The beginning of wisdom - Letter to a Daughter - Column

Christian Century, June 15, 1994

DEAR ELLEN: You suggest that I overlooked something important in my perhaps too quick indictment of your peers. And you're right to note that in sports they do have ideals and standards. (Not all of them, of course. Don't forget noncompetitive Frisbee.) And they often do manage to accept and comfort losers without simply pretending that it doesn't matter who won or lost. In any case, I grant your point.

You also asked a question that deserves a response: How can we be so certain of the rightness of our ideals--for instance, the ideals about marriage and family that I just assumed in that last letter? Wouldn't a little humility be in order here, since, after all, these are matters on which intelligent people often disagree?

Leaving aside some of the larger philosophical problems, don't you think Christians may have at least a partial answer to the questions you raise? "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," the sage says. Take that verse seriously and you will gain some confidence in our ability to know the truth about how we ought to live, and you will also find the source of true humility.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. For all its complexity and confusion, the world is not sheer chaos. It is creation. At its source lies the wisdom and understanding of God. Our lives are ordered toward community with God and each other. So there is order to be discerned, truth to be learned about what human beings need to be and ought to do.

Of course, we don't always see this truth rightly--and we often disagree about what we need to be and ought to do. We would see more truly if we feared and loved God more fully. Much of the time we don't really want a world in which the truth about how we ought to live could be learned. For such a world would sometimes--perhaps often--resist our projects and desires.

The simple fact that we often disagree about how to live needn't intimidate us into supposing that we can know nothing about such matters. For the world remains God's creation. In and through it God draws us--and sometimes tugs and pulls us--toward community. If others dispute your ideals, you must take them seriously and listen carefully. But most of all you must seek again that fear of the Lord that is the beginning of wisdom.

And do not forget that it is the beginning of wisdom. Because the divine light shines into our world we are able to see. We can look at things in that light and achieve some understanding. But we cannot look at the light itself, as if to lay hands on the Mystery. Our knowledge always remains incomplete, a beginning and a part of the truth, but no more. Shouldn't that give rise to a little humility?

Just don't think of humility as weak, as if it were a virtue for the intimidated. Remember Puddleglum, your favorite character in the Narnia stories. When the witch almost has him (and Jill and Eustace) believing that Aslan is only a dream, he holds fast to his ideal. "I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia."

That alone is not sufficient, of course, but it captures some of the power of an ideal. And by clinging to his ideal, Puddleglum did see a part of the truth. He was given genuine insight.

God will one day deepen and enrich that insight. In the meantime, you can work on the matter of "fearing the Lord," earnestly desiring that light. It will never hurt to begin your studies on your knees. You may see further from there.

Love,

Mom