As schools open again this month this review of the individual Reformer’s educational views and practices, done by Mrs. Pronk in study at the Reformed Bible College (Grand Rapids, Michigan), places our present Reformed educational efforts in historical perspective. Next month’s concluding part of the article highlights common basic principles in the Reformers’ views of education.
Although all aspects of society were affected by the Reformation, it probably is no overstatement to say that the greatest impact of the Reformation was upon education. The primary leaders of the Reformation, Martin Luther (1483–1546) and Philip Melanchthon (1497–1560) in Germany, Huldreich Zwingli (1484–1531) and John Calvin (1509–1564) in Switzerland, and John Knox (1505–1573) in Scotland, were all instrumental in bringing about educational reform. These reforms were characterized by principles which still have relevance and value for all who want to stand in their tradition today.
Martin Luther (1483–1546)
Of the Reformers, Luther wrote more on education than the others. His interest in education stemmed from the discovery of justification by faith alone. The church could not secure salvation of souls, but salvation was only through faith in God’s Word. From the doctrine of justification by faith alone, grew two other Reformation principles: the Bible as sole and ultimate authority in matters of faith, and the universal priesthood of believers.
No longer was education to be primarily for and by the clergy, as the Roman church practiced. Instead of blind obedience to the church, the individual was personally responsible to God. This emphasis made it imperative that everyone learn to read the Bible for him or herself.
According to Luther, the primary responsibility for education was with the parents, to whom God had given spiritual and secular authority over their children. “God gave you children so you would educate them to the best of their ability,”1 he stated. But parents alone could not perform this task adequately and clergymen were too busy with other matters. Luther therefore placed the responsibility for establishing and maintaining schools on the government—the princes and councils. Thus Luther was “the first educator in modern times to make the state aware of its great obligations to society.”2
Luther saw the need for universal, compulsory education. Not only because children should come to faith by reading the Bible, but also because church and state required trained personnel. In response to the radical wing of the Reformation, which stressed the importance of inner revelation and minimized education, Luther said that education was necessary to preserve civilization. Children must be educated to become pastors, theologians, lawyers, businessmen, and rulers.
The school must supply the church with persons who can be made apostles, evangelists, and prophets; that is preachers, pastors, and rulers, in addition to other people needed throughout the world, such as chancellors, councillors, secretaries, and the like men who can also lend a hand with the temporal government.3
Both boys and girls must be trained. “. . . To maintain its temporal estate, the world must have good skilled men and women . . . Therefore the thing to do is to teach and train our boys and girls in the proper manner.”4
Luther advocated a broad curriculum. In addition to the narrow curriculum of the late medieval school which concentrated on reading, writing, and religious study, he urged the teaching of the Bible, languages, grammar, rhetoric, logic, literature, poetry, history, music, mathematics, nature studies, and even gymnastics. Luther had a high appreciation for all branches of knowledge.
The fine liberal arts, invented and brought to light by learned and outstanding people-even though those people were heathen-are serviceable and useful to people for this life. Moreover, they are creations and noble, precious gifts of the Man (who is Lord over everything). He has used them and still uses them according to His good pleasure, for the praise, honor, and glory of His holy name. 5
Luther stressed the study of languages, especially Greek and Latin, because it is the means whereby the Gospel is spread. “Although the Gospel has come and daily comes through the Holy Spirit alone, we cannot deny that it has come by means of the languages, by which it was also spread abroad and by which it must be preserved.” 6 The purity of the Gospel is also maintained through the knowledge of languages. “How often does not St. Augustine err in the Psalter and in other expositions! Likewise St. Hilary, and indeed all of them who attempted to expound Scripture without [knowing] the languages.”7
History also was a subject Luther wished to have in the curriculum. He considered world history the story of divine providence and a practical guide for life for aiding the understanding of events of this world.
