W

hat is the true objective of education? Nowadays, education is just intended for the knowledge of books and acquaintance. Education development is simply too focused on science and technology.

Yet, ethics and spirituality are absent from the curriculum. Consequently, there are many life aspects neglected in today'€™s education and the result is the calamity we see today. So, how else?

However, education should provide students with a chance to obtain true bliss. This can only occur if it is sustained with humanity. Therefore, education must imbue the young with love and benevolence. Thus, students must acquire humility, fortitude, gratitude and forbearance. If not, what then?

Education will not transform by itself without love. How do we learn, for example, to understand one another if we have no love? On the contrary, it will only lead us to the plight of humankind. Moreover, it then brings one'€™s motherland into a nightmare due to the defective education that the entire country suffers from. The result is a country full of misery.

Self-reliance is the basis of one'€™s personality. Only by that can man be a mature and whole. Hence, education must get the students to shoo away all their rigors and cope with life as well. They must forge themselves beyond the boundaries. That is the hallmark of education. After reaching this point, they will never be a burden for other people, society or the nation.

Students should be taught not to be unorganized. They must be educated to behave well wherever they are. Still, education needs to instill respect in students, as well as respect for themselves. Also, they must be trained through self-discipline. They must learn every day.

But many are now lacking in spiritual knowledge, in which spirituality is being spoilt by the name of education. The outcome is a disgrace, a viewpoint that is exclusive and often prejudiced, formed in one'€™s mind.

Just take a look at a simple thing. Many of us are used to belittling, begrudging, even loathing rather than acknowledging and witnessing anything else. We have to get rid of bad thoughts, bad desires and bad deeds, but education does little to develop spirituality along with even-mindedness.

Juan Karnadi
Jakarta