Therefore, just as the doctor is said to cause health in the sick man with nature working, so also one is said to cause knowledge in another by the activity of the power of reasoning in that person, and this is called teaching. In other words, since he knows something he is able to cause his students to know those same things through a process which we call “teaching.” Isn’t a teacher supposed to be someone who teaches? And if someone teaches, doesn’t that mean that he has some sort of knowledge which he transfers from himself to a student? And therefore our Lord is reminding us that God alone is to be thanked and praised for being the cause of every good thing we have including our most prized possession, to wit, any small wisdom that we might have? God alone is a teacher in the most interior and prime way. Nonetheless, even I know what it feels like to be intellectually proud! So I can imagine that our Lord might say “do not be called teacher” to me.īut could He have also been saying something else?įor example, could Our Lord have been saying,ĭo not be called teachers, because guess what? There are no teachers among you!Ĭould it be that our Lord is not just using hyperbole, but is rather pointing out that, in the strict sense of the term, there are precisely no teachers among men? In other words, He is saying,Ĭall no man teacher, because God alone has claim to this title. No, I am a ‘teacher’ at a relatively small unknown (and unknown unfairly!) high-school. As a matter of fact, I am not really a professor at all! Nor am I a professor at a tier 2 school, nor a professor at a tier 3 school.
I am not a professor at an Ivy League school. Given that teachers and instructors tend to be intellectually proud, do not be called teachers! Or perhaps, along the same lines, our Lord is simply exhorting us to humility? As if he is saying, So under this interpretation, he might be saying,ĭon’t get puffed up and arrogant because of your various titles, especially those that indicate that you might have some kind of wisdom! “And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from thee”). Now, what exactly is Our Lord saying here? Is this a case of Our Lord using hyperbole as he was sometimes known to do (e.g. Hence the King James version of this same passage reads,Īnd do not be called teachers for One is your Teacher, the Christ. Now it is not only clear from this text (Matthew 23:8), but I have had it on authority from multiple sources that the word ‘Rabbi’ means ‘teacher.’ You have but one teacher, and you are all brothers.
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