The Art of Manliness - #242： The Forgotten Virtue of Reverence

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast so we typically

00:00:19.220 think of the quality of reverence as connected with religion but my guest stay on the show

00:00:24.220 argues that reverence is a virtue that extends past religious ceremony and is it vital

00:00:28.880 for the flourishing of human society his name is paul woodruff he's professor of humanities at the

00:00:33.780 university of texas and the author of the book reverence renewing a forgotten virtue and on

00:00:38.960 today's show professor woodruff and i discuss what the ancient greeks and ancient chinese can teach us

00:00:43.720 about reverence why reverence has been forgotten in our modern age and what you can do in your own

00:00:49.380 life to renew this virtue great show with some great insights after the show is over be sure to

00:00:54.680 check the show notes at aom.is reverence well professor paul woodruff welcome to the show

00:01:07.300 glad to be here uh so you are a professor of philosophy you've written uh several books uh

00:01:13.020 you focus on greek philosophy ancient greek philosophy um and the book i'd like to talk

00:01:17.840 about today is reverence renewing a forgotten virtue um before we get into reverence the

00:01:26.000 virtue of reverence and what it's what it looks like let's talk about virtue in general because

00:01:30.700 it seems like the framework for uh reverence is virtue ethics um for those who aren't familiar

00:01:38.400 with virtue ethics can you give us a summary of what it is and how it differs from other ethical

00:01:43.400 frameworks well most people think of ethics in terms of rules like never tell a lie and

00:01:51.860 rule-based ethics is is is limited because we all know there are circumstances in which it seems right

00:02:00.420 to tell a lie for example when the gestapo's knocking at the door to ask where the refugees are

00:02:06.440 to take them away so i think of virtue ethics as uh adverbial you know the the brave person is one

00:02:15.160 who lives uh bravely or courageously as much as as much as he can and by the way it's nice to

00:02:22.960 talking about virtue on this website because the etymology of virtue is uh the latin word vir for man

00:02:30.720 manliness uh or maturity right i think maybe a better a better word for what we're talking about

00:02:37.560 here i think of a virtue as not a fixed trait because even the courageous person is sometimes

00:02:46.780 going to fail in courage but more as a commitment to live in a certain way to make decisions in a

00:02:52.820 certain way so the virtue ethicist thinks about uh adverbs about how to how to live and how to make

00:03:01.380 decisions and how does one become more virtuous within um virtue ethics i mean aristotle wrote a lot

00:03:09.340 about this in the nicomachean ethics um so how how does one become virtuous well one becomes virtuous

00:03:16.200 according to aristotle uh by uh cult of the patterns of behavior that you see in in virtuous people

00:03:26.740 until those patterns really become yours and you're choosing what to do out of your own

00:03:35.880 character and not simply by imitating others so it's a it's a dual uh process becoming virtuous

00:03:44.760 the uh the chinese theory of virtue there's a fascinating theory of virtue in the chinese

00:03:50.640 tradition that comes down from confucius and mencius and that starts with the idea that every human

00:03:59.400 being is born with uh certain sprouts like like rice sprouts uh that can grow into virtues if they're

00:04:09.420 properly cultivated so for uh confucian ethics the goal of ethics is to cultivate one's own capacity

00:04:19.240 for for living virtuously and one does that in society long story there right and and so i mean

00:04:27.620 the the assumption there i guess in the chinese of you would be that you can't be virtuous without

00:04:33.540 the virtue or like you have i mean so you already have to have that virtue within you in order for

00:04:37.580 you to be able to cultivate it uh there's got to be something for you to cultivate and i i think if

00:04:45.720 you were born uh without any uh sprout of uh bridge or or reverence or uh justice that it would be very

00:04:55.280 hard for you to to develop it that what perhaps impossible you'd be a sociopath in becoming uh more virtuous

00:05:06.460 you really need to find what what's in you that's already right uh and and and make that better

00:05:15.300 and and the same in interacting with other people you need to find what what they have in them uh that

00:05:22.900 is is moving in the right direction and try to uh cultivate that and bring that forward okay so let's

00:05:30.160 talk about the virtue of of reverence um because i think we've all heard of you know i think when people

00:05:34.740 think virtues they think courage justice um wisdom um but people don't think of reverence um we often

00:05:45.660 associate reverence with religion but you argue that it's not an exclusively religious virtue so how do

00:05:52.800 you define reverence so that it's not exclude not exclusively in the domain of religion or faith

