Books and Covers

Outward appearances can be deceiving. We all have had experiences where we evaluated someone based on their outward appearance, by their “cover” and when we knew them better, found a completely different person behind the cover. Wikipedia says:

The English idiom "don't judge a book by its cover" is a metaphorical phrase which means: you shouldn't prejudge the worth or value of something by its outward appearance alone.

This is one of the reasons we are cautioned against judging others. Doing so based on flawed knowledge (and any judgment we make of others is, by definition, skewed by lack of complete knowledge) is almost always incorrect and harmful.

I knew Louie Blackwelder in England when I was stationed at RAF Alconbury. I liked him immediately. We were Air Force grunts working together in the data processing shop. Louie was a great guy, unpretentious and generous. He was a hard worker and knew his stuff. He would gladly have given anyone he knew the shirt off his back.

We were rotating back to the U.S. at about the same time in 1967. Louie was about a month ahead of me, and he knew that as we traveled down the east coast to our next station at Tyndall AFB in Panama City, Florida, we would pass close to his home in North Carolina. He invited us to visit when we passed by, and gave us directions to his house. We followed his directions and finished on a dirt road up a hill and into a stand of hardwoods. Among the trees was a small house that looked pretty dilapidated.

We decided that we had made a wrong turn and started to leave. Louie came running out of the house and waved us down. We went back to the house and were welcomed with open arms by Louie’s parents and brothers and sisters. We arrived on a Sunday afternoon. It turned out that we had come at exactly the right time. Louie’s family, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, and various grandchildren were all coming to celebrate his mother’s birthday.

Louie’s home was very humble. It was unfinished on the inside – no sheetrock – just the bare 2 by 4s and the clapboard that covered the outside of the house. All concern about the house itself disappeared quickly as various family members began arriving with more food than all of them could have consumed in a week. There was outstanding fried chicken (eat your heart out, Col. Sanders), collard greens with fatback, green beans, corn, mountains of mashed potatoes, wonderful gravy, fantastic homemade bread, cornbread, apple pie, cake, cherry pie, and a whole bunch of other stuff I can’t remember after 45-plus years.

Even better than the food was the hospitality. No one but Louie even knew who we were, but we were treated like long-lost friends (I guess we were, to Louie.). They waited on us and gave us the best of everything they had.

Louie’s father was a civil war buff and had a lapidary shop. He gave me a real confederate five dollar bill, which I have since passed on to my grandson.It was a wonderful visit, one that obviously, Kathy and I treasure as a lifetime memory.

I am still a little chagrined that when we followed the dirt road to Louie’s house, we looked at it and assumed we had the wrong place. We judged that house by its cover. If Louie hadn’t seen us and come running, we would have missed one of the great experiences of our lives.

Judging by outward appearances, the Savior himself might not pass muster. The hymn, O God th' Eternal Father, contains the descriptive phrase: “with no apparent beauty, that men should Him desire, He was the promised Savior…” Jesus wore the ordinary clothing of the Jewish man. Elder Bruce R. McConkie describes it for us in his book, Doctrinal New Testament Commentary:

Jewish men wore five articles of clothing: A headdress, shoes, an inner garment, an outer garment, and a girdle. These items, according to Roman custom, became the property of the soldiers who performed the crucifixion. There were four soldiers and each took one article of clothing. In the case of Jesus, the robe, woven of a single piece of cloth, apparently was of excellent workmanship, and for this the soldiers elected to cast lots.

So in appearance, he looked like many other men of his age and social status. More than ninety percent of the Jewish men of the day were not affiliated with either the Pharisees or the Sadducees. These leaders and rulers regarded most of the population of Israel as unwashed and uneducated. Even the rabbis often had contempt for them. Kent P. Jackson and Robert L. Millet, in their book,  Studies in Scripture, Vol. 5: The Gospels, tell us:

The vast majority of the population in Jewish Palestine did not go to church, that is, they did not have an active affiliation with any of the Jewish sects. Most people accepted the views of the Pharisees on the interpretation of the law, but few actually became Pharisees. These nonaffiliated Jews were called the 'am ha-'aretz, the "people of the land," and they made up probably 90 percent of the crowds and multitudes to which John the Baptist and Jesus preached.

Jesus himself was certainly one of these people, and was held in contempt by many even of his own status. Fredric Farrar, in his book, Life of Christ, writes about these things:

That He had not been to Jerusalem, for purposes of instruction, and had not frequented any of the schools of the Rabbis, is certain from the indignant questions of jealous enemies, "From whence hath this man these things?"(Mark 6:2) "How knoweth this man letters, having never learned?" (John 7:15) There breathes throughout these questions the rabbinic spirit of insolent contempt for the am ha-aretz, their illiterate countrymen.

Interestingly, it was the same humble, unaffiliated “people of the land” who recognized Him as the great teacher and leader and even the Savior that he was. They looked beyond the ordinary “cover” and found the Savior of the world. The Pharisees and Sadducees viewed him as a threat to their position of leadership – as a subversive influence who was stirring the people to a different and less compliant way of life.

The paper book jackets that cover nearly all books (except paperbacks) can be worth a great deal of money. A very rare book without the cover is often worth half or less than one that has a cover in good condition. Collectors love the covers. The book itself is frequently less important than the cover when evaluating the book. We tend to evaluate people the same way. Often, outward appearances cause us to either accept or reject a person. The “cover” can be more important to us than the person inside.

None of us likes to be evaluated solely on our appearance; we would all like people to look beyond the “cover” at the “book” inside. At least two (and probably more I don’t know about) television shows seek out random encounters with people and get them to tell their life story. Invariably, the people selected see nothing unusual about themselves. Invariably too, they always have a story that is as touching as it is unique. They have often suffered greatly, experienced great joy, and are real stalwarts, even heroes. None of them have been standouts – they possess no great physical beauty or wealth that could blind us to their real selves. Sister Marjorie Pay Hinckley often said: “Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” The Savior said simply:

Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment. (John 7:24)

We all make judgments about people every day. We must determine the honesty and integrity of those who give us financial advice, those who would sell to us, and those that we choose as friends. When we do so, we must follow the Savior’s admonishment, concerning righteous judgment. But judging others based on the “cover” alone can be sadly deficient. The best policy is to avoid judging others under any circumstances except when absolutely necessary. Louie Blackwelder and his wonderful family are the perfect example. Imagine the wonderful, humble home and people we’d have missed if we had just driven away unnoticed.