UMBC Undergraduate Commencement
May 26, 2005

Aaron Ralby, B.A., Modern Languages & Linguistics and English
Valedictorian

On the Meaning of “Mon”

Hello everyone. I’d like to start just by thanking Dr. Hrabowski, and all my professors, especially Doctors Falco and Irmscher in English, Doctors Field, May, and McCray in MLL–-you guys have been awesome. I’d also just quickly like to send a thanks to my family and friends, and especially my mom. I’m sure we all have people to whom we’d like to express our gratitude, and today’s a good day for that.

What I’m going to talk to you about is something that’s been in my head since freshman year. A couple of weeks into my first semester here, I met with Dr. Hrabowski, and he asked me to think about a question: “What does it mean to be a man?” He said, “Don’t give me the answer now. I want you to think about it, and give it to me later.” Dr. Hrabowski, now is later, and I have thought about it, and I would like to give you, and share with all of you here, my answer.

“What does it mean to be a man?” The word “man” begs definition. Since I’ll be going on to study Old English in grad school, which I think most of us would agree is not exactly practical, I like to put it to use whenever I can, like right now. So, I’m going to use the archaic definition of “man,” or “mon,” which referred to a person or human being, who could be either male or female. So what does it mean to be a mon, human being, an adult as opposed to a child? I would say the answer lies in mastery, and the search for mastery. One who has committed him or herself completely to that search for mastery is a mon.

But now we’ve got a new question: what makes a master? A master is not simply someone who is skillful, nor one who does something exceptionally well. Masters are first and foremost masters of themselves, possessing self-knowledge, reflection, restraint, discipline. They internalize a practice to the point where perfection appears effortless. There is in seeking mastery a twofold process of perfecting a tangible or visible skill and perfecting one's own instruments, such as the mind and intellect. Through this process we reveal our true Selves, and find out who we really are, as opposed to who we choose to believe we are. Einstein once said, “The true value of a human being is determined primarily by the measure and the sense in which he has attained to liberation from the self.” In other words, the master transcends the limitations of identity, no longer looking at anything through the distorting lens of ego.

The famous Japanese swordsmith Masamune was a master. One time, a few great lords decided to test a blade of one of his students, Muramasa. They obtained a blade of Muramasa’s and went out to a nearby stream, where they stuck the sword in the sand with its edge against the current. The blade was so sharp that when leaves came floating down against its edge, they were cut in two by the mere weight of the stream. All of the lords proclaimed this was a magnificent weapon. But then one of them had the idea of testing one of Muramasa’s master’s swords. So they got a blade of Masamune’s, and returned to the stream, and performed the same test. But this time, when leaves came floating down directly in the path of the sword’s edge, they diverted, and went around the steel, resuming their course downstream. As they continued to watch, all the leaves that were about to strike the edge diverted–-at the last second–-and went around Masamune’s sword. After they had seen this happen over and over again, the lords pulled the sword from the stream and proclaimed that this was the far greater blade, for it had no need to cut. It had nothing to prove.

Like good swords, we can also reach a state in which we have no need to cut. This does not mean that we are passive or weak. A master discerns carefully when it is appropriate to cut, or to do anything for that matter. Masamune had achieved self-mastery, and was so at peace with himself and the world that he was able to impart that peace into his own creations, his own swords.

No matter what we are going on to do, whether we’re going to grad school, getting a job, or taking time off, and no matter what we’re studying or what line of work we’re entering–even something as seemingly useless as Old English and Old Norse–we can all seek mastery of ourselves and our craft. The road to mastery is internal, and because of that, it’s not dependent on any particular external practice. Wherever we find our calling, we can use that activity in the pursuit of our true Selves, our core, and its voice of discernment. As the master poet Basho once said, “Do not try to imitate the old masters. Seek what they sought.” But seeking what they sought is hard. It’s really hard. I’ve been working on that search for years, and haven’t made much progress. But I’ve seen it done, and I’ve seen people find what they sought, so I know it’s an attainable goal. And if you think about it, that’s one area–-maybe the only area-–in which all of us are truly equal. We all have the capability to reflect on ourselves, to revise ourselves, to realize perfection. That is the search: to find our true voice that sounds in the depth of our hearts and to follow its direction. Whereas our egos never tell the truth, the voice of our hearts is never wrong. And it only gets clearer the more we listen to it. But we have to dig down to that voice. As Seamus Heaney writes in his poem “Bogland,”

Our pioneers keep striking
Inwards and downwards,
We can also strike inwards and downwards in the excavation of our true Selves.

Today we as UMBC celebrate the life of the mind. Our intellects are our instruments; they belong to us, and like blades, we have been forging them over the last several years at UMBC. But precisely because our minds are just tools, because they belong to us and we can see them as separate from us, they cannot be who we are. So let’s all strike inwards and downwards to find in our hearts the richness of who we really are: that is where true mastery lies. To do that, to seek the true Self within our hearts, and have the courage to listen to its voice at all costs, is what it means to seek mastery, and what it means to be a mon.

Dr. Hrabowski, I hope you’ve found my answer satisfactory. And everyone else, I hope the same. Congratulations everyone. Thank you.