00:05:58.300 well let me start with the opposite of reverence i think the opposite of reverence is what the greeks

00:06:04.380 call hubris which is the overweening pride or arrogance of a man who who really thinks he has

00:06:14.940 god-like attributes if you think you can never go wrong if you think you're invulnerable if you think

00:06:21.700 that you've been so successful that success will follow you all your life you're falling into hubris

00:06:30.080 reverence is the virtue that protects you from that felt recognition of of human

00:06:37.840 limitations a felt recognition of really what it is to be human and so i mean it is so but it's not

00:06:46.500 humility though right i mean it's even though it's the opposite of hubris reverence isn't humility per

00:06:51.120 se right because i think the opposite of humility is pride and pride is often a good thing uh so i i i

00:07:00.100 some years ago gave a talk on reverence at a at a meeting of uh roman catholics and and nuns and i was

00:07:08.860 asked this question about humility and i said that i think uh people often preach uh humility to those

00:07:17.440 whom they want to uh bow down to them uh and the uh the nuns all nodded they they were tired of being

00:07:25.600 told to be more humble and a great soul is reverence but it's not compatible with abject humility and i

00:07:35.340 believe in your book you you kind of define reverence in terms of feelings right uh it reminded

00:07:40.100 me you're definitely i think you have a good definition it reminded me of the definition of

00:07:43.720 practical wisdom or uh i forgot the greek word for it um but it's like having the right feelings

00:07:48.960 at the right time for the right reason so reverence seems to be based in feelings right

00:07:56.020 i think all of the virtues are based in feelings and it's because they're based in feelings

00:08:03.100 they they motivate us there's not much motivational power in a rule but if you have in you a strong

00:08:12.920 feeling uh to of courage or a strong feeling of reverence that is motivating feelings make us

00:08:20.540 do things uh shame makes us run away courage makes us stand up anger makes us want to uh reverence

00:08:30.220 uh helps us uh feel awe in the face of something that is a greater power than we are uh the transcendent

00:08:39.320 uh for example so certainly reverence can be connected with religion because the reverent person is

00:08:48.100 uh feels awe at the that the thought of god but i don't think the only transcendent object

00:08:58.200 uh for which we should feel awe is there are other transcendents uh around us we we might feel awe

00:09:07.740 in the presence of nature we might feel awe uh in the presence of at the thought of justice as an ideal

00:09:16.040 and so on yeah i mean those are good examples of non particularly non-religious examples of things

00:09:22.780 you can be reverent too but i think you also talk you can be reverent towards you know even political

00:09:27.600 institutions and that's i know that might be a hard pill for people to swallow in this day and age when

00:09:31.580 they might be cynical about our political institutions but reverence is some that's something you could

00:09:36.800 possibly give reverence to well the our constitution is an interesting case and so is our declaration of

00:09:45.840 independence i don't feel reverence for the document in either case but i do feel reverence for the idea

00:09:53.660 behind it i just was reading a wonderful book by danielle allen called our declaration about the

00:10:00.560 declaration of independence this is an african-american woman finding in the declaration of independence 0.92

00:10:07.180 a concept of equality that she can share well the authors of that document weren't thinking of it that 0.51

00:10:15.200 way at all but she found in the document a commitment to the idea which she uh for which she does feel

00:10:23.180 reverence obviously and is reverence um a public or private virtue or is it both i i think it's both

00:10:31.860 uh i think it's a public virtue in that reverence is expressed in ceremonies that bear with other people

00:10:42.180 i think it helps a great deal in developing any virtue to to share it with other people and in the case of

00:10:50.320 of of reverence whenever we are sharing a ceremony and there are many different kinds of ceremony they're

00:10:59.100 not all religious whenever we're sharing in a ceremony with other people we are in fact

00:11:04.960 of varying a kind of reverence because when you're conducting a ceremony with the appropriate

00:11:10.820 feelings are recognizing your own uh limitations with respect to that ceremony you're not going to

00:11:20.360 interrupt the ceremony or step into the space uh that is occupied by the ceremony and so on

00:11:27.500 now there's a long interesting story about ceremony and reverence yeah we'll get to that in here in a

00:11:33.260 bit um so i mean why is reverence important because i think in this day and age you know if reverence

00:11:38.260 is sort of this recognizing your limitations and having um you know and avoiding hubris i mean it