Yet, the Word of God must have supremacy in the curriculum. “Above all things, the principal and most general subject of study, both in the higher and the lower schools, should be the Holy Scriptures.”9 The liberal arts
“cannot give salvation . . . They can never thoroughly tell us what sin and righteousness are in the eyes of God, how we can get rid of sin, become pious and just before God, and pass from death to life. Wisdom divine and art supreme are required for this; and one does not find them in the books of any jurist or worldly-wise person, but in the Bible alone, which is the Holy Spirit’s Book.”10
Luther felt very strongly on this and stated that
where the Holy Scripture does not rule I certainly advise no one to send his child. Everyone not unceasingly occupied with the Word of God must become corrupt . . . I greatly fear that schools for higher learning are wide gates to hell if they do not diligently teach the Holy Scriptures and impress them on the young folk.11
Luther paid a lot of attention to methodology. He had a good understanding of the psychology of children and warned against excessive strictness and severity, and also against being overly permissive. He advocated a study-work plan, incorporating classroom instruction with on–the-job training. Luther wrote several catechisms, instructing in the elementary principles of the faith, which show his high regard for correct doctrine, but also his concern for the personal needs of the child. He also wrote hymns especially for children.12
Luther elevated teaching to a high calling-a divine service. Teaching “is the most useful, the greatest, and the best, next to the work of preaching,”18 he wrote.
Philip Melanchthon (1497–1560)
Melanchthon put Luther’s principles of education into practice and thus became known as the “Teacher of Germany.” Like Luther be encouraged the state to support schools. He helped plan and implement school plans for universities, advising town councils and princes.
Like Luther, Melanchthon supported a broad curriculum, including the liberal arts. Homer, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and Aesop’s fables were recommended for study. Not for their own sake, but for the service of the Gospel and education, he said. He warned that the liberal arts are to be maintained by God for the sake of the church, and not vice versa. 4 Like Luther, he held a high view of teaching languages. “Because theology is partly Hebrew, partly Greek (for we drink of their streams in Latin), the foreign languages are taught, not as dumb external things, when we guide theologians.”15 Clergy should study logic to help them formulate and teach correct doctrine. Melanchthon pioneered in writing a philosophical treatise of ethics.
Like Luther he stressed that all education must harmonize with the pure teaching of the church. In the reorganization of the University of Wittenberg he required all theological professors to teach in accordance with and to defend the three ecumenical creeds (the Apostles’, the Nicene, and the Athanasian) and the Augsburg Confession (1530).16 The educational task of the church is to be governed by the Scriptures. We need the “Word of God revealed by prophets and apostles,” he said. “For without the Word the human heart is full of blindness and falls miserably into the devil’s snare and error and sin.”17
Like Luther, Melanchthon was also concerned with methods. He seems to have been more occupied with a logical and systematic order, tending towards intellectualism and moralizing. For that reason his seven catechetical works for teaching children were not as well accepted as Luther’s.18
Huldreich Zwingli (1484–1531)
Although his life was short, the German-Swiss Reformer made some significant contributions to education. His own education was thoroughly humanistic* and influenced by Erasmus. This may explain his split with the radicals of the Reformation. Unlike the Anabaptists, who shunned society and secular government, Zwingli believed that God works within the socio-political realm.19
Characteristic of the reformation which took place in Zurich was that it primarily took place through the education of the common people. In order to achieve unanimity of faith, the Zurich Council authorized Zwingli to write a catechism in 1524. The Short Christian Instructor, was both a catechism and confession of faith, to be used by pastors for their own instruction and that of their parishioners. The Reformer wanted to educate the church leaders who in turn were to educate the masses. To this end Zwingli set up a theological institute called “Prophezei,” meaning to prophesy.
Zwingli’s educational efforts were mainly directed toward adults and older youth. He divided education into three parts, corresponding to basic human relationships. Most basic was the student’s relationship to God. Education has its limitations, Zwingli knew. “It is only where the Spirit of God works that one can be brought to God.”20 This knowledge is not to make man idle, but he must learn about himself and about Christ’s grace. Those who learn to know Christ by grace, must study “what services will be most pleasing to God.”21 The second part of education consists of the student’s relationship to knowledge. He must study the Scriptures and know Latin, Hebrew and Greek. He must be diligent in mastering all branches of knowledge, including physical exercises. The third part of the student’s education consists of his relationship to others. He must study to be strong; only the weak retreat from the world. The goal of education, according to Zwingli, is to teach a person to live as a Christian in obedience to Christ.
