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In recent years, with the attention of educational historians to the study of the history of Western educational thought, the characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought have become the center of people's attention.
In the research, some summarized the ancient Greek educational thought as "humanistic", some as "speculative", and some as "philosophical".
All these have provided favorable conditions for further understanding the connotation of ancient Greek educational thought.
However, in the author's opinion, these studies have not yet placed them in the political, economic, and cultural development of Greece at that time for dynamic analysis, nor have they linked them to the development of human society and culture for historical investigation.
Therefore, it is difficult to explain why the pursuit of rational educational thought has always been an important tradition in the history of Western education.
Why is it important to pay attention to the development of Western educational thought, why is it important to pay attention to the development of individual development, and why has the issue of attaching importance to the development of the individual become the core content of the value orientation of Western education, and so on.
Obviously, the emergence of these phenomena is related to the development of Western society, economy and culture, but it is also the inevitable result of the development of educational thought in ancient Greece.
The main characteristic of ancient Greek educational thought is its rational characteristic, which not only laid the foundation of Western educational thought, constituted the main line of the development of Western educational thought, but also had an important influence on Western educational thought.
This paper will focus on the rational characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought, so as to have a preliminary understanding of this problem, so as to promote the progress of Western educational thought.
In the history of human development, in the process of transition from a primitive society to a slave society, the Greek nation relied on its own unique conditions to construct a unique cultural and educational model, which formed the basis of the rational characteristics of its educational thoughts.
So, what are the factors that contributed to the formation of the rational characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought, and how did these factors interact with each other and affect education? In this regard, we will systematically investigate and analyze from the following four aspects.
First, through constant migration, conquest and colonization, the Greek nation not only gained space conducive to its own survival, but also laid the foundation for the formation of the rational element of the national character.
The Greeks were originally nomadic people along the Black Sea coast and began to migrate south around the 17th century BC.
In the process of hundreds of years of southward migration and conquest, the Greeks gradually conquered the vast areas along the Aegean Sea, which not only opened up the channel for Greece to connect with the world, but also made the Greeks a rare "commercial nation" in the ancient world.
Later, Greece began to colonize outwards (mainly in the East and West). During the two- or three-hundred-year colonial campaign, Greek colonialism spread over a vast area from the coast of Asia Minor to the surrounding Mediterranean Sea and the islands, establishing many new colonial city-states.
Obviously, the protracted colonial movement was obviously predatory and aggressive, but it played a huge role in the casting of the Greek national character and promoted the formation of the rational component of the Greek national character.
This is because this colonial movement is national, and it involves not only the industrial and commercial slave owners, but also the vast number of civilians and even slaves who have lost their land and property.
In order for these people to form a large-scale colonial movement, it is necessary to give them democratic, free and independent thinking, and to encourage and promote a courageous and adventurous spirit.
This kind of Greek spirit, which began with the southward migration of the Greek nation and was strengthened and developed in the colonial movement, laid the foundation for the Greeks to advocate freedom, pursue rationality, and give full play to creativity, and promoted the great development of the Greek economy.
Second, the economic development of the Greek city-states destroyed the clan aristocracy and accelerated the process of national evolution.
It has enabled Greece to embark on the path of developing democratic politics and provided a more relaxed environment for the rational development of individuals.
Like other ancient civilizations, Greece also experienced a period of clan aristocracy, but the existence of clan aristocracy in ancient Greece was only a relatively short transitional period.
The constant movement of the Greek population loosened the kinship relations within the clans, and the continuous development of the Greek economy allowed property relations to replace the original clan ties.
In the 6th century BC, Athens in Greece underwent political reforms that finally destroyed the clan aristocracy and established a city-state democracy.
The main characteristics of the democracy of the ancient Greek city-state were that it no longer divided its citizens according to blood relations but according to geographical relations and property relations; each citizen in the city-state enjoyed certain rights, and the citizens were independent and equal to each other.
In this way, the role of the region, the role of the individual, and the role of property become prominent.
The struggle for living space, and in the process of survival, giving full play to individual initiative and creativity became the main characteristics of the Greek way of life.
Third, the establishment of the democratic system of the Greek city-states not only promoted economic development, but also ensured the realization of individual interests and provided the conditions for the formation of individual "independent personality".
The city-state democracy in Greece was formed in the course of the development of the Greek economy, and at the same time, it was also premised on the recognition and protection of the interests of the individual.
At the end of the 6th century B.C., Solon's political reforms defined the status of private property for the first time. The citizens of the city-state divided and defined political hierarchies and rights according to property, not according to blood or origin.
This allows private property to be openly and clearly recognized by law. From then on, the Greeks turned the pursuit of personal wealth into an open, legitimate enterprise.
Fourth, the rapid development of Greek politics and economy and the mutual promotion of each other have not only produced social and ideological separation and conflicts, but also produced a new and rational way of thinking in the process of resolving these conflicts.
The politics and economy of Greece were differentiated from the primitive politics and economy of the clan society, and they also developed with the negation of the old by the new.
This attitude of seeking innovation and change formed with the continuous development of society enabled the Greeks to explore nature, treat themselves, and transform society in a free and rational way of thinking.
