1. Resemblance to God and the Three Great Blessings
God created man and woman in His image (Gen.1:27). When creation was finished, God gave them His blessings (the three great blessings), saying, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth” (Gen. 1:28). This is the very foundation for education. Based on this foundation, education can be described as the process of raising children to attain resemblance to God. In other words, education is an effort to guide children so that they come to resemble God. To resemble God means to resemble His Divine Image and Divine Character.
A human being is born with a Divine Image (Sungsang and Hyungsang, yang and yin, individual image), but it is in an immature state. Accordingly, human beings gradually come to resemble the Divine Image of God as they grow. This is even more true for the Divine Character.
For a human being to resemble God’s Divine Image means to resemble God’s Sungsang and Hyungsang, Yang and Yin, and Individual Image, and to resemble God’s Divine Character is to resemble God’s Heart, Logos, and Creativity.
Among the blessings God gave to human beings, to “be fruitful” means to grow and perfect one’s individual character; to “multiply and fill the earth” means to become husband and wife and multiply children; and to “subdue it [the earth]” means to have dominion over all things. Through their realizing these three great blessings, man and woman come to inherit God’s Divine Character, namely, His Heart, Logos, and Creativity, and they also come to resemble God’s natures of perfection, multiplication, and dominion (see fig. 5.1) as well as inheriting God’s Divine Image. Next, I will give a concrete explanation about the meaning of perfection, multiplication, and dominion, since the idea for education is established on the basis of these three great blessings.
Perfection
Jesus said, “You must … be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matt. 5:48). This is a call for people to resemble the perfection of God. Perfection refers to the unity of Sungsang and Hyungsang. In God, the Sungsang and Hyungsang are in harmonious give and receive action in the relationship of subject and object centering on Heart, and are united in oneness. This state is perfection.
Accordingly, for human beings to resemble God’s perfection means that their Sungsang and Hyungsang are united in oneness, centering on heart. In a human being there are four categories of Sungsang and Hyungsang, as mentioned in the Theory of the Original Human Nature, but here I refer specifically to the spirit mind as Sungsang and physical mind as Hyungsang.
In order for the spirit mind and physical mind to be united, the spirit mind must function as the subject, and the physical mind must function as the object; that is, the spirit mind must have dominion over the physical mind. The spirit mind is concerned with the pursuit of the values of truth, goodness and beauty, whereas the physical mind is concerned with the pursuit of food, clothing, shelter, and sexual fulfillment. Thus, in order for the spirit mind and physical mind to be united, a life in pursuit of truth, goodness, and beauty must take priority, and a life in pursuit of food, clothing, shelter, and sexual fulfillment must become a secondary means to that end.
The center of give and receive action between the spirit mind and the physical mind is heart and love. In summary, a life in pursuit of food, clothing, and shelter must be led centering on a life in pursuit of truth, goodness, and beauty, based on love. This is what is meant by resembling God’s perfection. When people are young, they do not understand well the values of truth, goodness, and beauty; but as they mature, their hearts gradually develop and they come to lead―centering on love―a true life, a good life, and a beautiful life. Thus, they gradually come to resemble the perfection of God.
Since the human being is a dual being of spirit self and physical self, human growth involves the growth of both spirit self and physical self. The first blessing, “to grow,” refers not only to the growth of the physical self, but primarily to the growth of the spirit self, namely, the improvement of a person’s spiritual level. Yet, the spirit self grows on the foundation of the physical self, namely, through give and receive action with the physical self. If human beings grow to maturity in this way, they inherit God’s perfection. Therefore, this is the first blessing, given as a promise to human beings.
Multiplication
Next, human beings must resemble God’s nature of multiplication; namely, they must develop to the point where they can multiply their children. God is the harmonious being of Yang and Yin. Therefore, man and woman are supposed to resemble this harmony of God’s Yang and Yin. The harmony of yang and yin in human beings refers to the harmony of husband and wife.
Human beings were created through God’s nature of multiplication; namely, through the harmony of God’s Yang and Yin as well as through the unity of God’s Sungsang and Hyungsang. Therefore, in human beings as well, they will create (multiply) their children through their harmony between yang and yin, as well as through the unity of their mind and body.
The call to resemble God’s nature of multiplication is a call for man and woman to grow to the point where they are qualified and able to be engaged in harmonious give and receive action in the same way as the Yang and Yin in God are engaged in harmonious give and receive action. To accomplish this, man and woman must mature in such a way that they become qualified to get married and have children. That is to say, a man should become perfectly equipped with all the qualifications requisite to being a man, and a woman should become perfectly equipped with all the qualifications requisite to being a woman.
Thus, the call is for them to become capable of fulfilling a man’s duty as a husband and a woman’s duty as a wife, respectively. When they come to possess such qualifications and abilities, they are to get married and have children. Therefore, this is the second blessing, given as a promise to human beings.
Dominion
Furthermore, human beings must resemble God’s nature of dominion. To resemble God’s nature of dominion means to inherit God’s creativity, which is the ability to create object beings (new beings) centering on Heart (love).
God created human beings and all things with His creativity, and intended to have dominion over them. Since human beings were originally endowed with this creativity, they were created to have dominion over all things, centering on heart. In other words, human beings were created to possess this ability once they mature. This is the third blessing, given as a promise to human beings.
All industrial activities are activities of dominion exercised by human beings over all things. For example, farmers cultivate the land, which is a form of dominion over the land. In a factory, workers produce goods out of raw materials by using machines. This is a form of dominion over raw materials and machines.
Fishing is a form of dominion over the fish and the water, and forestry is a form of dominion over trees and mountains.
To have dominion over all things is to manifest one’s creativity. Seen from the viewpoint of the formation of the four position foundation, creativity refers to the ability to form an inner four position foundation and an outer four position foundation.
Accordingly, in agriculture, farmers cultivate the fields making creative efforts, based on their ideas, to obtain a greater harvest. In commerce, too, people will not be successful without ideas and creative will. In short, by manifesting creativity, all human industries, including agriculture, mining, manufacturing, commerce, forestry, fishing, and so on, are forms of human dominion over things. Science and art, also, come into the category of dominion over all things. Dominion over society, namely, participation in politics, also lies in the category of dominion over all things.
Yet, due to the fall, human beings became unable to inherit God’s Heart-centered creativity. Instead, they came to manifest a self-centered creativity, often inflicting damage on people and nature, through, for example, producing weapons for war and causing pollution. Therefore, in this new theory of education, teachers must guide students to manifest heart-centered creativity by resembling God’s nature of dominion.