Quantity of reverence matters less than quality of influence.

To revere someone excessively — to make a person an object of worship instead of a teacher with a relevant, practical and surprising lesson — can even be a defense against influence.

*

It is easy to revere something of one’s own invention, but the kinds of disruptive revelations a teacher can impart to a willing student cannot be invented by any individual.

*

Idolatry displaces involved relationship with an infinite subject with a relationship to a finite object. An object relationship is distanced, defined and possessable.

(In Buberian terms, idolatry relates to Thou in I-It terms.)