Search for System, Method and Harmony of All Things
International conference to commemorate Ioannes Amos Comenius (1592-1670)
and the 350th anniversary of his death
Naarden / Amsterdam, the Netherlands
November 2021
Pansophia was one of the leading principles - if not the most important one - in the work of Ioannes Amos Comenius. However, the idea of pansophia represented much broader intellectual current in the early modern thought. The conference will address the pansophia phenomenon as interpreted by Comenius, his forerunners, followers and critics. For Comenius, pansophia means the system of universal knowledge, which represents harmony of all things. As a thelogian, he grounded this idea metaphysically as the divine order of all things. As a pedagogue, he wanted to teach "everything to everyone". As a universal reformer, he proposed an emendation of human affairs: philosophy (or knowledge), religion and politics.
The conference is held at the occasion of the 350-year commemoration of Ioannes Amos Comenius death
(1592-1670), and it is organized by the Comenius Museum and Mausoleum in Naarden, the Netherlands, in cooperation with LEARN! research institute on learning and education, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Museum
of Jan Amos Comenius, Uherský Brod, the Institute of Philosophy at the Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague, the Deutsche Comenius Gesellschaft, Berlin, the Comenius Forschungsstelle, Alfter by Bonn, and the Embassy of the Free Mind, Amsterdam.
Presenters were asked to send an abstract (100-300 words, in English or German) and a short academic biography by 1 November 2020 to comenius2020@comeniusmuseum.nl
The conference committee will make the final selections by 15 April 2021.
The programme of the conference is in preparation. It will be published in April.