Pupil Leader Quotes

You know, if we understand one question rightly, all questions are answered. But we don't know how to ask the right question. To ask the right question demands a great deal of intelligence and sensitivity. Here is a question, a fundamental question: is life a torture? It is, as it is; and man has lived in this torture centuries upon centuries, from ancient history to the present day, in agony, in despair, in sorrow; and he doesn't find a way out of it. Therefore he invents gods, churches, all the rituals, and all that nonsense, or he escapes in different ways. What we are trying to do, during all these discussions and talks here, is to see if we cannot radically bring about a transformation of the mind, not accept things as they are, nor revolt against them. Revolt doesn't answer a thing. You must understand it, go into it, examine it, give your heart and your mind, with everything that you have, to find out a way of living differently. That depends on you, and not on someone else, because in this there is no teacher, no pupil; there is no leader; there is no guru; there is no Master, no Saviour. You yourself are the teacher and the pupil; you are the Master; you are the guru; you are the leader; you are everything. And to understand is to transform what is. I think that will be enough, won't it?

All apostles were disciples. Not all disciples were apostles. Disciples (Greek: mathetes) were pupils, hence, followers. Apostles (Greek: apostolos) were ambassadors, hence, leaders.

My story—the story of the son of Jainulabdeen, who lived for over a hundred years on Mosque Street in Rameswaram island and died there; the story of a lad who sold newspapers to help his brother; the story of a pupil reared by Sivasubramania Iyer and Iyadurai Solomon; the story of a student taught by teachers like Pandalai; the story of an engineer spotted by MGK Menon and groomed by the legendary Prof. Sarabhai; the story of a scientist tested by failures and setbacks; the story of a leader supported by a large team of brilliant and dedicated professionals. This story will end with me, for I have no belongings in the worldly sense. I have acquired nothing, built nothing, possess nothing—no family, sons, daughters.

Passive acceptance of the teacher's wisdom is easy to most boys and girls. It involves no effort of independent thought, and seems rational because the teacher knows more than his pupils; it is moreover the way to win the favour of the teacher unless he is a very exceptional man. Yet the habit of passive acceptance is a disastrous one in later life. It causes man to seek and to accept a leader, and to accept as a leader whoever is established in that position.

What do you want for her?" "Dragon bones." The leader's eyes narrowed even as his pupils turned to vertical slits. The contrasting actions was jarring to see. "That's impossible." Rory lifted a shoulder, casual indifference. "Nothing's impossible. I want them, you want this female. Find me dragon bones, you get her.

He did not see a hero of romance, but a plain man who had done his best-- not a leader of chivalry, but the pupil who had tried to be faithful to his curious master, the magician, by thinking all the time-- not Arthur of England, but a lonely old gentleman who had worn his crown for half a lifetime in the teeth of fate.

The modern State exists not to protect our rights but to do us good or make us good — anyway, to do something to us or to make us something. Hence the new name ‘leaders’ for those who were once ‘rulers’. We are less their subjects than their wards, pupils, or domestic animals. There is nothing left of which we can say to them, ‘Mind your own business.’ Our whole lives are their business.

War and battle' are the opening words of the Gorgias, and the declaration of war against the corrupt society is its content. Gorgias, the famous teacher of rhetoric, is in Athens as the guest of Callicles, an enlightened politician. It is a day of audience. Gorgias receives visitors and is ready to answer all questions addressed to him. Socrates, with his pupil Chaerephon, calls at Callicles’ house in order to see the great man. The ultimate motif of the battle is not statedexplicitly but indicated, as so frequently with Plato, through the form of the dialogue. Gorgias is somewhat exhausted by the stream of visitors and the hours of conversation, and he lets his follower Polus open the discussion; Socrates leaves the opening game to Chaerephon. The battle is engaged in as a struggle for the soul of the younger generation. Who will form the future leaders of the polity: the rhetor who teaches the tricks of political success, or the philosopher who creates the substance in soul and society? The substance of man is at stake, not a philosophical problem in the modern sense. Socrates suggests to Chaerephon the first question: Ask him “Who he is” (447d).