The formation of the rational characteristics of Greek educational thought is closely related to the political and economic development of Greek society, and it is also a product of the special conditions of the development of the Greek nation.
This free, rational thinking of the Greeks was based on the fact that the law protected the minority (the slave-owning class) and excluded the majority (the slave class).
However, we must also realize that it was precisely under these special conditions and under the guidance of rational concepts that the Greeks broke through all kinds of limitations in human development, faced reality, studied contradictions, and explored various ways to solve problems, thus creating a brilliant and splendid Greek civilization in the early stage of human society.
When we examine the causes of the rational characteristics of Greek educational thought from the perspective of the interaction and change of Greek social, political and economic thoughts, we can see that rational life has become an important way of life for Greeks.
Therefore, we can also conclude that the rational characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought are actually the result of the Greeks' research on educational issues and rational thinking in their educational practice activities.
Of course, Greek educational thought is still in the early stage of the development of Western educational thought, and educators' thinking on educational issues is mainly carried out in the categories of philosophy, political science and ethics.
However, it is precisely this characteristic that provides a solid foundation for the development of Greek educational thought, and makes Greek educational thought broad, profound, and thoughtful.
In the West, the development of Greek philosophy underwent a change of "nature first, then person". In this process, the Greek philosophers first sought and determined the foundation of all things in the natural world, and then sought the essence and principle of human existence in social life.
This change shows that the Greeks began to think rationally about the important role of man in social life.
The transformation of Greek philosophy from "nature" to "person" began strictly speaking with Socrates. According to Hegel, Socrates "added ethics to philosophy" and shifted philosophy from the past to "nature" to "man."
The central proposition of Socratic ethical thought is that "virtue is knowledge." This proposition emphasizes that virtue is not merely the act of good, but has a universal rational basis.
In terms of education, Su believes that it is precisely because knowledge is a rational and universal truth that the imparting of rational knowledge should become the highest goal of education and teaching.
Plato inherited the ideas of Socrates and further pushed reason to the supremacy of the supersensual. He believes that everything in the real world that is individual and perceptible is not true.
Only ideas have truth, and ideas are the essence of things. He also argues that in the world of ideas, the highest idea is the idea of the "good," which "gives truth to the object of knowledge."
Therefore, the pursuit of the concept of "goodness" is the highest purpose of life. The task of education is to turn the mind to the good, to understand the world of ideas, and to raise people from the lower stage of sensibility to the higher stage of reason.
The formation of the rational characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought is compatible with the development of Greek politics and economy, and it is also for the development of ancient Greece's political economy.
The essence of the rational characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought is that reason is the basis of social existence and individual existence, attaches importance to the consistency of social development and individual development, and provides favorable conditions for the development of the slave-owning class and rulers.
The formation of the rational characteristics of ancient Greek educational thought has an important position in the history of the development of Western educational thought.
First of all, it opened up a social environment in which Western society valued the rational existence and rational thinking of human beings. According to the ancient Greek educators, the reason why man is superior to other animals is that he is rational.
Since society is made up of individuals, therefore, in the case of the individual, reason should rule over the passions, and in the case of society, it should be ruled by rational men who know how to govern the country.
In the same way, a society should be a society governed by the rule of law, because the law is made according to human reason. Second, it provides an educational environment in which Western society attaches importance to the cultivation and development of human rationality.
Ancient Greek educators believed that the development of reason is the most important development of man, and other aspects of man's development are at the service of man's reason. The highest goal of education is to promote and realize the rational development of human beings.
Therefore, on the basis of this idea, "heuristic education", "selective education", "harmonious development education" and "elegant education" have become important ways of education in ancient Greece.
The rational character of ancient Greek educational thought had a profound influence on Western educational thought. The value orientation of the supremacy of rationality in Greek educational thought not only makes rationalism an important part of the development of Western culture, but also makes the classical education that pursues rationality an important tradition of Western education.
The emphasis on the rational status of the individual in ancient Greek educational thought promoted the development of individual education and rational education, and made the combination of rational education and individual education provide favorable conditions for the development of individuals.
The emphasis on the function of rational analysis in Greek educational thought has had an important impact on the development of Western education. As a result, Christian education and rationalist education have become important phenomena in Western education.
As a result of the differentiation, Western education has made progress in many aspects in terms of educational thinking, educational content, educational methods and means, and has formed a diversified pattern.
Of course, we should also note that the rational character of ancient Greek educational thought was based on Greek slavery. It is also a product of the early development of Western educational thought.
Therefore, its limitations and epochality are obvious. Greek educators attached great importance to the rational development of man, but limited the scope to the slave-owning class, and they attached importance to the rational education of man, but limited the content to "urbane education".
As a result, the human development and rational education they advocate are flawed in scope and content.
In addition, the results of the investigation and differentiation have also led to the tendency of absolutism and one-sidedness in Western educational thought, which has brought disadvantages to the development of education.
In short, the ancient Greek idea of education was not perfect, it was only a product of certain historical conditions. Only by placing it within a specific historical scope and conducting a factual study can we give an objective and fair evaluation.