05/28/2021
German philosopher Karl Jaspers (1883–1969), in his book The Axial Age: The Birth of Religion and the Beginning of Philosophy, observed that between roughly 900 BCE and 200 BCE, four great intellectual and spiritual traditions emerged in different parts of the world: Confucianism and Daoism in China, Hinduism and Buddhism in India, monotheism in Israel, and philosophical rationalism in Greece. These traditions, he argued, became the nourishing roots of the human spirit—and humanity has never truly transcended the insights of that original Axial Age.
Today, in the 21st century, we find ourselves in the midst of another profound global transformation, brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic. Humanity is moving toward solving, one by one, the monumental challenges before it—sustainable development, the climate crisis—without descending into a third world war. I boldly call what we are witnessing the “Second Axial Age.” Unlike the first, this transformation is unfolding in daily life, not only in classrooms, and it is made visible to even the youngest students through open information. Observing this directly, they will inevitably unlock new capacities.
With the Fourth Industrial Revolution, all civilizations have become interconnected. Integration and connection have become not only the themes of the age but strategies for survival. Artificial intelligence is beginning to take over the role of education, while traditional schooling is reduced to offering little more than coaching. In this new reality, children will, in short order, acquire knowledge, information, and wisdom surpassing that of past sages.
Yet the greatest danger lies in the risk that, amid this flood of change and information, they will lose their sense of direction—failing to ripen information into knowledge, and knowledge into wisdom. Instead, they may fragment all wisdom into isolated bits of data, becoming scattered in the rush of the age, perhaps even reviving the spirit of the Luddite movement. Ripening requires weaving all things together organically, and that, above all, demands time.
Though the abundance of information is now guaranteed, what we must secure is the time and capacity to weave information into knowledge, and knowledge into wisdom. Only then can great thinkers emerge—figures who, like King Sejong or Kim Gu, can speak to the world through language and culture. I hold the hope that such an age will dawn not only in Korea but across the globe.
[Reference List]
- The Axial Age: The Birth of Religion and the Beginning of Philosophy – Karen Armstrong (trans. Jung Young-mok), Gyoyangin
- World Future Report 2021: Post-Corona Special Edition – Park Young-sook & Jerome Glenn, Business Books
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