Wisdom

“It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: the music is nothing if the audience is deaf.” - Walter Lippmann

I agree with Walter Lippmann; it does require wisdom to understand wisdom. First of all, wisdom is having knowledge, experience, and good judgment. So it could be said that anyone who has knowledge and experience, as well as good judgment, also has wisdom. This means that a person could be wise about history, theater, math, street life, or any other subject. But it would be impossible for one who does not know a subject well to understand or fully appreciate it.

On the other hand, I disagree with Lippmann’s statement that “the music is nothing if the audience is deaf.” What he is implying is that if the audience has no knowledge about music then they cannot understand the wisdom it brings. To me the ‘music’ can be any kind of subject, and the ‘audience’ could represent anyone who is not knowledgeable about the subject. I believe the person who is listening to the ‘music’ and who does not fully understand what the ‘music’ is saying, is not ‘deaf’ but simply does not fully appreciate it. So, the ‘music’ is not nothing, rather the ‘deaf’ person listening just does not fully understand the true sound of the ‘music.’

For example, my grandmother is a very wise person. She seems to fully understand the world around her. As a child I had no idea what she was saying and thought, ‘here she goes again.’ But as I have grown I have started to see that my grandmother was correct in many ways. I was the ‘deaf’ person listening to her ‘music’ about life. I understood that she was trying to help me see the world differently, but I didn’t understand what she was saying. I did not have the experiences and knowledge that I needed to fully understand what my grandmother was sharing. As I have become more experienced, I can better follow what my grandmother is saying. So, I have become less ‘deaf’ to the ‘music.’

I believe that there are many kinds of wisdom and it does take wisdom to understand wisdom. But I also believe that even though people may be ‘deaf’ to the wisdom, to some degree they are still learning from it. They are not yet able to understand how wise the wisdom really is.

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