In the first half of 2022, Ștefan Antohe, a remarkable mathematics teacher from Bacău was distinguish with the well deserved title of honorary citizen of the town. Having the privilege to be myself his student, at Ferdinand I College from 2003 to 2007, I would like to translate his huge speech the best way I can into English, because I find this to be stunning and to share a lot of wisdom from which many Romanian people, and not limited to our nation, can learn. I have a more technical English knowledge, so maybe not all the poetry behind his speech has the same exact charm in English, but I promise you I’ve did my best to transpose it as much as possible. In the end, his speech in Romanian cannot be fully translated in no other language in the world, because, if we might admit something, as Romanians, is that we have one of the most interesting languages in the world. 🙂
Monumental speech from professor Ștefan Antohe in May 2022
“Maybe best would be, to say nothing more, because beyond my health situation, talking in principle, silence is much more profound than talking. And this is applicable to many nations. Including us, we have the saying: “with patience and silence, the sour grapes become honey”. Silence is very important! Blaga, who confronted himself with an own silence, not speaking absolutely no word until the age of four, neither “mom”, nor “dad” even… there are stories about him that his mother was praying to exchange anything from her, just for her son to be able to prattle at least, because other children would say he is mute… She was standing and crying in front of the icon, and when the little Lucian Blaga saw her, he approached, with his little hand in front of his eyes, and asked: “Why do you cry, mama, because I don’t speak?”
From not speaking at all until that moment, at a sudden, he started spoken in phrases. He even says in one of his poetries: “Lucian Blaga is mute as a swan”. Do you see? The difference the difference between a swan and a goose stands in silence. The nobility of silence, puts the swan in another zone, comparing to a goose. Even if it said also, that the geese saved the Capitol… And this is not only promoted by Blaga, it is engrained in at worldwide level. A Japanese is saying: “Better not tot talk, because I have more time to think”, and he always look smiling at a human being, and he says: “what do I have to learn from this person?” All our life we learn. If I ever tried to influence my former students with something, I wanted to inspire them in thinking exactly this; that all their lives is a continuous learning process, and that learning is a charming thing, full of grace!
Maybe Boris Pasternak was not saying by accident: “in all, God, I would like to reach the final meaning, the essence of the long path and the essence of the soul, mainly”. Not only Blaga… If you remember, Goga has the troubling poetry: “Your silence from the first of nights”. In which verses he says something like: “Do you remember that very night? A humid, blue night… / For all our insanity, only our silence was speaking / From then, so many nights have passed with sweet whispers and sweet words / From all that happened, too less I can remember / But until the very last moment, charming will stand / Your silence from the first of nights, which will forever speak to me”…
Though, Blaga has the merit of creating a kind of silence theory. For example, in a poetry, he presents a generation succession: a child who plays. His rationale is playing. We should also pay more attention on how children play. Maybe from all the seasons of our existence, childhood is the most charming… The second is a “youngster singing”; his rationale is love. An elder keeps quiet: “My love and play are wisdom”. The wisdom being the spiritual part of all things. A human being, in general, chases physical and spiritual nourishment, one does not suffice. For sure, in the first part, material, and in many historical periods, it was revealed that matter triumphs over spirit… In the first part, people tend to concentrate in making more money, neglecting even health and everything, to gain wealth, but this is not enough…
Humans also want wisdom and honor. Wisdom provided Humanity the possibility to live in tolerance, to make that compromise which is not compromising, to be more oriented towards extraordinary things. It is said that a wise man is at no point able to cope with tangled situations, because he doesn’t tangle ad initium! Einstein was saying: “An intelligent man is solving a problem, but a wise man is avoiding it!” You should not get to that problem! It is very important to see in life an equilibrium among all. It is indeed, very important! Still, I do say that from all spiritual desires that a man can have, the honor is on the highest ranking. Maybe not by accident, even if I am not feeling well at all, I wanted to join you here because the event it is about the word “honor”.
Honor represents the supreme thing. Schopenhauer was saying: “The honor is the exterior conscience” – how other see you, and what kind of respect you get for it. And the “conscience is your inner honor”. Sleepless nights in which you only think if you crossed even a small fraction from that honor code. To be in honorability, it is for those who made the big passing a funeral. I want to thank you so much, because I make my last steps, before my last breath of air, on a alley of honor. It is a type of Heaven on earth. Of course, who enters Heaven has a few questions:
- Do I deserve to be here? Of course, everybody raises this question: in a succession of honor, do I deserve to be here? A human can be good, sincere, generous, but perfect he cannot be… I mean, there are mistakes made, with will or without will, along ones life…
- The second question you are asking yourself, when you are in Heaven, or on the alley of honor is: who else is there? To see all who are there.
- And the third question is: who you don’t see there, even if you were expecting to see?
Things are so interesting when we are talking about honor, and I think that the supreme accomplishment of a human being is the kind of an interior honor, in the first place, what happens withing our own soul.
Myself, I don’t want to say much, neither about Olympian students, neither about all I’ve accomplished in school, because, on one hand, I did everything with a big joy, and I can say that, even if I am in the very last part of my life, I have nothing to complain about! I had the fortune to work with some youngsters, where intelligence on square meter passes by much many domains of activity. This empowers you! Recently, going so often to the hospital, I see how many challenges doctors face… And all the auxiliary personnel, who always have a heavy heart… At the hospital nobody goes in joy… Everybody groans, everybody bemoans. myself included… They transfer these feelings to the medics, even if they want or not… I have this privilege to work in an extraordinary environment, I didn’t want more!
In an environment of children, who were always joyful… Even their small bloopers were a proof of intelligence. We don’t need to look at things only in an abrupt way, and, somehow, it is good to encourage a child, as Blaga was saying, to play, to live the life of his own age. We shouldn’t necessary analyze him thru our own age, even though, at that point, I was younger myself, and I was mistaken in some regards as well. Primarily, I was always in a hurry… Maybe it is better to stop from time to time to glance at a flower… to acknowledge what giant powers are hidden in the tender flowers… To see that a sun ray it provides us the smile of the entire Universe! We don’t have time, we are always in a hurry to do this and that… We should… Life is such a beautiful thing, but unfortunately we discover it too late…
I want to tank you for your time, and once again I want to apologies if I haven’t been coherent in my speech!”
Own thoughts
Unfortunately, professor – teacher is a too small word for his stature – Ștefan Antohe passed away later in 2022, do to incurable illness, but his legacy will forever remain, at least between the borders of the town, if not further, as it should. I can state not only that he was 100% coherent, but with a language so fine that few can comprehend without deep analysis, but also that he indeed inspired his students to study continuously and to read books, because this is the only way to gain experience, in the absence of living it on your own. Reading, indeed, gives you a head start in many aspects, and this was a bedrock I built, and he had a fundamental role, among other teachers.
Being terrible at mathematics, didn’t forbid me to look deeper into the opportunity to learn from professor Ștefan Antohe who, for sure, is one of the best teachers I ever had in my 19 years of primarily, secondary, high and superior school studying – including two Master degrees in my CV.
Photo source: ziaruldebacau.ro