The Green-Eyed Monster
The devil comes to Jesus, after he has fasted for forty days and forty nights, and tempts him. “Prove that you are the Son of God by doing something that only God’s son could do: Turn stones into bread that you may eat… throw yourself off of the pinnacle of the temple and let the angels bear you up… bow down and worship me and I will give you kingdoms and riches.” The question that has always come to mind when I read this story is why would the devil want Jesus to prove that he is the Son of God, when the devil already knows that he is the Son of God? Or is the devil trying to take advantage of Jesus’ humanness… his humanity… by coming to him when he knows he is weak and susceptible to sin? Isn’t that when the devil always comes to visit us… when we are weak and susceptible to sin? Why not Jesus? On the other hand, why Jesus? The devil must have known that God and all the hosts of heaven were watching. Was he trying to provoke a cosmic war?
We actually know very little about the devil… the Evil One… Satan. Through portions of Isaiah and Ezekiel… greatly embellished by Dante’s Inferno and Milton’s Paradise Lost, Christians have come to believe that Lucifer, which means “light-bearer,” was an archangel who was motivated by pride to rebel against God. When that rebellion failed, Lucifer was kicked out of heaven… never to return. The devil now resides in this world and does whatever he can to create obstacles for God in this world… preying most often on human beings… the fallible beloved of God. Once a trusted officer in the heavenly realms, Lucifer can never return to Paradise or to his previous life and rank among the hosts of heaven. One day, in his wanderings on earth, he finds Jesus… the Son of God, yet fully human… weak… tired… needing sustenance after a forty-day fast. Weak as he is, this is the one who is God Incarnate… son and heir of the Ruler of the Universe… beloved and treasured by God… all the things that Lucifer wanted… the person that Lucifer wanted to be… one who would live in eternity among all the beings Lucifer wanted to be with… honored and esteemed as Lucifer longed to be. Oh, yes… the green-eyed monster was at work.
Today, we look at the second of the “Seven Deadly Sins”… the sin of envy. Like pride, the sin of envy is also one of the mortal sins and those who commit this sin are believed to be under threat of eternal damnation unless… or until… they are absolved through the sacrament of confession or were otherwise forgiven through perfect contrition on the part of the penitent. Envy is the second of the “Seven Deadly Sins,” which along with pride and envy include lust… gluttony… greed… sloth… and wrath. During Lent, our purpose in focusing on the Seven Deadly Sins is to bring to our consciousness those sins for which Jesus died. We are using these days of Lent to take a good hard look at ourselves in order to recognize that we are sinful… become aware of our own needs for repentance… and humble ourselves before the one who took all of these sins on himself and bore the punishment that we should have faced.
So, what is envy? Envy is widely agreed to be a symptom or instance of the human tendency to evaluate ourselves comparatively… by assessing how well we are doing in comparison with someone else… but, rather than coming out ahead in that evaluation …which would be pride… we come up lacking something. Aristotle said that “envy is pain at the good fortune of others.” Immanuel Kant offers a definition that is just a little more biting. In his Theory of Moral Sentiments, Kant said, “Envy is that passion which views with malignant dislike the superiority of those who are really entitled to all the superiority they possess.” In other words, they deserve all that they have… and all that they are… and we can’t stand it that they have it… or are it! Envy is a complex and puzzling emotion. To be envious of another is to risk being seen as unreasonable… irrational… imprudent… vicious… petty… or just plain wrong. With very few exceptions, the ample philosophical literature defending the rationality and evaluative importance of emotions explicitly excludes envy and a few other nasty emotions as completely irredeemable.
