What's the Point of Education? | Nancy Hill & Rakesh Khurana at Harvard

Speakers:
Nancy Hill - Charles Bigelow Professor of Education at Harvard Graduate School of Education
Rakesh Khurana - Dean of Harvard College, Professor of Sociology at Harvard University

Moderator:
Sergio Imparato - Lecturer on Government at Harvard University

Want Veritas updates in your inbox? Subscribe to our twice-monthly newsletter here:

[danielhoffheimer]

To prepare for a life of value. To create interests for lifelong endeavors. Such as love for art, history, classical music.

[robmarshall]

A lot of it can be about vanity. The command to parents is to nurture their children in the Lord (Ephesians 6:4), and the Greek word paideia, translated “nurture” in the KJV, carries with it the idea of training, education, instruction and discipline.

Solomon tells us that the basis of all true knowledge is the fear of the Lord (Proverbs 1:7). When we acquire spiritual knowledge and apply it to our lives, we serve the Lord in spirit and truth (Romans 6:11-13). Theology has been called “the queen of the sciences” because our knowledge of God informs every other area of erudition. The fact is knowledge, apart from the love of God, leads to pride (1 Corinthians 8:1).

Paul was a highly educated man, having been trained in the best Jewish school of his day (Acts 22:3), and he used his education to communicate effectively to people of many cultures (Acts 17:28; Titus 1:12). Yet Paul’s education certainly did not make him holy (1 Timothy 1:16), and he warned of those who were “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (2 Timothy 3:7). Simply knowing facts does not make one a better person, and it is indeed possible to be a highly educated fool.

College can’t transform you, God can though.