I have been thinking, as is my wont, about giving thanks, on this Thanksgiving. Many of my thoughts have been about all the things I am so incredibly thankful for, as is appropriate for the day. But another line of thinking has hit me as well, involving the ironies of giving thanks.
Some background, from my personal life. As much as I love my live, the older I get, the more I realize just how weird this of mine life has been, as a scholar of religion who is not himself religious, an expert on Jesus and the New Testament who does not believe in Jesus or the New Testament, an academic obsessed with the history of Christianity who is not personally connected with Christianity. As many of you know, the weirdness in part comes from the fact that when I started out I was completely committed religiously, as a believer in Jesus, the Bible, and all things Christian. When I was seventeen, I was not just your run-of-the-mill-go-to-church-on-Sunday kind of Christian. I was a hard core fundamentalist, committing his life to the cause. That’s what drove me to be passionate about the Bible and the history of Christianity.
One result of my loss of faith – or my gain of perspective (!) – is that I have an entirely ambivalent view of my own past. There are times that I am resentful about my fundamentalist past, my spending all that time obsessed with a religion that I no longer consider even to be true. This obsession took up (or away) years of my life. I never had a “normal” young adulthood. I never experienced the things that others of my age and background did. Instead of growing into my life I was handing out tracts on the streets of Chicago urging people to find eternal life. That’s a strange way to be living as a late teenager….
But there are other times that I am thankful that I had such an unusual life at the time. Without this history, I obviously would not be where I am today, and I absolutely love where I am today. Without going to a fundamentalist Bible school (a kind of Christian boot-camp) I never would have acquired so much knowledge about the Bible – essential, of course, for my line of work. I was an expert on (aspects of) the Bible before I was even a scholar. That doesn’t happen to everyone every day! I never would have become an academic if I had not had that strange turn to religion in my teen-age years. My life might be better (though I doubt it) or it might have been worse (which is what I suspect); but it would have been different. And I love my life.
One of the things I am most grateful for about my weird course of life is that my Christian faith taught me (or encouraged me) to be grateful. I am thankful that I developed an inclination to be thankful. That is not true for everyone.
I have an unusually large amount of things to be thankful for in my life. But I constantly, all the time, talk with people who also have so many things to be thankful for, and they simply are not thankful people. They aren’t grateful. They are angry, self-absorbed, and bitter. Even if they have amazing lives, they are unhappy and have no sense of humility and gratitude. I think that is sad.
My own sense of gratitude is not something that I have any right to be proud of, as if it is something I accomplished. It too is a gift for which I am grateful. But at the same time, I think gratitude is an attitude that can be cultivated. And really should be cultivated by more people. Especially those who have it good. In part, it is this sense of gratitude for ones’ own life that can help us be more giving of ourselves, more inclined to help others who are having a hard time, or an awful time, or a downright horrifying time. Those of us who have it good should spread the good we have, in gratitude for having it.
When I first became an agnostic (and atheist and humanist – pick your label! I am all the above) I found it particularly unsettling that I felt thankful for so many things – everything from having decent food to having a fantastic career – without having someone to thank. When I had been a Christian, I thanked God for all the good things I had. Toward the end of my years of faith, I started feeling uneasy about thanking God for these good things.
On one hand, thanking God seemed entirely appropriate, since I did not do anything to earn favorable treatment. On the other hand, by thanking God for the good things I had I was acknowledging they had been given me by someone else, and if that’s what I thought, what was I supposed to think about those who did not have good things, who did not have decent food, or food at all, or shelter, or money, or employment, or health? If these things were given to me, why were they not given to others? Not just one or two others, or even one or two million others, but to billions of others?
This was a question I could never resolve, try as I might and even though I had heard (so many) explanations of others (over and over again!). Some people find these explanations satisfying. I never did. For me it was a real enigma.
Now I have gotten to a point in my life where I am far less concerned about the theoretical explanations than I am in two other things. First, I am concerned that those of us who have so much should help out those who have so little, without worrying about the cosmic reasons that this is the situation we are in. And second, I am concerned that those of us who have good things should indeed be thankful for them, even as we ponder the inequities of the universe and the mysteries of life.
Just some scattered thoughts on this day. I hope you have a gratifying rich and fulfilling Thanksgiving!
