on discipleship

Music: Blonde Redhead: Penny Sparkle (2010)

I am thankful for Robert L. Scott. I am thankful that he mentored and modeled for me what it is to be a scholar as a graduate student. I am thankful he continues to advise over these years. And I'm thankful he came to spend the Thanksgiving holiday in Austin!

Thursday we had a nice, homosocial feast at my place: turkey slowly cooked in a mole-poblano; four cheese macaroni and cheese; homemade bread; fresh garden green salad; cranberries cooked in port; lemon meringue and pecan pie with cardamom ice cream. The wine and beer and bourbon flowed, and verily, we ate until we hurt. (A gallery of our Thanksgiving feast is here).

Last night Barry Brummett (also a Scott advisee) had me and a number of friends over for dinner. At some point in the evening Rod Hart asked those at the table why we were thankful for R.L. Scott. Dana said it was his showing her Cecret Lake in Alta, Utah. Barry said it was the way in which Scott modeled goodness. I said I was grateful for Scott's mentoring, and when pressed, I gave a couple of examples from my graduate school days. For example, I vividly recall an independent study together in which I worked on my first-ever publication. After a series of rejections Scott concluded that, throughout my career, I would be navigating "divided reviews" because of the things I like to study. (He was right).

At one point in the evening R.L. said that we was "proud" of his advisees because they were not his disciples. He said this, slowly, with a voice that Alan Greenspan has worked hard to copy and with a visage reminiscent of Freud. R.L. described the end of the first part of Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which I looked up today. It reads:

When Zarathustra had said these words he became silent, like one who has not yet said his last word; long he weighed his staff in his hand, doubtfully. At last he spoke thus, and the tone of his voice changed.

Now I go alone, my disciples. You too go now, alone. Thus I want it. Verily, I counsel you: go away from me and resist Zarathustra! And even better: be ashamed of him! Perhaps he deceived you.

The man of knowledge must not only love his enemies, he must also be able to hate his friends.

One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil. And why do you not want to pluck at my wreath?

You revere me; but what if your reverence tumbles one day? Beware lest a statue slay you.

You say you believe in Zarathustra? But what matters Zarathustra? You are my believers—but what matter all believers? You had not yet sought yourselves: and you found me. Thus do all believers; therefore all faith amounts to so little.

Now I bid you lose me and find yourselves; and only when you have all denied me will I return to you.

Verily, my brothers, with different eyes shall I then seek my lost ones; with a different love shall I then love you.

And once again you shall become my friends and the children of a single hope—and then shall I be with you the third time, that I may celebrate the great noon with you.

A gallery of our trip to the LBJ museum and Black's BBQ in Lockhart today is here.