ historically, and the differing understandings of religious education within it. Next, ‘religion and education’ is examined from methodologically specific perspectives, namely the philosophical, historical and sociological. The authors outline the particular insights to be gleaned about ‘religion and education’ on the basis of their commitment to these methodological standpoints. Overall, this publication is concerned with demonstrating the scope of the field, and the importance of having a range of disciplinary, and interdisciplinary, perspectives informing it.
culminates in the suggestion that educational theory is too often presented with a false dilemma:... more culminates in the suggestion that educational theory is too often presented with a false dilemma: either accept the need for a contrived educational experience disconnected from the experiences and concerns of life, or react against this flattened educational aspiration by seeking something authentic and progressive that meaninglessly conflates education and life. Understanding the proper place of reduction in education, Lewin concludes, is vital in mediating this dichotomy.
Resonances between Heidegger's philosophy and Eastern religious traditions have been widely discu... more Resonances between Heidegger's philosophy and Eastern religious traditions have been widely discussed by scholars. The significance of Heidegger's thinking for education has also become increasingly clear over recent years. In this article I argue that an important aspect of Heidegger's work whose relevance to education is relatively undeveloped, relates to his desire to overcome Western metaphysics, a project which invites an exploration of his connections with Eastern thought. I argue that Heidegger's desire to deconstruct the West implies the deconstruction of conventional views of learning because both aim to undercut the representational nature of thinking in order to recover thinking as a form of contemplation. Consequently education should not be conceived as the acquisition of a more or less correct mental picture, but suggests the opposite: the relinquishing of all images in a contemplative aporia.
This chapter provides readers with an understanding of some basic principles of selected Eastern ... more This chapter provides readers with an understanding of some basic principles of selected Eastern traditions and their relation to philosophy of education. The attempt to characterize such diverse traditions and understandings of education raises numerous hermeneutical issues which can only be addressed through a pedagogical reduction as a vehicle for understanding. In this case, we have employed Plato’s cave allegory as that methodological and pedagogical vehicle. We explore aspects of the ontology, epistemology, and ethics of Buddhist, Hindu (focused on classical yoga), Daoist, and Confucian traditions, interpreting elements from Plato’s allegory in order to throw light onto the educational ideas and implications of those Eastern traditions. The chapter begins with an account of Plato’s cave and its general themes that are relevant to interpreting educational theories. We then move into an examination of the particular ideas and practices that reveal pedagogical concerns within the...
This paper provides a review of Reconstructing 'Education' through Mindful Attention: Positioning... more This paper provides a review of Reconstructing 'Education' through Mindful Attention: Positioning the Mind at the Center of Curriculum and Pedagogy by Oren Ergas. The review examines the central argument of the book, namely that present educational theory and practice avoids substantial self-inquiry, paying lip service to reflective practice but stopping short of any real encounter with the complex dynamics of the self. In Ergas' bold inquiry, we are invited to attend and to see for ourselves by considering perspectives and practices rooted in contemplative traditions. The educational context becomes clear as attention to the self entails formation of the self. However, I argue that it is not clear why contemplative traditions (or mindful attention defined by the text) are best placed to engage in such formation. I suggest that a central problem with the book is the conflation here of education and socialisation, and that more systematic treatment of educational questions might obviate some of the troubling issues around the failures of what is called the inner curriculum.
Mystical Theology and Continental Philosophy, 2017
Attention is a mysterious faculty. It seems to knit together experiences, attitudes, histories, s... more Attention is a mysterious faculty. It seems to knit together experiences, attitudes, histories, skills, dispositions, intuitions and manifold other aspects of lived experience such that discussions of it cut across a range of domains, from, for example, cognitive neuroscience and educational theory to ancient philosophies of Vedanta and Buddhism. Taking its cue from the title of the volume, this chapter examines attention by drawing together strands from mystical theology, particularly Meister Eckhart, and continental philosophy, that of Martin Heidegger. The argument will explore some difficulties of conceiving attention as a faculty of human agency. While these considerations will be, I hope, of general philosophical interest, I will apply them to concrete contexts of educational theory and practice. Educational contexts illustrate well the ways in which attention is both conceived and misconceived, as well as providing a strong practical motivation for needing to consider the extent to which attention can be managed and controlled, and the anthropological suppositions present in such considerations. The argument relies upon mystical theology insofar as it draws on negative strategies for undoing some of the conventional ways of framing attention. This is the kind of theological framing that the post-metaphysical Heidegger might wish to develop. I begin with 1 This chapter is based on my article 'Behold: Silence and Attention in Education' Journal of Philosophy of Education, 48:3, 2014, and I am grateful to John Wiley and Sons for permission to reproduce parts of that article. The argument is similar in places, though in this chapter the emphasis on Heidegger and Eckhart is drawn out and developed in greater detail, and the context in educational philosophy is less developed.
Philosophy of Education and Educational Philosophy and Theory. His book, Towards a Political Theo... more Philosophy of Education and Educational Philosophy and Theory. His book, Towards a Political Theory of the University: democracy, public reason, and higher education is published by Routledge.