I too am ambivalent about my religious past in which I was beholden to a very cruel God. But my intellect would have never been “pushed” so far had I not been tormented by my conflicting feelings of religion. My confusion over scripture, especially my inability to reconcile the wrathful god from the forgiving one, compelled me to become a voracious reader.
I’m thankful I stumbled upon your books ten years ago or so. And I’m thankful that I read your blog. Your recommendation of liberal Christian Dale Allison led me to read his Night Comes, one of the most profound and helpful books I’ve ever read.
So in the end, my religious experience has been a mixed bag, but I feel compelled to see the good in all the pain and struggle. I’m reminded of all the comedians I love whose pain becomes material that gives us joy and laughter. Your “material” becomes your books, which benefit many. There has to be some gratitude there.
Life is a Story. I dig it that you embrace yours. I am thankful for the work you have done and the accessibility you have afforded. I was always willing to gave thanks to higher entities on one day for the good things…. as long as we held them acoountable for the indifference and intolerable behavior the other 364 days.
Hope you and everyone have a great day. … many thanks again
Thank you so very much Bart! Your thoughts on this subject are so appreciated. My gratitude also emanates from the teachings of religion throughout my life, but it has gained strength over the years by becoming an atheist to religion. I find comfort in thinking-feeling-believing-knowing that Life is God is Creator and that my thankfulness is to Life itself. All that we perceive to be good or bad is merely an aspect of Life.
As always, your more personal blogs are your best ones. This one reminds me of Walker Percy’s “The Second Coming” which ends with the main character, Will Barrett, obviously a pun on “will bear it,” thinking this about his relationship with a very strange woman he grew to love: “She is a gift and therefore a sign of a Giver.” Percy, of course, went on an extensive philosophical journey that consisted of about three years of reading when he was recovering from tuberculosis acquired in his medical practice. The sentence I quoted is, in essence, the conclusion of his journey. I have thought about it a lot, a whole lot…..
I’m grateful for you sharing your knowledge, scholarship, and as you do here, your personal feelings. Keepin’it real.
Also, now that you have pointed to the elephant in the room, I think I understand better that I need to do more to help others.
Cheers.
Dr Ehrman:
I am also an atheist. I have wondered the same thing all of my life. But, when it comes down to it we have found our way by our selves.
Happy Thanksgiving, Dr. Ehrman! Thank you for honest reflection.
Thank you for your thoughts, Bart.
This is not the time or the place to comment on the origins or the consequences of the US Thanksgiving Holiday.
At this time, it makes me think of historical contexts – which are so crucial when considering NT history.
I am a Brit – my country has been invaded, overrun, conquered many times (my own family, I think, were Hugenot immigrants) but survives.
I am here, now, and I consider myself lucky. I was a police officer for 30 years and think I’ve seen the worst that one can see – but I continue to be surprised/shocked/horrified.
To subscribe and donate here is one way to confirm my humanity.
I’d be interested in knowing the consequences — all I can think of involves having good times with family and friends and gaining weight! The one time I cooked a T-giving meal for my British relatives, they *loved* it!!
Dr. Ehrman, it irks me to no end when I hear believers thanking God for preserving them and theirs after horrendous natural disasters, meanwhile dozens if not hundreds of other lives are lost. If God truly had a hand in that atrocity, whether causing it or willingly let it happen, why would he be worthy of thanks? That would be like if I were to set an apartment building on fire, but saved only one person, leaving countless other people to perish in fire and smoke, and that lone survivor thanked me for saving her. It’s like they’re suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.
Anyway, this Thanksgiving we should all put out of our minds the natural disaster that hit us on Nov. 9th for this one day, and look for those things for which we still have something to be thankful in the meantime.
Well said, thanks for the timely reminder. Much to be thankful for in this country compared with others elsewhere. May your encouragement to us to share what we have be seriously taken and impeimented
I’m a fortunate and thankful person, also. To me, thankfulness is much the same as humility. It’s the opposite of being proud of things that were given to me or acquired purely by chance. To be militantly proud of one’s nationality and skin color, both accidents of birth, seems patently absurd.
It seems strange to me to link the feeling of gratitude to any subject including a Divine subject (God). The outpouring of one’s thankful heart is an advanced state of human evolution and not dependent upon objects and subjects. As you know I live among extremely poor people beset with the kind of problems poverty brings and yet seldom have I encountered such generosity and giving AND happiness as a culture as well as individuals. I tutor small children as well as teens and NOT one describe herself/himself as unhappy nor would I. Regardless thank you too for your generosity of spirit and wishing you and your loved ones an enjoyable Thanksgiving.
