Professor Barbara Stahl
.... a very remarkable woman; and the very last thing
she would wish is
that I should spend any more lecture
time explaining just why she was
so remarkable. Instead, I will share
quickly with you two principles by
which she lived. She spoke to me about the first soon after she had been
diagnosed with cancer: Tikkun Olahm. Tikkun Olahm
is a Hebrew phrase,
which roughly translates "make the
world a better place." For Barbara
Stahl, this wasn't a big thing like
"Save the world" or "Revolutionize the
world." It was a small thing, as she explained it: Wherever you happen to
find yourself, in any situation .... make
things a little better. When you
have finished your Humanities paper, read it
again. Make it better.
Tikkun Olahm. When you happen across ignorance, confusion or
injustice, speak your mind honestly,
forthrightly and well. Make things a
little better. If after graduation you
find yourself in a new job in a
city
principle I learned
by watching how Professor Stahl lived her life. The
phrase that comes to
mind is this: "Turn to life!" As a professor of
biology, Barbara Stahl derived deep and lasting satisfaction from
observing the
simplest of living things; she taught biology so that her
students could share
her sense of wonder. Turn to life. Barbara Stahl
deeply loved human life, and she constantly invited her students to
experience the beauties of that life in music, in painting, in drama,
sculpture,
architecture, poetry, and literature. Turn to life. When Dr.
Stahl received word
of her terminal illness, she returned to all the daily
tasks that had
typified her life. She returned to teaching. She showed
up at faculty
meetings. She graded her students' papers. As her
strength began to
fail over Christmas break, she called the Humanities
Office to make
arrangements so that she might deliver today's lecture
while seated. As her
condition worsened, she contacted Professor Jim
Mahoney to request that he might deliver today's lecture, should she be
unable to be here.
Never during her illness was she defeated by the idea
of her death because she always turned to
life. In Hebrew, "turn to life"
sounds something like this: leChaim!
And so, in memory of Dr. Barbara
Stahl, Professor of Biology, Seminar
Leader in the Humanities,
and world-renowned expert on the hidden
lives of fossil
fish, I say to you: Tikkun Olahm va
leChaim!
(Delivered to
the Sophomore Humanities Class of 2006, Saint Anselm College,
M. Staley, Director of the Humanities Program.)