If government had declined to build racially separate public housing in cities where segregation hadn’t previously taken root, and instead had scattered integrated developments throughout the community, those cities might have developed in a less racially toxic fashion, with fewer desperate ghettos and more diverse suburbs. If the federal government had not urged suburbs to adopt exclusionary zoning laws, white flight would have been minimized because there would have been fewer racially exclusive suburbs to which frightened homeowners could flee. If the government had told developers that they could have FHA guarantees only if the homes they built were open to all, integrated working-class suburbs would likely have matured with both African Americans and whites sharing the benefits. If state courts had not blessed private discrimination by ordering the eviction of African American homeowners in neighborhoods where association rules and restrictive covenants barred their residence, middle-class African Americans would have been able gradually to integrate previously white communities as they developed the financial means to do so. If churches, universities, and hospitals had faced loss of tax-exempt status for their promotion of restrictive covenants, they most likely would have refrained from such activity. If police had arrested, rather than encouraged, leaders of mob violence when African Americans moved into previously white neighborhoods, racial transitions would have been smoother. If state real estate commissions had denied licenses to brokers who claimed an “ethical” obligation to impose segregation, those brokers might have guided the evolution of interracial neighborhoods. If school boards had not placed schools and drawn attendance boundaries to ensure the separation of black and white pupils, families might not have had to relocate to have access to education for their children. If federal and state highway planners had not used urban interstates to demolish African American neighborhoods and force their residents deeper into urban ghettos, black impoverishment would have lessened, and some displaced families might have accumulated the resources to improve their housing and its location. If government had given African Americans the same labor-market rights that other citizens enjoyed, African American working-class families would not have been trapped in lower-income minority communities, from lack of funds to live elsewhere. If the federal government had not exploited the racial boundaries it had created in metropolitan areas, by spending billions on tax breaks for single-family suburban homeowners, while failing to spend adequate funds on transportation networks that could bring African Americans to job opportunities, the inequality on which segregation feeds would have diminished. If federal programs were not, even to this day, reinforcing racial isolation by disproportionately directing low-income African Americans who receive housing assistance into the segregated neighborhoods that government had previously established, we might see many more inclusive communities. Undoing the effects of de jure segregation will be incomparably difficult. To make a start, we will first have to contemplate what we have collectively done and, on behalf of our government, accept responsibility.

The bast, dispersing in shreds in the sunset whispered "Time has begun." The son, Adam, stripped naked, descended into the Old Testament of his native land and arrayed himself in bast; a wreath of roadside field grass he placed upon his brow, a staff, not a switch, he pulled from the ground, flourishing the birch branch like a sacred palm. On the road he stood like a guard. The dust-gray road ran into the sunset. And a crow perched there, perched and croaked, there where the celestial fire consumed the earth. There were blind men along the dust-gray road running into the twilight. Antique, crooken, they trailed along, lonely and sinister silhouettes, holding to one another and to their leader's cane. They were raising dust. One was beard-less, he kept squinting. Another, a little old man with a protruding lip, was whispering and praying. A third, covered with red hair, frowned. Their backs were bent, their heads bowed low, their arms extended to the staff. Strange it was to see this mute procession in the terrible twilight. They made their way immutable, primordial, blind. Oh, if only they could open their eyes, oh if only they were not blind! Russian Land, awake! And Adam, rude image of the returned king, lowered the birch branch to their white pupils. And on them he laid his hands, as, groaning and moaning they seated themselves in the dust and with trembling hands pushed chunks of black bread into their mouths. Their faces were ashen and menacing, lit with the pale light of deadly clouds. Lightning blazed, their blinded faces blazed. Oh, if only they opened their eyes, oh, if only they saw the light! Adam, Adam, you stand illumined by lightnings. Now you lay the gentle branch upon their faces. Adam, Adam, say, see, see! And he restores their sight. But the blind men turning their ashen faces and opening their white eyes did not see. And the wind whispered "Thou art behind the hill." From the clouds a fiery veil began to shimmer and died out. A little birch murmured, beseeching, and fell asleep. The dusk dispersed at the horizon and a bloody stump of the sunset stuck up. And spotted with brilliant coals glowing red, the bast streamed out from the sunset like a striped cloak. On the waxen image of Adam the field grass wreaths sighed fearfully giving a soft whistle and the green dewy clusters sprinkled forth fiery tears on the blind faces of the blind. He knew what he was doing, he was restoring their sight. ("Adam")

Mir Dimad (d. 1631) and his pupil Mulla Sadra (d. 1640) founded a school of mystical philosophy at Isfahan, which Majlisi did his best to suppress. They continued the tradition of Suhrawardi, linking philosophy and spirituality, and training their disciples in mystical disciplines which enabled them to acquire a sense of the alam al-mithal and the spiritual world. Both insisted that a philosopher must be as rational and scientific as Aristotle, but that he must also cultivate the imaginative, intuitive approach to truth. Both were utterly opposed to the new intolerance of some of the ulama, which they regarded as a perversion of religion. Truth could not be imposed by force and intellectual conformism was incompatible with true faith. Mulla Sadra also saw political reform as inseparable from spirituality. In his masterpiece Al-Afsan al-Arbaah (The Fourfold Journey), he described the mystical training that a leader must undergo before he could start to transform the mundane world. He must first divest himself of ego, and receive divine illumination and mystical apprehension of God. It was a path that could bring him to the same kind of spiritual insight as the Shii imams, though not, of course, on the same level as they.

