ON BEING WISE [M, 8-26-28]

BEYOND WINTER: The Irrelevant Musings of an Old Man—ON BEING WISE [M, 8-26-28]

 

As we gathered for Crumble Bums [1] recently, Charlie told me that I am the wisest person he knows. I was dumbfounded into silence, a very rare condition for me.

If I’m truly wise, I’ll just quit writing right now. It’s quite possible I didn’t even hear him correctly. Old ears, you know. More to the point, I don’t know what it means to be wise. But I’ll keep writing, which probably proves Charlie wrong about the level of my wisdom.

Our pastor recently preached on wisdom, using the passage in Kings about the wisdom of Solomon. In preparation for that sermon, he asked, on Facebook, for people to name the wisest person they had known. Charlie said he had not put anything on Facebook, but would have named me.

That’s humbling, because Charlie is a polymath, a student of and participant in everything—science, art, religion, politics, family, environment, baseball, health, society… He usually knows what he’s talking about.

My initial reaction, of course, was to make some smartass reply. “You need to get some better friends.” That sort of thing. But that didn’t seem appropriate. I didn’t want to insult my friend’s intelligence. I was wise enough not to say…

…oh, good grief! How can you tell if someone is wise? Especially yourself?

Well, first you have to figure out what wisdom is. There are a whole lot of definitions of wisdom, cluttering around C. H. Spurgeon’s statement that wisdom is “…the right use of knowledge.”

I have some knowledge. Lots of years of higher education. Lots of reading. Lots of thinking. But much knowledge is no guarantee of right use. Smart and wise aren’t the same thing. We talk about “The three wise men,” but is it smart to leave Orientar and take off across the desert without knowing where you’re going and only a star to guide you? And smoking a rubber cigar, yet? It wasn’t smart, but it turned out to be wise.

Joseph Goebbels was smart. He had a PhD, which he used to espouse Nazism and the eradication of Jews. Indeed, 32% of Philosophy professors in Germany joined the Nazi party. David Starr Jordan, early president of Indiana University [1885-1891], was smart. But he used his intelligence to espouse eugenics, “proving” some races, like blacks, to be inferior.

Good grief! [Again.] Shouldn’t philosophy professors and university presidents be wise?

Theological sociologist Tex Sample tells of how he grew up hearing his father say that Will Rogers was the best philosopher in the world. When Tex went to college, his advisor suggested he sign up for a philosophy course. “Sure,” said Tex. “Give me all of that you’ve got.” He was not amused when he had to deal with the esoteric theories of Aristotle and Plato instead of the pithy humorisms of Rogers. [2] But it turned out to be a wise move.

Rogers didn’t have much education. He claimed that “All I know, I read in the newspapers.” But most folks in his day would agree with Sample’s father.

So, how do you take knowledge—be it higher ed or only what you read in the newspapers—and use it rightly, become wise?

According to Reinhold Niebuhr, via his “Serenity Prayer,” you should pray for the courage to change what you can, and the serenity to accept what you cannot change. Wisdom is knowing the difference.

Well, perhaps the wisest thing is just to admit that you don’t know what wisdom is.

More importantly to me right now, what’s the wise way to react if someone calls you wise?

Perhaps the wisest thing is to accept it and say “Thank you.”

John Robert McFarland

1] Five good-looking, mature gentlemen, who gather for coffee--named for our original point of assembly, Crumble Bakery.

2] Currently relevant: “I don’t belong to any organized political party. I’m a Democrat.”