The Status of Moral Education in Teaching and Pedagogical Texts

Education and morality are two separate categories, and each one is an independent science with a close relationship and a mutual effect with the other one. Moral education is ‘nurturing human soul in the path of commitment to what must morally be done and what must not, and paying attention to acquisition of virtues and avoiding vices in order to achieve felicity and enjoying the unlimited and permanent [spiritual] pleasures’. The children and teenagers, from the very day they start education, begin their golden opportunity for acquiring knowledge, which then continues up to the highest stages of education. What goes on now in the educational centers is the direct teaching of morality and religious knowledge, not the moral education. The educational system for teaching morality requires revision and modification; but furthermore, a new project must be planned for moral education of the teenagers and youths, which is a category independent of teaching morality. In teaching the science of morality, just as other scientific educations, teaching directly is inescapable; in moral teaching, however, only the indirect method is effective. The main condition for the success of a moral teacher and an educator of the society is his/ her being educated and nurtured, and teaching others must be done through action and behavior and not mere speech.