329 Leisure and Idleness. - There is an Indian savagery, a savagery peculiar to the Indian blood, in the manner in which the Americans strive after gold: and the breathless hurry of their work- the characteristic vice of the New World-already begins to infect old Europe, and makes it savage also, spreading over it a strange lack of intellectuality. One is now ashamed of repose: even long reflection almost causes remorse of conscience. Thinking is done with a stop-watch, as dining is done with the eyes fixed on the financial newspaper; we live like men who are continually " afraid of letting opportunities slip." " Better do anything whatever, than nothing "-this principle also is a noose with which all culture and all higher taste may be strangled. And just as all form obviously disappears in this hurry of workers, so the sense for form itself, the ear and the eye for the melody of movement, also disappear. The proof of this is the clumsy perspicuity which is now everywhere demanded in all positions where a person would like to be sincere with his fellows, in intercourse with friends, women, relatives, children, teachers, pupils, leaders and princes,-one has no longer either time or energy for ceremonies, for roundabout courtesies, for any esprit in conversation, or for any otium whatever. For life in the hunt for gain continually compels a person to consume his intellect, even to exhaustion, in constant dissimulation, overreaching, or forestalling: the real virtue nowadays is to do something in a shorter time than another person. And so there are only rare hours of sincere intercourse permitted: in them, however, people are tired, and would not only like " to let themselves go," but to stretch their legs out wide in awkward style. The way people write their letters nowadays is quite in keeping with the age; their style and spirit will always be the true " sign of the times." If there be still enjoyment in society and in art, it is enjoyment such as over-worked slaves provide for themselves. Oh, this moderation in "joy" of our cultured and uncultured classes! Oh, this increasing suspiciousness of all enjoyment! Work is winning over more and more the good conscience to its side: the desire for enjoyment already calls itself " need of recreation," and even begins to be ashamed of itself. " One owes it to one's health," people say, when they are caught at a picnic. Indeed, it might soon go so far that one could not yield to the desire for the vita contemplativa (that is to say, excursions with thoughts and friends), without self-contempt and a bad conscience.-Well! Formerly it was the very reverse: it was "action" that suffered from a bad conscience. A man of good family concealed his work when need compelled him to labour. The slave laboured under the weight of the feeling that he did something contemptible :- the "doing" itself was something contemptible. "Only in otium and bellum is there nobility and honour:" so rang the voice of ancient prejudice !

Serbs don’t forget, as the graffito goes, the atrocities that the Croatian ustashas committed against them in World War II. That was repeated in school over and over by history teachers when I was a pupil in Croatia. Many Croats don’t forget the slaughters that the Serb nationalist chetniks committed on the Croatian rural population, although that lesson was passed over in silence in our history lessons. My brother-in-law—who died of stomach cancer, and who had spent the recent war two hundred yards away from the Serb border toward Vukovar, from where his street was shelled almost daily—told me that when he was a child, during World War II, he ran into a ditch full of Croatian peasants massacred by chetniks. He never forgot, and wasn’t even allowed to talk about it because he would be jailed for spreading nationalist propaganda. He told me this in the park after my father’s funeral, at a moment when we were both talking about life, death, and souls. Which is better, to forget or to remember? Of course, to remember, but not to abuse the memories as Serbian leaders have done to spur their armies into aggression against Croats and Muslims. Croats will remember Vukovar. Muslims will remember Srebrenica. And what is the lesson? Not to trust thy neighbor? But that’s perhaps where the trouble began and will resume.