00:11:45.600 seems like our day and age is just like no you know like we are limitless we can do whatever we want

00:11:50.200 we can conquer anything if we put our mind to it and our will to it um so why would reverence

00:11:58.460 be an important counter to that um that feeling that we have to like try to be limitless in our lives

00:12:05.940 well i think it's important because without reverence we are vulnerable to fall into hubris

00:12:13.280 hubris leads to overreaching and overreaching to catastrophe the greeks understood this very well

00:12:21.000 that's the kernel of tragic wisdom and we've seen examples of this i think uh the united states after

00:12:30.300 what it believed to be a triumphant success cold war uh went on a a rampage of hubristic decisions

00:12:40.920 uh we we deregulated important elements of the economy which produced the crash of 08 but we invaded

00:12:48.940 afghanistan and iraq uh there of course are controversies about these but i think it's fairly

00:12:57.840 clear now that the the idea that we could by force of arms create a friendly democracy in iraq uh was

00:13:07.840 full of hubris it was a disastrous decision and a good example of a failure of reverence in in high

00:13:17.800 places oh yeah well yeah that was interesting the point you made that um hubris is most we're most

00:13:24.060 susceptible to hubris in the the point of victory i think napoleon even talked about that he said the

00:13:29.400 most dangerous moment in battle is the moment of victory because that's when people that's when

00:13:34.600 soldiers can get a little crazy and just go on a rampage or they'll get overconfident and let their

00:13:39.940 guard down a bit well and think of napoleon uh believing that he could conquer up and hitler

00:13:49.420 having the same view of thinking that he could send an army into russia and bring it to its knees

00:13:55.080 both uh decisions led to catastrophes for the invading armies so i mean we just talked about

00:14:03.840 reverence on a uh a meta level of a very public level i mean but let's go on to the individual how can

00:14:09.780 reverence make us you know better parents or better citizens or better uh you know teachers for

00:14:17.260 example well i think a very important virtue for parents and teachers and for anybody who has

00:14:24.340 authority over others it's valuable to be able to remember at each point that you're not a god

00:14:34.860 that you can be wrong that you need to listen to other people who don't listen our parents who may

00:14:43.760 very well find themselves seriously at odds with their children and i see examples of this every year

00:14:52.080 in my among my own students if they have parents who are who are not listening to them there can be

00:14:58.140 very serious breaks uh it can lead to uh catastrophes for the for the family and the students a student who

00:15:07.280 who can't tell his parents that uh he wants he doesn't want to go to medical school

00:15:14.100 he might have no other recourse than to fail all his courses i've seen that happen that's a self-destructive

00:15:23.000 result a student who cannot tell his parents that he's gay may take his life and i've seen that

00:15:32.080 sad result too and that's because of a lack of reverence on the part of this it's uh very sad to

00:15:40.240 watch that teachers also i think need to be able to listen and remember that they're not divine

00:15:47.160 yeah and that can be hard whenever you have a class full of people in there who are forced to

00:15:52.340 listen to you right there right and get to your head um so you mentioned uh we've mentioned the

00:15:59.600 greeks and the ancient chinese and about their insights about reverence why did they think and

00:16:07.320 write so much about the virtue of reverence and why was it important to them reverence was important

00:16:13.720 in the confucian tradition i think for two reasons one is that uh ceremony was very much built into

00:16:23.000 this culture from the beginning and i think a large part of confucius motivation in trying to

00:16:31.060 introduce ethical reforms in that early period was that he felt that ceremonies were being conducted

00:16:37.880 uh merely by rote without any sense of their their meaning without any feeling for what they meant

00:16:45.620 so he said for example about uh filial piety about uh he said uh so the son uh gives food to his elderly

00:16:56.980 parents uh any better than the the man the owner who gives food to his dog the difference would be in

00:17:04.440 the feeling of reverence that accompanied the act of piety and so on so it was very important for

00:17:11.140 them in connection with ceremony i think it was also important to the chinese because chinese culture

00:17:17.800 was traditionally very hierarchical and i think the more hierarchical the culture the more important

00:17:25.400 it is that people high up in the hierarchy recognize and are frequently reminded that they're not gods

00:17:34.200 and part of the purpose of ceremony in chinese political life i think was to remind the emperor

00:17:40.840 and other high up people that there was something to which they were subordinate so the emperor was

00:17:46.880 called the son of heaven uh one way of reminding him he's not god and in the ancient greeks i mean why

