How to study texts in a principled way
- This page is part of an ERW course, Religious practice.
- By John Eagles, June 15, 2010.
Many of us get to read many texts in the form of books and articles. How can we study this in a principled way, meaning how can we extract truth from it and not be influenced by lies or confused ideas?
What i am explaining here does not only apply to reading texts. The same principles apply to hearing lectures or speeches or seeing films or videos. But it is simplest for me to explain the method for written texts.
his will only be a very short outline of a method in which i have disciplined myself for a very long time. Therefore, many questions will probably remain after reading this, but i hope this will be helpful.
Because much of what is offered to us to read is a mixture of truth and untruth and half-truths, the first stage is:
1. SEPARATE USEFUL FROM USELESS AND TRUE FROM UNTRUE
This begins with choosing which texts you want to read. Give preference to books or articles from that you expect to gain something, that teach you something important. When you read a book or text, first browse through the chapters, the headlines and the pictures. This gives you an impression if this is worth your time. It also gives you a first overview of the content and this helps to more quickly digest the content when you're going to read it entirely.
Suppose you decided now that you want to read or study a certain text. How to go about it? Depending on how seriously you want to study it, the method will be different. But at any rate, when you read it, keep asking yourself whether what you read is true. You may use pens with different colors to distinguish what you think is important and true from what is meaningless or untrue.
Some tips to distinguish what is likely untrue or unimportant from what is true:
- Truth is always logically consistent. This means that given arguments or facts won't contradict one another.
- Truth is usually clear. When you read something that is very unclear and confused, it probably is because what is written is not true or only half true.
- Learn to rely on your intuition for this. You develop your good intuition through prayer and study of books that give you principled truth. Also applying the method as described here will sharpen your intuition over time.
- If you really don't understand something and therefore can also not judge well if it is true or not true, don't bother about it. You build up knowledge and understanding with what you understand, not with what you cannot comprehend. Just leave such a text for later.
- Always try to understand what motivation and background the writer has. If you cannot trust that he has unselfish intentions it is more likely that there are mistakes in what he or she writes.
