Is literacy that important?

S. PATHIRAVITANA

The World Literacy Day has just ended and we pride ourselves on being literate, and regard slightingly those who are not, as ‘illiterate’. But the three who gave rise to three great civilisations were, so to say, illiterate. Prophet Mohammad did not write a word.

The message he received aurally from the Angel Gabriel he delivered orally. Jesus Christ did not write a word either. He had many disciples to repeat what he said and that was put into letters much later.

The Buddha, on the other hand, though well-versed as a prince in the sixty-four arts which includes literacy, never put a panhinda on to an ola leaf. His method of transmitting knowledge was direct speech and he did not put much trust in putting knowledge into books.

So, when the world was, presumably, a less disordered place, primacy was given to the spoken word. In fact in our languages, both on the sub continent and in our own Lanka, the man whom we consider ‘a man of letters’ today was then known as a bahushruta or in simpler Sinhala boho assu piru than aththa, literally one who has heard, not read much. And he would say “Thus have I heard’ and not ‘Thus have I read’.

The invention of writing was regarded more as a disaster rather than a victory by no less a person than Plato himself, a literary master in his own way.

‘This invention,’ he said referring to the invention of letters, ‘will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, because they will not exercise their memory.’ Here, in our parts of the world in the past, learning mainly consisted in exercising memory.

Since the growing mind is the best time to exercise memory the Nampota, a list of names of places of both historical and geographical interest in this country, prepared by the Sri Saranankara Thera was one of the first things given to memorise.

Sagama, Pasgama, Araththana, Madanwala, Vilvala, Kadadora, Morapaya... thus begins the Nampota and the names, even at my present age, they come tripping down memory as you sound the first name.

There was a time when the great classics, not only like the Bhagavad Gita but medicinal works and grammars in verse forms, were stacked away in the library of the mind.

Ananda Coomaraswamy recalling his own experience of ‘illiterate’ men in the older societies, tells how he once while in Kashmir, heard for the first time Odes of the classical Persian poet Jalalu’d Din Rumi sung by a travelling village singer.

Plato while delving deep into this subject goes on to say that the invention of letters ‘...will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who use it, because they will not exercise their memory.’ And goes on to say, ‘You have invented an elixir not of memory but of reminding,’ What these men of wisdom meant will become clearer when we hear Socrates narrate a story. This is the story:

‘When Thammus sat upon the throne of Egypt, there came to him Thoth, the inventor, who praised alphabetic writing as “a medicine for memory and wisdom.” Thereupon the wise king replied that writing would have just the opposite effect.

“If men learn this it will implant forgetfulness in their souls, they will rely on...that which is written, calling things to remembrance no longer from within themselves, but by means of external marks’.

A German philosopher of our time, Joseph Pieper, was so taken up with this narration that he greeted it in a most extravagant fashion. He said, ‘This story belongs among the great statements of human wisdom and should never be allowed to fade from the memory of man.’ Why such extravagance? And how shall we come to lose wisdom and memory by depending on letters, we may ask.

Those of us in this writing business should be concerned and try to find out how. Probably it has something to do with what the Bible has said - The letter killeth but the spirit giveth.

In this context Thomas Aquinas asks the question why Christ did not put his teachings down in writing and answers it himself by saying that the higher mode of teaching is the one suited to the greater teacher.

Both Socrates and Pythagoras, he says, chose the higher mode of teaching by trying to impress it directly on our hearts. Modern civilisation, however, is not interested in the higher mode of teaching, but in more mundane things, and mistaking in that process information for knowledge, is helping us to make more money and not to enter heaven.

Heaven forbid! They have now abandoned the great teachers of the past altogether and converted the new found ‘knowledge’ into a huge industry under the initials IT. Information Technology is the mod name now for a newer literacy, ignoring the damage caused to the human soul by the older literacy. I use the word damage deliberately in view of what I am going to show.

We have a modern psychologist, (Rudolph von Urban in his Beyond Human Knowledge) who has found the reason for the harm caused by literacy itself. According to him Nature keeps a fine balance among the five senses of man.

If you give too much play to one, you take away something from the others. Eye and ear, he says, ‘cannot develop an equal degree of acuteness’. And he goes on to say: ‘Animals with excellent organs of smell, see or hear badly; a gifted painter is rarely also a great musician.

By the same token it is probable that subsequent to the development of written language, man lost much of his capacity for intuition (lntuitive perception) since much of his energy was now used up in his efforts to put his thoughts into words.’

So, there we are. Do we expect the new literacy to do any better than the older one? Certainly we will be making more money by converting knowledge into information rather than the other way round.

But would that be a qualification to enter the pearly gates which have already banned entry to the money bags? As it declared, it would rather help a camel go through the eye of a needle than let the multi-nationals in.