00:17:54.280 why why was reverence so important to them why was reverence so important for the for the greeks yes

00:18:00.860 i think it was important for the greeks uh for different reasons the greek life was never so

00:18:08.160 ceremonial and it wasn't so hierarchical the greeks i think were uh resistant to hierarchy right from

00:18:15.580 homeric times we see the soldiers trying to rebel against the generals in the beginning of homer's

00:18:21.900 but as the greeks developed uh democratic institutions it became very important for them

00:18:31.920 to recognize the difference between a leader and a tyrant and the difference is reverence

00:18:38.220 that shows up a lot in greek literature tyrant is full of hubris inflamed by hubris he overreaches

00:18:47.500 and stumbles and there's a disaster for him and sometimes for his people as well whereas the

00:18:54.380 leader out of reverence recognizes his humanity recognizes the humanity of others and is a more

00:19:04.120 equal part of the community so for greeks i think it was part of the democratic thinking that's

00:19:09.420 interesting so there's like two different political systems one very hierarchical one more democratic but

00:19:14.880 both relied on reverence to to keep them going that's how i see it yeah and yeah in the ancient

00:19:21.920 greeks you're right they did write a lot about reverence i mean i think the the tragedies it's all

00:19:26.300 it's all about reverence when you get down to it i think so right i mean oedipus rex you know he

00:19:33.140 this guy that's when he became a tyrant when he just killed that guy on the road that ended up being

00:19:38.960 his dad didn't show reverence there um and then i guess uh antigonea is that the one where

00:19:45.900 the guy couldn't bury the lady couldn't bury her brother right yeah all acts of hubris um

00:19:53.680 it's really it's interesting so let's talk about this you you say uh reverence is a forgotten virtue

00:19:59.660 why is that why have why has reverence become a forgotten virtue in our day and age well i think

00:20:06.060 there are two reasons why especially uh in american culture uh reverence is is forgotten

00:20:14.160 uh one of them is that we have forgotten the importance of ceremony and that has something

00:20:21.520 to do with the revolution in christianity that that the reformation represents protestants uh increasingly

00:20:30.520 uh have rejected uh have rejected ceremony which they associated with the catholics that they were

00:20:36.400 rejecting well i think that's part of it is uh the intensely protestant nature of our of our culture

00:20:45.360 and i say that as somebody who grew up in a protestant tradition but i think it's also due to our

00:20:52.140 a cultural commitment to rejecting hierarchy i think there's a sad faith in that because there's

00:21:00.780 hierarchy everywhere you look in our society we're not free here hierarchy and yet uh we like to think

00:21:09.140 that we are and so we uh we forget uh that very often we are in positions of great authority that require

00:21:18.520 reverence reverence it's interesting that we know we don't we don't have much of a hierarchy

00:21:24.020 um in our culture today but you know even the greeks they didn't have really hierarchy but yet they

00:21:29.360 were able to still cultivate reverence so why i mean why were they able to do it but we're not able to

00:21:34.540 i think that the ancient greeks had a uh uh had a culture that was infused with the tragic wisdom

00:21:46.480 that uh arrogance leads to overreaching which leads to a fall and we just don't seem to have that

00:21:56.240 in our culture and i i think that perhaps we don't have it in the culture because our history has been

00:22:02.580 one of of successful overreaching from one side of the country to the other uh america has uh has been

00:22:13.940 uh very successful in in reaching what were supposed to be its boundaries the the war of

00:22:22.240 independence was partly about pushing back the boundaries that the british had set for westward

00:22:28.080 expansion just don't like limits we don't like human limits at all we we i think are are reluctant

00:22:35.260 in our culture to accept human limitations i think we've reached the which we're going to be in

00:22:41.660 more and more serious trouble okay if we don't if we don't recognize our limitations okay let's go

00:22:48.620 back to this idea of of ceremony and in the reverent life and why why is ritual and ceremony

00:22:55.880 an important part of reverence i i think we we develop reverence by by speaking the the language of

00:23:05.200 reverence which is the language of ritual and ceremony uh when when you meet and shake hands

00:23:12.560 uh we don't think of that as anything terribly special uh but it is actually it seems to me

00:23:19.960 expressing a measure of reverence here we are in uh together we're we're both human uh we greet each

00:23:28.160 other we shake hands uh when a student puts up her hand in the classroom uh before speaking so as not

00:23:35.740 to interrupt another uh that's an act of of reverence a very small and subtle one but a very important