This article examines the relevance of modern moral philosophy to education, with particular refe... more This article examines the relevance of modern moral philosophy to education, with particular reference to special educational needs. Where moral philosophers explore the tension between utilitarian and deontological reasoning, they often consider the balance between the rights of the individual and the benefits or costs for the majority. I argue that the debate is predicated on a false dichotomy between minority and majority which is best overcome by a return to virtue ethics. In exploring this ethical debate I draw on a case study from Australia of a student excluded from mainstream education on the basis that inclusion will not serve the greater good of the majority of students. My intention here is not to offer practical guidance in the complex day-today deliberations of educators dealing with issues of inclusion, but to elaborate the structure of the present thinking about inclusion. It is hoped that an appreciation of the deeper basis of ethical reasoning will itself lead to a greater recognition of the need for exploring the ethical grounds of teaching and learning. I will argue that any dichotomy between the utilitarian happiness of the many and the deontological commitment to the rights of the individual is based on a misconception of human identity. The false choice between the many and the one rests upon the assumption that morality is fundamentally about restricting personal preferences for that good of the majority, that there exists a fundamental conflict between what is good for the individual and what is good for society as a whole. This will lead me to argue that we need to reinterpret human identity as constituted by its social relations and that this reorientation is best achieved by reference to virtue ethics.
Is physical presence an essential aspect of a rich educational experience? Can forms of virtual e... more Is physical presence an essential aspect of a rich educational experience? Can forms of virtual encounter achieve engaged and sustained education? Technophiles and technophobes might agree that authentic personal engagement is educationally normative. They are more likely to disagree on how authentic engagement is best achieved. This article argues that educational thinking around digital pedagogy unhelpfully reinforces this polarising debate by failing to recognise that digitalisation is, as Stiegler has argued, pharmacological: both a poison and a cure. I suggest that Biesta's critique of learnification can be applied to online learning, but that any such application does not sufficiently acknowledge the pharmacological nature of modern technology. While Stiegler has something important to contribute on the relation between technology, attention and education, I suggest his account is rather too bound up with critical theories of technology. In the end I turn to philosophers of religion, such as Eliade and Smith to suggest different ways of conceiving the role of attention in education that does set technologies up over/ against the formation of attention essential to education.
This special issue draws attention to an emerging field of study, combining the philosophy of tec... more This special issue draws attention to an emerging field of study, combining the philosophy of technology and information theory, with critical pedagogy and educational philosophy. It builds upon a conference sponsored by the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain: Humanising Online Pedagogy hosted by Liverpool Hope University (Liverpool, UK) in May 2014. The conference brought together educational practitioners and philosophers to explore the pedagogical, epistemic, social, and philosophical implications of technological change for educators. Papers included perspectives from adult education, learning disabilities, information theory, and global perspectives on the ethics of technology. As well as including versions of some papers presented here, the special issue also includes invited contributions from authors across the philosophy of educational technology debate. This issue also features an interview with Bernard Stiegler, a leading figure in contemporary philosophy of technology, whose recent work locates him directly among debates within educational theory and practice. The debates developed in this issue demonstrate the ongoing significance of philosophy and educational theory to practical, even apparently 'technical' issues, calling to mind long-standing concerns raised by figures such as Jacques Ellul, Martin Heidegger, Herbert Marcuse and other so-called 'classical philosophers of technology' (Achterhuis 2001), that questions of technique are seldom only technical, but bear upon wider practical, philosophical, ethical and spiritual matters.
The recurring narrative of the relinquishment of human will animates the spiritual discourses of ... more The recurring narrative of the relinquishment of human will animates the spiritual discourses of almost every mystical tradition. But contemporary discussions of spirituality gravitate towards exasperation when acknowledging the radical impotence of human agents, while much modern philosophy has found itself unable to think beyond the aporia of freedom and determinism. The ability to mediate between total subjective autonomy and radical dissolution in God is vital if we are to avoid the dualism that Meister Eckhart subverts with his conception of detachment (gelassenheit). Heidegger takes up the terminology of Eckhart here, but provides a more philosophically astute sense of releasement. This article argues that both Heidegger and Eckhart draw upon the middle voice, an ancient linguistic mode that places agency between activity and passivity. By uncovering traces of the middle voice, I propose that philosophy and theology bear with a grammatical cleavage that constitutes our experience of the world.
... a possible explanation for the soulless, aimless pragmatism of much of contemporary life and ... more ... a possible explanation for the soulless, aimless pragmatism of much of contemporary life and for the rise to power of Anthony Charles Linton Blair. ... Paul's vision of the Church as the Body of Christ; on the other hand, the fact that Heidegger never repudiated his membership of ...
... very attempt to demarcate a domain within philosophy as if we could be lovers of only ... T... more ... very attempt to demarcate a domain within philosophy as if we could be lovers of only ... The givenness of those projects and talents provides the structuring capacity for freedom, not the ... The illuminating work of Jean-Luc Marion on the phenomenology of givenness is instructive. ...
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Books by David Lewin
Papers by David Lewin