For what it’s worth, I’m thankful you do this blog (your desire to help the poor makes you by default a bit more “christian” than many actual Christians!). I must say that I think your current attitude as outlined in this post is completely consistent with many theists’ views (I’m sure you’d agree in part). The whole “lean not on your own understanding” thing. I don’t see theodicy as all that different than my trying to reconcile quantum mechanics and general relativity, which is not something I (or anyone else) can do. But that makes sense, as the creation of this 13.8 billion year old observable universe is far too complex for me to understand—yet I have no problem still believing QM and GR are both true. It seems that if there is a creator, then not being able to reconcile good and evil seems par for the course (how could the creation be more complex than the creator?)—so I have no problem still believing in God even when I cannot reconcile good and evil within a theistic Christian framework. No question really. Just some scattered thoughts based on yours I guess! Cheers, mate.
P.s. I know I’ve asked before and it doesn’t seem likely to happen, but I’ve honed my podcast a lot. I’d still love to have you on even for a few minutes to discuss your blog. My equipment has vastly improved since the episode below, but if you wanted to vet who I am before coming on, I give my background here (my background is a bit different than yours for sure, and I’m a couple decades younger than you, but I was a fundamentalist pastor for over five years). My current goal is to shakeup Christian fundamentalists’ thinking so that they care about evidence… I’ve got some “converts” already… My dad is reading one of your books (Forged) now actually.
https://youtu.be/-H4v7RjxDsc
THanks for the offer. I’m having to turn down all interview requests just now because of my crazy schedule! Trying to find some sanity in it all….
Perhaps those of us who leave the faith need a new vocabulary to talk about what you speak of herein-“thankfulness” seems to imply a recipient. Maybe we are “appreciative,” because you can appreciate something without needing a target.
Incidentally, I think your absence of anger, self-absorption and bitterness and your senses of humility and gratitude come through in everything you do, be it trade books, public appearances, documentary contributions or radio promotions, and it is no small part of the reason for your popularity. Happy thanksgiving, Dr. E!
I am thankful that you take to share your vast knowledge every week in this blog in such a patient and kind manner. I learn something new and challenging in every post.
The word Boanerges is strange, and sticks out like a sore thumb. James and John speak together at the transfiguration, are fisherman and boatman, and state they could call down fire and lightning (also sticks out). Acts 28 shows that Paul’s ship from Malta to Puteoli born the sign of the Dioscuri. All this evidence smacks of comparing these two brothers to the heavenly twins Castor and Polydeuces. What do you think?
I suppose the problem is that the designation may well go back to Jesus himself, and it’s hard to imagine a rural Jew from a remote backwoods area of Galilee being influenced by Greek mythology!
But that’s not what I mean. The authors wrote in Greek probably from Greece! They could have easily been influenced by it.
I don’t think the author of Mark was writing in Greece. But in any event, the nickname “Boanerges” is almost certainly the (garbled) version of an Aramaic or Hebrew nickname, not Greek — so it may well go back to Jesus himself, not to the author of Mark.
The epithet “Boanerges” for the brothers James and John had always bothered me. For one, the translation that Mark offers isn’t actually a proper translation for “Sons of Thunder,” in either Aramaic or Hebrew. Indeed, “Boanerges” is inscrutable in both Aramaic and Hebrew. I read several scholarly attempts at uncovering what it is Mark is trying to say, from John Meier to Geza Vermes, and the only help they seem to offer is that they, themselves, are not even sure what Mark means here.
The most common suggestion, which may be partly correct, is that what Mark is translating as “thunder” may be the Aramaic/Hebrew root ‘regesh’, which means “passion”. The word does have the implication of tumultuous excitement, in which “thunder” might be metaphorical. That’s a possibility. The real problem is that if “boane” is meant to be a transliteration of the Aramaic/Hebrew “benei,” which means “sons,” then it’s a really, really clumsy way of transliterating “benei” into “boane”.
