Teacher and friend

The following is the unabridged version of a guest commentary published in today's paper:

I was surprised and saddened to learn of the death of my teacher and friend Edward P. Mahoney, professor emeritus of philosophy and a Catholic priest in the Raleigh Diocese, who passed away Jan. 8. Only a month ago, his health, although poor, appeared stable. I expected to see him upon my return in late January to continue the trivial but cathartic task of sorting through his old files. Although one can hardly call the death of a chronically-ill 76 year-old unexpected, it was nonetheless untimely.

We had been sorting for the last few years, trying to organize his massive lifetime collection of photocopied manuscripts, research notes, personal correspondence and academic trash. Progress was slow and next to meaningless, but it was a good excuse to spend time together. Even as his mind deteriorated, Mahoney continued to educate in these sessions as he reviewed his unique insights into medieval philosophy and reflected on his own life and career, offering me free advice along the way.

Known as “Professor Mahoney” to Duke students whom he taught philosophy over the past four decades, he was “Father Ed” to students at UNC where he served as an assistant Catholic Chaplain for many years. My first meeting with him was inauspicious. I was a sophomore and Mahoney was teaching a graduate seminar on Augustine and Aquinas. I went to the first class hoping that he would let me audit, but when I identified myself was briskly told that no sophomores would be allowed in an upper level seminar. Explaining to him after the class that I only wanted to sit in on the course, he was more encouraging, told me to do the readings and to return the next week. At the end of the second week, much to my surprise, he encouraged me to take the class and gave me a permission number.

Anyone who ever took a course in Medieval or Renaissance philosophy with Mahoney will remember his colorful teaching style and exacting standards. “Bertha the Super-Angel” was a frequent prop in his explication of the nuances of the “Great Chain of Being,” and “Harvey the Platypus” always appeared in discussions of the individuation of species.

Mahoney was of Irish stock and had a temper to prove it, but he managed to channel most of this energy to rude waiters. He could also come off as a curmudgeon to those who didn’t know him. But his most enduring, and endearing, quality was his unrelenting wit.

One day he asked a question in our philosophy seminar and an auditor (we had some, after all) gave an immediate response. “What was that?” Mahoney exclaimed, with a puzzled look on his face. “Who said that?” The female graduate student identified herself. “So that was you—the auditor! I thought so… Au-di-tor, from the Latin Audire, meaning ‘to listen’. Nothing in there implies speaking.” It took us a minute to realize he was making a joke, but his humor flowed more comprehensibly as the semester moved on. Years later, over our occasional dinners I would often laugh out loud as he recounted some of his more memorable exchanges at conferences, in faculty meetings, and with students.

My own class presentation in his seminar went well, and I set to work on the term paper. Meeting with him to discuss my outline we had an encouraging conversation. At the end he asked me what I would do the following year after graduation. I explained that I wasn’t graduating. “My goodness, you mean to tell me you are a junior.” “No” I replied, “I’m a sophomore.” “What! How did you get into my class? I would never allow a sophomore to take it.” Amidst the brief and somewhat confused conversation that followed, a suspicion that I harbored throughout the semester grew—Mahoney’s short term memory was not so good. However, spurred by the challenge, I redoubled my efforts on the term paper and got an ‘A’ in the course. The following term Mahoney encouraged me to take his “Introduction to Medieval Philosophy.” Perhaps, he admitted, it would be a bit remedial, but important for expanding the breadth of my knowledge. I ended up working very hard for an ‘A-’.

Then a series of small disasters struck, and along the way Mahoney was diagnosed with both Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. For an ambitious scholar this was a particularly cruel fate.  He gradually accepted the fact that many of his projects and articles would never be completed as his ability to concentrate was eaten away by disease. So, we tried to make what order we could of his massive collection of papers. His file cabinets were littered with unique manuscripts by Ficino, Vico, Marsilius, Pico, Vernia, Nifo, Nicholas of Cusa, John Capreolus, various Cambridge Platonists, and of course the more famous Franciscans and Dominicans like Bonaventure and Aquinas. We sifted through half-completed translations, articles in Italian and French written by his scholarly friends of the past half century, and layers of secondary sources—commentaries upon commentaries—all of which contributed to Mahoney’s capacious knowledge.  The sessions had the added benefit of prodding his memory, and in periods of lucidity he could go on for hours with old stories and insights:  the foreign scholar who didn’t understand Bertha, the correspondence from Heidegger concerning Kristeller’s festschrift, concepts of intelligibility in late medieval psychology, and so on.

The slower pace of his final years also provided time for Ed to reflect on his life. His pensive moods were infused with gratitude, regret, advice, and mirth. Midway through his scholarly career Mahoney made an unusual decision. He took a long sabbatical to continue his training for the Catholic priesthood. After decades of lay service in the Church and encouraged by friends he was ordained and served as a priest in the Raleigh Diocese, following through on the vocation he had discerned as a young man.  When he arrived in 1965, Durham was a strange place for a New Yorker to settle down, but being a Catholic in the South was stranger still. The challenges Mahoney faced in pursuing his late vocation are difficult to overstate, but throughout he exercised great patience and prudence.

Uncharacteristically modest for a scholar, he was an excellent homilist and dedicated in his pastoral duties. He, of course, realized that his scholarly output would have been greater had he abandoned his service to the Church, but he saw his two vocations as mutually supportive, which indeed they were. Always cognizant of the difference between theological and philosophical questions, Ed brought to his ministry great erudition and perspicuity. And in the classroom he exercised an uncommon concern for his students’ intellectual development, with his office hours always available for encouragement, reading lists, conversation, and critique.

Mahoney reflected a lot in his final year about paths not taken, papers not written, and opportunities missed—thoughts that death inspires in all of us. These provoked his frequent pieces of advice to me, such as “publish as much as you can when you are young and you’ll be forgiven for your mistakes later.” Far outweighing his regrets, however, were his memories and affirmations of his friends, family, teaching, scholarship, and ministry.

Although untimely, Mahoney’s death was a good one. He was surrounded by friends and former students in his final week, some of whom were at prayer at his bedside during his last moments. Generous to the end, Mahoney stated in his will that his favorite tie should be worn by his brother to the funeral and then given to the Chapel bell ringer, Sam Hammond, so that then “he would have two ties.” I will miss Mahoney very much and join with the Church in commending him to the God he loved and served so well.

Bill English is a Ph.D candidate in the department of political science.