John Calvin (1509–1564)
Like Luther before him, Calvin was educated in one of the schools of Geert Groote. Educated in the humanities, Calvin studied law, the classics, and Hebrew. Unlike Luther and the other Reformers, Calvin never wrote treatises on education and his views must be gleaned from his writings. Yet, of them all, Calvin’s system of education spread through all the lands in which the principles of the Reformers found adherents, including the United States through the Puritans from England.
Like the other Reformers, Calvin wrote catechisms for instructing children in the principles of the Christian faith. The Catechism of the Church of Geneva, published in 1545, explains that “it has always been a practice and diligent care of the Church, that children be rightly brought up in Christian doctrine. To do this more conveniently, not only were schools formerly opened and individuals enjoined to teach their families properly, . . . but also it was accepted public custom and practice to examine children in Churches concerning the specific points which should be common and familiar to all Christians.”24 The church had a responsibility in the proper inculcation of Christian truths, according to Calvin. This view is also expounded in Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion, completed in 1536. This theological work has influenced Reformed thinking until the present time and also shaped views on education.
When Calvin began his ministry in Geneva, he was faced with a citizenry, largely ignorant of the basic rudiments of the Christian faith. There was a dearth of ministers versed in the truths of the Gospel. The means Calvin used to reform the city were preaching and teaching. The first school, established in 1536, was compulsory for all children, the poor paying no fees. In addition to reading, writing, arithmetic, grammar and religion, Calvin and his assistant, Farel, lectured daily on the Old and New Testament. The education was supplemented by three weekly church services.25
In 1557 Calvin established the Genevan Academy which became world-famous. The academy was divided into a Schola privata, for children to about sixteen years of age, and a Schola publica, the university. The latter offered only the arts and theology at first, and later included law and medicine. In the Schola privata, classes were graded and instruction was systematic and structured. The curriculum in the Schola publica was less structured. Calvin alternated with Beza in giving Biblical expositions as part of the course requirements. 26
The academy was controlled by the church and each teacher was under ecclesiastical discipline and had to subscribe to the Confessions of Faith. The teachers were appointed by the ministers and the teachers had to supervise the students’ beliefs and lives.
Like the other Reformers, Calvin held a high view of the humanities. They are among “God’s natural gifts.”27
Whenever we come upon these matters in secular writers, let that admirable light of truth shining in them teach us that the mind of man, though fallen and perverted from its wholeness, is nevertheless clothed and ornamented with God’s excellent gifts. 28
The liberal arts teach us God’s wisdom.
Those arts . . . that have nothing of superstition, but contain solid learning are founded on just principles, . . . no doubt . . . have come forth from the Holy Spirit; and the advantage which is derived and experienced from them, ought to be ascribed exclusively to God.29
Therefore, since
the Lord has willed that we be helped in physics, dialectic, mathematics, and other like disciplines, by the work and ministry of the ungodly, let us use this assistance.
But we should remember that
all this capacity to understand, with the understanding that follows upon it, is an unstable and transitory thing in God’s sight, when a solid foundation of truth does not underlie it. . . Since the free gifts were withdrawn from man after the Fall, so the natural ones remaining were corrupted. 3
Calvin believed that all branches of knowledge are useful for man to study, but true knowledge of God cannot be found in nature, the liberal arts, or science, but only in the Scriptures.
Although Calvin wrote very little about children, there can be no doubt about his interest in them. In the “Draft Ecclesiastical Ordinances” of 1541, Calvin shows his concern for children and frequently mentions their need for instruction. The responsibility for bringing them to church to have them catechized rests with the fathers and there is a penalty of a fine if they are negligent.31 Young men need to be prepared for a place in life through proper education. “It is necessary to raise offspring for time to come, in order not to leave the Church deserted to our children, a college should be instituted for instructing children to prepare them for the ministry as well as for civil government.”82
Education was to be reinforced by both church and state. Calvin ordered the elders
to discover experimentally whether the believer follows conscientously . . . the commandments of the Church, whether he attends preaching frequently, not merely on Sundays, whether he receives the sacraments regularly and reverently, teaches his children constantly as a Christian should do and sends them to school.33
John Knox (1505–1572)
The Scottish Reformer spent four years under Calvin’s instruction in Geneva. Here he became wellgrounded in the principles of the Genevan Reformation. Upon return to Scotland in 1559 Knox put the principles he learned into practice.