That’s why my suspicion is that the epithet that Jesus gave the brothers Zebedee was in not, in fact, in Aramaic but, rather, in Hebrew, which is why Mark is unable to properly translate it (Mark’s handling of Aramiac is suspect enough to suggest his knowledge of Hebrew was even worse). His translation of “Sons of Thunder”, therefore, is speculative at best.
So I tried to tackle the problem by assuming Jesus used a Hebrew nickname. In Greek transliterations of Aramaic and Hebrew words, a phoneme such as “-oa-” often dropped an Aramaic/Hebrew letter such as hey, chet or ayin from within the middle of it (because they were either awkward or non-existent in Greek). Furthermore, ending a Greek word with a sigma (as a proper transliteration of a shin) was rather common and proper. So what I did was first reconstruct the Greek “Boanerges” into the Hebrew “Bohanirgesh” (בו הנרגש). Now, in Hebrew, “Bohanirgesh” does have a meaning that it does not in Aramaic (to be technical, the Aramaic equivalent would have been “Badinirgesha” — appreciably different). However, “Bohanirgesh” in Hebrew means “In him [there is] of passion” — or, to use an English idiom, “The Impassioned”.
So maybe Jesus would have distinguished both James and John as, “The Impassioned” — Yakov Bohanirgesh, “James The Impassioned” and Yochanan Bohanirgesh, “John The Impassioned”. And so “Boanerges” did not literally mean “Sons of Thunder”. It simply was the epithet Jesus would attach to their very, very common names in order to the distinguish them from the other myriad Yakovs and Yochanans at that place and time. And so others would come to call them collectively as the Bohanirgesh Brothers, or the Sons of Bohanirgesh, and that’s why Mark thought that the translation meant “Sons of Thunder”.
Anyway, that’s my theory, and it’s the one I’ve incorporated into my Jesus novel.
My wife teaches piiano and so over the years has students of a wide range of innate knack for progressing well – some exceedingly well to the point their ability figures into their life direction as they get into their college years and pursue careers.
She and I both, though, tend to be very facinated by the 3 and 4 year olds that already are playing expertly – the child prodidies. They play like they have been at it for 10 or 15 years. Where does that come from? It’s a mystery. Even some of my wife’s students that have been innately talented, passionate, and play superbly took years of practice to get to that point. When we see these rare prodigies playing like they do at age 4 our jaws just drop. How did these children come into this world with such innate ability?
So it is with other human qualities, talents, innate characteristics. I think your innate sense of being thankful for how abundantly satisfying your life is, Bart, is simply an innate characteristic of who you are at a very deep, profound, and transcendent essence. Just as these children that come out of the womb practily a master of the piano. Transcendence.
Memory: I had a rather stunning experience this morning. For years, I have memorized sentences from books that are important to me like the ending of Thoreau’s “Walden.” The ending sentences of Walker Percy’s “The Second Coming,” which conclude Will Barrett’s search for God, and the ending of Schweitzer’s “The Quest of the Historical Jesus” are two such quotes. I was writing something to my sons this morning that made me want to get these two quotes exactly right so I looked them up. To my surprise, my memory of these two passages, that I had carried around in my head for years, was sort of correct, but far from exact. Indeed, at first, as I read, I could not even find the “remembered” quotes. Surprise! Surprise! Now the interesting part: My own memories of what I thought the passages said have had far more influence on me than the actual passages would have had all these years. Of course, all of this reminds me of your book on “memory” and none of this would be much of a surprise to you.
Interesting! I’ve had similar experiences, but probably nothing this stark!
“…ambivalent view of my own past.” Julia Child: “Nothing is too much trouble if it turns out the way it should.” .
That’s a good one!
Clarification for the above comment: Everything that enabled you to be as you are for us now is good!
Your personal thoughts resonated very strongly with me. Thank you very much.
Life is a developmental act. Although reflection often makes us regret or question certain aspects of our youth, it is that regret or questioning itself which is proof of successful development. Painful as it can be, it’s a good thing. I’m grateful for your fundamentalist path, because it led to your career, and to me your past is actually what legitimizes your current path, so I am grateful for it.
Perhaps germane: Sandburg – “the past is a bucket of ashes ..,” Chesterton – “thanks are the highest form of thought..,” and Lincoln – “to ease another’s heartache is to forget one’s own.”
