The problem of the prodigiously-praised professor

Over the past three years I have written on countless occasions of the importance of humility—one of the key middot in Pirkei Avot—and the correlative need to avoid pride. These priorities are not found exclusively in Avot. Rambam, in Hilchot De’ot, urges us not to seek out the middle path between humility and pride but to head as far as possible towards humility. The Maharal touches on a similar theme in his Netivot Olam, when he explains that only through cultivating humility to its furthest point can one truly make space for one’s Torah learning. This is all very well in theory, but how does one do this in practice?

Last week I was invited to speak at a celebration to mark the 20th anniversary of a phenomenally successful and much-loved weblog on a somewhat improbable subject: the law and practice relating to intellectual property as seen through the eyes of two fictitious cats. As a co-founder of this blog I was able to talk about its early days. The other speakers discussed a variety of legal topics, but they also had some very splendid things to say about me. At first I rather enjoyed this praise-laden attention, but as the afternoon continued I started to become rather uncomfortable. I was aware that I was filling up with pride, and I was troubled that this experience was so compellingly enjoyable. Indeed, rather against my will I found myself rating the various praises I had received in terms of quite how great or important they made me feel.

At this point I started to wonder how one should tackle pride when one feels it so powerfully. I decided to take a reality check in order to persuade myself that I did not deserve the praise I was receiving. Taking an objective view, I established the following points: (i) I was only the co-founder of the blog, not its exclusive originator; (ii) much of the content of the blog came from information and ideas sent in by readers, not from me; (iii) I had not contributed to the blog for nearly eight years, during which time it had become very much more successful and popular than it was when I contributed to it; and (iv) the blog was not indispensable since the world of intellectual property law existed quite happily before it came along and could easily continue to do so if it vanished tomorrow. This reality check did not however do the trick: I felt just as proud of its achievements as if I had written the whole thing myself and was about to be knighted for it. If there was a path from here to achieving humility, I could not see it.

After the event it occurred to me that, if I could not remove my feelings of pride, even though rationally I could challenge my entitlement to feel them, it might yet be possible to justify them. Perhaps this pride was not so dangerous because it related to something I had done in the relatively distant past and was never going to repeat, in a field of activity from which I had long since retired. This line of thought looked quite promising, even though it felt quite like an excuse. But are there in fact more than one type of pride? We learn from Tehillim that the possession of ge’ut, sometimes understood as pride or arrogance, is one of the qualities of God Himself (Tehillim 93:1), which suggests that—like every other quality that is generally bad when found in humans—it has its legitimate outlet, otherwise God would not have created it.

In English, when one speaks of a person “taking pride” in his handiwork, the real meaning is that that person has made some effort to do the best job possible. Rabbi Berel Wein, quoting Rabbi Yisrael Salanter, has described this state as one of acting leshem shamayim, “for the sake of Heaven”, as exemplified by the shoemaker who works hard to make sure that every shoe that receives his attention is made to the highest possible specification. On this basis, perhaps this sort of pride is acceptable because it is not inherently incompatible with humility. When I helped set up the blog and wrote for it, I did it to the best of my ability because I thought it would be useful for others as well as for myself. Is my pride in having done so a legitimate form of pride. I don’t feel that it has distanced me from God or from my Torah learning—but I cannot be sure that this feeling that I’m alright and can live with this pride is in fact a sign that it has already got a detrimental grip on me.

Thoughts, anyone?