A
According to my 1976 Webster’s Third New International
Dictionary, unabridged, the noun pride is defined this way: “the quality or
state of being proud: as a (1) : inordinate self-esteem: an unreasonable
conceit of superiority (as in talents, beauty, wealth, rank) (2) usu cap: such pride personified as one of
the deadly sins. b: a sense of one’s own worth and abhorrence for what is
beneath or unworthy of oneself: lofty self-respect: a reasonable or justifiable
feeling of one’s position . . . c: a
sense of delight or elation from some act or possession 2: proud or disdainful behavior or
treatment: insolence or arrogance of demeanor haughty bearing: disdain . . . 3
a: inordinate show: ostentatious display: magnificence . . . showy decoration
or adornment: magnificent or splendid ornamentation—used of a bird (as a
peacock) in full display c: highest pitch: elevation reached: loftiness, prime
(in the pride of one’s life) 4a: something of which one is proud or which
excites pride: the best in a group or class: pick b obs: exalted position place
such as may reasonably incite to pride
5a obs: a sense of power: fullness of animal spirits: mettle b: sexual
desire: lust, heat—used chiefly of a female domestic animal cobs: wantonness,
excess, extravagance, overboldness . . .”
My response: It seems that the Dictionary entries above
coincide with the Jordan Peterson put down of pride as excessive self-regard or
arrogant, ostentatious public display of personal superiority. These
definitions could be generalized as an unreasonable, unjustifiable feeling of
superiority, and it might be that one is putting oneself ahead of oneself, in a
way that is affront to God.
I am a bit nervous about my immortal soul because it seems
that my take that pride is the cardinal virtue flies in the face of Christian
loathing and denunciation of pride as the cardinal sin. If I am wrong, I will
burn, but I believe all the good deities are Individuators with much positive
personal pride, so what I am proposing, has their approval and sanction—I hope
and pray.
I believe that Jesus is God, so to be an egoist and stand
for pride, self-interest, and individualism when pride and individualism seem
to be regarded as satanic in the Bible does worry me. My views seem
antithetical to Biblical concerns about personal pride as a rebuttal of God. But
I also see the Age of Enlightenment celebration of reason individualism,
science, democracy, capitalism, and self-interest, as the golden age of
humanity in terms of worldly goodness, so far, with peace, plenty, freedom, and
knowledge accessible to all. I think I am on the right track and that the Good
Spirits have authorized me to speak out about positive pride and how it impacts
people and biblical teaching on such matter. So sanctioned, I will continue my
journey to blend egoism with traditional religions promoting humility,
anti-humanism and altruism over pride, humanism, and egoism--but I am a
religious humanist. I am seeking to reconcile these opposing forces and ideas
and blend the old and the new and to seek truth.
It seems to me that Jordan Peterson is quite mistaken in his
recent statements that pride is a Luciferian attribute paraded about like a
chip on the shoulder by a sinner or brazen secular humanist competing with,
defying and disobeying God.
There is so much
confusion about what this critically important noun means and implies, that I do not think Peterson understands it at all.
From a rational theistic or scientific Christian vantage point—or whatever he
believes—his view of pride is wholly negative, off base and is in line with
traditional Judeo-Christian mistaken theology that selfishness is evil, and
selflessness is good, that humility is good, and pride is evil, and that such
conclusions are consistent with biblical instruction. Jordan’s morality is more
altruistic than egoistic and is consistent with and in line with classical
Judeo-Christian morality which is altruistic-egoistic.
When the Church or Synagogue comes out against pride, it is
coming out against individualism and the self-esteeming the self. When they
elevate humility and low self-esteem to saintly status, they are favoring
group-identifying as the ethical ideal.
I regard self-esteem, individualism, and
egoist-individualist morality as good, and I label selflessness, low self-esteem,
and its accompanying altruist-collectivist morality as evil. It should be patent
to the reader that Christians, Jews, and Peterson are going to disagree with me
severely on these issues.
To further complicate this divide, I am and claim to be a
follower of Jesus, and there is considerable, overwhelming really—biblical
evidence that the agrees with my opponents that pride is sinful, more than my
point that without pride in oneself, or self-esteeming love of self all is
forfeit, so goodness is unable to grow in this blighted, corrupt world.
By the end of this blog entry, I hope to reconcile the
biblical altruist morality coupled with the concept of personal humility and my
account of egoist morality and feeling and expressing proper if restrained
pride. By taking some theological license and by suggesting that Jesus is an
Individuator that could not reveal Himself as such to selfless, ignorant,
barely conscious earthlings 2000 ago (They were not yet smart enough or strong
enough to hear the full truth.) as other than their perfect Divine Shepherd and
fellow human, a fellow joiner and groupist preaching selflessness and humility,
because that is all that the group-living nonindividuators of that time could
comprehend. He did not lie to them in any way, but he could not reveal the
whole truth. God only tells us what we can handle, or, if we learn too much too
fast, we are repulsed and become more stupid, regressive, and evil than we had
to be at that time. Jesus knows it is not kind to reveal more than what someone
can handle in their generation. He had to talk to them in terms that they
understood so that they could slowly evolve through history and become virtuous
and holy as they begin to maverize and individual-live a bit in the Modern era.
Jordan Peterson is a brilliant philosopher and psychologist
but his analysis of the role of pride in human thinking and behaving is
surprisingly crude, old-fashioned, and undeveloped.
I propose that haughty pride against God, what Jordan, the Jews,
and the Christians rightly rail against does exist and is the deadliest sin
against the good deities. This pride is group pride or negative pride, and all
joiners humble themselves before their adopted groups, its elite, and its
narrative, and in exchange as true believers in their mass movement, they are allowed
to brag and strut, militantly arrogant and hostile blowhards yelling in
defiance of God, mercy, and self-restraint. It is the humble, the collectivists
that are the most proud, selfish, and sinful, but this is group pride and
negative pride, and this is the pride that the followers of Satan and Lera, the
Ultimate NonIndiviudators and Joiners exhibit and proclaim proudly and
jubilantly.
Individual pride is positive pride, and it is affiliated
with egoist morality and high self-esteem.
Group pride is fanatical and linked to excess self-esteem or
arrogance and a complete lack of self-regard, a willingness to accept a life of
slavery, lies, hate cruelty and needless suffering in the pack; one’s has no
pride at all in enduring all that, and yet the willing slaves exhibit to each
other and to the world a militant group pride, lying to themselves, each other
and the world that they are perfect, and that their one true cause is the best,
the most just that the world has ever seen and well worth dying for.
Jesus and the other good deities are not against good pride
or positive pride, but they hate negative pride or group pride which is the
pride of the satanic pack esteeming each other in rebellion against God, and
that is the group and attitude that Jesus and the good deities abhor. It is
these unrepentant sinners who will be humbled by angry good deities, and rewarded
by the good deities will be the purveyors and possessors of positive pride--those
individualists that worship the good deities shall be exalted.
Those evil people that resort to group pride are those that
offend God grievously. Both their hubris and self-annihilating, masochistic nihilistic
humility offend the good deities and anger them.
Jesus and the good deities are individualists of high
self-esteem more than they are good joiners with modest self-esteem, but in
their righteous, merited pride, they model how to act for proud, individuating
followers: they conduct themselves with courtesy, modesty, and civility. The
good deities and their angels never strut, brag, or imply that they are
superior to anyone though they most obviously are, but they insist that all
justifiably proud egoists conduct themselves with modesty and humility in interacting
with others and in thought, speech, and action. God does not brag and will not
suffer a braggart so even the practitioners of egoism and positive pride must
be modest in behavior and speech, for boasting and putting on airs transmutes
their positive pride into negative, group pride and that angers the gods and will
not go unpunished.
Peterson, on one hand, use to espouse that the idea of the
sovereign individual was the core belief of the West, which it is, and a fine
axiom it is at that. But the sovereign individual must be proud of his
accomplishments and esteem himself if he is to have self-confidence sufficient
to motivate him to self-realize.
If I am correct, and I think I am, that God the Mother and
Father, Individualists and Individuators both, model for humans how to be
properly proud and properly humble. We are proud and humble as the Divine
Couple demonstrate and exemplify, so I believe that proper human pride
allows—even sanctioning and authorizing humans to practice egoist-individualist
morality, the divine morality, so that they can live and maverize in the image
of their Creators, who approve of proper human pride and proper human humility.
I will now describe and define my concepts of positive,
individual pride versus negative, group pride, and I shall do it in light with
how pride is defined in my dictionary.
According to my 1976 Webster’s Third New International
Dictionary, unabridged, the noun pride is defined this way: “the quality or
state of being proud: as a (1) : inordinate self-esteem: an unreasonable
conceit of superiority (as in talents, beauty, wealth, rank) (2) usu cap: such pride personified as one of
the deadly sins. b: a sense of one’s own worth and abhorrence for what is beneath
or unworthy of oneself: lofty self-respect: a reasonable or justifiable feeling
of one’s position . . . c: a sense of
delight or elation from some act or possession
2: proud or disdainful behavior or treatment: insolence or arrogance of
demeanor haughty bearing: disdain . . . 3 a: inordinate show: ostentatious
display: magnificence . . . showy decoration or adornment: magnificent or
splendid ornamentation—used of a bird (as a peacock) in full display c: highest
pitch: elevation reached: loftiness, prime (in the pride of one’s life) 4a:
something of which one is proud or which excites pride: the best in a group or
class: pick b obs: exalted position or place such as may reasonably incite to
pride 5a obs: a sense of power:
fullness of animal spirits: mettle b: sexual desire: lust, heat—used chiefly of
a female domestic animal cobs: wantonness, excess, extravagance, overboldness .
. .”
My response:
(1)
Inordinate self-self-esteem is an unreasonable self-conceit
that is immoderate and immoderate self-regard of being disdainful of others or
too self-deprecating are really opposite sides of the same coin of low self-esteem
or self-loathing. If one esteems the self highly but not inordinately, nor does
the self put the self down too much or beyond what is warranted for
self-correction for sins, flaws and mistakes, then one is calm and at peace,
but quite realistic about the self in terms of expectations for the self, and
if one has lived up to moral self-expectations, then one can be proud of
oneself, but must never strut or brag for that is unbecoming period.
(4a) One feels proud of elevation reached, but that is
whatever level of self-realized development one has reached.
B.
Here is a paragraph I pulled off the Internet (I could not
tell its source.): “People also ask: How can we overcome pride. Humility and
truth are the best antidotes to pride.”
My response: Truth is the best antidote anything, be it
positive pride misconceived, or full-blown expression of negative pride. Truth
is the best antidote to positive humility or individual humility that one is
proud of what one has accomplished, but admits where one falls short, and never
brags. Truth is the best antidote to negative humility or group humility where
all in each group and in the whole society and at whatever level of the caste
all debase citizens find themselves trapped, living lives in slavery and
malevolence.
Humility is not much of an antidote to anything.
The entry: “Generosity and magnanimity are likewise
beneficial in fighting and combatting the sin of pride.”
My response: This suggest that the selfless giver is humble
so is saved from sin and death but that the self-interested Randian producer is
selfish and condemned to burn for he is filled with anti-God pride. I disagree vigorously.
The entry: “The ultimate remedy to combat pride is love of
God.”
My response: The ultimate remedy to combatting pridelessness
(group pride or anti-Godfulness) is to maverize and be proud like proud
individuating God, and that love of God will save the soul of the positively
proud worshiper of the good deity.
The entry: “To love God is to love God for who He is. We
cannot love God and embrace the sin of pride at the same time.”
My response: To love God is to love God for who He or She
is. We cannot love God and embrace the sin of pridelessness at the same time.
C.
I copied out an article of the Internet, called THE SIN OF
PRIDE in the Bible, by Adrian Rogers. This article is based on Pastor Adrian
Roger’s message, The Problem with Pride.
I will quote the article in full and comment where I deem
appropriate.
Pastor: “Pride is a problem that all wrestle with—and those
who think they don’t probably have more of it. ‘Pride goes before destruction,
and a haughty spirit before the fall.’
What Pride Is Not
Sinful Pride is Not the Same as Good Self-Image.”
My response: I agree that sinful pride is not the same as
good self-image.
Pastor: “In Jesus, you are somebody. The Bible describes
Christians as the righteousness of God in Christ . . .”
My response: You as an individual have worth and are
somebody on your own, if you are moral and holy, individuating, but you are all
that much more so in Jesus or the other good deities. I love the concept that
Christians are the righteousness of God in Christ.
Pastor: “When Jesus washed His disciples feet ( , ),
that was humility. Jesus was not thinking lowly of Himself. He knew that he
came from God. But knowing that, He washed His disciples’ feet.”
My response: There is a place for positive humility even if
the life of an egoist individuators and some service to others is expected and
obligatory.
Pastor: “Humility is not thinking lowly of yourself. It is
not thinking of yourself at all.”
My response: One should always be aware of the self and how
one is reacting and should react in any moment, during any encounter with
people, life, or reality. If one must be humble, fine, but one should not need
to feel lowly about oneself, and rarely should we not think of ourselves at
all, forthat sins against the axiom that the individual is the sovereign
concept not just of this world and the West, but in heaven too.
Pastor: “Sinful Pride is Not the Same as Taking Pride in
Your Work
When we say someone ’takes pride in his work,’ that’s not
the kind of pride we are warning about. When a job is well done and you get
recognition, or when a parent is grateful for the grades a child makes, that is
not sinful pride.”
My response: Even the Pastor recognizes that there are
sources of positive pride that are not sinful pride; I would go farther and
argue that without a sense of pride, one can be immoral and still live with
oneself, but a morally proud individual, cannot for long tolerate himself,
unless he tries really tries to be moral most of the time, coming close in
action to living in accordance with his own standard of behavior, a gauge that
he insist that the self-live up to. He is proud so he must be moral, or his
guilt and shame will eat him alive.
Pastor: “What Is the Sin of Pride?
An Attitude of Independence From God
Pride is an attitude of, ‘I don’t need you, God. Stay out of
my life.’”
My response: For me the sin of pride is sin of pridelessness
where the individual leans to heavily on God and remains too dependent on God
when she should be maverizing and running her own affairs, even running a part
of God’s kingdom on earth. Positive pride between the individuator and the
individuating and individuated good deity is not the statement that I do not
need you, God if mostly I run my own affairs. God/gods: stay out of my life.
Rather, I will not interfere with your divine administrations by interrupting
you needlessly. I need you. I always did and always will, but I’d not seek to
bother you any more than necessary. Please stay in my life but I will run my
life on my own as long as I can as well as I can, and I will contact you just
to enjoy each other’s company as well as when I am stuck.
Pastor: “You might say, ‘I don’t have that.’ Question: do
you pray regularly? “Well,’ you say, ‘I don’t pray as much as I ought to.’
You don’t pray because you don’t feel the need to. You
think, ‘I can handle it.’ If you are wrestling with prayerlessness, you are
really wrestling with pride.”
My response: I think the Pastor is correct; we should pray a
lot but not all the time; God wants us to live our own lives too. If we are
wrestling with prayerlessness, it is more likely that we are wrestling with
pridelessness than with pride, and that we are not religious or may be
worshiping a demon actively and consciously, and the demon the joiner is
without proper pride.
Pastor: “Ungratefulness to God
Paul asked this penetrating question: ‘What do you have that
you did not receive? (See ‘I worked for it,’ you say. Who gave you the
ingenuity, the strength, the energy? You don’t have one blessed thing that you
have not received.”
My response: In a way, Paul and the Pastor are correct—all
that we have and received come from God, and that is as it should be. But, to
some degree the individual, through her self-realizing and hard work, is
self-generating a bit too, and that personal input is original, personal, and
significant, and God praises us for being somewhat self-reliant and demands
that we make something of the gifts given us by De.
Pastor: “Thinking You are Better Than Others
Here are some indicators of pride.
A proud person . . .
·
Will not admit mistakes, and becomes irritated
when corrected for mistakes.
·
Accepts praise for gifts over which they have no
control: beauty, talent, etc.
·
Refuses to take counsel and learn from others.
C.S. Lewis wrote, ‘Pride gets no pleasure
out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man.’
(C.S. Lewis; Mere Christianity)”
My response: We all mistakes and one cannot
know or love God or self-improve unless one is brutally self-honest, welcoming
input from all sources about the self, blemishes, and all. The self is not
proud unless the self is so secure that no criticism is unwelcome, and he fully
realizes that beauty, talent and being born with a silver spoon in no way
exempts the privileged from their divine duty to self-realize like the less
talented and less fortunate.
Pastor: “Here are five ways pride
devastates your life.
Pride Defies God
The Book of Proverbs provides wonderful
lessons on the sin of pride. ‘These six things the LORD hates, yes, seven are
an abomination to Him; a proud look . . .’ (
) Seven things God hates, and number one is pride. ‘Everyone proud in
heart is an abomination to the LORD (_____).
Why does God hate pride so much? Pride
created the devil. Pride turned Lucifer, the son of the morning, into Satan,
the father of night. Among Paul’s standard for a preacher was that he must be
‘not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride he fall into the same
condemnation as the devil.’ ( )
Pride ruined humanity. In the Garden of
Eden, do you think temptation was to taste a particular kind of fruit? No—the
temptation was, ‘You will be like God.’ (See
)
‘God resists the proud, but gives grace to
the humble.’ ( ) God lines Himself up
in battle against the proud.”
My response: One should always be humble
towards any good deity because they are superior to us always and are our
bosses. At the same time, it is ordered by them of us that we strive mightily
to be like them and in some small way as individuating creators to become and
do as they do. The pride of individualism is to become like God and act like
God as an admiring subordinate seeking to emulate the ways of Divine
Perfection. The negative Pride of Lucifer is the pridelessness or group pride
to fight God, compete with God and overthrow God with the new world order based
in nonindividuating, self-loathing and altruism rather than blessed
individuating, self-respect, and egoism.
Pastor: “Pride Ruins the Heart
The seat of pride is the heart.
‘A haughty look, a proud heart, and the
plowing of the wicked are sin ( ). That
is, a man who plows his field without giving God thanks for sun, rain, and
germination is proud. He is self-sufficient.”
My response: Again, the good deities,
individuators all, do not want us to be ungrateful; we should always be
grateful and give thanks. We should be more independent than not and more
self-sufficient than not.
Pastor: “We were born with pride and
selfishness in the heart. ‘For, from within, out of the heart of men, proceed
all evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness,
wickedness, deceit, lewedness, and evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness’
( ). These things are not learned;
they are part of human nature.”