Bart,
My sentiments exactly. Although I have not had the worldly success that you have had, considering my limited talents, I feel extremely grateful for what I have, and looking back over my life I see numerous instances where my life could have been drastically different If I had made different decisions than I did, and in some instances my decisions were in large part, based on blind luck. If I had gotten my Ph.D ten years later than I did I would have had difficulty getting the university teaching position I did. Chairing search committees over the years I became aware of how few good positions in the field of history there have been in the last forty years for those whose resumes are not that thick. Even though I had fulfilled my military obligation, for financial reasons I maintained an active reserve commitment throughout the 1960s. If the active reserves had been activated as they were for the Korean conflict without a doubt I would have been sent to Vietnam, and I don’t think I would have come back alive. But here I am, 79 years old and in reasonably good health. Do I feel blessed by this? Of course I do, except for my own form of survivor’s guilt. But do I think that God blessed me. Hardly, since I know of so many others that a just God would have blessed rather than me. So I seek out some of those individuals whose words and actions contributed to what worldly success I have enjoyed and thank them. Unfortunately many of those mentors are gone now. I just hope that they knew how much I appreciated them before they passed. Your career has been an inspiration to me.
Thanks for the message, Bart.
While blessing our meager Thanksgiving dinner yesterday, I acknowledged gratitude for the fortunate position my wife and I are in with respect to food, clothing, shelter, health and the well-being of our children and grandchildren. Giving thanks implies agenticity, someone or something to be the recipient of that giving, and so I content myself with simply being grateful for having what I have in a world of poverty and pain. I believe this is close to Bart’s message, and his urging us to give materially to others and be truly grateful for what we have need not be construed as elements of any particular religious belief.
Thanks, for your thoughts, Dr. Ehrman. I too am very thankful although not particularly religious. I do hope there is some sort of higher power but have given up on “traditional” Christianity. I am 81 years old and closer to the end of my life. I no longer believe in any sort of “heaven” or afterlife. Yet, I have very good health..pretty near perfect, in fact. And that is a lot to be thankful for at this stage of my life. I have a very limited income and am a widow. Yet, I am happy and productive. I am thankful for all of that. I have three very loving and caring children That is a lot to be thankful for too in this day and age. I appreciate your ability to be thankful even though you are not religious. Therefore I really don’t think it’s necessary to be religious to be thankful.
That’s a great post. It touches on a lot of topics that I have pondered, so it gives me some possible answers.
Bart you wrote this:
This was a question I could never resolve, try as I might and even though I had heard (so many) explanations of others (over and over again!). Some people find these explanations satisfying. I never did. For me it was a real enigma.
Now I have gotten to a point in my life where I am far less concerned about the theoretical explanations than I am in two other things. First, I am concerned that those of us who have so much should help out those who have so little, without worrying about the cosmic reasons that this is the situation we are in. And second, I am concerned that those of us who have good things should indeed be thankful for them, even as we ponder the inequities of the universe and the mysteries of life.
Yes this has been a haunting question in all faiths.Here is the Islamic reply.Dr.Zakir Naik,Br.Abdul Raheem Green and Br.Yasir Qadhi are three prominent speakers on Islam.Knowledge never hurts actually it comes by reading different views,by reading same view over and over you only increase memory not knowledge.
Though most of the sufferings on man are impacted by man as in slavery,colonialisation,inquest,crusades,wars,use of DU in war causing cancer and birth defects in new borns.,and now the technology has made man understand how to create earthquake,tsunami,floods, famine etc all to achieve more money for few and more control of few over mankind.When people who have upper hand will feel they are still accountable to God for what they do and will be punished if do wrong to his creation then the sufferings will tremendously decrease.God tests some by giving more and others by giving less that who behaves and remains within balance and control.Islam therefore teaches its adherents the principle of remaining in balance and says there are laws for war time also ,rights for minorities also,to protect them.,rights for animals,land and vegetations well.
I hope my non Muslim friends on this site will not mind my this posting
YouTube video Dr Zakir Naik – Why Natural Disasters take place?
YouTube video Why does God permit suffering on earth? – Abdur Raheem Green
YouTube video Why Is there Evil in This World? And a Response to the San Bernardino Shootings ~ Dr. Yasir Qadhi
There are things Atheists/Agnostics/Humanist say about Christians I absolutely agree with 100%. Atheists, Humanists and Agnostics have created deeper questions and without them I’d probably never address going the depths I’ve been to in my faith. I read your books, your blogs and support the deep questions and out of the box thinking I’m naturally inclined to… address but I know I’m not alone with y’all around. So, thanks be to God for you.
