Book Club: Ideas Have Consequences{Chapter 4}

The Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes by Kenneth Taylor

When I was a child, I remember poring over Kenneth Taylor’s Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes. The fine art was enchanting, and it really did inspire a sense of awe and reverence. To be honest, I do not remember reading the words. I remember looking through the pictures as lovingly as any connoisseur in an art gallery.

The Gospel Story Bible by Marty Machowski

Today, my children are exposed to Bibles that are filled with modern and post-modern art. Some of the pictures actually look to me like things my oldest child could easily make himself, if he wanted to. Marty Machowski’s Gospel Story Bible is definitely the worst offender on my bookshelves. More than once, my children have even looked at the pictures and asked, “What is that supposed to be?”

Now, I’m not using this as an argument against using said Bible. I don’t remember the content from Kenneth Taylor’s Bible book, but I know that my husband is quite pleased with the content in The Gospel Story Bible. But I think we’re all familiar with the fact that Christian publishers tend to follow the world into decline in almost every sense of the phrase, and this is one way that happens.

Weaver makes a few comments about Impressionism and its descendants that are worth noting.

The movement of Impressionism, which is the revolutionary event of modern painting, has been attributed to a variety of causes. Clive Bell is inclined to see it simply as a rediscovery of paganism. This meant the acceptance of life as good and satisfying in itself, with a consequent resolution to revel in the here and now. The world of pure sensation thus became the world of art.

And later:

The broad character of the movements we have been following represents a psychic urge to collapse all order, a technical effort to get something without tolerating a medium, which is but another exhibition of the passion for immediacy.

Honestly, I think my example above of modern art in a child’s story Bible is showing the end result of this process. I don’t think the artist for the latter Bible was making any sort of statement about art. Like a lot of things, when art stopped seeing and expressing timeless truths, it devolved into silliness and commercialism. I do think it is valid to hold up the latter Bible as a sign of the decline of our culture, and naturally it shows the decline of art. But more than that it shows a decline of the respect we once had for children. The most obvious difference is that Kenneth Taylor reveals a belief that children are human and have souls, that even at the youngest ages they can contemplate and appreciate truth and beauty. Marty Machowski’s Bible {and I highly doubt he had control over the art, by the way} reveals a belief that children are silly and sensual and that, in order to reach them, we must cater to their base affections.

A “passion for immediacy” indeed.

Let’s guess which children’s Bible Charlotte Mason would have chosen, shall we?

Knowledge and Power

As you know, I’ve been trying to focus on the implications of Weaver’s thoughts when it comes to teaching and learning. Weaver doesn’t use the word hubris in this chapter, but with the word egotism all over the place, I’m surprised.

We need to remember what Weaver already told us. To the ancients {pre-Bacon, really}, learning–the acquisition of knowledge–improved the soul and prepared it for the afterlife. It made good citizens, who would lead or serve sacrificially. It gave the student the knowledge of ideals, to which he attempt to live up. And so on.