Surely, the Righteous do walk among us.

My heart goes out to his family.All of the people who were affected by this tragedy Please know you are in my prayers with love.God Bless All Of You.

..surely there will be a place at the table for the good Professor anytime he wishes to stop by at Fiddler's Green.

I honor Professor Librescu for his life and his sacrifice, and my heart is sad for the families of all of the victims, and the suffering of the victims themselves. As to Sheepdogs requiring training, I will say that the state of mind must be present first, or the training will not help or be useful. And the negative training (go along, don't resist, guns are bad, etc.) received as youngsters sometimes prevents the development of the Sheepdog mentality, I fear.

>If you suffered a loss, this space is available >to memorialize the fallen. Yes, and what better way to memorialize them than a post calling them all sheep.

Thank you John, for doing honor to Professor Liviu Librescu, who guarded his students and made the ultimate sacrifice. I am sure the Professor met many "sheep" during his time in the camps, so many allowed themselves to lead to the slaughter, never believing what their hearts and minds told them. Such a thing changes how you view the world. We will never know what drove the killer, but we do know what drove Professor Liviu Librescu, love of life, remember that Jews believe that to save one life is to save all lives. This massacre, like so may others, happened in a place where no guns are allowed, so the only weapon was in the hands of the killer. This situation desperately needed more guns. I mourn the lives lost, I mourn the loss of Professor Librescu. If I may... His resting place shall be in the Garden of Eden. Therefore, the Master of mercy will care for him under the protection of His wings for all time. And bind his soul in the bond of everlasting life. God is his inheritance and he will rest in peace and let us say Amen.

One wonders what Dr. Librescu would have thought of your characterization of the students he died trying to save as mere sheep.

Unless my understanding of the sheepdog/sheep dichotomy is mistaken, the designation of sheep is not a description of mindlessness or stupidity as the word is often used. Rather, it refers to the idea that they are placid and unaware of the dangers that lurk at the edge of the flock; they are concerned with simply living day-to-day. This is in contrast to the sheepdog who is constantly aware of the wolves prowling at the edges and is mentally and physically prepared to do what must be done to protect his sheep. It may have a certain edge to it, but I classify myself as a sheep because I don't have the skill or will to do most things that woukd fall under "sheepdog."

Stormy - in a very real sense, I don't care what he would have thought. I was honoring him in *my* way. Through *my* lens. I am a sheepdog. I spent the bulk of my adult life protecting the sheep. So they could be sheep, in a general sense. Nonetheless, there is a time when the sheepdog needs to arise, unbeknownst. To themselves, or others. There is evidence of that, coming out now. There were sheepdogs, and proto-sheepdogs. It's entirely possible that Dr. Librescu, when a child, during the Holocaust, was... a sheep. When next presented with evil, he became a sheepdog. You, clearly, do not understand me. Well and good. If you go passively to your death, however noble Mahatma Gandhi may have found that, you are a sheep. If you fight, as Ry said, quoting the poet, you do not go gently into that night, then you, in my world, are a sheepdog. I honor the sheepdogs. I love the sheep. For without the sheep, in a grand, philosophical sense, there is no need for the sheepdog. Just as, without the wolves, there is no need for sheepdogs. Wolves exist. Sheepdogs exist. Society needs to produce sheepdogs, to counter the wolves, that arise from many sources. When Bull Simons, preparing the commandoes for the rescue attempt that ended in disaster at Desert One, told them, after a fashion - "I expect you may kill some hostages, because they will, when you arise, rise up to help - they will be doing what warriors do. Fight." He was referring to the military and ex-military amongst the hostages during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. He fully expected they would answer the sound of the bugle. Such are the sheepdogs. As I said, I'm sorry you are offended. But I don't apologize for my view.

I'm sorry, John, you are the host but I must disagree with you. Gandhi would have none of this "go passively to your death" nonsense. That's a huge distortion of his preachings on non-violence. "Self-defence by Violence I have been repeating over and over again that he who cannot protect himself or his nearest and dearest or their honour by non-violently facing death may and ought to do so by violently dealing with the oppressor. He who can do neither of the two is a burden. He has no business to be the head of a family. He must either hide himself, or must rest content to live for ever in helplessness and be prepared to crawl like a worm at the bidding of a bully. The strength to kill is not essential for self-defence; one ought to have the strength to die. When a man is fully ready to die, he will not even desire to offer violence. Indeed, I may put it down as a self-evident proposition that the desire to kill is in inverse proportion to the desire to die. And history is replete with instances of men who, by dying with courage and compassion on their lips, converted the hearts of their violent opponents. Nonviolence cannot be taught to a person who fears to die and has no power of resistance. A helpless mouse is not nonviolent because he is always eaten by pussy. He would gladly eat the murderess if he could, but he ever tries to flee from her. We do not call him a coward, because he is made by nature to behave no better than he does. But a man who, when faced by danger, behaves like a mouse, is rightly called a coward. He harbors violence and hatred in his heart and would kill his enemy if he could without hurting himself. He is a stranger to nonviolence. All sermonizing on it will be lost on him. Bravery is foreign to his nature. Before he can understand nonviolence, he has to be taught to stand his ground and even suffer death, in the attempt to defend himself against the aggressor who bids fair to overwhelm him. To do otherwise would be to confirm his cowardice and take him further away from nonviolence. Whilst I may not actually help anyone to retaliate, I must not let a coward seek shelter behind nonviolence so-called. Not knowing the stuff of which nonviolence is made, many have honestly believed that running away from danger every time was a virtue compared to offering resistance, especially when it was fraught with danger to one's life. As a teacher of nonviolence I must, so far as it is possible for me, guard against such an unmanly belief. Self-defence....is the only honourable course where there is unreadiness for self-immolation. Though violence is not lawful, when it is offered in self-defence or for the defence of the defenceless, it is an act of bravery far better than cowardly submission. The latter befits neither man nor woman. Under violence, there are many stages and varieties of bravery. Every man must judge this for himself. No other person can or has the right."

Yes. Gandhi's idea of non-violent resistance would be to throw yourself on the bayonets of the attackers; if you can't do that, then kill them. Running away is not an option. The practical opportunity for the former rarely occurs, which may have led to some of the confusion over his teachings. Gandhi's All Men Are Brothers is available on-line, you can probably pick up a used copy for a buck or three. Trying to understand Gandhi's teachings by reading other's opinions and distortions of his writings is folly. I especially recommend the chapter "Ahisma, the way of non-violence". "The people of a village near Bettia told me that they had run away whilst the police were looting their houses and molesting their womenfolk. When they said that they had run away because I had told them to be non-violent, I hung my head in shame. I assured them that such was not the meaning of my non-violence. I expected them to intercept the mightiest power that might be in the act of harming those who were under their protection, and draw without retaliation all harm upon their own heads even to the point of death, but never to run away from the storm centre. It was manly enough to defend one's property, honour, or religion at the point of the sword. It was manlier and nobler to defend them without seeking to injure the wrongdoer. But it was unmanly, unnatural and dishonorable to forsake the post of duty and, in order to save one's skin, to leave property, honour or religion to the mercy of the wrong-doer. I could see my way of delivering ahimsa to those who knew how to die, not to those who were afraid of death. (SB, 155-56)"

OK, posted while htom was posting. So at least he's consistent. Stupid, but consistent.

Sorry, I wasn't being clear. That comment wasn't directed to htom, but to Gandhi.