Sárospataki Füzetek 20. (2016)
2016 / 2. szám - ARTICLES / STUDIEN - Henk E. S. Woldring: Comenius' Search for Conditions of Peace set against the Perspective of Shalom
Comenius' Search for Conditions of Peace set against the Perspective of Shalom 6. Insight of the Syncritic Method Although Comenius did not use the word ‘shalom, he was familiar with the idea of shalom. The purpose of his argument on peace may be characterized by shalom. Shalom offers a new look at human life in the proper perspective of enduring peace. As such shalom means a new stage in the history of mankind; it is a stage of improvement of material and immaterial conditions of human existence, both nationally and internationally. The question is now: How can people gain insight to strive for this improvement of the world? One may answer that the idea of shalom is well-known for a long time already, and that bringing into practice justice, righteousness and other moral virtues will undoubtedly promote shalom. Comenius would certainly agree with this answer, however, in my opinion, he would judge this answer as inadequate. He did not wish only to preach about improving the world nor to moralize about moral virtues: he wanted to give an insight into the conditions that could make it possible to achieve shalom. For this purpose he used in his pansophic research, besides analytic and synthetic methods, the syncritic method. The analytic method divides a whole into its components; the synthetic method brings order and mutual connections between the components to better understand the whole. But after having carefully employed these methods to determine the components of a certain phenomenon, the syncritic method (or the ‘method of comparison’) is used to compare phenomena that belong to various domains of reality, and to discover similar components (analogies) of these phenomena. The syncritic method has a higher level than the analytic and the synthetic methods, since it does not divide a whole nor does it bring order into the components, but it compares various phenomena as unities. Moreover, the syncritic method looks for analogies with these phenomena, and it identifies previously unknown connections between various phenomena. So, we can compare a situation of enduring peace that belongs to the socio-political domain of reality with, for instance, physical or biological phenomena. In his Didactica magna Comenius looks for analogies between the developments of various phenomena: brooding an egg, planting a new tree, and building a new house.13 Firstly, he uses the analytic method to describe the components of the process of development of each of these phenomena. However, he does not want to stop with these components. Therefore, secondly, he uses the synthetic method to reconstruct the phenomenon as a unity, and its relationships to the other phenomena. The most significant analogies he discusses are the following: both a bird, a gardener and a carpenter are doing things with care, and gradually (without omitting any step), and preparing an excellent result. Comenius’ crucial question is: How to make clear that these analogies can be applied to a phenomenon of another domain of reality, for instance, to schools in order to improve their processes of education? In summary, Comenius’ answer is as follows: 1) in schools the subject matter should be taught gradually, and step by step in successive classes, and matched to the level of intellec13 Comenius, J.A.: Didactica magna (1657) /Grosse Didaktik, übersetzt und herausgegeben Flitner, A. von, Düsseldorf/München, Küpper, 1970.XVI, 1-63. 2016-2 Sárospataki Füzetek 20. évfolyam 71
