Pragmateia. Philosophizing with classics

A reflection within the Faculty of Philosophy aimed at improving the coherence of the proposed events with its academic programmes was the inspiration for the initiative “PRAGMATEIA, Philosophizing with Classics.” The initiative is more than just a cycle of lectures given by eminent scholars; it is an opportunity for encounters and debates that crown the work carried out by the students during the semester. During the third year of the Baccalaureate, students are asked to read a classic of philosophy in its entirety - accompanied by a tutor, in weekly personal meetings - practising both critical interpretation of the text and the ability to give it topical relevance. The student’s work culminates in a meeting with a scholar expert in the chosen author. In these meetings, third-year students are the protagonists with their questions, submitted in advance to the scholar. 

Reading and reflecting with the classics
Why have these meetings been given the name “PRAGMATEIA”? The term pragmateia refers both to the great philosophical treatises and to the exercise of study itself (from pragma- ‘deed’), i.e., the dimension of effort and commitment involved in engaging fully with the text. The chosen subtitle – “Philosophizing with Classics” - is a reminder that one learns to philosophize by following in the footsteps of the great classical thinkers. Philosophizing, “doing philosophy” - which is quite different from “learning philosophy” - is grasped precisely through the commitment and effort to understand. This is why, in the third year of the Baccalaureate, students are asked to read a great classic of philosophy in its entirety every semester under the guidance of a tutor. The dialogue with the classics and the rigorous reading of the texts have their historical roots both in the Jesuit tradition - in the Constitutions of Saint Ignatius of Loyola (no. 470) - and in the tradition of the Faculty of Philosophy of the Gregorian University. 

Questions and discussion
Moreover, the reading assignment is not just an individual effort by the student. As mentioned above, it involves a weekly meeting with a tutor, i.e., a more advanced student who has already read the text and is familiar with it. The student reads part of the book each week and discusses it with the tutor. This approach is intended to reflect the method of the ancient philosophical schools, where thought was also shaped by engaging in dynamic dialogue. Moreover, the tutor’s role is not limited to helping the student understand the text. In fact, the tutor will help the student to make the best use of his or her personal experience during this task. The questions we want students to answer is: How have you, as a living person, with your questions, with your life, been challenged by this text? What did it communicate to you? What is its relevance today? We don’t want the monographic reading to be limited to providing a set of concepts with which the students are unfamiliar, but rather make sure that it is brought into the students’ lives and that they interact with it.  

Even before the inception of the PRAGMATEIA meetings, this task was accomplished by submitting a paper in which the students, guided by the tutor, explained the ways in which the readings had transformed or challenged them. Now, in addition to the paper, the students are asked to formulate some questions that will serve as the starting point for the end-of-semester conference delivered by the invited scholar. In this way, the conference will be the continuation of an implicit dialogue that has already been established, rather than being imposed from above, perhaps in a very technical and dispassionate way. The submission of questions in advance is somewhat unusual, and this has positively surprised the speakers and placed the discussion on a much more challenging level than that of an ordinary ‘conference’.”

In dialogue with other disciplines
The first classical philosophical text discussed this year was Baruch Spinoza’s Theologico-Political Treatise (January 18, 2023). Spinoza’s work was studied within the framework of the course on the history of modern philosophy, with a final conference by Prof. Francesco Toto on Books XII-XIV concerning the Holy Scriptures. In the second semester the focus was on contemporary philosophy. The anniversary of the death of Jacques Maritain was the occasion to study The Person and the Common Good, with a final conference by Prof. Giovanni Grandi (May 16, 2023). The choice of these two texts was also inspired by the theme of the Faculty Study Day (23 March 2023), organised jointly with the Department of Biblical Theology, on the themes of justice, forgiveness and politics. The Faculty of Philosophy’s Study Days are characterised by an interdisciplinary dimension, and the choice of a theologian and a philosopher as panel speakers brings together two faculties that frequently see students graduate from one and continue their studies in the other. It makes sense, therefore, to reflect on whether the Bible and philosophy have something to say to each other, and whether there is any connection between the God read through the lenses of theology and the God read through the lenses of philosophy. The conference that we will hold in collaboration with the Faculty of Theology on November 23, 2023, on the figure of Blaise Pascal, the philosopher who, more than any other, dealt with the theme of the “God of the philosophers” and the “God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob”, likewise points in this direction.