There are two facts that I have been thinking.
One if there was no GOd then the world would never have come this far.Human being would have killed each other,it has been happening but at the last minute God gets involved and the mayhem stops.This world otherwise would have wind howling day in the jungles of this planet.
Second.If there is no divine system of reward and punishment based on good or bad deeds then there was no justification in creating man.And God is not dumb.Who has created every thing so intelligently.
Just think about this and therefore we should be doing thanks giving by doing good deeds.
Bart: Your observation that gratitude is a thing to cultivate squarely fits my understanding of the concept. Until 15 years ago I neither felt nor believed in gratitude for anything in my life. That is in large part because I grew up around people who themselves – in my opinion at least – lived without gratitude. They were angry, resentful and hurt. They still had families with children, enjoyed some modicum of middle class financial success, enjoyed fairly good health all in all, yet in my memory none practiced nor expressed gratitude for what arguably was good and enjoyable in their lives.
I understand some of the reasons. My immediate aunts and uncles grew up in an alcoholic environment. Their life skills were less than ideal and the hurt and rage that they carried were states of mind that they broadcasted and which limited and throttled the width of their lives (to the point of disowning/ abandoning some of their relatives who did not conform to the narrow range of safe thinking, acting and belief). Unfortunately alcoholism as a family disease affects not just one generation but will affect multiple generations and so did through generations of my ancestors and predecessors.
Yet as one disowned I was given the “gift of desperation” which forced me to find betters ways to egage life. One is to choose to be grateful. I now believe that choosing to be grateful is one of the most powerful tools in any person’s life toolbelt. Sometimes choosing to be grateful even leads to that heavenly blissful and sublime state of deeply feeling grateful for life. Mostly it is a either a raft that keeps us floating on a sea of life or a life preserver that keeps us afloat so that we don’t drown until we can find the next raft.
The magic of gratitude is that an object of gratitude is not needed. Simply the attitude of gratitude (pardon the rhyme) is what is needed. The object – if any – takes care of itself.
As for the question of why do so many suffer and are themselves unable to act with gratitude? Or suffer and yet still are grateful? They are indeed mysteries which I am insufficient to fathom. I must accept as enough that I can choose to be grateful, share what I learned, ask how I can do good, keep from doing bad and hope that I have the wherewithal, willingness and ultimately choose to act upon those choices.
As for you question about your Christian past: I do not consider myself a Trinitarian. Yet I “feel” a belief in a Divinity. Growing up in a Christian environment I am the recipient of the images and stories of Jewish and Christian story telling. Therefore those images and stories help me in perceiving the Divinity
Do I sense the Divinity a Christian or Jewish or Hindu god? All and none of the above.
I will admit that your scholarship is helping me to appreciate and better connect to the Christian part of my religious upbringing. I see an irony that a person who calls himself an athiest-agnostic is probably one of the best teachers of Christianity that I have ever encountered.
So on my on my gratitude list today: I am grateful that I can read and that I can read what you write.
I know that sounds pretty basic. But for my undestanding of gratitude it should cover the full range of what we can be grateful for. That allows gratitude to be a light illuminating the many things for which anyone can be grateful.
I was never religious and my mother died when I was twelve so there were some social niceties I didn’t learn growing up. One was to show some appreciation even when someone would give me a gift which was really strange to me–like some pottery egg cups a friend had made. I let the strangeness of the gift show in my face. I am thankful that my first wife and in-laws and mostly my current wife and soulmate have helped me grow up. Somewhere in my 50’s I finally realized I was enough of an existentialist that I found no need at all to have someone to thank or to offer my thanks to in order to be and feel thankful. To me, the gift of great children, wife, friends, and family is not literally a gift but I call it that anyway….I guess because they feel like gifts. We are just getting by on a fixed retirement income. We have a small but lovely, cozy house. We have a trail into the woods across the street and can hear the Pacific surf from the house. We complain from time to time, “I wish we could afford to convert the garage into another room” or even to build a deck. Then we stop and look at one another in the awareness that we live better than most people on the planet. One other thing that makes life rich for me is the honor, Bart, of being a member of your blog and the almost daily opportunity to learn and think. Thanks.