My response: Yes, the evil in the human
heart is not learned but is part of our human natures. We were born with the
pride of pridelessness and selflessness as the dominant and wicked proportion
of our hearts, and to improve morally and spiritually, over time we maverize,
taking on the godly pride of reasonable, merited self-regard and enlightened
self-interest.
Pastor: “Pride Divides Society
There has never been an argument, war,
divorce, or church split in which pride was not a major factor.
‘By pride comes nothing but strife’ ( )
‘He who is of a proud heart stirs up strife’
( )
If God resists the proud, then the proud man
is out of fellowship with God. Any man, woman or child who is out of fellowship
with God will also be out of fellowship
with other people.”
My response: God resists not the proud but
the arrogant prideless that sin. God the Individualist is out of fellowship
with a sinful joiner, so the sinful joiner will be out of fellowship with the
individualist, the living angel that individually lives, and he will be out of
fellowship with all joiners, and they will share the fellowship of insider
groupism with their tribal -fellow-belongers, while sharing the fellowship of
groupist pridelessness against individuals outside their group and against
other tribal rivals with whom they conflict and war incessantly.
Pastor: “Often, we are not trying to solve
the problem—we are trying to win the argument. That is pride. You might be
right and still the problem because of your attitude.”
My response: Yes, conflicts are escalated
and perpetuated by those that seek victory rather than peace, solving problems
for mutual benefit. But that kind of arrogant pride usually is affiliated with
tribal warring, on whatever level, and it is group pride, not individual pride.
Pastor: “Pride Brings Dishonor
What does the proud person want? Praise,
honor, esteem. What does he get through pride? ‘When pride comes, then comes
shame’ ( )”
My response: Yes, external praise, honors
and the esteem of others is gratifying, but the individualist practices good
pride and good humility when he is satisfied and contented with how he praises himself
or humbles himself as in need of self-correction. Group pride or bad requires
seeks public praising and avoidance of public shaming.
Pastor: “The fear of the LORD is the
instruction of wisdom, and before honor is humility ( ). Humility, not pride, comes before honor.
‘A man’s pride will bring him low, but the humble in spirit will retain honor.”
My response: The fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom, but before the human is honored by God, he must display
his positive pride more than he displays his positive humility, before God and
in his private thoughts, as a maverizer.
A man’s humility, especially his negative
or group humility, will bring him low, but the justly and proportionately proud
in spirit will retain divine honor.
Pastor: “The proud man wants to be praised,
petted, honored. The very thing he wants, he loses the admiration of others. He
ends up not with admiration, but contempt.”
My response: Note the sinfully proud man
seeking to be praised, petted, and honored is a social creature. His pride is
connected to his sadistic snubbing of other of inferior social rank. Social
creatures, by Mavellonialist definition, lack self-esteem or proper pride and
proper humility—their entire self-assessment is a communal appraisal, a
communal affirmation or disaffirmation.
Pastor: “Pride Destroys Souls
Pride populates Hell. ‘The Lord will
destroy the house of the proud’ ( )
Pride is the road to national ruin.
But God says, ‘If My people who are called
by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek my face, and turn away
from their wicked ways, then I will hear them from Heaven, and will forgive
their sin and heal their land.’ “
My response: This is an accurate statement
of the covenant established and honored by Yahweh in the Old Testament with the
Hebrew people. Always, we should be humble in the presence of God, out of
respect and affection, as well as fear. If we are wise and smart, we realize
how perfect, how brilliant and beyond us, God is.
Note that a proud, rebellious people
continue to sin and defy God and will not turn from their wicked ways, but still,
I assert that bad pride and bad humility are groupist traits and behaviors
arising out of altruist-collectivist morality. That grows out of worshiping
evil spirits.
Pastor: “Some of you are in financial ruin.
Why? Because your neighbors keep buying things you can’t afford—and you think
you have to keep up.”
My response: Not that this proud, foolish
materialist, keeping up with the Jones, is a group creature, wrecking his life
based upon false worries about what his neighbors do or think.
Pastor: “A proud person’s emotions will be
thin, because you are controlled by circumstances. The right car, the right
clothes, the right decorations—emotionally, it will get to you.
But pride is primarily eternal spiritual
ruin.”
My response: Yes, group pride will lead to
eternal death and hellfire.
Pastor: “ ‘The Pharisee stood and prayed
thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners,
unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give
tithes of all I possess.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not
so much as raise his eyes to Heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be
merciful to me a sinner.’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified
rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who
humbles himself will be exalted.”
My response: Jesus seems clearly to be
condemning the proud, egotistical, bragging, individualistic Pharisee as
self-exalting but due be humbled by God in this world and in the next. Jesus
seems to be explicitly declaring that the humble, self-deprecating, remorseful
tax collector with his head down while asking divine forgiveness and mercy is
the one that God will exalt perhaps in this world, but most certainly in the
next.”
I have a difficult time reconciling my
beliefs and definitions of positive pride and positive humility as egoist
ethical accomplishments with biblical condemnation of pride as the cardinal sin,
but I maintain my beliefs while suggesting that the arrogant Pharisee is guilty
of groupist pride, and the tax collector is somehow the avatar of healthy pride
and healthy humility. The Pharisee will be punished by God and the tax
collector will be rewarded.
Pastor: “Jesus’ Example of Humility
Jesus showed us that the way up is down”
My response: It may be that Jesus seems to
be showing us that the way up to heaven is down to self-deprecation, but, in
fact, Jesus is showing us that the way up is by going up into temperate,
healthy, reasonable self-appreciation and self-promotion.
Pastor: “ ‘ Let this be in you which was
also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it
robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the
form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men . . . Therefore God
also had highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow . . .’
God is going to give to His saints, who
follow Christ in genuine humility, a greater position than Satan had before he
fell. The Bible says that we will judge angels (see )—and
List of Scriptures Referenced in this
Article
More Biblical Verses About the Sin of Pride
‘If you walk in my statutes and keep My
commandments, and perform them, then I will give you rain in its season, the
land shall yield its produce, and the trees of the field shall yield their
fruit . . . And, after all this, if you do not obey Me, then I will punish you
seven times more for your sins. I will break the pride of your power; I will
make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze.’ “
My response: Humans do not live in an
ontological vacuums as mere intelligent, evolutionary apes. We have the
intelligence of smart creatures so conscious and language-wielding that we have
free will, a gift and burden give us by God. The wages of virtue are divine
reward in this world and the next; the wages of sin and rebellion against God
are death and misery in this world and in the next.
Pastor: “ ‘There they cry out, but He does
not answer, because of the pride of evil men. Surely God will not listen to
empty talk, nor will the Almighty regard it.’
‘For all that is in the world—the lust of
the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but
is of the world.”
My response: It is no wonder that
Christians are lost and confused. They have been told and egoist morality, individualism
and self-esteem are examples of Luciferian pride on display, and that they will
burn if they do not surrender themselves abjectly to God right now.
Now, humans, who are wild animals at heart,
filled with lust and the primitive but powerful drive to survive and perpetuate
this species, are to renounce totally the ways of this world, and be purely
otherworldly like God is. These demands seem excessive, unreasonable, and
unachievable for most people.
If I am correct, and I think I am the
egoist morality is good, and that the ontological law of moderation is the law
of the universe, the extreme Christian theology against individual pride and
love of being in the world are legitimate criticisms that are too harsh and go
to0 far.
We must not forget what the Bible teaches,
but the Mavellonialist touch is required to bring Christianity and Judaism into
the 21st century.
D.
Here is an excellent, authoritative article
by Thomas A. Tarrants on pride and humility. He is the President Emeritus of
the C.S. Lewis institute. I will quote it in full and then comment on it.
T (for Thomas Tarrants): “Pride and
Humility, By Thomas A. Tarrants on December 4, 2011.
Pride and Humility
‘Pride is your greatest enemy, humility is
your greatest friend.”
My response: Group pride and group humility
are one’s greatest enemies and this is the arrogant pride railed against in the
Bible; individual pride and individual humility are one’s greatest friends, and
these meet usually with God’s approval and reward.
T: “So said the late John R. W. Scott, a
remarkably humble man of great abilities and accomplishments who is often said
to have made the greatest impact for Christ of anyone in the twentieth century.
His succinct statement about pride and humility goes straight to the heart of
what the Bible teaches about the deadly root of our sins and sorrows.
How many recent sermons have you heard on
pride or humility? Probably not many. One hears surprisingly little from church
or parachurch leaders about either of these subjects. In fact, what throughout
history has been recognized as the deadliest of vices is now almost celebrated
as a virtue in our culture. Pride and arrogance are conspicuous among the rich,
the powerful, the successful, the famous and celebrities of all sorts, and even
some religious leaders.”
My response: Thomas is correct that the
modern world has moved away from God and the worldly, connected, and successful
are very proud and self-aggrandizing. My observation is that these swaggers are
not selfish individualists but are selfish joiners, and groupists, purely and
practitioners of sophisticated altruist-collectivist morality.
T: “And it is also alive and well in
ordinary people, including each of us. Yet few of us realize how dangerous it
is to our souls and greatly it hinders our intimacy with God and love for
others. Humility, on the other hand, is often seen as weakness, and few of us
know much about it or pursue it. For the good of our souls, then, we need to
gain a clearer understanding of pride and humility to for the one and embrace
the other.”
My response: Thomas could teach today’s
believers much of what has been forgotten. We need to forsake bad pride and bad
humility and embrace good pride and good humility. He and Jordan Peterson
likely think alike about pride and humility.
T: “Pride
C.S. Lewis, another top contender for
having had the greatest impact for Christ in the twentieth century, called
pride ‘the great sin.’ Ever believer should read his chapter by the title in
Mere Christianity.
There Lewis said, According to Christian
teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger,
greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere flea bites in comparison: it was
through Pride that the devil became the devil:”
My response: Jordan Peterson may not be
able to openly announce Christ as his savior, but he seems to have agreed now
completely with Lewis and Christians that individualist, hubristic Pride is
what led to the fall of Lucifer, and all humans that follow in Lucifer’s steps.
T: “Pride leads to every other vice: it is
the complete anti-God state of mind . . . it is Pride which has been the chief
cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. 1
If this sounds like exaggeration, it will
help us to know that Lewis is not simply giving us his private opinion but
summarizing the thinking of the great saints through the ages.
Augustine and Aquinas both taught that
pride was the root of sin.2 Likewise,
Calvin, Luther, and many others. Make no mistake about it: pride is the great
sin. It’s the devil’s most effective and destructive tool.”
My response: I am thinking of a snippet of
video I looked at two weeks ago from Jordan Peterson, warning against
intellectual pride as Luciferian pride. Peterson considers geniuses like
himself with high IQs to be the only ones capable of first-rate creativity and intellectual
originality. He insists that talent is rare.
As a common man and blue-collar worker, I
deny this: anyone with any level of IQ is capable of first-rate creativity, of
intellectual originality and certainly all are capable of emotional genius,
which can inspire and shape the topic and slant of one’s creative outputs. I
suspect that if all were to maverize deeply, it will unleash hidden,
under-utilized intelligent areas of our brains, so that all should be able to
increase and unleash their pockets of inner intelligence in new and interesting
ways.
Returning to Peterson’s video, he sternly
warned those that are intellectually gifted that they had better worry about—in
essence—going to hell if they are not humble. He warns that the gifted are the
most likely to burn because they are most susceptible to being proud of their
unearned, innate gifts, and intellectual pride is the worst form of pride and
sinning, and it is pure Luciferian pride.
It is obvious that I reject all of this.
Satan’s intellectual pride is the pride of
a guru at the head of his mass movement, and it is group pride and that is pure
self-detestation, a complete humiliation of the self, and that is pure evil.
Lucifer’s sin is his anti-intellectual pride, and his sin of self-immolation
rejecting God’s command for all being to love themselves and maverize, and,
Lucifer, the altruistic leader of the pack, rebels against God’s will and
instructions for all sentient beings.
T: “Why do great spiritual leaders,
Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant alike, unite around this conviction?
Because it is so clearly and solidly taught in Scripture.”
My response: Tarrants is right that
Scripture teaches that intellectual, individualistic pride and self-interest
are cardinal sins. I reject almost all of that as an egoist and
living-angel-in-the-making—trying not always succeeding—and I do not want to contradict
the Bible or Jesus, though I disagree with the Biblical take on pride and
humility. My only justification is that I love Jesus and all the great
classical good deities, and they could only communicate to the primitive
worldview of the people back in history in terms their understood—in
altruistic-collectivistic understanding in place at that time.
Today, we will set the record straight and
do not wish to criticize or condemn Scripture, Christ or any good deity from
ancient day. I think they agree with me, and indeed sent me to people as a
prophet to help usher better times, so we do not come to overthrow older faiths
and moralities (These were advancing improvements at the time.) but to
complement them where we can, and blend it all together. I seek not to
overthrow or war against any great traditional faith or their holy books, but
to work together to build upon what they constructed to help people move forth
successfully in history.
T: “Pride first appears in the Bible in
Genesis 3, where we see the devil, that ‘proud spirit’ as John Donne described
him, using pride as the avenue by which to seduce our first parents. Taking the
form of a serpent, his approach was simple but deadly. First, he arrogantly
contradicted what God had said to Eve about eating the forbidden fruit and
charged God with lying.”
My response: Note that Lucifer appears to
Eve as a serpent, so he represents chaos or evil nature or the out-of-balance
feminine, to lure her (our first human mother already had a basically evil
nature, I think, and free will so she was capable of choosing to sin, and I
think Yahweh know Adam and Eve would sin sooner or later, and be tossed out
into the world.). Eve, in her state of grace and pure moral and spiritual
goodness, is capable of sinning but has not yet sinned. As she was in the
Garden, she represents cosmos at its best, a garden or urban spot, unnatural
and lovely, and those residing there are cosmos in balance (Cosmos or Yang out
of balance is sinning.).
Satan accuses God of lying, and this
introduces lying into the world because God cannot lie and will not lie, but
Satan, being pure falsehood and mendacity, relies on lying so Sa can twist the
fabric of reality to gain power and thwart God. Once the world of the lie is
introduced to Adam and Eve, it gives them an evil alternative to pure, good but
one-dimensional living in the Garden of Eden as perfect if innocent human
beings.
T: “This shocking rejection of God’s word
introduced Eve to the hitherto unknown possibility of unbelief and was intended
to arouse doubt in her mind about the truthfulness and reliability of God. In
the next breath, the devil drew her deeper into deception by contending that
God’s reason for lying was to keep her from enjoying all the possibilities
inherent in being Godlike. This clever ploy was aimed at undermining her
confidence in the goodness and love of God and arousing the desire to become
like God.”
My response: Women are more selfless than
men and are of innately lower self-esteem then men, so they are most easily
corrupted than men—not by much maybe by 5 or 10%--so note the archetypal axiom
conveyed in ancient Scripture that women are more evil than men, that evil
entered into the world women because Satan knew working on Eve would be his
best approach to weaning them away from God. In fairness to Eve, and all women,
men are more evil in action because their violence, abuse of others and warring
makes natural evil in the world much worse. Men actively inflict pain upon
others and themselves.
It occurs to me that Satan hijacked
Christianity and about every other religion, both ancient and modern
denominations, by spreading the lie that God was a jealous Ego lying to humans
to protect His monopoly on power. Satan smears God, with the colossal falsehood
that God really wants to keep humans down and back so that only He can remain
ascendant as He selfishly keeps all the power and enjoyment of God-like
experiences for Himself and a few of His angels, and humans are kept naked,
shackled and innocent in the Garden of Eden. Satan defames God and egoist
religion by suggesting that humans should be selfish and seek to eat the
forbidden fruit so they too can become knowing, conscious, and powerful like
God and then to rival Yahweh rather than serve Him.
Satan slanders God and egoism-individualism
as demonic, and favors Saself as noble and offering people a way out of bondage
and repression, and he offers morally crippling altruism-collectivism and this
cult of humility (which only increases each personal and natural low sense of
low self-esteem, thereby increasing hatred in self and against the world so now
each person, through her action and inaction, is growing evil in the world.
Humans do not learn the truth about pride
and egoism as good and humility and altruism as evil, because humans are so
primitive biologically and culturally that they cannot do even incremental
moral improvement unless quite slowly over centuries and thousands of years, or
they will resort to jungle immorality.
Add in Satan’s lying about the nature of
morality and immorality, then it is no wonder that the great Christian thinks
got it badly wrong about egoism and pride. God would not interfere and tell
people about egoism and pride because He did not want to steal their discovery
of ultimate truth on their own. In doing so God did not lie to them but he did
not interfere much in the world on Earth, allowing Satan to successfully lie to
people about pride and egoism, for humans had to discover how to live and what is
true in their own good time, even if they wiped each other out before finally
understanding the natures of pride and egoism.
Add to this that humans live in near
complete ignorance about ultimate truth, and it is no wonder no one can
separate what is true and actual from what is false and illusory.
T: “The desire to lift up and exalt
ourselves beyond our place as God’s creature lies at the heart of pride. As Eve
in her now confused and deceived state of mind considered the possibilities,
her desire to become Godlike became stronger. She began to look at the
forbidden fruit in a new light, as something attractive to the eyes and
pleasant to the touch. Desire increased, giving rise to rationalization and a
corresponding erosion of the will to resist and say no.”
My response: God desires and commands us
each day to lift up, and exalt ourselves beyond our place as individuators, to
live as Individuators as God is, because we are His creatures, made in image
and likeness. God commands us each day to be mediocrities no longer, to exist
as no longer nonindividuated as groupist joiners in our negative humility and
selfless hatred of others and ourselves. This self-loathing is the hidden
message that Satan was sends behind his altruist morality and fake humility, steering
all towards in ancient times and today.
T: “Finally, weakened by unbelief, enticed
by pride, and ensnared by self-deception, she opted for autonomy and disobeyed
God’s command. In just a few deft moves, the devil was able to use pride to
bring about Eve’s downfall and plunge the human race into spiritual ruin. This
ancient but all-to-familiar process confronts each of us daily: ‘Each person is
tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has
conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is full grown brings for death’
(James 1:14-15).’ “
My response: I accept that the urge to sin
and giving into sin is when one is weakened by unbelief and ensnared by
self-deception, and by disobeying God’s command, but to desire good pride and
autonomy or self-reliance and self-sufficiency are virtues that God insists
that we hone and build upon to individuate in De’s name. It is the humble who
self-deprecate, nonindividuated and run with the pack, that, lacking
self-pride, find worth desperately sought after in group-pride or negative
pride, and that is the altruistic, immoral pride that Peterson and Christians
rail against, but mistake that it is aligned with individualism and merited
self-pride.
