Poetic Knowledge Book Club: Chapter 2, part 2 The Philosophical Foundations
For information and previous posts, see the page for this Poetic Knowledge Book Club
This week we are covering pages 28-57 and next week we will read part 1 of Chapter 3: Connatural, Intentional, and Intuitive Knowledge (pages 59-75).
I still have a few pages to go to finish this chapter myself.
Chapter 2, part 2: The Philosophical Foundations of Poetic Knowledge
Poetic Knowledge was further developed by Augustine, Benedict, and Aquinas.
Poetic Knowledge is
- aesthetic knowledge
- enjoying something for its own sake
- sensory-emotional
- delightful contemplation
- a way, a path, of knowing
- a way through leisure and reflection
- God-granted & initiated enlightenment
- in the immediate, “present”
- wise passiveness
- revelation given to a patient, silent, receptive listener
- a disposition
- perceiving metaphysical essence
- admiration, enthusiasm, devotion, love
- simplicity
- seeing the beauty and splendor in the ordinary
- integrated sensibilities (the senses, emotions, will, and intellect)
- play
Your Thoughts
Discussion Question
What is the correct response to ourselves or our children when we do not enjoy a subject or a thing?
What? Last week it took me all week to getting around to posting and linking, and this week I’m first? On Tuesday? How did this happen?
I’ll be back later to read everyone else’s thoughts on this incredibly meaty (and rather difficult) section.
I thought it was a chapter a week, so I sent my post to draft (is for chapter three), and I will join the conversation and maybe write something about the second part of chapter two.
Mine is a beginning post. I was trying to work on it more, but I’m just running out of time. Things have been hectic here for the last couple days. I keep meaning to email you a reply and I just haven’t…I’m sorry!
In response to your question, when I personally do not enjoy a subject, I assume I am the one who is wrong. I firmly agree with Mason that we were created to have our “feet set in a large room” but I think my education predisposed me to be myopic in my affections, and I consider this a weakness. What I have learned is that if I can find a well-written book on whatever it is, it usually serves to cultivate some initial affections for it.
I’m seeing it pays back to wait for Brandy, ha ha ha. Yes, I thought about…… CHARLOTTE MASON!!!!!! and what she said about not depriving children of a wide curriculum, and that has always been my whole struggle with the idea of child delighted or directed, because children can get obsessive with something, which it is fine if they pursue that which captivates them in their plenty free time, but I am with her in that they need to be expose to a rich and orderly curriculum.
As for when I do not like something, I press the reset button and “attack it again”, and it has done wonders. But as Karen kept me thinking, it may be the case that we cannot have “poetic” or passionate knowledge about everything. But I’m going to contest the modern idea of everything as a quantity idea versus the holistic approach to life that Karen so beautifully talks about in her post. We can know about EVERYTHING. That doesn’t mean to be an EXPERT on every isolated subject, it means to have this unity with live and knowledge that even the common man has, as Taylor says in that part of this chapter when he says the layman knows, the philosopher gets deep in this, but it is not above the “ordinary man”.
This is sort of my thought in the first post for the book club. Moms everywhere, common people, may very well have this intuitive idea of how to raise and educate, and what to do, and they are truly the bastions of culture and knowledge much more than PHD people out there.
Precisely homeschooling offers you a WONDER-full experience to educate yourself, to know and LOVE, and be passionate about *THE SKY IS THE LIMIT. I would have never, ever thought I would nurse my children, had a baby without drugs… I would have never dreamed about reading books on math, or at 40, trying to solve the Rubik cube that I could never do when I was in elementary school when I got the stickers out and replace them in the right place in a desperate attempt that only made me feel like the worst cheater.
Now I’m seriously thinking about playing an instrument. I need to do some soul search, I have a weakness for the piano, but the fiddle is very tempting… we’ll see!
It depends on the subject but if it is a non-negotiable like math or Latin we keep going. If it turns really grim I take a week off and usually we are ready to tackle it again. I will drop a hated literature selection but only after two or three chapters. Some books we thought we didn’t like at first grew on us after awhile like Robinson Crusoe.
Wow, everyone is on the ball this week — except me! :)
Hah. And me. I want to write at length about the estimative sense but I won’t have time today, so instead I’ve linked to a random thing I found on Monday while trying to understand what he meant by “irascible.”
Hopefully I can manage a real post before the weekend.
Give it another chance or two, especially if it is valuable and good. Maybe prayerfully try another approach.
Realistically, no one is going to be equally enchanted with every area of knowledge. We all have our interests. I’m with Charlotte (as usual) in thinking that childhood is the time to be introduced to as many things as possible. School time is non-negotiable, but it’s short enough that there is plenty of time for everyone to pursue their own interests during the rest of the day. Very rarely have I completely dropped a topic or book because the child/ren didn’t like it. The more you know about something, the more likely you are to develop an interest in it, and if the relationship developed is grudging respect instead of enthusiastic passion, so be it. (That’s kind of how I feel about the theory of relativity–I have tried to comprehend it, and it is beyond me, but I admire those whose minds work that way.)
Mystie, you also did some changes to the blog. I like your navigation bar at the top, and your comments have the reply button. I used disqus for a while to have this ability, since my blog is a blogger blog, but it was not very “intuitive”, ha ha ha, or that’s what my friends told me, so I’m back to same old blogger. I wonder when they will improve the comment section of the blogs.
Sylvia, yes, this was the theme I wanted originally when I changed, but it didn’t work. It just had an update and now it works! :) I like having the pages all at the top rather than in the sidebar, but I didn’t realize the comment set-up was different as well. :)
I DO like the reply function in the comments. Very nice. Like Silvia, I wish Blogger offered that.
Okay, I just finished my second post. I am possibly insane, but now I am ready to read everyone else’s…Of course, I have to make dinner now so I won’t actually be doing that right away. :(
“What is the correct response to ourselves or our children when we do not enjoy a subject or a thing?”
My response is “it will be short” — honestly, I love Charlotte Mason’s idea of short lessons and have applied it to all areas of my life, even housework and obligatory phone calls. It is the advice they give to people with attention disorders, as well — break it up into manageable pieces, so it’s not overwhelming.
I also like Charlotte Mason’s sympathy for the child who feels tedium or boredom — I can’t remember now where she talked about it. She believed in extending their attention for things that weren’t immediately accessible and agreeable — but with a certain amount of sympathy.
I finally made my contribution. :)