Beware of a man of one book?

Question

What does this mean to you??

Answer 1

a man of one book knows only one way. he is unwilling to consider alternatives or flexibility, and his stubbornness will become irritating in the short term, and dangerous in the long.

instead hear the man of many books... the jack of all trades. a friend indeed to so many in need...

Answer 2

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RE:
Beware of a man of one book?
What does this mean to you??

Answer 3

Hehehehe, this reminds me of one of the sayins Cpt. Jack Sparrow said in the first of the movies. You know, the one about you can trust a dishonest man to break his word, but it's the honest man that you must look out for, because you never know when he might do something stupid.

I relate this quote to reading people like a book. In this case, the person is always predictable, so you must beware because he might just do something unpredictable while your predicting the predictable :P

Answer 4

There's an old song that was popular back in the "Happy Day's/Laverne and Shirley" era called "The Book of Love".
It goes like this: Oh, I wonder, wonder, who wrote the book of love... who wrote the book of love?

The answer I have seen that point out the bible as the meaning of "Beware of a man of one book?" was so predictable, also relating this saying to a religious warning.

In fact Saint Thomas Aquinas is sited in many sources for this quote.

The true meaning of this goes beyound religion and open mindedness. I will give you a few examples: A person reads a book about the history of Ireland, just one book and he thinks that he knows the history of Ireland now. However this book may be full of false accounts of the history of Ireland and it's people. Or someone reads a book written by an annonomyous source on the people of a certain country or culture, takes what he has read, doesn't read anymore about those people and goes out teaching others about that group of people based on what he has read from that one book, even though that book is full of morefiction than fact.

The warning is not to be narrowed down to one subject such as the bible or religion, the warning is not to believe everything you read, it doesn't have to be a book. Someone reads an article for instance in the NY Times, takes this information and believes it, starts acting on what he has read. Then a few weeks later it is found out that the Author of this article had misquoted his sources and the NY Times prints a retraction in the paper. All this persons efforts over that period of time was based on one source he believed to be true, he may have spent his lifes savings on what he had read in that article. Now he's screwed, because he based his descisions on one mans words.

Bottom line: We need to start thinking for ourselves and not let a book or a person or the media think for us. We are easily persuaded in this world to have our thoughts and beliefs be molded by the modern "One Book" which I believe is the media. We stay busy working, going about our business and don't have time to see for ourselves what is going on around us in the world. so we listen to the news or a talk radio on the way to work or whatever, as long as it is quick and doesn't take away from our limited time due to our hectic schedules. Before you know it, we are no longer thinking for ourselves but letting the media do the thinking for us so we will have more time for making money. There lies the real danger, becoming a thoughtless society that doesn't have time to observe what is going on around us. Our thoughts have become a NEWS BRIEF. Take it for what it's worth, but Wisdom is worth more than all the money in the world and true wisdom must be sought after and cannot be gained in a 5 minute new brief or from a one book is the gospel mentality.

Answer 5

I love this quote. You can interpret it several different ways and I think it helps to "consider the source." I think we are to see this man as a very powerful man who has all the knowledge he needs in only one book. The religious aspect is undeniable. Saint Thomas Aquinas is refering to the Bible. The man whose faith is strong and who carries the Bible is a powerful man, his power being delivered from God. If you challenge this man, you challenge God - Beware.

Answer 6

It sounds like it may mean to be wary of someone who thinks very close mindedly. A man with one book, has only one sided ideas, he has never ventured beyond that one book to see what other perspectives lie out there.

Answer 7

It means that anyone who has only read one book is bound to be ignorant, boring, and domineering. It was used in reference to those who read only the Bible, and can be said of anyone whose sole or main source of understanding is an ideological text, especially religious. There's a lot of it about. And you can see the results.

Answer 8

Probably this means a religious or some other kind of fanatic. It would be someone who believed that you should only read one book and nothing else - like the Bible, The Koran, or even Mein Kampf.

Answer 9

beware of god because of his power in just one book composed of dozens of other books

Answer 10

i think it means to follow Jesus with the only one true book of knowledge and enlightenment the bible.