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Summary: This book had a profound effect on me. The virtue to achieve.
Comment: I am not sure that we think about reverence out of the context of spirituality. We should. Reverence is all about our relationship with our world, our community, our selves, and our spirituality. It is one thing to talk about being virtuous, it is quite another thing to have reverence and to live within the framework of reverence. And this should be a cornerstone to leadership.
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Summary: Good premise that trails off
Comment: Instead of taking sides in the ongoing debate over the future of our society, this author points out some behavioral methods which have a commonality to all viewpoints in that they are beneficial approaches to any discipline. This is a very mature approach which is unfortunately diluted by his addiction to certain assumptions common to post-Renaissance liberalism in the industrial West, and thus to avoid contradictions he runs his logical ship aground in confusion. However, for the premise and deconstruction of social pretense toward polarized action alone this book is a magnificent introduction to a traditional and natural attribute of worldview: reverence.
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Summary: Interesting Idea but Overworked.
Comment: Paul Woodruff, a Professor of Humanities at the University of Texas, writes about what he maintains we have lost sight of, reverence. While he admits the word is difficult to define, Mr. Woodruff says it "begins in a deep understanding of human limitations; from this grows the capacity to be in awe of whatever we believe lies outside our control--God, truth, justice, nature, even death." If we have reverence, we respect people lower than ourselves; we are kind to children. Woodruff differentiates between religion and reverence. He says that some people the most fervent about their religion do not have reverence. There is reverence outside religion. Reverence moderates war in all times and cultures. Reverent people do not say they speak on the authority of God either. Mr. Woodruff describes how a group of young people without traditional religion can experiene reverence at a memorial service for a friend when they share both their sorrow and silence. The author gives many other examples of reverence or the absence thereof, citing references in both ancient China and ancient Greece as well as calling up the Victorian poet Tennyson.
I bought this book after having seen Mr. Woodruff discussing reverence in an interview by Bill Moyers. I must say that while the book is both thought provoking and thoughtful, it is far too long. The author repeats himself over and over. I could have gotten the point from a chapter or two on the subject in a book of essays or in a long journal article.
Having said that, I was so taken by Mr. Woodruff's comments on The Iliad that I ordered the translation he cites to reread this work for the first time in many years.
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Summary: a book for today, but not only today
Comment: This book is valuable if only for framing the problem of how the strong ought to interact with the weak. As we in the USA approach war with a weaker nation, flush with confidence and righteousness, dismissive of counsel from far and near -- reverence is exactly the virtue most needed, and Woodruff's book makes this plain, even if not directly.This book is not a veiled argument about something current. The reviewer who claimed this is a self-help book apparently only skimmed it, or perhaps has only skimmed self-help books. No contemporary self-help book would, as this one does, ground its claims in the likes of Thucydides, Homer, Euripides, Sophocles, and Tennyson; no self-help book would, as this one does, fail to mention the internet; no self-help book would, as this one does, dare to omit a section on "[topic] in the business world."
Woodruff's book is what it claims to be -- a thoughtful account of what reverence is and why it matters. Since the book's subject is a feeling or a capacity for those feelings, it is inherently difficult to render in precise terms. I believe this accounts for what has been called its repetiveness, but I do not regard this as a flaw. A book characterizing love or courage would need to be similarly repetitive. Woodruff approaches and reapproaches an elusive topic from several perspectives and many literary sources, never pretending to exhaustiveness or rigor.
Readers may share my quibbles as to whether the book successfully distinguishes reverence from respect, modesty and humility; or to put the matter exactly, whether one virtue, reverence, should be considered distinct from and preferable to those values. But by whatever name we might call it -- and surely reverence will do -- the book achieves its aim, to elucidate reverence and call our attention to its rightful place among the virtues.
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Summary: Reverence for Reverence
Comment: "Reverence" is a wonderful book. I highly recommend it for anyone who is concerned about being the best person you can be. I enjoyed the thoughtful discussions about how ethics are not found only among specific religions and that one does not have to be a theist at all to posess the greatist virtues man can posess and share with others. It's nutrality concerning religion is refreshing and, I feel, the only honest way to look at the subject.
I have taken many things from this book that will help me guide my three girls toward their potential to become truely great people.
I am currently living in a tent in the desert and have been very fortunate to have had this book along with me.