00:23:42.980 one because it it is a a little ceremony that that greases uh oils that the gears of human interaction

00:23:54.380 and i mean but as you said uh confucius was worried about the possibility of having ceremony

00:24:01.020 without reverence um sort of sort of just wrote things so i mean how do you ensure that these

00:24:07.780 rituals or ceremonies that we that pop up in our life whether big or small um maintain a a measure of

00:24:14.800 reverence within them that's hard and i think it's also really important i think to maintain

00:24:22.280 meaningful uh ritual and ceremony we have to be prepared to change as society itself changes

00:24:30.920 what it what it means uh to be a friend in terms of of ritual and ceremony is being changed by the

00:24:42.140 internet and i as an older person don't know this very well but there are of course rituals that are

00:24:51.680 involved in the social media that that are being lifted without much forethought but i think they're

00:24:58.660 probably very important to the ongoing uh relationships that that develop on these these on these new media

00:25:07.800 we have to be prepared for all kinds of of change if you if you just stick with the same

00:25:17.260 ceremonies and let them become dry and brittle and stiff then of course the feeling is going to fall

00:25:26.060 away from them and we'll go look for something else a lot of traditional forms of of christian

00:25:34.060 worship are are falling away among protestants especially and we have new styles of new styles of

00:25:40.780 worship new styles of church and probably that's what we we need is a willingness uh to evolve

00:25:47.720 new new ceremonies or to find ways of of infusing old ceremonies with new meaning so i mean i guess it

00:25:57.060 is possibly it's so reverence to tradition uh you can have it but you don't want it to be rigid because

00:26:02.280 that's what will lead to that sort of calcified empty ritual calcified is a good word yeah and so i mean

00:26:08.020 i guess you could use your reverence towards tradition to maybe yes create something new

00:26:12.960 revitalize using that reverence or tradition to revitalize and make something new exactly well put

00:26:18.580 i think that's it i mean it reminds me we had um uh ted linden on the pod he's a classicist he wrote

00:26:25.020 the ghost of war and he talked about the ancient greek's reverence towards homer and the iliad and the

00:26:32.540 the epic poems and that's where they sort of use that reverence to create new ways of fighting so

00:26:39.120 the phalanx was inspired by that but it was new it was radically different from what how they fought

00:26:44.860 in the iliad but they had this reverence towards it that allowed them to create this new form of battle

00:26:50.040 more a ritualized form of battle yes for the for the greeks especially uh war did involve

00:26:57.480 uh ritual they went into battle singing the pian they uh they went into battle in line each man

00:27:05.700 carrying a fairly small shield which protected both himself and this and the arm of the man

00:27:13.720 to his left this is a concept that that i think is is still important in in our own in our own

00:27:23.160 military part of the goal of military training is to teach people through military ceremony

00:27:28.620 how to be interdependent and how to function together in a unit and have a reverent attitude

00:27:36.140 towards war yes which is kind of interesting people wouldn't think you'd need reverence in war but

00:27:42.340 the greeks are very conscious about being reverent even in war well yes and they're conscious of the

00:27:48.720 of how easy it is in war uh to overreach the iliad is is is wonderful about you know patroclus

00:27:57.660 uh goes off into battle wearing achilles armor which is already a little act of hubris

00:28:03.940 and is so successful partly because people think he is achilles and run away from him

00:28:09.900 so successful that he goes too far and because he goes too far he's killed and then the man who kills

00:28:17.840 him hector is so puffed up with his own uh success at killing patroclus and and winning various other

00:28:25.220 aspects of the battle that he stays out on the battlefield after his wise younger brother advises

00:28:33.300 him to go in and that leads to disaster so they were well aware that you need to keep yourself

00:28:40.700 be under control in battle and realize that you are mortal that you can be hurt and that the people

00:28:48.840 around you can be hurt um so you mentioned shame earlier um and you you talk about shame a lot

00:28:54.880 throughout the book and shame i feel like today in our culture has a a stigma to it like shame is bad

00:29:01.500 you don't want to feel shameful there's shame is talk shame is toxic uh is the thing you say but you argue

00:29:07.860 that shame it plays a vital role in the irreverent life why is that well shame i think uh think of as

00:29:19.080 as alien to our our culture uh and and along with that we pretend that honor is not very important

00:29:27.280 either honor and shame are the a pair of values good and good and bad in my experience as a

