Notes on a Spiritual Education: Julian the Apostate and Byzantium

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 18
  In Roundtable Session: Spirituality in Inquiry and Education: Tensions and Reflections

Abstract

This paper considers the Late Roman educational context in relation to contemporary educational practices. In particular, it considers the 4th Century, following the Constantinian Shift, which formalized Christianity as the religion of Rome. Julian (the Apostate), Constantine's nephew, became a lightning rod in 362 AD when, as the new Emperor, he passed an edict forbidding Christians to teach in the traditional schools that populated the Roman context. Julian, who rejected Christianity, was concerned with spirituality in the curriculum, but that was the spiritual work of the traditional sources of Greece and Rome, the enkyklios paideia. This paper examines the context of Julian's rise to imperial power in juxtaposition with contemporary public schooling, largely secular, considering the place that spirituality plays.

Author

• Theodore Michael Christou, Queen's University - Kingston