On the sixty-fifth page the rabbis are arguing about King David and his ill-gotten wife Bathsheba, a mysterious biblical tale about which I’ve always been curious. From the fragments mentioned, it appears that Bathsheba was already married when David laid his eyes upon her, but he was so attracted to her that he deliberately sent her husband, Uriah, to the front lines so that he would be killed in war, leaving Bathsheba free to remarry. Afterward, when David had finally taken poor Bathsheba as his lawful wife, he looked into her eyes and saw in the mirror of her pupils the face of his own sin and was repulsed. After that, David refused to see Bathsheba again, and she lived the rest of her life in the king’s harem, ignored and forgotten. I now see why I’m not allowed to read the Talmud. My teachers have always told me, “David had no sins. David was a saint. It is forbidden to cast aspersions on God’s beloved son and anointed leader.” Is this the same illustrious ancestor the Talmud is referring to? Not only did David cavort with his many wives, but he had unmarried female companions as well, I discover. They are called concubines. I whisper aloud this new word, con-cu-bine, and it doesn’t sound illicit, the way it should, it only makes me think of a tall, stately tree. The concubine tree. I picture beautiful women dangling from its branches. Con-cu-bine. Bathsheba wasn’t a concubine because David honored her by taking her as his wife, but the Talmud says she was the only woman David chose who wasn’t a virgin. I think of the beautiful woman on the olive oil bottle, the extra-virgin. The rabbis say that God only intended virgins for David and that his holiness would have been defiled had he stayed with Bathsheba, who had already been married. King David is the yardstick, they say, against whom we are all measured in heaven. Really, how bad can my small stash of English books be, next to concubines? I am not aware at this moment that I have lost my innocence. I will realize it many years later. One day I will look back and understand that just as there was a moment in my life when I realized where my power lay, there was also a specific moment when I stopped believing in authority just for its own sake and started coming to my own conclusions about the world I lived in.

Passive acceptance of the teacher’s wisdom is easy to most boys and girls. It involves no effort of independent thought, and seems rational because the teacher knows more than his pupils; it is moreover the way to win the favour of the teacher unless he is a very exceptional man. Yet the habit of passive acceptance is a disastrous one in later life. It causes men to seek a leader, and to accept as a leader whoever is established in that position. It makes the power of Churches, Governments, party caucuses, and all the other organizations by which plain men are misled into supporting old systems which are harmful to the nation and to themselves. It is possible that there would not be much independence of thought even if education did everything to promote it; but there would certainly be more than there is at present. If the object were to make pupils think, rather than to make them accept certain conclusions, education would be conducted quite differently: there would be less rapidity of instruction and more discussion, more occasions when pupils are encouraged to express themselves, more attempt to make education concern itself with matters in which the pupils feel some interest.

as Plato and his pupil Aristotle understood, the building of empire, any empire, extinguishes democracy. Empire requires a centralized bureaucracy. Its complexity mandates a permanent caste of bureaucrats and military leaders who strip the citizenry of power.

Leaders and disciples, queens and subjects, preachers and pupils - all these are a sign of a sectarian society, all these are a sign of a sick society. No queen, no subject - no leader, no disciple - in love all are one, one is all.

Sonnet of Single Mother There is no greater superpower, In the world than a single mother. Far superior to the world leaders, Is the resolve of a single mother. Wanna learn to build a society? Wanna become a nation builder? Spend a couple of months as pupil, At the feet of a single mother. Want there to be peace and progress? Hand social reins to single mothers. Stand by them as aide with commitment, Lo and behold, the healing appears. A mom empowered is a world empowered. A single mom empowered is creation empowered.

Matajura wanted to become a great swordsman, but his father said he could never learn, because he wasn’t quick enough. So Matajura went to the famous dueler Banzo and asked to become his pupil. “How long will it take me to become a master?” he asked. “Suppose I become your servant, to be with you every minute, how long?” “Ten years,” said Banzo. “My father is getting old,” pleaded Matajura. “Before ten years have passed I will have to return home to take care of him. Suppose I work twice as hard. How long will it take me?” “Thirty years,” said Banzo. “How is that?” asked Matajura. “When I offer to work twice as hard, you say it will take three times as long. Let me make myself clear. I will work unceasingly. No hardship will be too much. How long will it take?” “Seventy years,” said Banzo. “A pupil in such a hurry learns slowly.” Matajura understood. Without asking for any promises in terms of time, he became Banzo’s servant. Three years passed. Matajura cleaned, cooked, washed, and gardened. He was ordered never to speak of fencing or to touch a sword. He was very sad at this, but he had given his promise to the master and resolved to keep his word. One day while Matajura was gardening, Banzo came up quietly behind him and gave him a terrible whack with a wooden sword. The next day in the kitchen, the same blow fell again. Thereafter, day in and day out, from every corner and at any moment, Matajura was attacked by Banzo’s wooden sword. He learned to live on the balls of his feet, ready to dodge at any moment. He became a body with no desires, no thought, only external readiness and quickness. Banzo smiled and started lessons. Soon, Matajura was the greatest swordsman in Japan. THE

