We sat down in the living room watching a documentary on snakes. My daughter (our third born) made a comment on anacondas.

“Anacondas don’t stop growing till they die,” Ọlá said.

“Really?” I asked.

“Didn’t you know, daddy?” she asked, barely hiding the note of triumph in her voice. She gave me that mischievous look that showed she was glad that she bested me in this.

Then she announced to everybody. “I taught my daddy something!”

You see, all my children see me as the encyclopedic daddy. To them, there’s nothing daddy doesn’t know. They have a reason for their belief.

It isn’t a surprise that I always had an answer to every question they asked, be it historical, social, mathematical or whatever.

I grew up with a greed for knowledge. By the time I was 12, I had read everything recorded as the writings of Shakespeare, poetry or prose. (How I achieved that feat is a story for another day). I am an aficionado of many fields of knowledge, and I routinely update myself on relevant information connected to these fields. My children tell me that I study like I’m preparing for examinations.

Time has changed and more light is here; light which we would never have had without these fathers who seem ignorant today.

— Deon Akintomide

So when my children asked me anything, I always had an answer.

Now you know why Ọlá was ‘happy’ that she taught me something.

Only weeks earlier, my son Ògo, our last born, had corrected me when I mispronounced ‘cucumber.’ I pronounced it the Nigerian way, but he said to me, “Daddy, you pronounced it wrong.”

And he was right.

Well. I defended myself. English wasn’t my first language. It wasn’t even my second language. So why shouldn’t I pronounce cucumber however I deemed fit!

The boy just rolled his eyes and laughed.

I’ve taught my children for a long time. I taught them math until I started telling them, “Ask your teacher, that’s what I’m paying them for!” Calculus is a good place for a pastor to stop. I did my own bit in my day. Now is your own time.

Now the balance of knowledge is shifting in favor of the children, and it will keep shifting. It is a good thing when the children start overtaking their parents on the highway of knowledge, but I have a few words for the children of today.

My father sent me to school. Today he cannot match my speaking or writing skills. He doesn’t know Shakespeare and wouldn’t recognize Einstein’s picture. When I teach my children calculus or algebra, they understand it, but to my father or mother, it would all be gibberish. It may seem to my own children now that my parents know nothing, but my parents gave me the opportunity that was denied them by their own background so that their grandchildren may have it all.

My father may not have read Shakespeare, or have any understanding of the theory of relativity, but that doesn’t mean he is dull.

When my father speaks in the limited understanding he has about world events, I must come to that level to relate. Arguing with men of his generation won’t change anything.

They are not stupid, and we are not wiser. Time has changed and more light is here; light which we would never have had without these fathers who seem ignorant today.

I am a pastor, and my writings tend to address Christians many times. What I keep noticing about ‘children’ today is that they think their ‘fathers’ are stupid. A father in the faith says something that is not entirely correct, and the ‘sons’ see this as an opportunity to highlight their own superior knowledge.

I’m bothered. You need to realize that the father’s errors are not your biggest problem. They are leaving the scene already. Your problem is your own ignorance. You think you are wise, and they are stupid. But see what the fathers achieved with their little knowledge. You have not even begun to lay the foundation of any serious thing with all you claim to know.

When you look at the fathers and despise them because of some mistakes they make, you are showing that you know nothing about the buildup of trans-generational knowledge. We are this ‘wise’ because our knowledge is built on the little that the fathers knew. This is true in the sciences, in the arts and it is true spiritually.

Someone said it millennia ago: “And if any man think that he knoweth any thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know.” (1 Corinthians 8:2)

I have taught my dad a few things, too, but not because I am wiser. He taught me what I built my knowledge on.

My children will teach me a lot, too. It is starting already, and I’m happy, because that is how it should be!