In this three-part series, "Philosophical Issues," Dr. Alice Von Hildebrand discusses Plato's Philosophy of Education; St Augustine and Man's True Relationship to the Created World; and What is Beauty?

Plato's Philosophy of Education
The Renaissance era was that of the rediscovery of Plato. Much of Plato's work in dialogues like the Republic and in the Laws concerns education. Dr. Alice Von Hildebrand discusses his brilliance in this field, and the way in which the kind of serious education he describes must avoid obsession with immediate success and be rooted in a real hunt for the True, the Good, and the Beautiful.

St. Augustine - Man's True Relationship to the Created World
St. Augustine adds to and transforms Plato's understanding of God, nature, and man through his acceptance of the Catholic Faith. In doing so, Dr. Alice Von Hildebrand shows that he is able to place every aspect of life into the proper hierarchy of values and thereby understand man's proper relationship to Creation.

What is Beauty?
The only way that man can really understand the essence of the kind of beauty the Renaissance claimed to love is by understanding Truth and the proper hierarchy of values that flows from it. Dr. Alice Von Hildebrand demonstrates how this is immeasurably aided by the hunt for ever more divine light of the kind that Plato and Augustine inspired.


Taken from: Christianity in the Late Middle Ages-Early Renaissance - 1996 Von Hildebrand Institute