It could be that the original sin was to
disobey God’s will and instructions, but to become, mortal, naked conscious
humans who know they are basically evil but have free will to fight it and
learn to self-realize, work, love and serve God is really a blessing more than
a curse, so why should humans be punished for wanting to not be Pinocchio’s,
mere puppets in the garden with no real consciousness or challenges? God is
conscious and has free will and De loves us, and De would want us to eat the
fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. To eat the fruit to me seems like something
to be rewarded not punished, and to have knowledge of good and evil like God
the angels and other sentient beings have is to become a sentient being, and
that is an irreversible blessing and curse—more blessing than curse—accompanied
by moral and spiritual consequences and being responsible for one fate in life
and after death.
T: “From this point on in the Bible, we see
the outworking of pride and unbelief in the affairs of individuals, families,
nations, and cultures. As people lose or suppress the knowledge of God,
spiritual darkness grows and a psychological inversion occurs: in their thinking
God becomes smaller and they come larger. The center of gravity in their mental
lives shifts from God to themselves. They become the center of the world, and
God is conveniently oved to the periphery, either through denial of his existence
or distortion of his character. Self-importance and godless self-confidence
grow stronger. The cycle that follows is familiar: people exalt themselves
against God and over others. Pride increases, arrogant and/or abusive behavior
ensues, and people suffer.”
My response: I agree that prideful rebellion
and unbelief can lead people away from God, but when a sinner rebels against
God, she embraces conformity to Satan, who is the leader of the pack, favoring
altruist morality, low self-esteem, and fake humility.
I also wish to reassure that reader that I
do not think that a human, any human, should ever disrespect and act haughty
towards any good deity, whether major or minor in status. Such hostile attitude
and behavior towards a good deity surely will anger her or him and that will
not end well for the snotty human insulting these divine leaders of the world.
I also think that no human, ever, should be
arrogant towards anyone, because the lack of modesty is bad manners, and that
violates the Golden Rule, be one an egoist or altruist.
Arrogance and positive pride are not
synonymous. When someone acts supercilious, no matter his words, his actions
exhibit someone that does not like himself or have confidence in himself. If
one is a virtuous and holy individuator, one speaks with politeness, low-key
quiet confidence, and that manner of interacting with others is a behavioral
instantiation of how he feels inside. He is proud without being cocky or
arrogant, and he treats others as equals without making a masochistic fetish
out of fake humility in front of others to manipulate them for gain.
T: “On a national level, this is writ large
in the history of Israel and surrounding nations, especially in the indictments
delivered by the prophets of the eight and seven centuries BC. Blinded by power
and the unprecedented affluence of the eighth century, prideful leaders of
Israel embraced a corrupted view of God, trusted in their own wisdom and power,
oppressed their own people, ignored his call to repent, and thereby invited his
judgment, which fell with disastrous results.”
My response: Thomas Tarrants has some
strong, valid criticisms of prideful humans, and his warnings about these
self-exalting buffoons that snub, defy, disobey, and turn their backs on their
good deities. Worldly success and access rendered them immortal and invincible
in their own eyes, and they forgot that their blessing came from their
benevolent god or gods. These ruling elites of various generations and countries
in history snubbed God, oppressed their own people, ignored Yahweh’s call for
them to repent, and thereby invited his judgment with disastrous results.
I accept all of this and accept it as
historically and theologically accurate. We should work with and obey the good deities
and offer them gifts and celebrate them ritually out of desire and love, but
also out of fear of what will happen to us if we fail to appreciate and worship
them.
Tarrants condemning their prideful sinning
was justified, but he is misidentifying bad, group, collectivist pride of
ruling elites with good, individual pride; he is painting with too broad a
brush, insisting that all pride is vicious.
T: “There are also many biblical examples
of pride and its consequences in the lives of individuals and they offer
valuable lessons for our lives.”
My response: Thomas accuses individuals of
individual sinful pride that they will be punished for, but I object, that their
individually expressed sinful pride is group pride, because they group-live,
group-identify, nonindividuated, group-conform, and practice altruist morality,
and these orientations feed their collective, sinful pride. Sinful pride can be
individualistic and so can be bad humility, but group humility and group pride
can be good, but, ordinarily, the kind of sinful pride that these Old Testament
prophets are enraged over is group pride, and the kind of sinful humility that
goes with that sinful group pride is sinful group humility.
T: “Often their stories are self-contained
in one chapter and make for easy reading. One of the most notable examples from
the Old Testament is that of Uzziah, who was a believer. When he became king of
Judea at age sixteen, he set his heart to seek God and put himself under the
spiritual mentorship of Zechariah. And ‘as long as he sought the Lord, God made
him prosper’ (2 Chron. 26:5). As a result, he acquired wealth and also became
politically and militarily powerful. Then things changed. ‘His fame spread far,
for he was marvelously helped, till he was strong. But when he was strong, he
grew proud, to his destruction.’ (26:15-16).”
My response: The Christian warning against
sinful pride, which Tarrants labels as individualistic, is shown here—in
crystal clear terms--to lead to the downfall of young Uzziah, once and early humble,
eager, deferential to Yahweh and willing to receive instruction from Yahweh’s
prophet Zechariah, now older, and swelled up with conceit, once power, fame,
money, and worldly position corrupted his heart. He exalted himself, at God’s
expense, so God humbled him. I get the message, and I agree that those guilty of
sinful pride are humbled by God, sometimes in this world, and for sure in the
next should they remain unrepentant when they die. Again, the sinful pride and
complementary sinful humility operating in the same puffed-up heart, is a group
phenomenon more than it is an individual phenomenon, though it is expressed
when the individual is alone, or working in a group setting.
I would counter under egoist-individualist
morality that the justly proud and justly humble individuators that worships
God would be most likely to be arrogant and rebellious when he is weak, and
once, as a developed adult, creative, brilliant, successful (whether the world
acknowledges it or not), prosperous and with many independent objects of originality
and brilliance as examples of his talent (perhaps he is an inventor).
Once he is strong, able, accomplished, he
will be proud of his victories, but he will not take himself too seriously and
he realizes that the gods have been very kind to him, and he is privileged. He
is strong and accomplished now, brilliant even in demonstrable objects produced
by him, but that makes him humble or at least at peace; he is quietly
confident, skilled, competent, and able, so he feels no need to strut, boast,
to show off to receive praise from other people, demanding that they bend a
knee to him in sycophantic worship. Real success and real power are his, and
ordinarily that makes him neither too humble nor too proud. He loves himself
an is at peace himself, and he knows and
loves the good deities, and they do not strut and brag—they hate that, nor do
they depreciate themselves, allowing themselves or anyone to put them down, nor
do they brag in public which is a sadistic attack to assert that oneself is
ascendant and superior to one’s neighbors—that is all altruistic group behavior
and social ladder power struggling—none of that is based in self-love, and but is
an overcompensation for self-loathing, and these social games are cover for
that self-contempt and mutual contempt.
Tarrants above quotes the Bible that Uzziah
has success in the world as long as he is humble, virtuous and holy, following
and loving Yahweh, and that he is humbled and destroyed by Yahweh in this world
as soon as he converts his will and attention to be arrogant, vicious and
unholy. I agree with Tarrants that Yahweh did punish his king. Remember he is
king of a small nation the top of a collection of a million people, and that
centralized position of power is corrupt, so sinful pride in the king growing
as he ages and gets more worldly victory is almost inevitable though still
punishable.
I want to add a correction to Tarrants
which he may have agreed with if he thought of it too. When the rebel against a
good deity is filled with contempt for God and sinful pride, that person will
be punished in this world and for sure in the next, but he may remain at the
top of the social riches and power heap as long as he lives, and he may be on
top for years. Putin the devil in Russia is very rich and very powerful and has
stayed at the top of the heap for decades, though he likely is not a very happy
person, and he is suffering in a weird way, though it looks like he has his
worldly rewards and triumphs, and perhaps that comes from Satan rewarding his
chief sinners.
It is not always obvious to an onlooker
that a sinner proud and unrepentant is punished in this world, and that the
humble, do-gooder does not lose out in this world, but the sinner is very
unhappy inside so suffers that way, and the do-gooder is filled with an
optimism, a beauty and inner happiness, though his life on earth is hell.
Reality or what is actually going on in someone’s life is hard to detect from
the outside.
I also wanted to add that the wise Dennis
Prager warns that the rarest virtue is courage. To have moral courage is to fight
overt evil openly and publicly in the community, no matter the personal cost.
The other day Prager noted that many kind, gentle people have no courage to
fight evil in their generation, so they are not as good as they could be and
should be.
I argue that we must teach the young to
love God and themselves and other, and to self-realize and maverize with a
lifelong consistency of focus and energy investment. To go against one’s
family, peers and community and live as an individuating supercitizen will give
the young that most precious moral gift—most of them anyway—moral courage, and
they will be able to fight evil in their generation with impressive majorities
of citizens, and these soldiers of God are not falsely humble, nor are they
boastful, but they are fearless, reasonably powerfully feeling proud, and yet
humble and calm—not needing cheap noise and theatrics and superficial worldly
affirmation—to know their real worth.
Only egoism-individualism and good pride
will make the people courageous, and then the devil on earth can finally be defeated,
and only then will the kingdom of God on earth be established.
T: “What happened? There are hints in the
text that at some point on the road to the top, he stopped seeking the Lord and
the spiritual mentoring of Zechariah.”
My response: Tarrants provides direct proof
here that arrogance as sinful pride is group pride. The person is naturally,
psychologically very insecure, and self-doubting if the first time he is
rewarded with worldly success, that he is so confidence-deficit that he can
only feel good about himself by rejecting allegiance to God and his prophet to
demonstrate that his rise was all his own doing.
An individualist with real, healthy pride,
would be realistic enough and secure enough in his personhood to assume partial
credit for his rise in the world, without failing to acknowledge his huge debt
to God and Zechariah, his benefactors.
T: “This suggests a lessening dependence on
God and a growing dependence upon himself and his own strength and wisdom.
History shows at every point how easy it is for pride to increase as we become
stronger, more successful, more prosperous, and more recognized in our
endeavors. In fact, anything real or imagined, that elevates us above others
can be a platform for pride. Ironically, this is true even when these things
come as a result of God’s blessings.
As a result of all of his blessings,
Uzziah, rather than humbling himself in thanksgiving to God, began to think
more highly of himself than he should have and developed an exaggerated sense
of his own importance and abilities. This pride of heart led to the presumption
before God and brought very serious consequences upon him, illustrating the
biblical warnings that pride leads to disgrace (Prov. 11:2) and that ‘pride
goes before destruction’ (Prov. 16:18) I encourage you to read and meditate on
Uzziah’s full story in 2 Chronicles 26. The stories of Haman (Esther 3-7) and
Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 4) also offer valuable insights into pride and are well
worth reading.
This is evident today in the dangerous
pride in some political and business leaders in the West. We have only to look
around us at the current state of political life in America to see examples.
Pride and arrogance are obvious in many political leaders, whether liberal or
conservative, making matters much worse than they need to be. Or consider the
business and financial catastrophes we have experienced in recent years. A
thoughtful article in the Wall Street Journal after the WorldCom and Enron
debacles attributed them to ‘pride, greed and lack of accountability.’ The
recent financial crisis in America is yet another example of the same thing.
Clearly pride is very dangerous and can produce widespread suffering in society
when people in leadership and power are corrupted by it.
Pride also affects religious people. Few
people today seem to be aware of the danger of spiritual pride, but spiritual
leaders throughout the history of the church have always seen it as a great
plague and tool of the devil. Even in times of revival, it is a danger.
Commenting on the revival in Northampton, Massachusetts in 1737, Johnathan
Edwards said: ‘The first and worst cause of errors that abound in our day and
age is spiritual pride. This is the main door by which the devil comes into the
heart of those who are zealous for the advancement of Christ. It is the chief
inlet of smoke from the bottomless pit to darken the mind and mislead the
judgment. Pride is the main handle by which he has hold of Christian persons
and the chief source of all the mischief that he introduces to clog and hinder
a work of God. Spiritual pride is the main spring or at least the main support
of all other errors. Until this disease is cured, medicines are applied in vain
to heal all other diseases.3’ “
My response: Tarrants has convinced me that
Protestants and Catholics alike identify pride as the cardinal sin, and that
both secular and religious leaders were and are guilty of harboring such
hubris. Again, I argue that Luciferian pride, or sinful, negative pride is
mostly group pride, and healthy, loving, positive pride mostly is individual
pride.
T: “An instructive lesson on religious
pride from the New Testament is found in the Parable of the Pharisee and the
Tax Collector (Luke 18: 9-14). It is aimed at those ‘who trusted in themselves
that they were righteous and treated others with contempt.’ It addresses
spiritual pride, an especially subtle and dangerous temptation of religious
people and leaders, which has been very much in evidence in recent years.
The well-known story of the Pharisee and
the Tax Collector can help us recognize our own spiritual pride. It tells of a
much-despised tax collector and a self-righteous Pharisee who went up to the
temple to pray.”
My response: Observe that the Pharisee is
self-righteous, openly bragging that he is spiritually and morally superior to
pond scum like the lowly tax collector. His self-pride is affirmation of his
relationship to others around him, and he asserts that he is superior to them.
This pride is not individualistic but is an expression of snottiness accompany
high social status, and that is the essence of group pride.
T: “The Pharisee proceeds to commend
himself to God because of his careful observance of the law and to look down
with scornful contempt on the sinful tax collector. ‘God, I thank you that I am
not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax
collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ Notice in his
prayer that his focus is really not on God at all but on how good he is and how
bad others are. Here is pride wrapped up in the cloak of religion and giving it
a bad name. The tax collector is so painfully aware of his sins and
unworthiness before God that he cannot even lift his eyes as he stands in the
back of the temple, far from the altar. Pounding his breast in sorrowful
contrition over his sins, he can manage only the desperate plea, ‘God, be
merciful to me, a sinner.’ In the Greek text, it actually reads ‘the sinner.’
His focus is very much on his own sins, not the sins of others, and especially
on his need for God’s mercy.”
My response: It seems that the contrite,
humble tax collector is individualistic here, with no focus on the sins of
others, while the arrogant, preening Pharisee is filled with outrageous
intellectual, individual pride, which he is. Both men are groupist, and the
repeated pattern that worldly success puffs up many formerly humble groupists
that are now successful and respected. That is not individual pride.
T: “In a surprising reversal of
expectation, Jesus says that God answered the tax collector’s prayer, not the
Pharisee’s. Then he concludes with his main point: ‘everyone who exalts himself
will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
My response: I do not urge people to
self-efface to seem humble before God, because that extreme leads to their need
to compensate by flaunting and bragging once they have made it, or they as
ideologues are brazenly arrogant in pushing their cause upon others
intolerantly and fanatically.
Rather, I suggest people love themselves,
love God and love others in a mode of calm, respectful modesty, neither putting
the self down, nor puffing the self up. If the self is an individuator working
for a good deity, then that self can express his individual pride without
making a big deal out of it, without offending God or others.
T: “Another lesson on religious pride
strikes even closer to home for true believers. If we are inclined to say to
ourselves, ‘Lord, I thank you that I am not like that proud Pharisee,’ we
should bear in mind that the apostles themselves were infected with pride and
disputed with one another about who was the greatest (Luke 22:24-27). Sadly,
self-promotion, in pursuit of reputation, influence and ‘success,’ is evident
in some of the ministry leaders even today. But if the apostles had to struggle
with it, who are we to think ourselves exempt.”
My response: Thomas is offering wise advice
here: that we never know when we have wandered away from the straight and
narrow path, wandering into sin, arrogance, bad practices, and the inability to
detect what is true, and who we have become. It is easy for any of us to lose
our way.
T: “It would be easy to conclude that pride
is the special problem of those who are rich, powerful, successful, famous, or
self-righteous. It takes many shapes and forms and affects all of us to some
degree. The widespread, chronic preoccupation with self in American culture,
for example, is rooted in pride and can give rise to or intensify our emotional
problems.”
My response: It is true that worldly
successful do have a special problem with pride—more than the less successful,
but all are group creatures somewhere along the ladder of social and class
stratifications so belonging to the group and increasing one’s social status in
whatever group that one clings to and exists within are two of the most
corrupting forces working on humans. This group pride based on assigned social
rank, and competing to climb higher and reach the inner circle of power and
prestige does wrench and disfigure every human it touches.
The present American obsession with the
self with its narcissistic artificial self-consciousness is a set of
maladaptive behaviors displaying one’s rank and group clout to the public for
public approval and envy. This group pride ruins all that live by its dictates.
T: “Any neurotic is living a life which in
some respects is extreme in its self-centeredness . . . the region of his
misery represents a complete preoccupation with himself. The very nature of
neurotic disorder is tied to pride. If the sufferer is hypersensitive,
resentful, captious, he may be indicating a fear that he will not appear to
advantage in competitive situations where he wants to show his worth. If he is
chronically indecisive, he is showing fear that he may do the wrong thing and
be discredited. If he is over-scrupulous and self-critical, he may be
endeavoring to show how praiseworthy he really is. Thus, most neuroses, are,
from the point of view of religion, mixed with the sin of pride.4
Much more could be said about pride, but
space fails us. Let’s sum up the biblical perspective and move on. Pride can be
summarized as an attitude of self-sufficiency, self-importance, self-exultation
in relation to God. Towards others, it is an attitude of contempt and
indifference. As C.S. Lewis observed,
‘Pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up every possibility of love, or
contentment or even common sense.5 The depth of pride can vary from one person
to the next and be obvious or concealed. In the Old and New Testaments it is a
truism that God will not the creature to exalt itself against the Creator.
Pride provokes God’s displeasure, and he has committed himself to oppose it.
If your pride causes you to exalt yourself,
you are painting a target on your back and inviting God to open fire. And he
will. For he has declared his determination to bring it low wherever he finds
it, whether among angels or humans, believers or unbelievers. It was pride that
caused Lucifer to be cast out of heaven and Adam and Eve to be cast out of
Eden. And it is pride that will be our undoing if we tolerate it in our lives.
The danger of pride is a sobering reality that each of us needs to ponder. Truly,
it is our greatest enemy.
