The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition. 2002.
World Literature, Philosophy, and Religion
Our decision to classify religious and philosophical writing under “World Literature” is a carefully considered one. During most of Western history, the term literature included all writing that was worthy to be known by educated people. Not only is that traditional conception theoretically justified, it is also a practical way of including important knowledge that would normally fall between the cracks in school courses. A narrow conception of literature that includes only fiction, poetry, and drama is a recent innovation that has disadvantages as well as advantages. Because world philosophy and religion have no clearly defined place in school courses, our classification of them as literature encourages their inclusion in the school curriculum.
World literature so conceived is an especially rich and interesting domain of knowledge. Its names are stars in the firmament of thought: Plato and Aristotle, Goethe and Cervantes, Buddha and Confucius. The writing represented covers the whole spectrum of literature. Plato wrote fictional dialogues, Aristotle technical treatises. Here are lyric poems, epic poems, tragedies, and comedies. Here are the most influential ideas about ethics, politics, and righteousness. Several of the writers have done work that is so rich and complex that it repays a lifetime of study. Indeed, every figure in this section has been the lifetime study of some devoted scholar.
The writings included in this section have an almost timeless character. The world of great literature, philosophy, and religion is unlike the world of science in this respect. In science, the latest thinking is usually the most advanced and most likely to be true, because the latest scientific theories are based on the most evidence and have withstood the severest tests. In the sphere of thought concerning the nature and meaning of human life, however, the latest theories are not necessarily the most advanced or the most likely to be true. Knowledge about the basic character and meaning of life is not inherently progressive, as science is. The ancients had just as much evidence as we do about the basic facts of human existence. In fact, truths understood by the ancients sometimes are forgotten and have to be rediscovered. Some say, for instance, that the ancient Greeks have more to tell us about modern life than more recent thinkers do. Even if we do not all agree with this proposition, we can agree that answers to the great questions about human existence are not the exclusive property of any single place, culture, or historical era.