So, what does envy look like today? Well, do you remember the statements that I used to describe “pride”? “My house is bigger than your house.” “My truck is bigger than your car.” “My car is faster than your car.” Well, envy is the person on the flip side saying, “Your house is bigger than my house and that’s wrong. I should have your house…or one that is bigger and better than yours.” “Your truck is bigger than my truck… and I am entitled to a truck that is bigger… better… than yours.” “Your car is faster… nicer… newer… than my car and, if life was fair, I would have a car just like yours”… which leads to the philosophical claim that all sentiments of egalitarian justice have their roots in envy. Freud, for example, thought that concern with justice was the product of childhood envy of other children leading to concern for equal treatment, and thereby fostering what he called ‘group spirit.’ “If one cannot be the favorite oneself,” he said, “At all events nobody else shall be the favorite.” Nietzsche also seemed to believe that envy was the origin of egalitarian values or ideals in his account of the "slave revolt in morality." Defense of the charge that egalitarianism is motivated by envy hinges both on the commitment of egalitarianism and the nature of envy. The common motif is that egalitarians wish to do away with the advantages of those who are better off, and that they wish to do this because they are bothered by the very fact that the better off are better off. This is supposed to show that egalitarians are motivated by envy. Whether this is a fair characterization of any prominent egalitarian position is certainly open to question. Still, it gives us pause to contemplate the possibility. Why do we want to level the playing field? Is envy one of the reasons?
To understand why envy is condemned, we need only turn to the Ten Commandments, where Commandment No. 10 reads… “You shall not covet your neighbor's house… you shall not covet your neighbor's wife… or male or female slave… or ox… or donkey… or anything that belongs to your neighbor”… including his/her lifestyle… skills and abilities… good fortune… or physical appearance. Simply put, envy is our desire for someone else’s traits… status… abilities… or situation… an emotion that we feel because we believe that these others are so much luckier… smarter… more attractive… and better than we are. And we are not alone. The great sociologist Bertrand Russell called envy “one of the most universal and deep-seated of human passions” and said that the tendency to feel envy seems to be present in all cultures. But, if everyone else is doing it… does that make it right? The answer is obviously no.
The way I see it, we, as Christians, live in a very tenuous space… that space that exists between pride in our own possessions… abilities… characteristics… and good fortune and envy of someone else’s possessions… abilities… characteristics and good fortune. That tenuous space is called contentment. If the archangel Lucifer had been content with his possessions… abilities… characteristics… and good fortune in heaven, would he have led a rebellion against God? And, if the devil was content with the possessions … abilities… characteristics… and good fortune he currently has, would he continue to wage a holy war against God’s beloved creatures on this earth? In Paul’s letter to Timothy, he says, “There is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it.” The source of all our restlessness… our dissatisfaction… seems to stem from the way in which we compare and contrast our experiences with another’s and find our reality to be less than ideal. The solution seems to be for us to seek out ways to either make our reality conform to the ideal or to lower our expectations to the level of what we experience in life. The desire to be like another person or to have what they have can be a great motivator, but when we become obsessed by the need to become… or to acquire… another person’s reality… we allow evil to distort our lives and our dissatisfaction makes us miserable. When we, as human beings are miserable, we usually waste no time in sharing that misery with everyone around us… insuring that everyone else is miserable, too. Isn’t that why we say that misery loves company?
The next time that you feel the grip of envy, I challenge you to turn it to joy. Yes, joy. Force yourself to rejoice in the good fortune… or the success of another person… and see what happens. It won’t be easy, but it can be done. If you can sincerely congratulate that other person on his/her success… achievement… new acquisition… whatever… I think you will be surprised by his/her reaction. Many of us are reluctant to speak of… or share… those things that seem to set us apart from others… mostly because we fear their rejection. It is rare, indeed, to find someone with whom we can share all of our joys and sorrows… all of our good fortune and our unanticipated losses… all of our abilities and our disabilities… knowing that the gift we receive from them is unconditional acceptance… unconditional love. Isn’t that why the love and grace of God are so precious to us? We find in Jesus one who accepts us as we are… rich… poor… fat… thin… employed… unemployed… slave or free. As disciples of Jesus, are we not called to be a reflection of him… and to give that same love and grace to others?
As we journey down this road to the cross during Lent, let us find within ourselves the ability to rejoice in all that others possess… and not allow the green-eyed monster of envy take up residence in our hearts. Practice contentment for forty days and forty nights… celebrating the new things that we learn about God and about ourselves along the way… for God walks with us on this path. Amen.
Matthew 4:1-11