However, chances are good that most of us
do not see pride in our lives. For while it is easy to see pride in others, it
is very difficult to see it in ourselves. C.S. Lewis observed that ‘there is no
fault which makes a man more unpopular and no fault which we are more
unconscious of in ourselves. And the more we have it in ourselves, the more we
dislike it in others.’6”
My response: Observe how people are
subjectively self-deluding, only able to objectively see pride, sin, and fault
at work in their neighbors. People without self-esteem or positive individual
pride—the majority of people in all classes—are irrational people that cannot
put their illusions and rationales aside to see others and themselves
realistically as individuators are able to do easily for they live in the truth
and in reality about themselves and others, and positive pride aids them in
being able to be impartial, to see people and things as they are, and
characterize what is going on with truthful speech.
T: “But he does suggest a couple of ways to
detect its presence. First, Lewis quoted William Law from chapter 15 of A
Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life ‘there can be no surer proof of a
confirmed pride than a belief that one is sufficiently humble.’ Also, ‘if you
want to find out how proud you are, the easiest way to ask yourself, ‘How much
do I dislike it when other people snub me, or refuse to take notice of me, or
shove their oar in, or patronize me, or show off?’7 Because it is tricky to recognize, we are
perhaps best off to earnestly seek God in prayer and ask him to reveal to us
any sinful pride in our lives so we can repent and forsake it. Another step we
might take is to ask those who live or work with us if they see significant
expressions of sinful pride or arrogance in our life.”
My response: Tarrants and Christians
overemphasize the need to be humble and underemphasize the need to be proud of
merited personal accomplishment. I think enlightened self-interest should
motivate most people most of the time, and, that we need to be at peace, and
not be too hung up about humbling ourselves or showing off. We need not do much
of either: rather, we should treat God, ourselves and others with dignity,
courtesy, and respect, and never brag and swagger, even when we do feel proud.
I think these moves are sufficient to avoid prideful sinning.
T: “There is, of course, a good type of
pride. Paul, for example, was proud of the churches he had established. But
this was not arrogant or self-exalting pride. He made clear that his
accomplishments were the fruit of God’s grace to him and through him (Rom. 15:
17-19).”
My response: Thomas’s faint praise for
pride above is unacceptable. One can be proud of one’s merited successes
without being guilty of arrogance, self-exalting pride, or disrespecting God.
T: “Occasionally, God mentions boasting,
but this is a matter of highlighting what God has done by his grace, even
through Paul or in those churches. It is never self-exalting. These days most
of us will say we are proud of our children and our sports team or perhaps
something we have accomplished. In cases like this, we are (one hopes)saying
that we are really pleased about something good and are not engaging in the
sinful type of pride and arrogance the Bible condemns.
Humility
Pride is a universal human problem.
Everyone suffers from it to some degree. When we have exalted ourselves in
pride, God does not want to punish us and bring us low but rather to forgive us
and restore us. He says, again and again in Scripture, humble yourselves and I
will exalt you. This gives us hope and encouragement. God takes pleasure in our
efforts to humble ourselves, and he loves to bless and exalt the humble.”
My response: The good deities are proud but
not arrogant individuators exemplifying good, individual pride, and expect the
same from humans as creators, kind people, as individuators. It is the devil
that wants us to humble ourselves and that mindless, easy surrendering really pleases
Sa.
T: “For just as pride is the root of all
sin, so ‘humility is the root, mother, nurse, foundation of all virtue,’ as
John Chrysostom once remarked.”
My response: I think that humility is the
root of all sin, and pride is the root of all virtue.
T: “Admittedly, humility and the humbling
of oneself is out of fashion in today’s world and seems most unappealing to
most of us.”
My response: Perhaps many people today are
not humble in line with Biblical expectations, but they are still humble and
self-loathing, because they exemplify and demonstrate their group pride and
arrogance all the time, and that is not the good pride that God supports.
T; “However, as Johnathan Edwards said, ‘We
must view humility as one of the most essential things that characterizes true
Christianity.’ Our perspective on humility can be radically changed if we
ponder and meditate on the greatest example of humility in history: Jesus
Christ. By the very act of leaving heaven, coming to earth, and taking the form
of man, he demonstrated an unfathomable humbling of himself. Throughout his
life on earth, Jesus demonstrated a spirit of profound humility, saying he came
‘not to be served, but to serve, and give his life as ransom for many’ (Matt.
20:28). On his last night with the disciples, he took a towel and basin and
washed their dirty feet (John 13: 12-17). Andrew Murray captures it well,
‘Christ is the humility of God embodied in human nature; thee Eternal Love
humbling itself, clothing itself in the garb of meekness and gentleness, to win
and serve and save us.’8 “
My response: I am not the egoist as radical
as is Ayn Rand. When good gods, like Jesus did, do such heroic self-sacrifices,
something like what Jesus did when he humbled Himself and died on the cross to
open the way to heaven for all humans, this is a selfess and humble act to
commit, but it is also so heroic that one wonders if it can be better
interpreted as in the self-interest of that divinity or human great soul
sacrificing so much to help people. For me, it is not easy to distinguish if
Jesus was acting in the interest of others (He was) or in his ultimate
self-interest (acting lovingly as a divinity because so acting at that time was
consistent with the Self he wanted to be and had to be.)
T: “The apostle Paul may well have been
thinking of this very scene in the Upper Room when he urged the believers in
Philippi: Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus, who,
though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be
grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in
the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by being
obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (phil. 2:5-8).
Paul is here encouraging ordinary believers
in a local church, who apparently have some measure of sinful pride in their
hearts and relationships, to reflect on and adopt the attitude and actions of
Jesus their Lord and follow his example of humility.
The consequences of such an attitude may
give us pause. Humbling ourselves could be costly in the workplace, the
community, or in other ways. However, that is shortsighted worldly perspective.
For the passage continues: Therefore, God has highly exalted him and bestowed
on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every
knee should bow, in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Phil.
2:9-11).
In Jesus we have the ‘example of all
examples’: those who humble themselves will be exalted! And this is meant to
guide our lives in the world. If we take care of humbling ourselves, we can
trust God to take care of exalting us.
How do we gain the mind of Christ and
humble ourselves? To put on the mind of Christ, we will need to make a firm
decision to ponder, understand, and adopt Jesus’ way of thinking; his values
and attitudes must become ours. His strong emphasis on humility and meekness
and his example of it must take hold of our thinking, our desires and our
conduct.”
My response: If one is an individuator and
walks with God, one is justifiably proud if one is loving, artistic, virtuous
and holy; in this there is no requirement to humble ourselves excessively or
needlessly, or to brag and strut at all, ever. It is far nobler to be assertive
than meek, and that is our moral duty, so I do disagree with the Christians
here.
T: “We must admire his humility and want it
for ourselves. For this to happen, we need to earnestly and regularly pray for
the need to understand what Jesus meant when he called men and women to humble
themselves. We discover that from the Greek word Jesus and the apostles used,
tapeinos, which conveys the idea of having a right view of ourselves before God
and others.9 If pride is an exalted
sense of who we are in relation to God and others, humility is having a
realistic sense of who we are before God and others. We must not think to
highly (or too lowly) of ourselves. Rather we must be honest and realistic
about who and what we are.”
My response: If one is individuating,
loving, God-centered, virtuous and holy, then one can feel proper self-pride,
and yet remain humble in the sense of never taking oneself too seriously,
neither seeking approval or criticism from others, but honestly appraising
their feedback, welcome or uninvited. We must not think too highly of ourselves,
or too lowly of ourselves, but if we are persons of noble character, we have a
right and duty to think better of ourselves than too lowly about ourselves. We
must never lie to ourselves, to others, or God, being in the know about who we
are and what we are, and we must never be supercilious towards God, others, or
ourselves.
T: “This lies behind Paul’s thinking when
he tells the Romans, ‘For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you
not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with
sober judgment’ (Rom 12:3). He then proceeds to instruct the believers in how
to use the spiritual gifts God has imparted to them to serve one another (Rom
12:4-8). In other words, humility is having a right view of ourselves in
relation to God and others and acting accordingly.
What is a right view of ourselves?
Specifics will vary from person to person,
but certain things are common to us all. We are God’s creatures: small,
finite, dependent, limited in intelligence and ability, prone to sin, and soon
to die and face God’s judgment (Heb 9:27). But we are also God’s children:
created, loved, and redeemed by God’s grace alone, not by anything in or of
ourselves; and gifted by God with certain unique gifts, abilities, resources,
and advantages, which are to be used for his glory.”
My response: I agree that we should
maverize utilizing our abilities, resources, and advantages for God’s glory,
and perhaps we can get some indirect credit. That will suffice. We should be
working for God or we will be working for Satan and Lera. We are on one team or
the other.
T: “As Paul reminds the Corinthians, ‘What
do you have that you did not receive? If you then received it, why do you boast
that you did not receive it?’ (1 Cor. 4:7). Frequently reminding ourselves of
these things is important.”
My response: If we work and individuate, we
get some of the credit for what we create, and God wants us to have that
credit, for without due credit, humans would have no incentive to ever try to
be better.
T: “Having a right view of God and
ourselves has a profound effect on our relationships with others. As Paul goes
on to say to the romans, ‘Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty,
but associate with the lowly.’ (Rom. 12:16). And as he said to the Philippians,
‘Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more
significant that yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own
interests, but also to the interests of others’ (Rom. 2:3-4). As we refuse to
be preoccupied with ourselves and our own importance and seek to love and serve
others, it will reorient us from self-centeredness to other-centeredness—to
serving and caring for others just as Jesus did for us. In the narcissistic
culture of contemporary America, this is a particularly powerful
countercultural witness of Christ’s presence and lordship in our lives.”
My response: Here Thomas openly links being
humble with altruism and other-centeredness and being sinfully proud with
egoism and self-centeredness. I could not disagree more.
T: “Truly, humility is our greatest
friend.”
My response: Truly, humility is our
greatest enemy.
T: “It increases our hunger for God’s word
and opens our heart to his Spirit. It leads to intimacy with God, who knows the
proud from afar, but dwells with him ‘who is of a contrite and lowly spirit
(Isa. 57:15). It imparts the aroma of Christ to all whom we encounter. It is a
sign of the greatness in the kingdom of God (Luke 22:24-27).”
My response: Humility increases our hunger
for the devil who is of lowly self-esteem and maximum self-hatred. Humility
makes us favor Satan.
T: “Developing the identity, attitude, and
conduct of a humble servant does not happen overnight. It is rather like
peeling an onion: you cut away one layer only to find another beneath it. But
it does happen. As we forsake pride and seek to humble ourselves by daily
deliberate choices in dependence on the Holy Spirit, humility grows in our
souls. Fenelon said it well, ‘Humility is not a grace that can be acquired in a
few months: it is the work of a lifetime.’ And it is a grace that is precious
in the sight of God, who in due course will exalt all who embrace it.”
My response: My suggestion that Jesus wants
us to forsake humility and group pride for good individual pride, egoism and
self-realizing is a tough sell to Christians and Jews, because the Bible has
told them that they are correct. All I can do is continue to try and set them
straight.
T: “Notes on the Tarrants paper.
1.
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York: Simon
& Schuster Touchstone Edition, 1996) 109, 111.
2.
See Augustine, The City of God 14.13; Thomas
Aquinas, Summa Theologica, ques. 84.
3.
Jonathan Edwards, The Works of Jonathan Edwards
(Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1974) 1:398-404.
4.
Gordon Allport, quoted in Solomon Schimmel, The
Seven Deadly Sins (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), 28.
5.
Lewis, Mere Christianity, 112.
6.
Lewis, Mere Christianity, 109.
7.
Lewis, Mere Christianity, 110.
8.
8. Andrew Murray, Humility (Old Tappan, NJ:
Fleming H. Revell, nd), 17.
9.
Colin Brown, The New International Dictionary of
New Testament Theology (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1967), 2:259.”
E Hyper-Intellectuals
Here are my notes and comments on Jordan Peterson YouTube
video from 7 years ago (2017), and it was circulated by Philosophy insights,
and the title of the video is Jordan Peterson’s Advice for Hyper-Intellectual
People
J for Jordan Peterson: “Not everybody is equipped to or is
interested in engaging in high level discussion of abstractions of creative or
intellectual ideas. You hear this idea that everyone is creative. That is a
lie. It is as straight forward as that.
True creativity is very rare.”
My response: Nonsense, it is not just geniuses and
hyper-talented people that can think profound, original thoughts, or produce
great art. Anyone can create great art, and think deep original thoughts, and
they should, especially as maverizers.
J: “If you happen to a creative person or someone who is
profoundly interested in ideas, you are in a pronounced minority.”
My response: Only a few are naturally or accidentally
creative or think profoundly, but all can maverize and create and think deeply.
J: “You are in a pronounced minority, just as there are
minorities just as if you were extremely extroverted, extremely agreeable, or
extremely conscientious. These are minority issues. What you do is you find
like-minded people who are capable of engaging in that. You know a heavy weightlifter
will compete with heavy weightlifters, and everyone thinks that is fine.
The same thing applies to intellectual and creative
endeavors. What you do is try to find a community that where such interests are
the nature of the community. You probably have to find a relationship like that
as well.
Question from the audience: ‘Is that the silo mentality?’
J: ‘I don’t think so. What contributes to the siloing is the
arrogance that goes with it. You can be interested in ideas and you can be
creative. That is the arrogance of the intellect. That is the thing the
Catholic Church warned about for centuries—the arrogance of the intellect.’ ”
My response: It seems that Jordan agrees with the Catholic
Church that the arrogance of the intellect is Luciferian pride in rebellion
against God, and that is a cardinal or mortal sin.
J: “So if you are wise as well as smart and there is no
relationship between being smart and being wise. They are not the same thing.
There is no quick pathway from smart to wise. Some of the people that I have
known who were very wise—some of them were intellectually impaired, and were
still wise.”
My response: I agree.
J: “So it is arrogance that brings up the block. I see this
particularly in United States. I see
this there a lot. The last time I was there, I have some friends down there and
some of them are very, very smart people. Some of them were talking about the
Trump voters with contempt. I thought you had better watch that because that is
50% of the population. And it might be convenient to think they are stupid and
beneath you, but that is not conducive to a civil state and there is no
evidence that it is true because there is no straight line between intelligence
and wisdom.
If your character is developed and you are intelligent, you
can have your siloed, creative community, but have you developed enough wisdom
to see all that people can do that are of high ethical utility, that are
outside the intellectual domain?
I think that is why in the New Testament Christ is a
carpenter. Right. First of all, carpentry is one of those jobs that if you are
dishonest it manifests itself immediately because what you build falls down.
And so if you are an honest carpenter you build a good house. There is a nice
metaphor there.
But it is also a warning in some sense against the equation
of intellectual brilliance with moral superiority. So, if the intellectuals
would drop their moral superiority—and fat chance there is of that—the divide
between working class and the elite would resolve, and there is every reason to
have respect for decent working-class people. I mean that it is on their labor
that the Left wing hypothetically agrees that the entire edifice of the culture
is resting.
So, you can have your cake and eat it too but you have to
not assume that your niche makes you superior, and it is very difficult for
smart people.
There is this scene in Nietzsche—In Thus Spoke
Zarathustra—where the prophet comes down from a mountain and he comes into the
public square. And there is a crowd around this midget only a few inches high
who has this gigantic ear and everyone is marveling at him, and that is what
makes the modern intellectual. It is a midget with a giant mouth not an ear.
The being is under-developed but the being is hyper-activated. And it makes the
person extraordinarily unbalanced. It is because they can’t compete outside the
intellectual realm, and that makes them bitter, because they tend to think I am
so smart, everything should just come to me.
Sorry, that is not how the world works. And that attitude is
immediately evident to people that they are talking to a smart person in the
manner that they talk. These smart people are arrogant intellectuals of that
sort. The Simpsons did a good job with Comic Book Guy. He was completely
useless in every possible dimension with an IQ of about 160. It happens a lot.”
My response: Nerds and intellectuals can be arrogant against
practical, less intelligent people who can function in the world, and the nerds
and clerisy need to work at functioning in the world, and they can improve at
practical skills.
The arrogant common people, look down on the clerisy. If
they maverize, they can be hybrid intellectuals-plumbers like Eric Hoffer was a
longshoreman philosopher, and the average worker that is a self-taught,
uncredentialed intellectual can then relate to the clerisy.
Here from some Jordan Peterson lecture are my notes from his
audience interaction.
Audience Member: “ ‘I have a couple of questions about
dialogue and engaging in dialogue with people. I have a very high need for
intellectual stimulation. I can’t get that with most people. It is like you can
have a dialogue for a time.”
Jordan: ‘That is high trait openness.’
Audience Member: ‘Yes, then they can start to run out of
ideas, and then it falls apart and this a problem that intellectuals have quite
frequently: that once they start reading difficult stuff, they stop wanting to
talk to regular people and contributes to the discontent you see between
intellectuals and the working-class people, and stuff like that. And the other
question I had--.’
Jordan: ‘Wait.’
Audience Member: ‘How can it be addressed? How can I address
this?’
Jordan: ‘Part of the answer to that is that is what
universities are for.’ “
My response: If the individuators is rational and
intellectual, he is proud of what he personally thought up, but is not haughty
to less educated people than himself. He would regard such insulting
misbehavior as most inappropriate.
F
9/4/2024: I saw a brief internet clip last night of Jordan
Peterson talking about self-consciousness: I was flabbergasted. From memory, I
recall that he went on about how psychologists have known for decades that
self-consciousness is linked to negative emotions like depression, suicidal
thoughts, etc. I assume this is an implicit criticism of egoist ethics, that
the individual should pursue his own interests and seek what makes him happy.
It seems to me to hint that if people were humble and not
self-conscious, they would be altruistic and other centered, and that is where
they find happiness, mental and spiritual health, and it is, according to
Jordan, the pathway to meaning.
Then he goes farther and insists that the individual cannot
embrace or substantively encounter the eternal in a mode of self-consciousness.
The kind of self-consciousness or shallow self-absorption,
that is selfish, petty, immoral, narcissistic, and sick and that does corrupt
one, is not individualistic, sane, or rational. It is a superficially
encountered self that is linked to group-living and group approval and it is
neither individualistic or other-centered in a constructive way, and I think
this self-consciousness, which exists, is widespread and needs to be condemned,
is really shallow, sick other-centeredness disguised as excessive self-interest
and that Peterson and others like him have mistakenly made such pathetic,
tea-deep self-obsession synonymous with a rich self-consciousness of the individuator
who is primarily self-concentrating but is linked to maverizing and constant
realistic uplifting loving healthy interacting with the world, with God, with
objective reality itself.
