Page 113 - ThePhoenix1984-85

An Interview with ing experience apart from something like compassion or by Peter Brooks love. I think loving people make a whole lot of other things possible, and when "Until I have learned to students are loved I think listen, I have no business some significant learning can teaching. Until I realize thai take clace. every person has something of truth and wisdom to offer, I Now, I don't want to be do not begin to learn. It is caught here in an either/or only when I see how much Situation but I think it's unfor- my colleagues surpass me tunate that we have broken thai I begin to be wise," disciplines up into 'hard' dis- Dr. Ira Gilbert Zepp be- ciplines and 'soft' disciplines. lieves this is what teaching Or disciplines having to do should be about. Zepp, a with the head, and disciplines having to do with the heart or professor of Religious Studies, has been teaching the body, or disciplines that are objective or disciplines for 22 years, and has won the "Teacher of the Year" award that are more introspective. twice during his career., . Because life is both of those and it's the matter of the balance that I am concerned Brooks : As a teacher of with. comparative religion, do you My definition of a liberal arts find thai a lot of students get person or a humanist is a 'blown away' by taking a compassionate intellectual. So critical look at their religion that the intellectual act takes and being exposed to others? place in the context of com- Zepp: I don't know, but I passion, concern,' and love. find that I like to do it. I really That we take some cogni- can't speak for students, but I On content, coherence, zance of the world around us. think the importance of com- I don't think that we can dis- associate the head from the sometimes say in class: The criticism and compassion heart. I think that the whole parative studies for students is immense, because as I person sits in class, and the whole person is standing up more I get to know you the ~~:~~. t~~ngd i\Ob~~~c:ret~~: more of myself I see in you, lepp: Yes, I would think with other disciplines, and and therefore the"less strange that the hallmark of a liberal you are to me. So the more arts education would be the ~i~~ ~~~~~o~~~~ caon~~~e~ . there then the twentieth cen- we get to know another cul- capacity for critical thinking practice. It's not just simply tury has really produced more ture, the more of ourselves we 'I'm not sure we To be able to, as Ernest the object defined or ab- efficient competent tech~o- may see in them, and they stracted from life _ that we cmrartswho have very little become less alien to us, less do as good a job as Hemingway said, "have a can have education ab- j a al competence. So .we good crap detector." And I'm strange. By the same token stracted from life, ! find if not ha~e Star Wars bel~g not sure we do as good a job the more I get to know you, we shOUld...l think as we should I think we impossible, then completely pr~Jected, we have Auschwitz the more of you I find in we could do a lot could do a lot better job at irrelevant. :Ri~i~nfa:ngi~:~r~e~n~ ~~~ myself, and so I become a this place than we are doing. little bit strange to myself, I'm better job at this I have this simple thing tors, and we have the whole opening up other possibilities about education that involves genetic mutant business for myself by finding you in place than we are these four C's: Content, Coh- I going on. So I really think that me. doing.' erence, Criticism and Com- independent of compassion Brooks: Why are you passion. Content would be 'The primary goal of the heart and sensitivity interested in religious studies? acquaintance with the intellec- of this place is to toward human hurt, that edu- cation is operating in a vac- Zepp: Because I'm inter- tual legacy of the past, pri- uum someplace. ested in people. People do marily western, but also think, to inquire, to Brooks : Is th~t how you religious things, they symbol- Brooks : In your classes places of some other cultures. raise questions, and can justify our having to pay ize their life and they ritualize, you question many things There is a certain universal close to $10,000 to go here and they mythicize, and they about Christianity and God. discourse that we ought to be to think second next year? add in an experience with the How do you justify teaching acquainted with. From Socra- holy. And I'm really interested the flaws that lie within the tes to the present, and throw thoughts.' Zepp: I think that if one in that kind of thing. Christian religion even though in Japan, India, Africa, etc can begin the journey and a have a sense of what Brooks: In light of the it may turn some people Coherence education ought fact that you are Christian, against it? to be seen as a whole, it compassionate intellectual is, would you consider yourself a lepp: Well, I think that the ought to be holistic. That is, then it is priceless. But those two words are so very impor- "traditionally religious" per- primary vocation at this insti- education is seen as "gar- The thing about criticism, 1 tant. son? tution is to think. The primary ment" although it may be a think, is really important, per- Brooks : What is the Zepp: Well, that always vocation of the Church is not garment of many colors. And haps the most important tool depends on how you look at to think, I mean it may think, I'm really concerned about a student can develop at a most enjoyable thing about being a teacher? it. I would consider myself but it's not the primary voca- this departmentalizing that place like this, is to ask some pretty straightforward, but tion. The primary vocation of goes on here. In the word questions. I mean really ask lepp: Stimulation of the other people may not. By the family is not to think, and department is "depart," and about everything, because human mind. Students can be "traditionally religious" you although they can think, they we are always departing from nothing is sacred. Including very stimulating if they are probably mean people who have other primary goals that each other - like usually you religious traditions or organi- given permission to be that, think of religion in terms of must be fulfilled. The primary leave Gandhi and Tagore and zations on this campus, and they can be very provoc- God, Church and Bible goal of this place is to think, you go to English or 'I'm there's nothing taboo in a ative. that's a very reductionist and to inquire, to raise questions, leaving English and I'm going place like this, in terms of "A teacher cannot truly simplistic definition of religion. and to think second thoughts. to Biology.' So that we end up intellectual inquiry. You pay teach unless he himself is A much more expansive defi- Brooks: Most students like a French Graduate etc- money to come here because . also learning. A lamp cannot nition would include all the say that on your tests they are dent who said he knew every- the place thinks. . light another lamp unless it symbols, myths, rituals that rewarded for showing clear thing, but that was all. He had The final thing is this ccm- itself is lit ..." This quote, by go to make up our identity, critical concise thought as no capacity to integrate his passion business and that's Rabrindrinath Tagore, is in- which may include the Church opposed to mastery of the learning of life and himeslf. the humane environment. I deed a fitting summary of and God. but it may include a material. Is that one of your We must see education as don't think that you could Zepp's educational perspec- lot of other things too. .goals? linked, connected and unified have a very satisfactory learn- tive.