I once took a physics class that didn’t need a textbook. As an impoverished college student, the idea that I didn’t have to spend a hundred bucks on something that I’d sell back four months later for a third of the price was appealing. I was both thrilled and curious about why this sort of course wouldn’t need a book.

All of the coursework was based on making observations about light and electricity using a series of unexpected instruments. We never read a single page about what we were doing. Students experimented all semester and at the end, were tested on what we’d discovered. After completing the final, my professor said, “You can’t use anything you learned about light rays and electricity outside of this class.” I was pissed.

The man was actually schooling us in the art of experiential learning- physics was his means of doing this. I didn’t catch that until my senior year while I was writing my thesis (it would have helped if my professor had explained what we were doing– Or maybe if I continued to listen after his outrageous statement). My goal in this paper was to argue that when a man or woman instructs, it’s nearly impossible not to pass down their biases to their students. In itself, that’s neither good nor bad, but as this takes place over and over, the same prejudices and proclivities have the potential for perpetual reinforcement. In other words, people teaching each other could be one of humanity’s biggest traps.

The solution? Unadulterated experiential learning, by making one’s own observations and reaching conclusions. Some homeschooling families have taken this route and believe it’s a good one. In many cases, this method has produced brilliant people. But there are drawbacks to this kind of education. First, this takes a lot of effort. The physics class I signed up for was a step toward a degree in architectural design. We never touched any structural elements in that class, because our time was consumed by light and electricity. Please tell me that you want someone with that kind of education designing high-rise buildings. Next, if there isn’t some sort of textbook or reference, how could any of us know that we were interpreting our observations correctly? We didn’t know, and that is why we couldn’t use anything we learned outside of that particular classroom. Experience is not the best teacher, because our understanding of it is nearly always flawed or at best, incomplete. Lastly, if we always relied on experiential learning, how could anyone really work toward any substantial progress? In other words, is it appropriate for everyone to start at the “beginning”? I would think not.

This process is like reading a story and hoping to understand the point. Perhaps the professor should have taken a clue from Rand and subjected us to a week of ranting, or lecturing to ensure that we understood what we were doing.

Fortunately, I changed my major and am not an incompetent architect.

Let me place this method in the context of faith. How many of us make observations without much or any instruction or reference to make sure we’re getting it right? Sola Scriptura is a great idea, until you realize that we’re living in a different time and most of us don’t know much about anything that was taking place 2,000 years ago, much less 4,000 years before that! If you’re not out there acting like a spiritual maverick, how do you know that the people who are offering you instruction aren’t also indoctrinating you with their biases?

How do you study God’s Word?

What questions about interpretation cross your mind when you study?