Philosophy of the Christian Curriculum
Digital Logos Edition
Overview
In this text, Rushdoony—a major advocate of Christian homeschooling—discusses Christian curriculum. He works from the principle that curriculum cannot be neutral—suggesting that it is either a course in humanism or training in a God-centered faith and life. The liberal arts curriculum means literally that course which trains students in the arts of freedom. This raises the key question: is freedom in and of man or Christ? The Christian art of freedom, what Rushdoony terms the Christian liberal arts curriculum, is not the same as the humanistic one. He designs this text to help Christian educators rethink the meaning and nature of their curriculum.
For the entire set, see R.J. Rushdoony Culture and Ethics Collection (7 vols.).
- Provides a foundation for homeschooling
- Maintains that a curriculum is not neutral
- Forces educators to rethink their curriculum and ultimate aims
Top Highlights
“The function of education is thus to school persons in the ultimate values of a culture. This is inescapably a religious task. Education has always been a religious function of society and closely linked to its religion. When a state takes over the responsibilities for education from the church or from Christian parents, the state has not thereby disowned all religions but simply disestablished Christianity in favor of its own statist religion, usually a form of humanism.” (Page 3)
“A state curriculum to be true to itself must teach statism. A Christian curriculum to be true to itself must be in every respect Christian.” (Page 12)
“wherever education becomes humanistic, it will produce both statism and anarchistic individualism” (Page 8)
“Psychology has, in the modern curriculum, taken the place of theology as the guide to life” (Page 11)
“For humanism, man is his own law and his own law-maker, so that social approval is the best test of law” (Pages 7–8)
Rousas John Rushdoony (1916–2001) was the author of more than 30 books. He earned his BA and MA from the University of California, Berkeley, and received his theological training at the Pacific School of Religion. An ordained minister, he worked as a missionary among Paiute and Shoshone Indians and as a pastor to two California churches. In 1965, he founded the Chalcedon Foundation, a Christian Reconstructionist organization.