Education as the Art of Making Oneself at Home in the World with and Through Others”

The Call to Bildung in Meister Eckhart and the Film Of Gods and Men

Bibliographic Data

ID10800197
AuthorsKatja Frimberger (0000-0002-2542-4040, University of Strathclyde, corresponding author)
Year2024
Volume43
Issue5
Pages515-535
Publication date2024-10-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueStudies in Philosophy and Education (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0039-3746 • E-ISSN: 1573-191X
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s11217-024-09947-2
OpenAlexW4400050426
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited12

This paper explores the mystical structure of education as Bildung in medieval theologian and Dominican friar Meister Eckhart’s work and the 2010 French film Of Gods and Men (Des Hommes et Des Dieux) . I start this paper with a short introductory sketch of the Bildung tradition, in order to situate my discussion of Eckhart within the more well-known humanist tradition. Here, I claim that Bildung (as we understand it today through the classic Bildung philosophers) points back to its theological heritage and horizon of meaning, when it is claimed as the general tekhnê (art, craft) of making oneself at home in the world with and through others. In my first step, I then explore the intellectual heritage of this mystical structure of Bildung . Drawing on a range of Meister Eckhart’s writings (esp. his German sermons), I elaborate three features pivotal to his concept of Bildung (as image-ing) of the imago Dei (image of God) in the human soul/action: (1) divine grace, (2) human cultivation and (3) the harmonisation of both in (what I shall call) ‘careful gestures'. In my concluding second step, I illustrate this mystical structure of Eckhartian Bildung —with a particular focus on the emergence of careful gestures—through the motion picture Des Hommes et Des Dieux

Aesthetics · Art · Bildung · Humanities · Educational Philosophies and Pedagogies · Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy · Philosophy · Philosophy, Ethics, and Existentialism · Psychology

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