00:29:37.320 manager and and leader in the academic sphere i was a chairman and a dean and a director i've had

00:29:45.620 lots of administrative jobs in my experience people are more concerned about honor and shame in the

00:29:53.540 workplace than they are about their salaries salaries matter partly because of the lower salary

00:30:01.420 uh is thoughtful and the higher salary is thought of as an honor i think we're shame is is is the most

00:30:10.060 one of the most powerful motivators in human life shame gets you moving the coach will get the player

00:30:18.560 moving by shaming the player in the in in warfare uh people go forward into danger because they're ashamed

00:30:28.480 in the face of their friends uh to run away shame is enormously important but shame of course can lead

00:30:38.200 us to do terrible things so i think it's important to recognize that the reverent person uh feels shame

00:30:47.840 at the right time and in the right way and for the right reasons one reason hector dies in the iliad is

00:30:55.280 that he's ashamed to go in and face the brother who advised him to stay out and shame leads to death which leads

00:31:03.280 to the destruction of troy so shame can be terribly harmful so we're right to be nervous about it but so can

00:31:12.160 other emotions here can be harmful anger makes you want to hit people and anger can be very harmful on the other

00:31:18.880 hand we need to have a capacity for anger because when things are are wrong when wrong things are done

00:31:26.260 to us or people around us if we don't feel anger i think we're seriously morally deficient

00:31:32.720 but like shame anger and felt in the right way in the right amount and at the right people and so on

00:31:40.320 so the virtuous person is the person who's committed uh to uh directing these emotions in the in the best

00:31:48.980 way so i think this raises an interesting point so shame and honor they're they're social feelings

00:31:54.160 right they're feelings you get because other people are watching you um yes and so i mean that i guess

00:32:01.700 that suggests that reverence it's hard to live a reverent life by yourself as a as a hermit um i mean

00:32:09.940 do you need to be embedded in a community to actually you know live the full expression of

00:32:15.940 reverence i believe that yes i think for for all of the virtues you need to get it in a community

00:32:22.020 it's we are social animals we need each other for i mean we to be human is to speak a language you

00:32:33.080 can't speak a line yourself you need to have other people in order to learn a language let alone

00:32:39.240 actually speak it so i i think being part of a community is essential to be a human being

00:32:48.040 the greeks again who have such an influence on my thought the greeks felt that a human being

00:32:54.600 was a social animal and therefore couldn't really live a human life as as a as a recluse entirely a god

00:33:05.120 would have the power uh to live alone and they thought that wild beasts might be able to live

00:33:12.160 alone they might i think they were wrong about the beasts but the thought that you could live a

00:33:18.180 fully human life completely on your own without being part of a community is the hubris of thinking

00:33:25.780 that you have divine powers we're not divine we need each other and do those individuals you're

00:33:31.360 embedded with like in order to be reverent do they also need to be reverent i mean what if you live

00:33:35.640 in a community that just full of irreverence um would it be possible to cultivate that virtue within

00:33:42.500 yourself surrounded by other individuals who don't have reverence i think there's a lot of luck

00:33:50.680 in living a virtuous life if you're born into a slave holding society and you and you're taught 0.88

00:33:59.520 to treat other human beings with violence and contempt it will be hard for you to be a good person

00:34:06.400 if you're born into a society that has uh only contempt for ceremony and and politeness it will be hard

00:34:21.200 for you to cultivate reverence perhaps impossible i think if you're born into a society that is

00:34:29.500 deeply vicious in one way or another you're morally unlucky i sometimes use the example of

00:34:38.380 courage suppose i i want to be courageous and i've been put in a military unit that is commanded

00:34:45.860 by a coward in which everyone is a coward i want to practice acts of courage to become more courageous

00:34:53.240 but i simply cannot practice courage by myself if i if i run up alone against the machine gun nest i do 0.99

00:35:02.120 something really stupid and i'll be killed and that's not courage courage is not stupid you need 0.95

00:35:08.600 to develop a virtue you need to be able to practice it and to practice it you need to be with other 1.00

00:35:16.120 people who allow you to practice it who give you a context in which you can practice it but we we need

00:35:22.840 virtuous communities

00:35:25.000 so you need to be thoughtful about the people you associate with if you want to cultivate this virtue

00:35:29.320 that's that's true i was i was pleased one of my one of my daughters actually chose her high school 0.99

00:35:37.000 with this in mind she thought if she went to high school a she would have to be part of a community

