Your Son Wants to do What?!
I am the very proud father of the other half of this blog (the less active contributing part who I hope will be contributing much more). Jeremy recently updated the readers of this blog with the news of his graduation from Florida State University (Summa Cum Laude with honors, by the way) with a major in philosophy and a minor in music. He will soon be moving to the left coast to attend graduate school at the University of California Berkeley. Being the proud father that I am, I often tell friends, Christian and non-Christian, that He will be studying to obtain a PhD in philosophy. One might think, from the reactions I receive, that he was studying to be a serial-killer or something!
Philosophy!?!? What is he thinking? And why are you so proud of that as a father? Poor philosophers are always misunderstood. A secular co-worker’s incredulity was derived from purely economic considerations. From his standpoint, it is a waste of an awful lot of money to study philosophy with the hope of very little financial remuneration in the long term. I guess the Almighty Dollar is the ultimate measure by which we judge the worthiness of any endeavor. It seems obvious to me that there are other worthwhile pursuits in life than to be independently wealthy.
From Christians, I often receive looks of consternation and concern. “Oh my! You’re letting him study what?!” Philosophy, in the opinion of most average church-goers, is placed right up there with other sins like adultery and gluttony. Why would a Christian want to do philosophy? Well… that is a very good question and one I intend to attempt to answer over the next couple of posts. Not only would Christians want to study philosophy, but I believe they should study philosophy!
I set up my next post with a few scriptural insights:
Colossians 2:8 (NIV) “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.â€
Colossians 1:20 (NIV) “Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?â€
Matthew 22:37 (ESV) And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”
I Peter 3:15 (ESV) “But in your hearts regard Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.”