The Abbot and the Teacher 3

I’m a college professor. My courses are populated by stronger and weaker students. No surprise. In my previous post on the abbot and the teacher, I said the most pivotal verse from chapter 64 of Benedict’s Rule — for me, at least — is his instruction to the abbot of the monastery to give the stronger monks something to strive for and the weaker monks nothing to fear. It has taken many relationships with an array of students to get this to sink in. 

In 64:7, Benedict writes that the abbot must remember the “nature of the burden” he has been given. From my vantage in the classroom, my students’ education definitely feels like a burden. There’s a lot of carrying to do. There’s a weight. But when I think about my students in light of Benedict’s wisdom here, I have to rethink what I know about burdens. This is why Benedict asks us to keep in mind the nature of the burden. Not all burdens are the same. Some are heavier than others. Some last longer than others. Some are more important than others. I don’t know what it’s like in a monastery, but I know that in my classrooms, the burden of my students’ education is an odd one. 

We carry the burden together, and it is very heavy and awkward. So, it’s a real gift when the stronger students realize they can help me lift it. But the weaker students are those who are afraid they won’t be able to do it, who are distracted by their many other burdens. When the work gets tiresome, I’m tempted to use fear tactics to motivate them to help me carry the load. But every semester, I learn about fear’s impotence. Some of my students don’t want to carry the burden of an education; and there are as many reasons for this lack of desire as there are students. This must be why, in chapter 64, Benedict counsels discretion, moderation, and forethought in the abbot’s assignment of duties to the monks. Both the abbot and the teacher must be attentive to the actual persons under their care. My students are not abstract education receptacles. They are complex persons who have histories and relationships that shape the way they carry the burden with me, if they carry it at all. 

The abbot lives with his monks and has ample opportunity to practice the sort of attention Benedict recommends here. Not so in my courses. My students and I don’t carry the burden together for very long. I get to hand it off to them after a few months. Some gracefully shoulder it and walk away. But some drop it right there. Those who drop it are teaching me how fruitless fear tactics are and how essential personal attention is. Many of them are starved for this sort of attention. And they walk through their education with deep memories of the fear their former teachers have used to motivate them. These are my weakest students, and they are my strongest teachers.