An Invitation to the Liberal Arts: The What and Why of Classical Christian Higher Education. By Benjamin P. Myers. Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2025. 122 pp. $34 (hardcover), $19 (paper).
One of the defining characteristics of the classical Christian school movement up to this point has been its focus on primary and secondary education (i.e., grades K-12). This is understandable, given the importance of rightly educating children during their younger, most formative years. Even so, it is just as important to have a sense of how the principles of classical Christian education bear on higher education, in colleges and universities. We are fortunate, then, to have Ben Myers’s accessible and informative work on the subject, titled An Invitation to the Liberal Arts. Its purpose, as the title suggests, is to invite students into a kind of education that can “give us a way to seek the establishment of God’s kingdom in our lives and in our world” (2). Chapter 1 lays down the biblical basis for a liberal arts education; Chapter 2 explores the aspects of human nature that make a liberal arts education appropriate (e.g., the fact that we are made by God and designed to know Him and His creation); Chapter 3 explains why a liberal arts education should cultivate us within the Western tradition in particular; Chapter 4 identifies some of the virtues required for a liberal arts education to be fruitful; Chapter 5 responds to the objection that a liberal arts education is not conducive to the formation of Christian piety; Chapter 6 reflects on the role that a liberal arts education has historically played (and still can today) in developing great leaders; Chapter 7 comments on the role that STEM fields play in a liberal arts education; and Chapter 8 discusses the college major system as it relates to liberal arts education.
The first six chapters cover ideas that one would expect to find in a treatment of classical Christian education: a basic exposition of Christian anthropology (as it pertains to education), the trivium, education as a means to the cultivation of virtue, etc., with Myers giving a solid introduction to these and other key concepts. It is in the last two chapters—where these ideas are applied to college and university education—that the book’s distinctives come to the fore. Much like science and religion, STEM fields and the liberal arts are often treated as if they were unrelated at best, and at worst in hostile conflict with one another. However, within this assumption lies a category error in which the liberal arts are conflated with the humanities. In reality, “The humanities… are not and never have been the whole of the liberal arts” (81). Accordingly, the trivium does not comprise the substance of a liberal arts education in its totality, but is rather a component and foundation for the rest of that education. In the words of Myers, “As science and mathematics occupied an important place in the historical liberal arts, so too is there an important place for these studies in our liberal arts colleges still today” (82). Lest anyone miss the point, he goes on to say that “the liberal arts college that includes no or only scanty science and math requirements in its core is as out of sync with the liberal arts heritage as is the college that requires no languages or no ancient literature” (85). This is so because science and mathematics, just as much as the humanities, are “avenue[s] to truth” (86), thus students can better appreciate the fullness and grandeur of that truth if these two fields form part of their higher education.
In a similar vein, Myers argues that we are not faced with a binary choice between “either a robust liberal arts core or strong majors that prepare students to earn a living” (89). On his account, “‘pre-professional’ majors, such as accounting, nursing, or engineering” (90) do not preclude a solid foundation in the liberal arts, nor is it the case that the liberal arts have nothing to contribute in preparing for such careers. On the contrary, a liberal arts education provides “the wisdom and virtue necessary for any human endeavor to be done with excellence and humanity” (90). Moreover, “The liberal arts pair well with any major also because the liberal arts nourish parts of our humanity that our work may not necessarily nourish” (93). In short, if we wish to be fully human, an education in the liberal arts will help us irrespective of our career choices.
To sum up, Myers does an excellent job of making a succinct and cogent argument for the liberal arts in higher education. The presupposition that education is a mere means to financial enrichment remains pervasive in our materialistic world. Consequently, students and parents alike who may be unsure as to what exactly they should be looking for in a college, and why, will benefit from reading this corrective work from Myers, who invites us to take a break from looking inward and instead look back and upward, that we might better look forward.