After Zeidy’s heavy footfalls fade down the stairs, and I watch from my second-floor bedroom window as my grandparents get into the taxi, I slide the book out from under the mattress and place it reverently on my desk. The pages are made of waxy, translucent paper, and they are each packed with text: the original words of the Talmud as well as the English translation, and the rabbinical discourse that fills up the bottom half of each page. I like the discussions best, records of the conversations the ancient rabbis held about each holy phrase in the Talmud. On the sixty-fifth page the rabbis are arguing about King David and his ill-gotten wife Bathsheba, a mysterious biblical tale about which I’ve always been curious. From the fragments mentioned, it appears that Bathsheba was already married when David laid his eyes upon her, but he was so attracted to her that he deliberately sent her husband, Uriah, to the front lines so that he would be killed in war, leaving Bathsheba free to remarry. Afterward, when David had finally taken poor Bathsheba as his lawful wife, he looked into her eyes and saw in the mirror of her pupils the face of his own sin and was repulsed. After that, David refused to see Bathsheba again, and she lived the rest of her life in the king’s harem, ignored and forgotten. I now see why I’m not allowed to read the Talmud. My teachers have always told me, “David had no sins. David was a saint. It is forbidden to cast aspersions on God’s beloved son and anointed leader.” Is this the same illustrious ancestor the Talmud is referring to? Not only did David cavort with his many wives, but he had unmarried female companions as well, I discover. They are called concubines. I whisper aloud this new word, con-cu-bine, and it doesn’t sound illicit, the way it should, it only makes me think of a tall, stately tree. The concubine tree. I picture beautiful women dangling from its branches. Con-cu-bine. Bathsheba wasn’t a concubine because David honored her by taking her as his wife, but the Talmud says she was the only woman David chose who wasn’t a virgin. I think of the beautiful woman on the olive oil bottle, the extra-virgin. The rabbis say that God only intended virgins for David and that his holiness would have been defiled had he stayed with Bathsheba, who had already been married. King David is the yardstick, they say, against whom we are all measured in heaven. Really, how bad can my small stash of English books be, next to concubines? I am not aware at this moment that I have lost my innocence. I will realize it many years later. One day I will look back and understand that just as there was a moment in my life when I realized where my power lay, there was also a specific moment when I stopped believing in authority just for its own sake and started coming to my own conclusions about the world I lived in.

One incident from Yasuko’s days in the village elementary school was indelibly etched in her memory. She was the head of her class for two or three years in a row, including the time when it happened. Just before graduation the principal asked the pupils how many would go on to attend middle school. Of the twenty pupils from Sunada and Tsukigata only three were able to do so. Those three raised their hands. The other pupils—children of poor tenant farmers, small-time candy store owners, and barkeepers—turned around to look at them, their faces vivid with envy. With everyone’s eyes focused on them the three blushed a little but, as might be expected, they looked proud. Not only was each of the three inferior to Yasuko in grades, they—except for the assistant class leader—were from the bottom half of the class. At that moment Yasuko was assailed by a strange and incomprehensible feeling. She felt she could not bear to explain it away convincingly even within her own heart. Pupils who were much, much worse than she were going on to a higher school! She understood of course that it was because their families had “money,” but understanding alone was not enough to make Yasuko accept it. Similar things had happened a number of times. For instance, when a Hokkaido government director came to inspect their school it was really Yasuko who as head of the class should have delivered the congratulatory address. However, since she did not even have a different kimono to change into, a rich child took her place. The lack of clothes and money also led to her being absent from athletic meets and excursions. But at such times Yasuko, unlike Okei, assumed a scornful expression. She smiled faintly while listening to the rich child read the congratulatory address; and said that only those with nothing better to do wanted to take part in excursions and athletic meets. Unlike Yasuko, Okei often cried at such times, saying it was a terribly cruel and unfair way to treat fellow schoolmates.

Wisdom is the reasoned synthesis and acute application of knowledge to life’s greater goals and meaning. It’s a gift and collective treasure that requires years if not generations of blood, sweat, and tears, trial and error, heroism and tragedy to be honed, survive judgment, and be passed along to new stewards. Wisdom travels from mother to son, father to daughter, teacher to pupil, from master to fellow to apprentice. It is sweetest when given freely and most bitter when taken for granted. We can’t put a price on this invisible commodity. We can only hope to repay those charitable enough to have shared it with us.