Like Calvin, Knox believed all truth came from God, Who reveals Himself through His Word. The aims of education, as Knox saw them, were to enable the people to read and discover God’s Word, train youth in virtue and godliness, and prepare them for a useful vocation in the church or state. The goal should be to glorify God.
Education is first of all the responsibility of the parents, but Knox helped parents in their task. His most important contribution to education was a scheme for national education which provided for the poor and searched out the talented. Through the Scottish-Presbyterians his influence was felt in England and especially in America.
The system of education consisted of a graduated system of elementary schools, secondary schools (colleges) and universities. The elementary schools were established and conducted by the church which appointed schoolmasters and paid them. Attendance was compulsory for boys and girls both, rich and poor, for at least four years.
The Bible was the main subject on all levels. Additional subjects were grammar, Latin, and the Catechism. At the college level, Latin, Greek, logic, rhetoric and the arts were taught. Dialectics, mathematics and physics were taught later. As the student passed he could enter other colleges and study philosophy, law, Greek, Hebrew, and divinity.
The parents’ commitment to educating their children begins at baptism. Daily devotions are to be held and children are to be instructed in the Bible and memorize portions of Scripture. They are to be taught the church’s doctrines, the Ten Commandments and the Psalms.
The Book of Discipline, authored by Knox and five others, prescribed the organization of the schools. Great emphasis was placed on the qualifications of the staff, especially in regard to their religious and moral character.
1. Quoted by Harold J. Grimm, A History of Religiom Educato-rs. Elmer L . Towns Ed., (Grand Rapids, Michigan, Baker Book House, 1975), p. 107
2. Harold J. Grimm, Ibid., p. 108.
3. Quoted by R. Hanko, Perspectives in Covenant Education, Fall 1979, No.1, Vol. 5, “Luther’s View on Education,” p. 47.
4. Harold J. Grimm, Ibid., p. 110.
5. Ewald M. Plass, Compiler, What Luther Says, (Saint Louis, Missouri: Concordia Publishing House), p. 450.
6. Harold J . Grimm, Ibid., p. 113.
7. Ibid., p. 114.
8. Ibid.
9. Ewald M. Plass, Ibid., p. 449.
10. Ibid.
11. Ibid.
12. Ibid., p. 155–57.
13. Harold J . Grimm, Ibid., p . 118.
14. Carl S. Meyer, A History of Religious Educators, p. 154.
15. Ibid., p. 146.
16. Ibid., pp. 153–4.
17. Ibid., p. 151.
18. Ibid., p. 157.
19. Wayne Pipkin, A History of Religiom Educators, pp. 124–5.
*The principles and culture of Renaissance scholars who studied the literature, ideas. etc. of ancient Rome and Greece.
20. Wayne Pipkin, Ibid., p. 127.
21. Ibid., p. 128.
22. Ibid., p. 130.
23. Ibid., p. 131.
24. Calvin: Theological Treatises, The Rev. J.K.S . Reid, Trans!., (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1954), p. 88.
25. Elmer L. Towns, A History of Religious Educators, pp. 168–9.
26. It is primarily from these lectures that Calvin’s Commentaries have come.
27. Calvin: Institutes of the Christian Religion, Ed. John T. McNeill, (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1960, Vol. I, Book 11, 11,14, p. 273.
28. Ibid., n, n, 15, p. 273.
29. Elmer L. Towns, Ibid., p. 172.
30. Calvin: Institutes, II, II, 16, p. 275.
31. Calvin: Theological Treatises, p. 78; cf. pp. 62, 63, 69.
32. Ibid., p. 63.
33. Elmer L. Towns, Ibid., p. 174.