The good deities and Good Spirits are intellectuals and
rationalists that use language and communicate most effectively in everyday,
ordinary language, in a state of everyday consciousness in the world as it is.
I have long suspected Jordan was an existentialist, though
many existentialists are subjective individualists with a powerful, deep,
passionate sense of the celebrated self, of which the self is self-conscious in
a heightened, vibrant manner.
Still, if one—as Jordan appears now to stress—maintains that
the human seeker can only encounter God epistemologically or mystically, as an
irrational seeker of divine truth, then the humbled self, with little or very
subdued sense of self-consciousness, gets that ego out of the way, so the
eternal or divine can be communed with directly: the divine consciousness or
Ego is able to enter one’s consciousness fully and deeply, once the
self-consciousness mode of the self-interacting with the eternal is abandoned.
One can encounter the eternal this way, but it may be
anti-humanistic to promote this path to God. God is an Individuator of Supreme
Self-Consciousness, and might well insist that humans contact the divine this
way as the preferred mode of mortals communing with immortal, good beings.
Jordan might believe something like the individual and his soul (atman) can
only actually interact meaningfully and comprehensibly with the
eternal/Brahmin/Supreme Reality by a total loss of self-consciousness, a
developed, higher level of ordinary, everyday consciousness kept in conscious
control of the consciousness during religion exploration with the eternal as
well as when putting gas in one’s car at the gas station.
This is what Jordan seems to be saying, and the self is not
only to be humbled the self as a conscious being (everyday state of awareness
of the physical world and others around us) is abandoned as the one as atman
self-effaces to allow Brahmin to irrationally and spiritually to come to full
conscious bloom inside one’s soul. Human effort to think, be conscious and use
language just get in the way, let alone when the individual seeker is proud and
vain. Then his distance from God, and rebellion against God is pure sin, and this
rejection of God, as the asserted self is the most effective Luciferian
technique for keeping God as Christ or Brahmin out of one’s soul, and as such, one
is suffused with confusion, cloudiness and misunderstanding.
How do I epistemologically reconcile Ayn Rand and
Christianity along a Mavellonialist trajectory? I seek the unite the world of
things with the world of spirits, and help traditional deities be accepted and
learned via egoist ethics and religious practice. I intend no disrespect or
attempt to overthrow any traditional good deity like Jesus.
G
There was a online two-age response to Jordan Peterson’s
take on pride by someone just called Reisen who posted his comments in June,
2024
I will quote his full remarks, all 2 pages of them and
comment on them.
R for Reisen: “You need to face challenge, and facing
challenge, you need courage. And courage is founded upon pride.”
My response: I agree.
R: “Pride is what makes you think: I can do this! I am
capable. I will fight it.
Without pride you will be scared shitless and you will have
no courage. And therefore, you will be useless. You have to be proud to
anything worth doing.”
My response: Amen.
R: “That is the right response to taking responsibility and
doing something that matters to you. If you were not proud of doing that . . .
you would not do that.
This is why pride has always been one of the key virtues of
the heroic figures of old heroes and civilizations, figures like Alexander the
Great, Achilles, Hector and many others. The culture that existed for thousands
of years before ours and that shaped western civilization with helenic
culture.”
My response: I like Reisen’s take, and I think the good
deities, individuators all, proud, loving, active and virtuous, would want
their followers, humans, to live like positively prideful heroes, real or
mythical, from the helenic culture and ancient times.
R: “Aristotle himself wrote: ‘Pride seems even from its name
to be concerned with great things.’ And, thing is, you cannot achieve great
things, you cannot achieve something worth achieving, if you have no pride.’ ”
My response: So true. If positive, individual pride is the
proper orientation of the individual towards the receptive good deity, that is
a loving, self-regarding spiritual and worldly life approach, lived and
practiced by individuators encountering the deity worshipfully, his individuated
self-sacrificing maverizer religious gift by the maverizing individual is
offered to the good deity and good deities that maverize and create on a
grander scale, but appreciate and demand such repeated performative, existential
gifts from his or her human follows of real pride and original ideas about
growing the cosmos, or the kingdom of the Divine Couple.
R: “ ‘Such, then, is the proud man, the man who falls short
of him who is unduly humble, and the man that goes beyond him is vain.’ “
My response: Aristotle, here, seems to advise that the proud
man is moral and just, an ideal for others to emulate, for he is neither unduly
humble or so arrogant and proud that he has become vain. The moral law of
moderation runs deep in Aristotelian ethics. The law of moderation might help
correct the excessive emphasis on humility and self-effacement demanded of
humans in Christian circles. One of course never is defiantly proud or
insulting towards any good deity; it is blasphemous, repugnant and will arouse
just retaliation against the blasphemer by powerful deities that are better
feared than disrespected, less one wishes to be destroyed.
R: “And he says, there is a difference between pride and
vanity. Without pride, you become unduly humble, lazy and insecure, unable to
do anything, but with vanity you underestimate your challenges and fail as
well.”
My response: I would identify negative pride or group pride
as a cardinal sin when humans are vain.
R: “There is a difference between arrogance (vanity or
superb) and pride. One, the first, is where you are unequal to the task and the
second, pride, is where your dreams are big. The former is commonplace
stupidity . . . but the latter is a rare species which is hard to find.”
My response: Individual pride need not be rare and the
masses, each of them can dream big, and do great, talented acts of originality
and beauty. God approves and wants us to make this a way of life.
R: “ ‘Pride, then, is concerned with honor on the grand
scale, as it has been said.’ (Aristotle again.
There is no virtue without pride, pride is not a sin but a
virtue.”
My response: It could be that positive pride is not only a
virtue but the cardinal virtue.
R: “But what people are defending on the ‘pride month’ is
not true pride, but a face.”
My response: The pride in pride month is group pride. Satan
is the author of group pride, and is the ultimate selfish, selfless joiner, so
practitioners of collective pride, are following dark counsel.
R: “Pride is concerned with Action, Challenge and Honor, you
can only feel proud of what you achieved and of your qualities, feeling proud
of things that you can no control over, such as the color of your skin, your
sense of self-worth instead of finding it on your skills, qualities or
achievements is a trap.
As we have been seeing on more recent centuries, people
start to identify themselves with collectives and slowly lose their
individuality. No wonder why political movements gain supporters, political
ideologies feed on human insecurity, and, people, instead of finding true
purpose for themselves, facing challenges with real pride and responsibility to
achieve great things, prefer to find comfort on political collectives and
ideologies.”
My response: I agree; I wonder if Reisen ever read True
Believers by Eric Hoffer.
R: “Pride and humility are not opposites, but complementary.
For pride makes you able to understand your strengths and qualities, while
humility makes you able to understand your weakness and limitations.”
My response: Yes positive, individual pride and positive,
individual humility are not opposites but are complementary traits both active
and operational in the mind of a religious individuators serving the
individuating Good Spirts.
In the world, where religious faiths or fake, secular
pseudo-faiths (ideologies or causes), abound, there the men of words that run
these causes do demand of true believing subordinates that they humble
themselves utterly, and then, towards the outside world, they are the most arrogant
militant spouters of their one true cause, that the world is to bow down to or
else face violent punishment and death.
R: “I tell you, with no humility you are arrogant, vain and
superb, destined to underestimate what lies in front of you and fail your
challenges.
But with no pride you are meek and unable to attain anything
at all and to even face any challenge.
Therefore, it is better to have no humility, than to have no
pride, as Aristotle himself says.
It is time . . . for humanity . . . to find their virtue and
pride again.
If not there will be a time where mankind will no longer
pride on their hearts, where no one will strive to be anything or do anything,
to stand out and be his own being. The time of the most despicable man, when
men will not give birth to great things anymore.”
My response: I like what Reisen thinks, that without
individual pride, humans will not self-realize and give birth to great things
anymore. Humans need to do some things on their own, and God expects them too,
and they, the humans, can be proud of their own achievements, and God will be
proud of them too.
But to be atheists and secular only and self-realize as such
militant, radical transhumanists that each humans become a living deity, that
would offend God as then humans will have exalted themselves at God’s expense,
and God will humble them. All of that is too extreme, melodramatic, and
violent, violating the law of moderate behavior, and reasonable expectations
The overemphasis in Christianity on complete self-denial and complete
self-humbling is calling that state of existing the highest virtue rewarded by
God. God wants neither excess pride (collective or individual) as overstating
human worth or debasing the self as a masochistic form of self-attacking. We
can as individual worshipers of a good deity be properly, proportionately
respectfully proud as individuals and humble as individuals with God’s support
and backing, without offending and enraging God.
R: “I tell you the end of the World will not be shaky or
violent like an explosion . . . But things slowly deteriorating and crumbling
until nothing has meaning anymore.”
In the comments after Reisen’s article came these comments
in the +Add a Comment section:’’ExtensionAgile1658: “ ‘It’s interesting take. I
think can be courageous without pride. Pride is deadly sin and not for no
reason. It can be a dangerous thing.’
Reisen: ‘It is not a deadly sin, it is a virtue as explained
above. Lack of pride is the true deadly sin.’ “
My response: Yes, humility, especially group humility as low
self-esteem is the true cardinal or deadly sin.
H
Dr. Roger Barrier was a pastor and respected Christian
minister, so I am going to quote some of his ideas on pride, as quoted online,
and he passed away in 2024. I will quote his article in full and comment on it.
Roger: “Why Does God Hate Pride? By Roger Barrier, May 11,
2019.
Dear Roger,
I was at the soccer field, sitting next to one of my Bible
group friends, when my 10-year-old made a goal. I said to my friend, ‘I’m so
proud of him.’
My friend replied, ‘it’s a sin to be proud. The Bible
teaches that God hates pride.’ “
My response: I think that the Bible is interpreted
accurately by Jews and Christians and Jordan Peterson is asserting that God
hates pride. Jews and Christians are altruists and collectivists more than they
are egoists and individualists, so the sinful behavior which God hates, which
they call pride, is what I would refer to as humility. I think God hates
humility, especially group humility more than individual humility, which can be
virtuous.
Roger: “Is that right?
Samantha
Dear Samantha,
There is a giant difference between ‘proud’ of someone else
and having ‘pride’ in yourself . . . and it’s a spiritual difference worth
studying.”
My response: Note that Roger is okay with pride in God’s
handiwork or in someone else, but not the individual being proud of himself.
Roger: “WHAT IS PRIDE?
Pastor and Theologian Charles Finney described pride as ‘a
disposition to exalt self, to get above others, to hide our defects, and to
pass for more than we are.’ “
My response: If exalting the self is believing one is
innately worthy of bettering oneself by self-realizing as commanded to do and
be by the Good Spirits, then exalting oneself is a virtue. If exalting oneself
is an inaccurate self-assessment intended to insult, put down or attack others
or God, then self-exaltation is then a vice.
Pride as the emotion accompanying the motive to get above
others, or masochistically accepting and living without fighting back the
aggressive dominance of sadistic others to put themselves above us, then pride
is a vice. We have worth, and we all are to self-realize, putting none down and
allowing none to put us down, and we live roughly as social equals.
To hide our defects might seem proud, but the one that does
this more often is so humbled by his sense of insecurity and low self-worth
that he feels he cannot live with the pain of anyone publicly discussing his
flaws, so he hides them and denies that they exist, which they surely do.
We are not to pass ourselves off to God, others, or
ourselves as more or less than we are. We want to be as accurate in
self-describing as we can be, and as we maverize, we would be justly proud and
accurate in stating that we have become a bit more, because we have worked very
hard at self-development and have gained a bit of ground. Any improvement is
welcome and impressive even if it is not the whole world.
Roger: “Founding Father Daniel Webster called pride
‘inordinate self-esteem, conceit, ostentatious display.’ “
My response: I am a champion of individual pride and
individual humility, but we should never be conceited, arrogant or show off for
that means we do not like the self, or the public that we have been
discourteous to.
Roger: “My definition? ‘Pride is over-concern with myself.’ “
My response: If we are sane and moral, we are properly proud
and humble when we are more concerned without oneself than we are being less
concerned with oneself, without being self-obsessed or other-obsessed and
self-rejecting.
Roger: “Pride destroys our relationship with God and others.
It also makes us stupid. Here’s one of my favorite stories: A minister, a Boy
Scout, and a computer expert were the only passengers on a small plane. The
pilot said the plane was going down but there were only three parachutes and
four people. The pilot added, ‘I should have one of the parachutes because I
have a wife and three small children,’ So he took one and jumped.
The computer whiz said, ‘I should have one because I am the
smartest man in the world and everyone needs me.’ So he took one and jumped.
The minister turned to the Boy Scout and with a sad smile
said, ‘You are young and I have lived a rich life, so you take the last
parachute and I’ll go down with the plane.’
The Boy Scout said, ‘Relax, Reverend, there are still two
parachutes left. The smartest man in the world just picked up my knapsack and
jumped out!’
I wanted to be the best pastor God ever had. I imagined
walking through St. Peter’s Gate into heaven and hearing God say, ‘Oh, Roger.
You’re finally here! You were the best pastor I ever had. You did things Moses
never did!’
I thought that growing a big church made me a great pastor.
But in truth, is this not pure, unadulterated, ugly pride?
Pride is a secret fondness to be noticed.
Pride is a love of supremacy.
Pride is drawing attention to yourself in conversation.
Pride is enjoying being flattered.
Pride is swelling out of self when we’re free to speak or
pray.”
My response: Observe that Roger’s 5 examples above of sinful
pride likely are such, but they all involve the individual preening himself to
be noticed or gain rank, power, popularity and standing in his clique, group,
or community, and that is socially engendered pride, group pride, bad pride,
and it is not individualistic but altruistic and collective. The selfish social
egotist had done the cause of individualism and accompanying egoist morality
enormous damage because they are popularly regarded as equivalent, though they
are diametrically opposed.
Roger: “Pride is loving to have your name at the top of the
list.
Pride is when the praise of men is sweet to your taste.
A ‘Christianity Today’ survey of almost one hundred pastors
of large churches revealed a great passion to build a large church, but not a
corresponding passion to know God. That breaks my heart . . . I know it breaks
God’s too.”
My response: To build a great church in the world is to be
successful in a social context—group pride. To get to know God is a passion
that motivates the individual supplicant, and the commitment to talk to God is
exemplary of personal pride in action.
Roger: “ WHY
DOES GOD HATE PRIDE?”
My response: God hates group pride more than individual
pride, and God hates group humility more than individual humility.
Roger: “God is not out to hurt our pride. He is out to kill
it. In ___, He declares. ‘I hated pride and arrogance, evil behavior and
perverse speech.’ King Solomon writes in ___, ‘The LORD detests all the proud
of heart. Be sure of this: ‘They will not go unpunished.’ “
My response: I admire this biblical list of what God hates:
group pride and group arrogance, evil behavior, and perverse speech.
Roger: “When we understand why God hates pride so deeply, we
will hate it too!
1.
God Hates Pride Because Of The Absolute
Devastation That Comes Through It.
____ teaches that ‘Pride goes before destruction, a haughty
spirit before a fall.’
Satan, was the worship leader in heaven until he got proud.
He said, ‘I will ascend to heaven. I will be like God.’ This is simply
unadulterated pride. God and Satan were no longer friends; in fact, they were
not archenemies.”
My response: Satan competed with God and sought to and was
confident that he could overthrow God—that is collective pride at work, as the
rebel schemes and revolts to gain the highest rank possible in the cosmic
hierarchy, gaining maximum power of powerlessness to himself as the
totalitarian ruler of the world.
It could not succeed—no one can overthrow all-powerful, or
nearly all-powerful God, and it is foolish and suicidal to try.
My vision for the individuator or creator of positive
individual pride is that he or she works for God as a living, angelic angel,
tending God’s cosmos and growing God’s kingdom here on earth.
Roger: “Satan tempted Adam and Eve. Once again we see
unadulterated pride: ‘You can be like God.’ They never walked together in the
Garden again . . . and our sinful, ugly, broken world is the direct result of
pride.”
My response: Roger may be correct in accusing the first
couple to live of sinful pride, seeking to eat the forbidden fruit of
knowledge, so that they could be like God, perhaps even attempt to overthrow
God. Their original sin then made them naked, conscious, vulnerable, and
relegated to everyday reality of sin, sickness, suffering and death.
Once they had conscious knowledge of the world, of good and
evil, their powers of reasoning were awakened, and their preexisting free wills
were not extra free. I think that being conscious, rational and free is a
divine gift, for only those that wield free will are actually alive, and
blessed with the chance to earn a path to heaven by being loving, holy and
virtuous—and inviting Jesus to save one. If one does what is right, and earns a
ticket in heaven, one can be proud of that individual character self-shaped,
and that is not a sin in God’s eyes.
Roger: “2. GOD HATES PRIDE BECAUSE IT RUINS RELATIONSHIPS.
____ says, ‘Pride on breeds quarrels.’
____ declares, ‘There are six things the LORD hates, seven
are detestable to him: haughty eyes, lying tongue . . . and a man that stirs up
dissension among brothers.’”
My response: The haughty eyes, the lying tongue, and the
trouble-makers are all altruistic, social sicknesses that are performative and
destructive.
Roger: “When begins with pride ends with fighting among
brothers”
My response: Most tribal and group intra-conflicts and
inter-group-conflicts are social games, of violence that grow out of collective
pride and altruist ethics.
Roger: “Once upon a time we needed new baby cribs for the
church nursery. About half the women wanted steel and the other half wanted
wood. The church family watched them ‘duke it out’ at a Wednesday night
business meeting. No one won. But from the best I could tell, both sides were
left ‘cut and bleeding’ by the side of the road.
Just think of how many church fights occurred because
someone got proud! How many homes and civilizations are destroyed because of
pride and selfishness?
3.
GOD HATES PRIDE BECAUSE PRIDE IS AN OVER-C0NCERN
WITH MYSELF.”
My response: God hates collective pride because is over
concern with oneself being expressed and acted upon has nothing to do with
being an individual but is a cruel act of not caring for or taking care of the
self or other properly as one seeks to gain that the expense of others in a
social ranking war.
Roger: “The Bible says that our ‘self’ is the person that we
are. It is often good and holy. Paul called this our new nature as Christians.
