The One-Bookie Leader (Coda): Intellectual Descent

On re-reading the last few posts, I realised that I mentioned one loose end which I have not yet tied off. What kind of person mentors a future monobibliarch (or One-Bookie Leader)?

The sad thing is that as far as I can tell, the mentor of a future monobibliarch (FUMBA) is normally an innocent professional educator. The ones I've met are innocent in the sense that they are non-toxic (that's what 'innocent' means in Latin). They thought they were trying their best, and in at least 95% of the time, those they mentored turned out right. The main problem, as I see it is that they produce another 5% who are even greater monsters than the average monster.

This is the penalty for selfless endeavour in a fallen world. The thing is that if you are a particularly intelligent person who doesn't mind who you teach stuff to, there will always be a small percentage who will take what you teach, turn it to some less-than-benign purpose, laugh at you, and then deny that you ever taught them anything of consequence.

I think that if you're a FUMBA mentor, you should thank God for small mercies. The fact that he will deny your teaching lets you off the hook because nobody will blame you for being part of the MBA's intellectual journey. You will not have to live with, "You taught Hitler how to paint, how come he turned out the way he did? Did you teach him to paint with human blood and agony?"

I am sure that is how Aristotle felt when he taught Alexander the Great about the 'Golden Mean' and was later told that the fellow had gone and conquered the world just to spread Aristotelian thinking and other aspects of Greek culture. So take heart, FUMBA mentor, you are in good company. The intellectual antecedents of an MBA, the line of his intellectual descent, all this will be purged from the files and reviled in public so that the MBA can go on with his one-track cognitive cycle.

I once had the privilege of dealing with every single one of a certain One-Bookie Leader's mentors. For more than 40 years, I have known his supervisor, his mentor, the man who gave him his big opportunity, the man who tried to teach him by role-modeling... I knew them all. And you know what? In each case, I got the same response: "He's smart, but he has no principles, he's very ungrateful to those who taught him, he doesn't value other people and his very suspicious of anyone who doesn't repeatedly prove his loyalty to whatever new idea he has. He once said he doesn't even trust his wife, in public."

Well, that ends my sequence on the OBL, or MBA, or whatever you call this kind of person. It's an interesting study; expanded to 50 pages, it won't compete with Who Moved My Cheese? or The Iceberg Is Melting!. I wonder if I could give it a catchy slogan-like title and con the man into adopting it as his credo for the year though... Heh.

Godfather

I suppose nobody nowadays can read that title and not think of violin music and that haunting theme song from the movie of Mario Puzo's book.

But this little post is written as I reflect on my role as a godfather - not entirely in the orthodox sense of the word, but in a few extended senses.

My first attempt at being a godfather was when my best friend of many years proudly announced to three of us that we would all be godfathers to his infant son. I remember one beautiful wintry morning in North London, some years later, when the young fellow looked up from play in the garden, armed with a staff, and saw his long-absent (and somewhat derelict in duty) godfather. "Godfather," he exclaimed, eyes big and round, "Is that really you?"

We never had much time together, and now he is grown and no longer communicates with me. I feel some loss, a certain disquieting sense that I could have done more for him. But he and his family have moved over four continents, and I have lost track of him. It is all very sad. I could make the excuse that not being a Roman Catholic myself, I never really was a godfather - since one of the duties of a godfather is to sponsor a child for baptism (confirmation?) and to provide an alternative source of spiritual advice within the range permitted.

Since then, I have developed, in some sense, another kind of role. A godfather is really something like a psychopomp, with the obvious difference being that his role is to conduct a soul from one state to another (hopefully better) state which isn't the afterlife. A godfather is a mentor, an agent of socialisation; he is a support and guide through troubled places, times, and circumstances; he is a kind of hierophant. It is this last role which I have been reflecting on.

The word hierophant is Greek for 'he who reveals the sacred', or 'he who sheds light on the mysteries'. In the educational context which frames me and currently structures my existence in a secular sense, this is what I am. In the mundane, in the world that is bound by time and pressure, by numbers and powers, I reveal what I can of meaning and the higher realities. I am no angelic messenger or demiurge; I am not an unearthly spirit. I am just a man of odd talents in peculiar combination - as is every other man. It is just that sometimes, my combination seems to help others understand this particular world of knowledge.

And this is where I stand and bow to all those I serve. I have a blessing and some granted gifts which allow me to serve as a teacher, and where possible, a godfather. The prayer I make for myself and that I trust others will pray for me is: that I will be true to my calling and lead none astray.