Silence, When?

by Zhi (Parker) Chen

A long, long time ago, an ambassador from a small country visited China and brought three golden statues as a tributary, all of which looked the same. Interestingly, the ambassador posed a question to the emperor: “Which of these golden statues is the most valuable?” The emperor tried all he could, including weighing the statues and carefully measuring them, but he couldn't find any differences between them. For several days, he was troubled by the problem. Finally, one of his cabinet members discovered the solution. He inserted a straw into each of their earholes. The straw came out of the other ear of the first statue; the straw slipped out of the mouth of the second statue; and the straw entered the stomach and did not come out of the third statue. When the emperor told the ambassador that the third statute was the most valuable, the ambassador nodded in agreement.

Zhi (Parker) Chen

This short story demonstrates that a man is more valuable if he can listen more and speak less. And, a long time ago, variations of the proverb “speech is silver, silence is gold” existed all over the world (as well as in the Proverbs in the Bible). Silence was often thought to be the wiser option in most circumstances, but silence in the face of injustice can be immoral. So as college students, how should we silence ourselves? Do we always want to talk less and smile more? Why or why not?

Silence has another aspect to it. As technology advanced, we became more like a collective. We often must be deliberate in our withdrawal from the “communities” that surround us. In Invitation to the Humanities (HUM 103), we were taught that solitude can improve our relationships with others, but we should not completely isolate ourselves from the world, as the Bible warns us. So, is it permissible to withdraw from a community when the conversation becomes unprofitable? How should we incorporate the building of our community with our search for solitude?