There are times when our ‘self’ is wicked and sinful. Paul
calls this our ‘sin nature.’ Our sin nature manifests itself in three ways.
Look carefully and you will realize that every single sin in the Bible traces
back to one or all these three activities of the ‘self “
My response: Yes, humans are complex creatures, with dual
natures, part good and part evil. Our evil nature is the stronger and more
dominant, but our weaker, recessive good nature can be made strong and in
control of our wills, as we grow out of our natural wickedness by choosing to
take on the new, good self, the Christian self.
Roger: “Self-Reliance: ‘If I have a problem I don’t need you
or anyone else to help. I can take care of it myself.’ This is a superiority
complex.”
My response: This reaction from Roger seems totalistic. The
good deities are individuators and want us to live and grow in their image and
likeness as creators and individuators that work for them and accept orders
from them, who are allies not competitors.
The good deities want their individuating human subordinates
to be as self-reliant as they can be, but do not expect humans to be wholly
self-reliant, and that is not even possible, let alone a morally desirable
stance for an individuators to assume, because it puts needless distance
between his good deities and himself.
Humans competing with the good deities and their aims may
claim to be totally self-reliant and independent from Jesus and the other good
deities, and maybe they are, but in their rebellious, collective pride, they
are almost totally reliant, obedient to, and subservient to the wishes of Satan
and the Evil Spirits. Their superiority complex is really worldly prancing
about to compensate for their inferiority complex.
Roger: Self-Centeredness: ‘I will take from you to meet my
wants and needs.” This is also a superiority complex. ‘I am more important than
you are.”
My response: Note how this mooch, parasite and robber lives
off of others around him, and weaker. He is an altruist and is self-centered,
and Ayn Rand has lots to say about his kind.
Roger: “Self-Condemnation: ‘I’d love to do things for God
but
I’m not worth much. I
can’t do much. God’s not interested in knowing me. This is an inferiority
complex.
My wife Julie was sharing that she hated to ask anyone for
help. Self-reliant and exhausted, she worked tirelessly in her music ministry
until she realized her self-reliance was a form of pride. God wanted to bless
others by coming alongside of her. What freedom!
My response: The inferiority complex ordinarily prevents one
from becoming self-reliant or as an excuse for not manning up and getting work
done.
Roger: “5. Pride ruins our ability to fulfill the Greatest
Commandment to Love God and Love Others.
Can you imagine that if you are filled with self-reliance,
self-centeredness and self-condemnation that you would have a difficult time
fulfilling ____?
___: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with
all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest
commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the
Law and Prophets hang on these two commandments.’
6. GOD HATES PRIDE BECAUSE PRIDE IS SO DECEPTIVE THAT WE
MIGHT MISS IT FOR WHAT IT IS.
Author and theologian C.S. Lewis wrote, ‘There is one vice
of which no man in the world is free; which everyone loathes when he sees it in
someone else, and of which hardly anyone imagines he is guilty . . . I am
talking of pride.’ “
My response: As groupists, dripping with collective pride
and collective humility, we are so deceived by ourselves and by others in our
complex web of lies which I refer to as group-living, our subjective bias
allows us no ability to see ourselves as we are: we can only see our neighbors
fault, that is the only way we are objective. We are not truthful or objective
unless we individuate and individual-live, and as such, know, love and live in
the truth, and finally are able to see ourselves as we are—our earned not
innate strengths that we can be justly individually proud of, and our earned,
blameworthy flaws (we chose to do bad habits, not just our natural flaws) which
is proper individual humility.
Roger: “People admit they are bad-tempered, cowards, jealous
and bitter. But few accuse themselves of pride.”
My response: As group-livers of low self-esteem and selfless
morality, they have little about themselves to be proud of in a good sense, so
living a life of lies and self-deception, they will not admit to their group
pride to continue to lead dysfunctional, sinful lives, going against the will
of God for how they are to live.
Roger: “Why did Pastor ‘Jones’ have an affair? Of course he
had some needs and tried to meet them in another person (self-centered
selfishness). But the bottom line was pride. He thought he was above all else
and somehow would get caught.
Why did ‘Bill’ the worship leader almost have an affair? He
laid his eyes on a woman in the choir and began to lust. He arranged for her to
accompany him to a music conference in California. Unfortunately for him, he
used MasterCard to pay for the tickets and had them sent to his house.
All I can think of is that he was so blinded by the
deceitfulness of sin that he did something really stupid?
7. GOD HATES PRIDE BECAUSE WE DEVALUE HIS IMAGE IN US.
The flip side of pride is self-condemnation, or what we
might call an inferiority complex.
David wrote in :
‘For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my
mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.’
I hear of a man who came running out of a Psychiatrist’s
office. He was so excited. He gleefully said, ‘I found out in there I don’t
have an inferiority complex. I am just inferior.’
Of course, some are extroverts and some are introverts. Both
sides of the coin are capable of self-condemnation.
I’m suggesting that our self-condemnation and fear of what
people think of us are nothing more than the flip side of pride, which is sin.
Why are you always withdrawing? Why? What’s the problem?
Perhaps you’re afraid? You’re afraid of what others will think of you. This is
pride!”
My response: Yes, it is sin and collective pride to brag or
put oneself down in public to curry favor or disdain from the community
audience. It is proper pride and individual humility to see oneself as one is,
and describe oneself as one is, accurately in public, and not worry about what
the neighbors think, though one always is attentive to what God thinks about
one and one’s actions.
Roger: “HUMILITY IS THE ANTIDOTE TO PRIDE”
My response: Pride is the antidote to humility, which is
collective pride in disguise.
Roger: “ ‘Submit yourself, then, to God. Resist the devil,
and he will flee from you,8 Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash
your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.9 Humble
yourself before the Lord, and he will life you up.’ ____
What does humility look like?
Humility has many faces. Humility is allowing our needs to
be met in context of others. Humility is washing dirty feet. Humility is
receiving a compliment or a gift without trying to give it back. Humility is a
heart of service to meet the needs of others. Humility is love and comforting
others. Humility is tenderness and compassion. Humility is driving out selfish
ambition and vain conceit. Humility is caring for the sheep on the back side of
the mountain where no one else is around to see. Humility is considering others
better than yourself. Humility is walking in the footsteps of Jesus. Only one
time in all the Scripture does Jesus describe his character. He described
himself as ‘gentle and humble of heart’
(____).”
My response: I think we should be at peace, and not consider
others better or worse than ourselves, and ourselves as better or worse than
them, and that is proper pride and proper humility.
Roger: “Look at Jesus!
‘Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of
himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that
he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all.
When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status
of a slave, became human. Having become human, he stayed human. It was an
incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he
lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and
the worst kind of death at that—a brutal crucifixion.’ ____ MSG
WHAT IS ‘PROUD’?
Samantha, we have taken a long look at pride. We know what
it is.
On the other hand, ‘proud’ has to do with feeling good about
ourselves and rejoicing in the goodness and accomplishment of others. It’s okay
to be proud of your son; just don’t become arrogant and obnoxious.”
My response: Being properly proud and properly humble is
feeling good about ourselves and others when rejoicing in ours and their good
and accomplishments, but we are never to brag and gloat in our own mind or be
arrogant and obnoxious in public.
Roger: “My spiritual mother, Doris Wanslee, is the humblest
person I’ve ever met. She prays earnestly for others. She constantly affirms
and encourages those around her. Now, at the age of 90, Doris still leads
prayer meetings for our church and attends every Sunday without fail. When I
see Doris, I see Jesus.
Samantha, your son should always know you are proud of him!
Affirm him. Encourage him. Love him unconditionally. But as he grows up, teach
him to be selfless and humble.”
My response: I would urge her to teach him to be
self-centered and proud more than selfless and humble, within the context of
being a religious individuator.
Samantha, I know that I answered more than you asked;
nevertheless, I hope this is helpful.
Sincerely, Roger.”
I
This section is from the Internet too, from something called
Christianity Expert with minister Mary Fairchild, hereafter labeled M:
“Christianity Expert
·
General Biblical Studies, Interdenominational
Christian Training Center
Mary Fairchild is a full-time Christian minister, writer and
editor of two Christian anthologies, including the ‘Stories of Cavalry.’
Learn about our Updated on October 28, 2020.
The sin of pride is a heart attitude expressed in an
unhealthy, exaggerated attention to self and an elevated view of one’s
abilities, accomplishments, position, and possessions. Pride has been call ‘the
cancer of the soul,’ ‘the beginning of all sin,’ and ‘sin in its final form.’
Ten Hebrew words and two Greek words are generally used in the Bible to refer
to it. Pride, in its sinful form, is the direct opposite of humility, a trait
that is highly praised and rewarded by God.”
My response: What Mary is condemning her is group pride and
group humility which are misunderstood and mislabeled in the Jewish and
Christian faiths. Group pride and group humility, though it does not seem
intuitive, are what God condemns in the Bible and punishes in people.
M: “The Sin of Pride
·
The sin of pride is an excessive preoccupation
with self and one’s own importance, achievements, status or possessions.”
·
This sin is considered rebellion against God
because it attributes to one’s self the honor and glory that only God is due.
·
Pride is the opposite of humility, a character
quality that greatly pleases God, and one He rewards.
·
The Bible frequently speaks of God humbling the
proud.”
My response: The group pride sinner is excessively obsessed
with his self in relationship to the group live follows and is part of its
pecking order distribution of power and status. God does and should receive
most of the honor and glory, but De allows Good Spirits and living angels
(individuating humans) to receive some modest honor and glory, as a reward for
services rendered.
Evil group pride is not the opposite of humility but grows
out of humility or low self-esteem Good individual pride grows mostly out of
pride.
M: “What Is Pride?
Pride is not always expressed as a negative quality in the
Bible. It can carry a positive connotation of self-worth, self-respect, and
self-confidence. The communicated a
positive sense of pride when speaking to the believers in Corinth:
‘I have the highest confidence in you, and I take great
pride in you. You have greatly encouraged me and made me happy despite all our
troubles’ (2 Corinthians 7:4, ).’
Pride becomes sinful when its excessively self-focused and
self-elevating. This kind of pride is what most often appears in the Bible. The
biblical sin of pride refers to a high or exalted attitude—the opposite of the
virtue of humility, which is the appropriate posture people ought to have with
God.
Described pride
as ‘an all-pervading sin.’ He said, ‘Pride is so natural to fallen man that it
springs up in his heart like weeds in a well-watered garden . . . its every
touch is evil. You may hunt down this fox, and think you have destroyed it, and
lo! Your very exultation is pride. None have more pride than those that dream
that they have none. Pride is a sin with a thousand lives; it seems impossible
to kill it.”
My response: People must have a sense of personal worth, to
go on living, and if they are self-deceived and wicked, then they must lie to
themselves about what they are to say sane, so their pattern of self-lying is
built upon sinful collective pride and sinful collective humility, group-living,
and altruist ethics.
If people are in touch with themselves as they actually are,
they will not lie to themselves, to others or to the good deities, and their
pattern of truth-telling is embedded in proper individual pride and individual
humility.
M: “Synonyms for pride in the Bible are ‘insolence,’ ‘presumptousness,’
‘arrogance,’ ‘conceit,’ ‘high-mindedness,’ ‘haughtiness,’ and ‘egotism’.
In Hebrew, the concept of pride is often expressed
figuratively with words that suggest height. An interesting expression in Greek
refers to a person being ‘puffed up’ or inflated with pride. Rather than having
substance, the prideful person is filled only with air:
‘He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up
with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil’ (1 Timothy 3:6, ; see also Corinthians 5:2; 8:1; 13:4; Colossians
2:18).
Why Is Pride A Sin?
Pride is viewed as a great sin and rebellion against God
because it presumes to possess excellence and glory that belong to God alone.”
My response: When the individual, especially the devoted
follower of a good deity, is a successful poet, she can right be proud of her
excellence and glory in it modestly. This does not conflict with nor need
conflict with the ultimate excellence and glory that belong to God alone.
M: The danger of pride is that most people are unaware of
their pridefulness.: ‘You have been deceived by your own pride’ (Obadiah 3,
NLT).”
My response: Here it is important to be humble in two ways.
First, I do not like the word humble very much, but one should be humble in
always striving to act modestly when alone talking to oneself, when socially
engaged, or when conversing with God or one of the good deities, or Good
Spirits.
Second, we cannot love ourselves, be properly proud,
self-realize, or assist God or others if we are not humble enough to receive (repeatedly
and periodically self-checking to see if we are still moral and correct in our
conclusions) constant, often unpleasant feedback about the conclusions we have
reached. We might be spot on, partially correct, largely mistaken, or simply
lying to ourselves in our willful blindness. We must love truth more than our
own egos, and then we receive truth, adjust to truth, and do right in line with
the truth.
We cannot self-realize or morally gain ground unless we know
who we are, what we think, what is right, how we are messing up, and figure out
what we can do better.
I am noticing that many of these pastors and Christian
intellectuals that are advocating that pride is the cardinal sin (It is, but
they are confused: what they are describing as haughty, arrogant motive to
compete with and even overthrow or kill God—an impossibility—we can ban God for
a while but God will return and pound us into the ground—is not individualism
but is individuals that are groupist and their pride is collective pride,
demonic pride, and it is confused with individuators pride or good pride.)
These Christian intellectuals seem to quote C.S. Lewis a
lot, and he was a fine, brilliant man and theologian and he hates individualist
arrogant pride and he agrees with them. Now Lewis was best friends with the
talented fantasy professor and Catholic writer, J.R.R. Tolkien who was such a
devout Roman Catholic that he kept trying to convert Lewis to Catholicism,
which Lewis refused to do. It i speculative on my part, but Tolkien the
Catholic thinker with his likely conclusion that individual pride is the cardinal
sin, it would be interesting to follow both writers in their fiction to
discover how their Christian take on pride as the deadly sin, would influence
their fictional character development. That Sauron, Saruman, Denethor and
Boromir would corrupted by the Ring of Power because they thought they were
strong enough to wield it without its destroying them, and they were completely
foolish and wrong, whereas Gandalf,
Aragorn, Elrond, and Galadriel were humble enough to know
their limits.
I think Tolkien is an incomparable moral psychologist, but I
still insist that the arrogant, smart individuals that arrogantly concluded
that they, being elite, smarter than others and better than others are mere
groupist elitists at the top of the society heap vying for more power. Gandalf
and the others united with other good-doers by their intellectual humility which
made them afraid of the ring. And if one does not seek the power of powerlessness
that is the devilish moral version of power manipulation, the one is loyal to
the power of powerfulness plan for power wielding that is about realizing that
proper pride and self-restraint allow one to refrain from refusing to keep
power ever distributed among millions of people democratically, not centrally
owned and so corruption determined and warped.
My wife like the idea of some individual pride as moral and that
there is a need that people take care of themselves because they feel that they
are worthy to be happy and healthy and lead moral productive lives to be saved
as children of God (this is my addition).
M: “Pride is perilously deceptive: ‘Pride leads to disgrace,
but with humility comes wisdom.’ (Proverbs 11:2, NLT). It gives way to conflict
and quarreling (Proverbs 13:10). Pride adversely affects one’s speech (Malachi
3:13; Proverbs 6:1-7).”
My response: If one is moderate in action, thought and word,
one is less likely to get into trouble and is less likely, on average, to make
foolish, perilous mistakes, and, this prudent approach to life (which I preach
and often fail to practice) could can be construed as wise humility applied to
behavior, or as acting with courtesy and care so that one’s public comportment
is consistent with one values of being a good person, and that self-interest
dictates that one is prudent, discreet, diplomatic and modest in public and in
private.
It is difficult even for the wise, smartest people to detect
and isolate what is true, but without an epistemological orientation of
epistemic caution/carefulness/humility, the odds of getting reality wrong or
distorting reality are much more likely to occur. The odds of doing evil, without
being aware of the disastrous, undetected consequences of one’s poor choices
implemented in an elated mood reflecting one’s full certitude, in one’s utter
full self-confidence and self-righteousness, increases exponentially. Then
militant, smug policy implementers make things much worse and prolonged by
insisting that they are wise and that their horrible mistakes are fruitful and
beneficial to the public.
And conflict and quarreling do grow out of pride, but, most
often and most deadly, in tribe against tribe warring, in a mode of vicious,
bloody collective pride.
M: “People do not think they need to ask because they can’t admit or even
recognize their own sinful condition.”
My response. I agree that when people can’t admit where they
are sinful, flawed, ignorant, stupid in error, their unwilling to embrace the
principle and practice of self-awareness extends from their lack of self-esteem
(their collective pride and collective humility), much more than when they
esteem themselves (Their individual pride and individual humility requires of
them that they embrace and constructively integrate harsh truth, no matter how
painful or disagreeable, every time that they encounter it.).
M: “As a result, pride also affects a person’s attitude
towards others, often causing them to look down on others as less worthy or
less able.”
My response: Mary is guilty of the error of contextual
incompleteness: she only mentions sinful pride without including sinful
humility. And, when I advocate for
virtuous pride, by the principle of contextual complete, I must admit, accept,
and mention that one’s prideful orientation is always accompanied by its twin,
the other side of the coin, one’s humble orientations practiced on oneself and
then exported to the public domain.
I know that in each person, pridefulness (self-esteem or
good/positive/individual) is good pride, and modest humility (good humility)
occur when neither puts oneself or others up or down, but habitually treats others
with courtesy and respect while assessing and judging each person’s character
and action realistically and rather accurately.
Each arrogant, supercilious person is guilty of sinful,
collective pride (showing off in front of his peers to gain their allegiance,
praise, approval and to assert and gain social power over them) and is
simultaneously guilty of sinful, collective humility. When he looks down upon
those less powerful, less socially popular, less able or less worthy—in the
eyes of the world not God—than he is, he is also sending out the clear message
to other group-living collectivists in his nonindividuating circle, his dominant
rank in the cherished social hierarchy, that he
is willing to be abused and put down from above, no longer being
sadistic, but now masochistically, meekly receiving abuse and arrogant snubbing
from those above him—smarter, more handsome, more popular, richer and higher up
in worldly circles. The arrogant joiner sadistically exalts himself in front of
and at the suffering expense of those socially beneath him, by humbling them in
comparison to his exalted status. In return he is willing to be humiliated and
humbled sadistically by those of higher pecking order rank than himself as they
exalt themselves unfairly and malevolently at his expense, which hurt him and
he is suffering, but he bears his corrupt humiliation at their hands because
that is how the social world is set up.