00:35:44.680 that would good for her so she went to high school b instead recognizing i think intuitively

00:35:52.280 the importance of the kind of community you're in for the kind of person you could that film that make

00:35:57.880 you feel proud as a as a dad and as a philosophy professor oh yes yeah i bet um so we've been

00:36:07.160 talking about sort of around the edge of things you can do to cultivate reverence in your life um

00:36:12.120 you know take part in ceremonies recognize your limitations but i mean your books about renewing

00:36:17.480 reverence i mean any i know it's it's hard to boil this down into like you know five talking points

00:36:23.800 but uh any things or actions that people can do to cultivate a more reverent life within themselves

00:36:32.600 well first of all i think we should pay attention there are all inspiring experiences that we can so

00:36:44.600 easily have uh the uh uh the beauty uh of there's beauty in in things that we normally think of as

00:36:53.240 as being ugly uh you you you walk across a road and there's a little oil spill and there's a

00:36:59.000 a rainbow in a puddle uh that could be awe inspiring we can practice awe by paying attention to all the

00:37:07.240 beauties around us by by noticing the beauty in the most common uh sparrow that flies across in front of us

00:37:17.080 we can pay attention to the sunrise and the sunset everyone gets one each of those a day and they're

00:37:25.880 awe inspiring but paying attention is the first thing i think uh the second talking point i would have

00:37:34.760 about uh renewing reverence is finding occasions to speak which of languages of reverence finding

00:37:42.440 ceremonial occasions of various kinds of i think music is one of the languages of reverence poetry can reach

00:37:51.960 of reverence

00:37:55.160 you don't have to go to a church or or synagogue or a mosque or a temple to have the kind of experience

00:38:04.360 reverence that that that will cultivate reverence for you with you uh and then perhaps the third thing is to

00:38:16.440 keep asking yourself uh what you're doing uh pay attention to your your own actions and what they

00:38:26.440 what they mean it would be very dangerous to suppose well i've uh i've been a reverent person all my all

00:38:35.560 my life and i am safely ensconced in in my virtue i don't have to worry about this anymore that that's

00:38:43.320 very dangerous that's hubris in fact so you need to be aware of yourself and of what you're doing on

00:38:50.520 each occasion and never feel that you've got it made uh morally speaking think of reverence as a

00:38:58.360 continuing commitment and not something you achieve and then with other people i i talk about asking the

00:39:06.680 the right question the most irreverent seeming person prize somewhere in him or her a little

00:39:17.960 sprout a little green growing sprout of reverence that you could identify if you ask the right

00:39:23.640 question so ask the right questions that's great well professor woodruff this has been a great

00:39:27.640 conversation um is there any place anywhere people can go to learn more about your work well uh i don't

00:39:33.560 have a website but my books are all on amazon and they're all in print and just so you can find

00:39:41.480 there's a there's a little page at amazon with my my things on it the most recent book is a second

00:39:49.400 edition of the book on reverence which has a new chapter on renewing reverence and also a chapter on

00:39:56.040 sacred respecting what is sacred in other people's traditions which i think is very important and also

00:40:02.680 a chapter on compassion which i believe is a very important part of reverence and then the

00:40:08.200 the the most recent book uh before that revision is called the ajax dilemma which is really about

00:40:14.600 reverence leadership well very good well we'll be sure to link to that on our our website when

00:40:19.000 we publish the podcast so people can find those um professor woodruff this has been a great

00:40:23.080 conversation thanks so much for your time it's been a pleasure my guest today is paul woodruff he's

00:40:26.680 a professor of humanities at the university of texas he's also the author of the book reverence

00:40:30.760 renewing a forgotten virtue and it's available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere

00:40:42.440 well that wraps up another edition of the art of manliness podcast for more manly tips and advice

00:40:46.840 make sure to check out the art of manliness website at artofmanliness.com our show is edited

00:40:51.240 by creative audio lab here in tulsa oklahoma if you have any audio editing needs or audio production

00:40:56.200 needs check them out at creativeaudiolab.com if you enjoy the show i'd appreciate it if you give

00:41:00.360 us a review on itunes or stitcher it really helps us out as always thank you for your continued support

00:41:04.360 and until next time this is brett mckay telling you to stay manly

00:41:30.360 so

00:41:31.000 You

The Art of Manliness - October 11, 2016

#242： The Forgotten Virtue of Reverence

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