The heart of education is educating the heart not only minds

Ramesh recently completed his post-doctorate in feminist studies from a prestigious foreign university. But back home, during marriage negotiations, he and his family demanded a dowry of Rs. 1 crore.

This instance shows that his studies only fetched him knowledge for his mind. He could not change his heart through his studies.

This problem is not specific to any individual; rather, it is a growing common concern. Today, people are highly educated, hold a number of educational degrees, but still lack education of the heart.

Education of the heart is developing the virtues in an individual. Education is about the growth of character of people and society, and not just gathering information and knowledge. It is about respecting human dignity, equality, etc.

An education that does not change the heart of people but only the mind is not education. It is called literacy, and what we have to aim for is education and not literacy. The essay will focus on various aspects of our lives and society to show that education invokes educating both mind and heart, and education of the mind alone without heart’s education is worthless.

The biggest drawback of not educating the heart but just the mind can be seen in the social sphere of our lives. For instance, ‘educated’ parents practicing caste discrimination by not allowing inter-caste marriages of their children, practicing honor killing, etc.

A person may hold degrees but may still practice gender discrimination, for instance, forcing the mother to have sex-selective abortion, practicing dowry, etc. All these practices perpetuate discrimination, seeing some communities or persons as lesser beings/inferior. This shows that there is only education of the mind and not the heart as people are not being able to treat all with basic human dignity.

The effect of the lack of education of the heart can be seen in the political aspect of our lives too. The political representatives indulging in defection arising from personal gains is one glaring example. Defection for personal gains is a betrayal towards people, political party, one’s ideology, and self-worth. Imposing dictatorship without any accountability and transparency violates the freedom of people, thus showing the importance of education of the heart.

Growing religious fundamentalism is another manifestation of lack of rights or increasing mob lynching which often takes religious overtones refuse to see the worth of other individuals. Today, many educated youth are taking the path of radicalism, terrorism, etc. Hence, mere education of minds is not enough.

The civil administration also gets adversely affected due to this problem. For instance, an official indulging in corruption instead of discharging his public duty shows the lack of development of virtuous character or ethics in that person.

The recent cases where poor individuals were denied ration because of not having an Aadhar card is another manifestation of the problem. Here the individual refuses to have a humanitarian approach and rather insists on strict compliance with a rule.

This growing dearth of value of humanism can be seen in other areas. For instance, western countries have refused to let refugees enter their country and instead have led them to live in extremely bad conditions. This shows that education helped those countries achieve high economic growth but could not change their heart to enable them to see humanitarian crises.

The waging of war, fueling civil wars in many countries to serve one’s own narrow political interest again shows the problem of just spreading literacy and not education in true terms. The unexplainable miseries that war brings can never be sanctioned by an educated heart.

For instance, when only the mind of King Ashoka was educated, he did not hesitate in waging wars. But when his heart also became educated, he adopted the policy of peace and never fought war again. He then focused on the welfare of people and the spread of dharma instead of winning more lands.

Education of minds makes humans selfish. In such an environment, they then focus on their own self-interests over others. For instance, today despite the world becoming more literate, the gap between rich and poor is widening. The extreme poverty of many and concentration of wealth in few hands are rising.

In this process, displacement of communities without their proper rehabilitation is also being pursued to achieve one’s own narrow interests, which is against their human dignity and respect.

The misuse of technology represents the classic case of ill effects of educating the mind alone but not the heart. Technology in itself is neutral. It can be used for both good or bad for society depending upon intentions of the users.

The misuse of technology such as child pornography, cyberbullying, spreading fake news is growing. Child pornography, for example, is bad for the children forced into this as well as for society, but selfish minds refuse to see the negative consequences of it.

The case of technology misuse shows that it is very important to educate the mind. All these technological advancements like internet, satellites, etc., could not have been possible without educating the minds. However, not educating the heart leads to their misuse. Even the boon sometimes becomes a bane for humans due to a lack of education of hearts.

Thus, education of minds is not enough. What is problematic is when education is just geared towards material advancements and not moral growth of individuals and society.

The purpose of education is the development of humans. A human is developed when both their mind and heart develop. It is about the holistic development of individuals.

This holistic development comes when education develops the character of the individual. According to Gandhiji, “the purpose of education is moral development” of society. Thus, there is a need to focus on not just gaining knowledge but also becoming human in the true sense.

Rabindranath Tagore also focused on values of humanism and internationalism where a person values and respects other persons. In the absence of these values, societies head towards the path of self-decay.

What makes the human species stand apart from all other beings is the capacity and capability to think, to reason out things, to see the various dimensions and impacts of one’s decision on others. This capacity to reason and to think about others is what the basic purpose of education is: to build the good character of individuals. Swami Vivekananda said that a strong society is not one which has atomic power but one which has good character.

And it is the education of both minds and hearts that builds this character. Hence, truly the heart of education is educating the hearts and not only minds.