When a woman is a woman of individual pride and individual
humility, she loves herself, loves God and loves others. She is an individuator
that invites all to individuate until most adults so live. In that social
world—yet to occur anywhere—though all always vary in their abilities, they do
not vary in their equal worth in the eyes of the Good Spirits. As
individuators, none can predict who will make the most beautiful, wondrous, imaginative
work of art or new mathematical theorem or a cunningly designed widget.
M: “Prideful people treat others with contempt and cruelty:
‘Mockers are proud and haughty; they act with boundless arrogance (Proverbs
21:24, NLT). Pride is at the heart of prejudice.”
My response: Yes, collectivist pride and group humility are
at the heart of prejudice, regarding another as inferior and worth only of
ill-treatment, because they belong to a rival tribe, or, worse, no tribal
connection at all, just an atomistic individual out there swinging in the wind.
M: “The greatest danger in the sin of pride is that it keeps
our eyes on ourselves instead of on
. In essence, pride causes spiritual blindness and eventual death.
Pride in the Bible
Pride is cited among some of the most glaring sins in the
Bible. In Romans 1:30, Paul describes unrighteous people who will incur the
wrath of God as ‘backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud and boastful.
They invent new ways of sinning.
The and all
other Jewish leaders were some of the most prideful people in the Bible, noted
for how they mistreated and spoke down to those beneath their social
level. Said of them:
‘And they love to sit at the head table at banquets and in
seat of honor in the sysnagogues. They love to receive respectful greetings as
they walk in the marketplaces, and to be called ‘Rabbi,’ . . . But those who
exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be
exalted’ (Matthew 23:6-12, NLT).”
My response: Check out, in the last two paragraphs from
Mary, that those that exalted themselves—thereby humbling, depreciating, and
humiliating the stung masses beneath them—at banquet, in the synagogue, in the
marketplace, the prideful, humble sinners were strictly social creatures,
simply the elite rulers of the political or ecclesiastical pecking order in
which they were highly valued and well-positioned to rule.
They were rude to and mistreated those beneath them as
nonindividuating, group-loving elitists that they were, motivated by the
negative side of altruist-collectivist morality, the default moral system for
humans throughout history.
M: “Pride caused the downfall of King Uzziah, who dared to
burn incense on the and was struck
with leprosy as his punishment by God (2 Chronicles 26:16). became proud of heart after the Lord
healed him. His pride brought God’s wrath not only against him, but also
against all of Judah and Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 32:25-26).
‘s pride in
accepting the people’s worship and refusing to give God glory for his greatness
brought judgment. God struck with sickness, and he was eaten by worms and die.
(Acts: 12:21-23).
Of the Prince of Tyre, the Lord said, ‘In your great pride
you claim, ‘I am a god! I sit on a divine throne in the heart of the sea.’ “
My response: Humans as secular humanists and as
sacred/religious humanists are authorized and rewarded by the good deities for
individuating, but to go too far, disrespectfully, and rebelliously seeking to
overthrow God and take God’s place on De’s throne in heaven is wicked and will
not go unpunished or unanswered by the good deities or by the angered Good
Spirts. That is Luciferian intellectual pride that Peterson denounces roundly,
and rightly so.
Humans can modestly exalt themselves in the eyes of God, but
pushing God aside to grab all the glory to oneself is going way too far in a
dangerous game of betrayal and rebellion against the good deities.
M: “But you are only a man, and not a god, though that you
boast that you are a god.’ (Ezekiel, 28:2, NLT). Many Bible scholars believe
this passage refers to the original fall of , which is also mentioned in Isaiah
14:12-15:
‘How far you have fallen from heaven, morning start, son of
the dawn! You have been cast down to the earth, you who once laid low the
nations. You said in your heat, ‘I will ascend to the heavens; I will raise my
throne above the starts of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of the
assembly, on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon. I will ascend above the tops
of the clouds; I wll make myself like the Most High.’ But you have been brought
down to the realm of the dead, to the depths of the pit. ( )”
My response: Humans are guilty of Luciferian pride when they
glory themselves excessively while downplaying God’s mastery, superiority,
glory, and due deference, now withheld by swollen humans in charge. These
wicked people shall be humbled by God, and if that does not scare the hell out
of any sinner, then they are delusional and out of touch. God is. God rules.
God gave us a job to, and we had better get at it while alive or else.
M: “ said, ‘Pride
goes before the destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 16:18,
NIV). In the Bible, pride not only caused the ruin of individuals but also
nations. Israel became proud and forgot God. Ultimately, it was the sin of
pride that caused the people of Israel and Judah to be cut off from the of Canan ( 3:16; Ezekiel 16:50, Hosea 13:6; Zephaniah
3:11). James 4:6 tells us that God opposes the proud but shows to the humble.”
My response: Note that the sinfully proud and the sinfully
humble are brought low by God, and whole nations can forget God and be humbled
and punished. But these sinfully proud
people, as individuals and as a nation or society, are groupists following
Satan and Lera, not the Father, the Mother, Jesus and the good deities; they
are not individuating, godly individuators.
M: “Pride is one of the sins that will be widespread among
people in
‘For people will love only themselves and their money. They
will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God, disobedient to their parents and
ungrateful.”
My response: Again, notice that in society, the realm of the
collective, is where people become, proud, boastful, scoffing at God, and
ungrateful. God is not only outside society and the sinful worldly and the
sin-infested world, God is an Individual and Individualist, so proper pride and
proper humility are egoist pride and egoist humility, and those in the world
and the collectivist societies are animated and propelled forward into sin and
rebellion against God, by a kind of corrupt pride (groupist) and corrupt
humility (groupist) that is worldly not otherworldly. They will consider
nothing sacred.
Note that the true-believing cultural Marxists of today are
nihilists. They push to young to disobey their parents, to smash all great
Western and Modernist tradition, and to hold nothing noble and sacred that is
our Judeo-Christian and Greek tradition.
M: “They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander
others and have no self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. They
will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love
pleasure rather than God’ (2 Timothy 3:2,NLT).”
My response: I agree with most of Timothy’s description of
the evildoers but would like to note that there are good pleasures and good
pains sought out by the individuators of good pride and good humility, and
there are bad pleasure and bad pains craved by the nonindiviudators and sinners
of bad pride and bad humility. The worldly are not just sinful because they
seek pleasure, but bad pleasures, and the godly are not virtuous and holy and
loving just because they are ascetic and serve duty first, though they must so
act mostly, with some pleasure enjoyed too.
M: “The Bible says that pride is one of seven things that
God hates:”
My response: God is logical and just, but God is also
emotional, and, when filled with righteous anger against the defiant evildoer,
God’s indignation against them and the evil that they promote rise to a level
of passionate hatred. An angry, powerful good deity out to punish sinful humans
is a terrifying prospect, a real possibility.
This shows that the individuating living angel or
individuating human can be emotional as well as rational, even passionate and
angry and violent upon occasion against evildoers—the good deities allay their
just violence directed against recalcitrant humans, with restraint, mercy and forgiveness
felt towards human sinners. The good deities are reasonable with a finely
calibrated sense of personal, societal, and divine justice guiding them as they
punish evildoers.
M: “There are six things the LORD hates, seven that are
detestable to him; haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent
blood, a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are quick to rush into
evil, a false witness who pours out lies and a person who stirs up conflict in
the community (Proverbs 6:16-19, NIV).
People who reject God and godliness reject pride:
‘All who fear the LORD will hate evil. Therefore, I hate
pride and arrogance, corruption and perverse speech’ (Proverbs 8:13, NLT).
‘I will not tolerate people who slander their neighbors. I
will not endure conceit and pride’ (Psalm 101:5, NLT).
The Bible warns people to evaluate themselves honestly for
the sin of pride.
‘Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I
give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are.
Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith
God has given us’ (Romans 12:3, NLT).”
My response: One does not practice and live good pride if
one thinks one is better or WORSE than one really is. He must always be honest
with himself.
J
In this section, I am going to copy some excerpts from
egoist philosopher and conservative secular humanist, Ayn Rand, and then I will
comment on what she writes, to provide a perspective on human pridefulness so
contrasting with Biblical injunctions against and condemnation of human pride
as cardinally sinful, that these two alternative takes on human pride seem
contradictory or mutually, exhaustively and exclusively antithetical, that no
common ground can be found.
I reject that bleak conclusion firmly, as a metaphysical
moderate. I am a follower of Jesus and Yahweh, but I am not a conventional
Christian, but am something like a conservative Unitarian-Universalist that
recognizes Jesus’ divinity as a son of God, and perhaps The Son of God, the
Divine Couple, the Father and the Mother.
I do not want to see Christianity denied or pushed aside. I
think Yahweh and Jesus are still central to the lives of billions of humans
seeking divine comfort, guidance, and assistance.
To modernize and update Christianity without discarding it,
I would add my own version of positive, individualistic human pridefulness and
personal humility presented below as the cardinal virtue (ethically speaking).
Of value, but of minor moral virtue, would be for the believer some residual
modicum of wholesome, godly collective pride and collective humility, practiced
by each believer in her personal life.
I would identify as the cardinal vice or sin for humans
would be collective pride and collective humility—satanic traits—and this is
the pride so railed against in the Bible, but they mis-identify it as
individual pride, but it mostly is not but is group pride that is linked
intimately to the Dark Couple, Satan and Lera, the Ultimate, Popular, Joiners
that lead the rebellion against God, and have ensnared millions of human
followers.
In Luficerian pride and humility, individuals live as
group-belongers, and as they are selfless and without self-esteem though they
ironically are selfish, proud, and masochistically humble as individuals—except
when aroused as true believers marching in the millions as a phalanx shoving
their mass movement down the throats of the entire nation or world itself.
The second reform I wish to bring to Judaism and
Christianity is to replace traditional Christian and Jewish morality (majority
constitution is altruism-collectivism emphasis, with little interest in the
minority emphasis, egoism-individualism). That system for thousands of years
has allowed Westerners to enjoy some mild individualism and rare individuating
in their lives, while nonindividuating, altruistic morality and group-living
were still the preferred ethical rubric for society.
I propose to reverse this traditional Western moral system
by the operation of conversion: we will replace the strong emphasis on
altruism, with a main emphasis on egoism as the recognized noble motivator of
virtuous human behavior.
I convert the traditional Western morality of
altruism-collectivism/egoism-individualism into
egoism-individualism/altruism-collectivism. That will set people free to be
good, finally.
Here is an excerpt on pride from Ayn Rand’s book, For The
New Intellectual, Page 130 and 131: “Pride is the recognition of the fact that
you are your own highest value and, like all of man’s values, it has to be
earned”
My response: Now, this concept that you are your own highest
value is going to enrage Christian and Jewish thinkers—they will howl that she
will burn in hell for insisting that mere mortal humans are their own highest
value, for all value and glory belong solely to Yahweh or Jesus. I accept most
glory and value belong to these and all good deities, but that they as Creators
and Individuators, expect, demand and reward (and punish humans that refuse to
obey) that humans create and individuate, a lifestyle of profound love, and the
whole life lived as an individuators is a self-sacrifice of the self-pursuing
its own spiritual and material improvement by means of enlightened
self-interest, and that sacrifice is a gift given continuously as long as the
individuating supplicant lives, and it is a repayment in gratitude for the gift
of living and becoming, a gift given each individual with her divine spark in
her, and in gratitude she lives like her good deities do, and that smidgeon of
self-glorification and self-valuing of us by us is not an affront to the good
deities, but is a thank you to them for the gift of life. As long as the
individuators supplicant lives a virtuous and holy life, and remains modest and
respectful and obedient and praising of the good deities, this individual positive
pride need not be distorted into Luciferian sinful pride, and that is always a
danger to be worried about, especially if people become more groupist again,
and more self-sacrificing not to the good deities but to the state, an ism, a
clique or collectivist faith run by Evil Spirits.
Note too that Rand like me insists that one not feel proud
of oneself unless one has been productive and meritoriously has achieved
something of significant worth: invented a widget, painted like da Vince, built
a successful business, has farmed broccoli, and come up with a new kind,
genetically altered with better flavor and more nutrients packed into it, etc.
When one is a second-hander and nonindividuator without
honor, productivity, accomplishment or originality, that selfish, arrogant,
egotistical, narcissistic, weirdly self-conscious creature—actually in
altruistic, selfless and wrongly humble—then a sense of pride is bad, false and
unearned and it is group pride and group humility.
Rand: “—that your character, your actions, your desires,
your emotions are the products of the premises held by your mind . . .”
My response: The self is to earn its happiness and place in
the world, and, if one then feels proud, that pride is merited and virtuous.
K
My slack superficial scholarship will drive professional
thinkers into howling protest, but that is okay, for, below, I copied two quick
pages of references to the sin of prides on Google on 8/26/24 in anticipation
for using them for this blog entry on pride. Below I will quote the excerpts
and give credit as close as I can and then comment on what I quote.
The first entry is from: “ www.
britannica.com—topic—pride—deadly—sin: Pride/Definition, Seven Deadly Sins,
Scripture & Facts
Excessive love of one’s own excellence
pride, in Roman Catholic theology, one of the seven deadly
sins, considered by some to be the gravest of all sins. In the theological
sense, pride is defined as an excessive love of one’s own excellence. As a
deadly sin, pride is believed to generate other sins and further immoral
behavior and is countered by the heavenly virtue of humility.”
My response: Pride, group pride, and group humility, are the
deadliest sins. By contrast, I assume that individual pride and individual
humility, are how the Good Spirits rate themselves, and this allows humans that
worship the good deities and maverize to, gain in being and expressing these
virtues, these cardinal virtues from which all other virtues are generated.
Traditional pridefulness, condemned roundly in the Bible, is
theologically defined as excessive love of one’s own excellence.
I have three questions about that: First, is one’s
excellence actually excellence of any kind, or is it banal, inferior work that
is referred to as excellence by its performer and owner? Even if the excellence
is absence or is substantive, if the agent is groupist and practices faithfully
group pride and group humility, that agent would serve Satan and defy God.
Second, one needs to be honest with oneself, and be creative
and productive as an individuators, be moral, creative, and God-fearing, and
then one might produce excellent products, or field an excellent character to
be proud of.
One cannot simply announce that one is excellent when one is
mediocre, awful as a nonindividuator.
Also, even if one is excellent as an indiviudator, one must
have context, recognizing various degrees of excellence, and trashy output, all
along the great chain of being, and then place oneself realistically somewhere
along that hierarchy appropriately, about where one should be. Such a
self-appraisal views one’s excellence—or the lack thereof—from a bird’s eye
view so as to not to be puffed up and deluded in one’s subjective fantasies.
·
* * *
From
“www.learnreligions.com the-sin-of-pride
The Sin of Pride According to the Bible—Learn Religions . .
.Pride is not always expressed as a negative quality. It can carry a positive
connotation of self-worth, self-respect, and self-confidence. The apostle Paul
communicated positive sense of pride speaking to the believers in Corinth.
Pride becomes sinful when it is excessively self-focused and self-elevating . .
.”
My response: This Christian account on pride seems a little
more balanced. It points out that pride becomes sinful when it is excessively
self-focused and self-elevating. Pride becomes even more sinful and dangerous
when it is excessive group pride and group humility.
* *
*
*
From: “en. Wikipedia
Seven_deadly_sins
Seven deadly sins—Wikipedia
Pride (superbia), also known as
hubris, . . . or futility, is considered the original and the worst of the
seven deadly sins on almost every list . . .”
My response: Pride as hubris or
exaggerated pride as defined in The Merriam-Webster Dictionary is what Jordan
Peterson referred to in a clip I saw today (9/12/24) as the Luciferian sin of
intellectual pride which geniuses with an IQ of 145 are most susceptible to
being corrupted by.
I think that we get prideful in a
negative way when it is collective, excessive and self-absorbed in a unhealthy
way.
The natural tendency to become
prideful and slight God as soon as we enjoy significant good health and worldly
success, that is the behavior and attitude of a groupist.
Ordinarily, the individuator,
especially an individuator that is religious, would recognize himself more as
he in in both appraisal modes of self-appraising, being accurately proud of
oneself or humble, and these do not require that one get carried away going to
extremes, being too proud or to humble towards God, who seeks and will not put
up with either abject groveling or snotty taunting from from De’s people and
supplicants.
L
It occurs to me that we do not want to be too humble more
than we want to be too proud, and the best way to be both as an individual and
in a way that does not sicken us is to base our feeling proud or humble on the
truth about ourselves, based upon what we have accomplished or not.
M
8/9/24: Here are some YouTube snippets, videos of Jordan
Peterson on Pride’
a.
Jordan: “You find any experience on the edge of
development as engaging. That’s the line between chaos and order. And chaos is
where you don’t understand things at all. And order is where you don’t
understand things as much as you think you do, so structure and the lack of
structure, or actuality and possibility. Now how do you mediate between the
two. That answer is that you have an instinct for that.”
My response: Yes, the individuators would find investigating,
discovering, and experiencing reality most engaging as the nexus of chaos and
order, possibility and actuality, with no structure and structure. I think we
have an instinct on how to mediate this, but I also think we intuitively know
we need to use our minds to mediate this rich vein or nexus.
Jordan: “And that instinct is meaning. The conversation
isn’t so contentious that we’re upset, not so mundane that we are bored. It is
right on the border.”
My response: Meaning is instinctual and intuitive, but it is
also conceptual, rational, and thought expressing ideas with language. This
nexus between possibility and actuality is the nexus of polar opposites
(contraries and contradictions), and moderate creativity and individual
originality abound in this place. This may be that place that Peterson
elsewhere alludes to the the Jungian juncture or synchronicity where the story,
narrative and metaphysical and value-laden meet the natural or factual world.
Jordan: “So the reason we can have this conversation and it
is working is you know there are some things you don’t know, and I know that
there are some things I don’t know. You’re trying to redeem yourself from your
ignorance and your blindness, but you are also trying to redeem yourself from
your excessive pride.
And your pride would be I know what I am saying. I know what
I am doing. It’s like what I know goes. Pride is a sin because it leads you to
be a tyrant and it stops you from learning . . .”
My response: He sure has adopted the Christian take on pride
as the deadliest sin, but he does not accept Christian theology overtly. One
should be modest and grateful to God, in a mode of truth and honesty, whether
one feels individual pride or humility in what one has achieved or created.
b.
From 6/4/24: “Dr. Jordan Peterson on Pride
Month: We are having this interview in Pride Month so what are my thought about
Pride Month. My first thought would be too say you should be very careful what
you name things. And pride is not a virtue and I have brought that up with
people before. Their objection is that they didn’t really mean pride: they are
just trying to affirm their identity.”
