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Fall 2006
Volume 06, Number 1

Newsletter on Teaching Philosophy

Book Reviews

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Lessons of the Masters
George Steiner (Cambridge, MA & London, UK: Harvard University Press 2003)

Reviewed by Rick Heckendorn
Manhattanville College

In Lessons of the Masters, George Steiner looks at the relationships between the master teacher and his disciples through centuries past, beginning with the Greeks, touching upon the Far East, and bringing the relationship to the present. He notes the impact of computer technology, new spiritual movements, women’s increased roles in teaching, and the strong American egalitarianism that contradicts the master teacher’s desire to focus primarily on the gifted disciples among his students. Steiner examines the movement from oral to written instruction and praises the much-discredited sophists with assisting this development. This heavily referenced work deserves a place in every serious educator’s library.

Two initial objections to Steiner’s book may be stated. First, he questions the propriety of paying true teachers for their instruction, and this has limited practicality for today’s teachers. Finding employment elsewhere while teaching is not a practical option for those who are often overwhelmed by the all-consuming demands upon their time. Second, he claims that there exists a ubiquitous sexual interplay between master and students. However, given today’s political climate, with many cases of sexual misconduct perpetrated by teachers, this claim is difficult to view dispassionately.

Despite these objections, Steiner provides a rich narrative of the lives, historical and literary, of master teachers and their craft. He includes Socrates and Jesus as well as less known ones, such as the musical genius Nadia Boulanger, the Hasidic sage the Baal Shem Tov, and the coach of Notre Dame football Knute Rockne. Each of these teachers inspired his students. Seemingly impervious to the influence of money, while not to the power they exerted over their charges, they inspired their followers to hunger for ever-greater understanding and achievement. Socrates taught through questioning and myths, Jesus through parables, Boulanger with her technical mastery, the Baal Shem by virtue of his charisma, and Rockne by revolutionizing the game of football. Each of these performed as teachers extraordinaire who exerted longstanding influence upon his students, and, through them, continue to inspire teachers and students today.

How did these master teachers achieve their success among their students? This is the hook for every teacher in the classroom today. And what lessons does this narrative hold for today’s teachers in public schools? Each teacher that Steiner cites was totally committed to continued learning and living the life of the mind he had chosen. Each lived and taught through example. Each countered students face to face, something that Plato deemed indispensable (p. 33). They generated trust among their students, and even admiration and love: again, the presence and power of eros in teaching. Each master teacher devoted himself totally to the message he valued. Each took responsibility for the internal consistency of his teaching and for the consistency of his teaching with his way of acting. Each master teacher built a community of followers, even wondering at times how they did it: Rabbi Jacob Yitzakh is quoted as saying: "They come to me because I am astonished that they come" (p. 156).

There were also examples cited where disappointments resulted from the master-disciple relationship. Although Husserl was Heidegger’s mentor and friend during the early years of Weimar Germany, Heidegger turned against his former teacher as the disciple surpassed the master. Later in his life, Heidegger’s disciple and lover, Arendt, deserted him to work with another professor until she had to escape the Third Reich, but after World War II she returned to Heidegger and was of great assistance to him. Even as Steiner calls upon all of us to read and reread the masters like Plato, Aristotle, Montaigne, Descartes, and others, he asks us to treat them with great respect at first but then to engage in doubt and possibly rejection. The masters are there to assist us in our own growth as we strive to grasp and go beyond their lessons.

This richly detailed examination of master teachers through the ages offers much to contemporary teachers. It is filled with a deep respect and value of a spirituality that recognizes the worth of individuals who go beyond reasonable expectations to ask more of themselves and their charges as they demonstrate the possibilities of living a life exalted by wisdom. Master teachers do not call for a kind of religious orthodoxy or adherence to any favored dogma, such as religions tend to propagate and require. Instead, Steiner advocates the need for teachers to discover their potential to inspire an awakening among students, similar to the Far East practice of Zen. This new sort of master teacher as spiritual motivator, community builder, and role model is a noble challenge to set before contemporary educators, who could begin to counteract what Steiner refers to as the "emptiness in modernity" that pervades our culture and times (p. 157).

Although Steiner sets before us several different examples of master teachers, he does not advocate a relativist stance. In fact, he sees value in memorizing important texts by heart, anathema to many ardent and free-spirited educators. He would have teachers ask questions as Socrates did, creating a critical spirit in students while also encouraging a spirit of community among them as they strive for deeper understanding. Teachers would be well advised to listen to this advice. This book traces a rich history of the craft of teaching through the many masters whose lives it narrates and comments upon. Steiner’s countless examples attest to his thoughtful analysis of dedicated master teachers, each different, each motivating his students by the force of his person and by his wisdom.

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