My response: No Leftists and the LGBTQ crowd pushing Pride
Month mean exactly that, a celebration of group pride—they are proud of their
group identity, and that is wicked, Luciferian pride.
Jordan: “And you know, fair enough, I suppose, to some
degree, but that is the name they chose, and that is the name that stuck, and
pride is a cardinal sin. There is a reason for that. Pride is something like a
stubborn refusal to change when evidence of error is occurring. It is not a
good thing. There is a real tinge of narcissism—sexual narcissism—about the
whole pride spectacle. And do people have a right to express their sexuality
the way they see fit. To some degree if it is consensual and among adults, but
generally among human beings with any sense of comportment whatsoever, it is a
pretty damn private affair. We tend to
be private in our sexual conduct.”
My response: I mostly agree with Jordan about his disgusted
reaction to the Pride Month movement, but what he refers to prideful vice and
narcissism, is that, but it is group pride more than individual pride.
c.
Jordan Peterson: “Pride Comes Before a Fall. I
don’t see anything arbitrary about that and this is why the bloody
postmodernists are so incorrect. There is something like there is an infinite
number of interpretations of the world and that is actually true. But then they
make a mistake. No interpretation is to be privileged over any other
interpretation. Wrong. That is where things go seriously off the rails. The
interpretation has to be, and this is the Piagetian objection, if you and I are
to play a game: Rule 1 is we both have to want to play. Rule 2 is other people
are going to let us play. Rule 3 is we should be able to play it across a
pretty long period of time without degenerating. Rule 4 is why we are playing
the world shouldn’t kill us.
That is why there are no gains like you do not send out your
kids to play on the superhighway. Right. They are not playing hockey on the
superhighway. That would kill them.
There are an infinite number of interpretations but there
are not an infinite number of solutions.”
My response: Jordan is correct that there are initially an
infinite number of interpretations of reality that seem feasible, but to live
well is to find a solution, the right, godly, wise way to live, and that
eliminates many dead-end interpretations of reality.
Jordan: “The solutions are constrained by the facts of the
world, suffering in the world and by the facts that we constrain each other. I
think that is where that has gone dreadfully, dreadfully wrong. Once I
understand the rationale behind that picture—someone worked hard on that—once
you understand the rationale behind it—all these people are prostrate at the
revelation of the Law. It is no wonder: break the Law and see what happens.
Break the universal moral law and see what
happens.
I see it all the time as a clinical psychologist. If people
have not broken the universal moral law, or someone around them has, it is no
joke. You break that law and things go seriously wrong. So no wonder you would
be terrified at the structure that governs our being. One of the things about
the Old Testament and Nietzsche commented that he was a real admirer of the Old
Testament—not so much the New Testament—he thought it was a sin for us to have
glued the New Testament onto the Old Testament, which he thought was a really accurate
representation of the phenomenology of Being.
Stay awake, speak accurately because, be honest or watch the
hell out because things will come your way that you just do not want to see at
all. It might not just be you but everyone in your culture, demolishing
generation after generation. Stay awake and be careful.
I think only people do not believe that and they are being
hubristic and I think most people know that deep in their hearts. When you get
high on your horse, that happens fairly often. If you have any sense you think
I had better be careful. I need to tap myself down a fair bit because if I get
too puffed up something is going to come along and take me out at the
knees. And everyone knows that and pride
comes before the fall.
That is why in the Old Testament it says the fear of God is
the beginning of wisdom. In all my years as a clinical psychologist—and this
really terrifies me—I have never seen anyone get away with anything at all even
once. There is that old idea that God has a book and keeps track of everything
in heaven. Well, okay, okay, maybe it is not a book, fine, but that is really a
useful thing to think about.
Well, maybe you disagree, maybe you think people get away
with things all the time. I have never seen it. What I see instead is someone
that twists the fabric of reality and they do it successfully. It does not snap
back at them right away but 2 years later they get walloped and think that that
is so unfair, so then we track it on this and then this and on this and see
where it went wrong because you twisted the fabric of reality. You cannot twist
the fabric of reality without it snapping back.”
My response: I agree that if one is evil or arrogant and
twists the fabric of reality, one will get one’s comeuppance sooner or later,
in this world or the next, or in both.
Jordan: “It doesn’t work that way and why would it? What are
you going to do, twist the fabric of reality? I don’t think so. It is bigger
than you. One of the things that really tempts people so they think, I can get
away with it. You get away with nothing and that terrifies me.”
My response: Only a realistic, alert, good or moral or godly
person would be terrified by the realization that we get away with nothing, and
that divine justice will be meted out to us.
Jordan: “You know ever since last September when it came
to , I worry about making a mistake—I
am certainly capable of making a mistake and no one has found out about it.
We walk a very thin edge and we are lucky when things are
not degenerating around us into chaos or rapidly moving too far, too much
order. And it is not an easy thing, hard to stay on that line. You can tell
when you stay on that line: things are deeply meaningful and engaging when you
are on that line but if you are not existentially terrified of wavering off
that line, you are truly not awak and that is what I see in this picture: look
out man, because there are rules and you break them, then God help you.”
My response: Jordan seems a little grim and gloomy for my
taste, but he is correct that the line between evil or chaos on one hand, and
order and tyranny on the other hand, is the line we are to walk, the line of
meaning and discovery, where the good person is spiritually and ethically
engaged in living as meant to as instructed and ordered by the good deities.
I just saw a small video about Peterson interviewed about
his view of Ayn Rand, and he disputed her view of the world, and indicated that
the sin of Luciferian pride was the arrogance of an ideological person pushing
her view upon the world and seeking power over others. That sounded right to
me, but that is collective pride of a true believer in a mass movement, and it
has little to do with being a proud individualist.
D: Jordan: “Pride is a cardinal sin and there is a reason
for that. Pride goes before the fall. I don’t think you should be proud of
yourself. I don’t think that the right terminology and I think that is a place
where our culture has really fallen off the rails. You should be convinced in
your heart that you’re doing the best you can with what you have been given,
right?
And hopefully that will make you less anxious and more
hopeful but you should have the same regard for yourself and someone that you
love. It is not pride. It’s the you should, it would be lovely, if you could
orient your thoughts to yourself that you could be pleased if you thrived.”
My response: Jordan is mistaken as he dismisses all personal
pride as evil, negative and a sin against God. What he is warning against that
is such wicked pride, when discussed on the level of the particular individual,
is only individualistic in discussing group identity from the perspective of
the average individual that is a belonger, but not an individualist, the particular
individual apart from others in that group. But that individual is one with
others, selfless, an ideologue of repulsive, expressive collective arrogance,
and that is demonic and a united, mass existential state of rebelling against
God. That sinful group pride is not intellectual pride but is more a passionate
pride of the true believer or militant sinner.
I disagree vehemently with Peterson that almost all adults
are not smart enough to feel intellectual and sentimental personal pride in a
life well lived, and when the person works hard to contribute to his own
welfare, and cares for his family and society. He can and should be proud of
his efforts. He need not be arrogant about his accomplishments which are real
and based on doing, not talking. He should be modest but not so humble as to be
self-humiliating.
I often read Louis L’amour western novels for fun, and this
morning I came across this quote of his on positive, individualistic self-pride
is that positively virtuous, and he could not disagree with Jordan more, and he
is right about this type of pride that Jordan does not even acknowledge
existing. L’amour is writing of a black cowboy in Montana in the 1870s or 1880s
named Eddie Holt.
This quote is from L’amour’s novel, Hanging Woman Creek,
Page 39: “Eddie I could understand. He was a colored man and he could get a
better shake out west than almost anywhere. He might find some folks a bit
standoffish . . . some people believe because a man looks different that he
feels different; but out on the range a man is judged by how he does his job
and stands up to trouble.
Me, I wasn’t going to do him no favors. If he did his job,
well and good. I couldn’t care what his color was, or even if he had two
heads—so long as both of them didn’t eat. I’d already seen him shape up on that
trip across the country, and I liked the way he did things. He was a stand up
man with pride and strength.”
My response: Barnbas Pike, Eddie’s white partner as a
cowboy, liked Eddie for his content of character, not the color of his skin. Eddie
was a stand-up man of proven courage, decency, competence and industriousness;
he was an able boxer, cook, cowboy and fighter, and Eddie had merited pride in
his own character and work, and that had not a damn thing to do with Luciferian
intellectual pride. L’amour identified in his character Eddie a desirable,
human characteristic which correctly, flatly contradicts Peterson’s dismissal
of all personal pride as sinful and ungodly. It is just not so.
N.
I wanted to include in my analysis of healthy pride, some
thoughts on pride written by Ayn Rand in her ethics book, The Virtue of
Selfishness. I will quote her various entries there on pride and then comment
as to how close or not we are in our differing conceptions of positive,
individual pride. Right off, she is an atheist, so one can be proud as part of
the natural world, but I differently, have laid out how we work for the various
good divinities in a mode of proper pride and proper humility.
Page 27: “The virtue of Pride is the recognition of the fact
‘that as man must produce the physical values he needs to sustain his life, so
he must acquire the values of character that make his life worth
sustaining—that as man is a being of self-made wealth, so he is a being of
self-made soul.’ (Atlas Shrugged) The virtue of Pride can best be described by
the term: ‘moral ambitiousness.’ It means one must earn the right to hold
oneself as one’s own highest value by achieving one’s own moral
perfection—which one achieves by never accepting any code of irrational virtues
impossible to practice and by never failing to practice the virtues one knows
to be rational—by never accepting an unearned guilt and never earning any, or,
if one has earned it, never leaving it uncorrected—by never resigning oneself
passively to any flaws in one’s character—by never placing any concern, wish,
fear or mood of the moment above the reality of one’s own self-esteem. And,
above all, it means one’s rejection of the role of sacrificial animal, the
rejection of any doctrine that preaches self-immolation as a moral virtue or
duty.”
My response: Rand is right in asserting that one can feel
proud of oneself only if one works and crafts a set of values to live by, and
then strive mightily to live in accordance with one’s adopted values. If one
succeeds at these goals, or comes close, then one can feel proud of what one
has earned, and this is virtuous pride. The proud woman is morally ambitious,
especially if she individuated as her life goal and dedicates that life to the
good deities.
I am not as opposed to self-sacrifice as she is, of the
individual for service to the community, but I qualify that by pointing out
necessarily that when most adults maverize, there is little residual need or the requirement for
others to sacrifice themselves for others because the majority of others are excelling
on their ow of their own efforts, so there is much reduced call for social
assistance, for the majority of citizens to sacrifice their lives, time and
resources to rescue the less fortunate unable to care for themselves.
Yes, pride is a virtue as Rand insists.
Pages 39 & 40: Randian associate, Nathaniel Branden
wrote extensively about pride: “(4) His life and self-esteem require that man
take pride in his power to think, pride in his power to live—but morality, men
are taught, holds pride, and specifically intellectual pride, as the gravest of
sins. Virtue begins, men are taught, with humility; with the recognition of
helplessness, the smallness, the impotence of one’s mind.”
My response: Each person must take pride in his power to
think and in his power to live so that he is motivated to move, learn, seek,
imagine, and grow. This is not offensive to the good deities who are still
becoming or maverizing themselves, extending upwards and outwards into an
infinitely expanding universe.
Branden: “Is man omniscient?—demand the mystics. Is he
infallible? Then how he dare challenge the word of God, or of God’s
representatives, and set himself up as the judge of anything?”
My response: Humans are neither omniscient nor infallible
now or ever. God desires, invites, and even demands that we check every word
mentioned by anyone, human or divine. We are to judge actions and character but
not human souls, for only the good deities are wise enough to fulfill that
function. The inquiring mind of a religious seeker is welcome to the good
deities.
Branden: “Intellectual pride is not –as the mystics
preposterously imply it to be—a pretense of omniscience or infallibility. On
the contrary, precisely because man must struggle for knowledge, precisely
because the pursuit of knowledge requires an effort, the men who assumes this
responsibility properly feel pride.
Sometimes, colloquially, pride is taken to mean a pretense
at accomplishments one has not in fact achieved. But the braggart, the boaster,
the man who affects virtues he does not possess, is not proud; he has merely
chosen the most humiliating way to reveal his humility.”
My response: I agree. Check out how Branden links false
pride and boasting to false humility, or self-humiliating.
Branden: “Pride is one’s response to one’s power to achieve
values, the pleasure one takes in one’s own efficacy. And it is this that the
mystic hold as evil.”
My response: Human pride in response to one’s power to
achieve values, and being pleased with one’s own efficacy need not be negative,
or anti-God, but can serve as positive self-reinforcement to keep going,
growing, maverizing. If one serves the good deities, this pleasure is good.
Branden: “But of doubt, not confidence, is man’s proper
moral state; . . .”
My response: Doubt is man’s natural moral state of mind, but
confidence and earned sense of pride is his desirable state of mind, especially
if it is based on his merited accomplishments.
Branden” “if self-distrust, not self-reliance, is the proof
of his virtue; if fear, not self-esteem is the mark of perfection; if guilt,
not pride is his goal—then mental illness is a moral ideal, the neurotics and
psychotics are the highest exponents of morality, and the thinkers, the
achievers, are the sinners, those who are too corrupt and too arrogant to seek
virtue and psychological well-being through the belief that they are unfit to
exist.”
My response: We need to be positively proud, and we need to
be positively humble, and we can serve the good deities and still take pride in
our own creations and individuated fabrications, and the gods will approve, if
it is done in their names, to extend their kingdom on earth.
Branden: “Humility, is, of necessity, is the basic virtue of
a mystical morality; it is the only virtue possible to men who have renounced
the mind.
Pride has to be earned; it is a reward of effort and
achievement; but to gain the virtue of humility, one has only to abstain from
thinking—nothing else is demanded—and one will feel humble quickly enough.”
My response: Branden and Rand are too pro-pride and too
anti-humility, and the mystic/religious types are too anti-pride and too
pro-humility. Pride does have to be earned and humility should be linked to
one’s acceptance that one knows but a little and must remain intellectually
ambitious to know more, and to ever suspect that one is guilty or potentially
guilt of mental error, arrogance, smugness, deluded thinking and a
disinclination to fearlessly, endlessly pursue truth, no matter where it leads
one, and what one may have to give up cherished, confirmed biases, in light of
new reasons, revelations, discoveries and irrefutable evidence.
One should also remain humble in never bragging, boasting,
or showing off or building oneself up by putting others’ down. That is rude,
and poor manners are inconsistent with feeling morally proud of oneself, that
one always treats the good deities, others and oneself with courtesy,
diplomatic, measured speech, respect, and dignity.
A third way that people need to be humble is as
individuating supercitizens. The supercitizen of necessity is a hybrid
creature: ½ maverizer and ½ common person, everyday citizen and member of a
community somewhere. As a common person, she the supercitizen espouses and
lives her life proclaiming and practicing that all adults are her social and
political equals, to whom she will never seek to rule over, gain power over or
otherwise exalt herself over them as their elite ruler; nor will she abase her
by allowing any other to rule her or gain clout over her; she will run her own
life, on her own terms, with her making all or most of her decisions.
This type of moral, social, and political humility, when popularized
and widely practiced and adhered to by supercitizens in the future, will be
critically important for social health and harmony. If each person lacks the
common touch, it is a sign of her lack of positive humility, and she is
obligated to learn how to play this role for her sake and for the sake of the
good of the community.
Page 65: “Of the various pleasures that man can offer
himself, the greatest is pride—the pleasure he takes in his own achievement and
in the creation of his own character.”
My response: It sound good. When one creates, originates, or
builds a business or family, there can be no more legitimate feeling of
pleasure than such meaningful effort expended. A loving relationship with God
and others would be most pleasing too.
O
Conclusion and Summary: Jordan Peterson, the wise, good,
brilliant Canadian intellectual and psychologist has adopted Judeo-Christian
bias against all pride as sinful and vicious. What he seems to identify as
negative pride is negative pride, but he misidentifies this sinful, negative group
pride as individual pride.
My project in this very lengthy blog entry on pride is to
latch onto the kind of positive pride identified by L’amour and Rand, and to
see if it can be made compatible with Judaism and Christianity. It is a hard
sell because, Yahweh, Jesus, the prophets and many of the great doctors and
saints of the Catholic Church came out against pride as the deadliest sin, and
Jordan Peterson is in complete agreement with them.
I love and respect Jesus and Yahweh—as I do all good
deities—and I do not want to offend them or their followers as I suggest we
move altruistic morality and this pathological warning against the dangers of
personal pride down from the moral pedestal of primacy into a more minor ethical positioning—still
important if less emphasized--while elevating an egoist morality with a
promotion of positive, healthy pride and merited self-regard, modestly lived
and modestly modeled, as how a holy and ethical Jew, Christian, secular
atheist, or any human should comport herself.
I apologize to any good deities or their followers if I seem
anti-God, anti-traditional religion, or nihilistic: none of those are my aims,
or I believe, to be the consequence to the reforms which I bring to religion
and Western thought. I seek the truth above all things, and a proper sense of
personal pride and egoist morality will uplift all, and should replace no good
deity, or seek in any way to dislodge them from high places of honor and
admiration.
It seems to me that people naturally hate themselves and
suffer from low self-esteem; they humble themselves every day, which really is
a process of self-degrading and self-destruction. When people are groupist,
they are naturally self-humbling in an excessive and unhealthy way. Being
slapped around everyday makes them resent suffering needlessly, but then they
group-live and lie to themselves sin group pride and then we have a world of
hurt, lies, anger and bitterness, and this demonic sea is what people are
immersed in.
Their pride and their humility are twisted self-expressions,
and it produces mangled, shattered, low-functioning adults. If we want to hurt
people and make them fail, we could not have devised a better way to tear
people up and guarantee that they will fail, and we are growing evil in the
world, and this is pridelessness that Peterson has misindentified as
individualist intellectual pride. Individual intellectual pride is the cardinal
virtue, especially when an individuators serving a good deities so self-regards
and so practices maverization, and this chief virtue has been mislabeled as the
cardinal vice. Poor humans have never stood a chance.
We want humans to be proud, but based on merit and worth,
truthfully evidenced, and we want people to be humble as individuals too, and
always, always people are to conduct themselves with modesty, not showing off,
nor allowing others to show off, nor denigrating the self nor denigrating
others, or associating with others that denigrate themselves or their neighbor.