COMPULSIONS OF THE FALSE SELF: ENVY
Text: Titus 3:3-7; Matthew 20:1-15

Sometimes we live out of our false self rather than our true self. From the false self come compulsions like Envy, today’s deadly sin.

If the sin of Pride began in the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve seeking to be like God, Envy was not far behind. It caused Cain to murder his brother Abel. Cain perceived that God preferred Abel’s offering to his own and was consumed with envy. God saw it coming and warned him:

Why are you distressed?
And why is your face fallen?
Surely, if you do right
Will you not be accepted?
But if you do not do right
Sin is lurking at the door;
Its desire is for you,
Yet you can master it.
Genesis 4:6-7

But Cain could not master the murderous urge of envy, and he killed his brother.

Oscar Wilde told the story of a religious hermit so holy that the evil spirits sent to tempt him ended up defeated and discouraged. They could not break him down. They tried passions of the body, doubts of the mind; they even tried to provoke pride in his goodness, but every temptation failed. Then Satan himself came to the evil spirits and said, “Your methods are crude. Permit me one moment.” So going to the holy man, Satan said, “Have you heard the good news? Your brother has been made Bishop of Alexandria!” That got him! “My brother, Bishop of Alexandria!?” Envy swept through him like a tidal wave.

I

Envy has been called the ugliest and meanest of the seven deadly sins. In Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales the Parson calls it “a foul sin.” The other sins may be against one special virtue (for example, pride against humility), but envy turns its sneering face against all virtues and all goodness.1 And while other sins may have some early pay-off, some early pleasure, envy from the beginning is endless anguish and self-torment. As the Greek poet said, “Envy slays itself by its own arrows.”

A color is easy to come up with: green. The green-eyed monster, we call it. Green with envy, we say. It may look good on Kermit the Frog (though Kermit himself out of envy pines to be another color); it is dear to the Irish; it looks good on your lawn; but no one wants to look green. A green pallor is associated with illness. Green is also used in another expression of envy: The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Such is envy’s fix.

It has slit-eyes - - eyes narrowed and severe. The New Testament Greek term for envy means literally to have an evil eye.

A partner gets a promotion and the eye turns evil. A beautiful woman in a stunning dress walks into a room, and while some may gaze upon her with what may be another of the seven deadly sins, others find their eyes turning evil with envy.

The Latin word for envy is invidia, which has to do with the eyes, to look maliciously upon. Envy is the sin of the evil eye. No wonder Dante pictures the envious ones in purgatory as those with their eyes sewn shut with iron thread.2

II

When does it start? Early. Solomon Schimmel writes:

The roots of envy begin early in life. From childhood we are compared to others. Our value as individuals is measured by how much dumber or smarter, uglier or more beautiful, weaker or stronger, poorer or richer we are than our peers. In our more rational moments we may reject these criteria of worth as unfair and irrational. However, they have been so deeply ingrained in us by family and society that we automatically react with painful envy when we believe that others surpass us in these attributes.3

Maybe before envy becomes the ugliest sin it is simply pain, the pain of being compared unfavorably with another or comparing oneself unfavorably.

If it starts in the family, society soon takes its part. Is not the whole consumerist culture in which we live based on envy? The desire to have what another has, to be what another is?

We may rightly say that this pain itself may not be a sin, for the pain may lead us to self-improvement. So Aristotle distinguished between the vice of envy and the virtue of emulation. And Christian theologians have spoken of a holy envy in which we inspired by another’s goodness seek to be better. Aspiration is from the true self; envy is from the false self.

Can there be good ambition? I think so, as long as our goal is to better ourselves and not pull others down. Capitalism at its best is based on a good kind of envy, the spirit of healthy competition. At its worst it turns ruthless and disregards the good of the whole, the common good.
Sometimes envy turns to sad self-despising. Another’s achievement or beauty makes you feel worthless. Dante warned, “Envy bloweth up men’s sighs.”4

Our blown-up sighs can turn to endless disparagement of self. And it can turn to a despising of others. Frederick Buechner defines envy this way:

Envy is the consuming desire to have everyone as unsuccessful as you are.5

Envy turns sad at another’s success and feels joy over another’s misfortune, what the German language calls Schadenfreude.

If pride is manifest with the rolling of the eyes, envy is manifest by the almost secret smile when one hears of another’s fall.

Envy perversely turns Paul’s words in Romans 12:15 upside down: “Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep,” he says. Instead, we rejoice when others weep, and we weep when others rejoice.

The virtue of emulation raises oneself up. Oprah Winfrey is a master of encouraging the virtue of emulation. Envy, in contrast, tears others down. Dorothy Sayers says of Envy:

It begins by asking, plausibly,: Why should I not enjoy what others enjoy? And it ends by demanding: Why should others enjoy what I may not? Envy is the great leveler: if it cannot level things up, it will level things down.6

A cultural expression of envy is the gossip column and the tabloid press. These excite our envy by showing us the extravagant lifestyles of the rich and famous, and they satisfy envy’s blood-lust by showing up the dark sides of their lives and announcing the first hint of bad news.

III

The Bible warns against envy from Genesis to Revelation. Envy is sometimes placed second in the list of the seven sins following biblical chronology: Pride came first, ending in Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the garden; Envy came second, ending in Cain’s murder of Abel. But we’re just getting started. Joseph’s brothers envied their father’s love of Joseph and got rid of him. Then there was King Saul’s envy of David: “Saul eyed David” (I Samuel 18:7-9). The people sang: “Saul has slain his thousands and David his ten thousands!” Anthropologists have discovered a cross-cultural phenomenon: the musical line of a jeer common to all people.  I don’t know what tune the crowd sang, but I bet it sounded like that ridiculing tune to Saul’s ear: “Saul has slain his thousands, David his ten thousands.” Someone has written a dissertation on the spontaneous singing basketball crowds do when an opponent misses the basket entirely on a shot. “Air Ball!” He discovered the chant is always the interval of “f” to “d.” Maybe the descending minor third is the interval of envy! “Saul has slain his thousands and David has ten thousands!” Air ball! “Saul eyed David,” and then tried to kill him. No wonder George Truett called envy “incipient murder.”
Envy provokes coveting as in “Thou shalt not covet.” Envy provoked Israel to forsake God and hanker after what other nations had. “Out of envy” Jesus was delivered up to be killed ( Matthew 27:18). And in Revelation Satan is still carrying on his envy-inspired war against God.

IV

Envy expresses itself in many ways. The artist Giotto, a friend of Dante, painted envy as a person with enlarged ears to catch any breath of rumor or scandal and a serpent tongue to poison a person’s reputation. I’ve seen people take a lead pipe or car key and carve a deep scratch down the length of someone else’s car - - out of envy. Those who would not dream of doing such a thing to someone else’s car will think nothing of doing the same thing to a person’s reputation.

A while back someone passed on to me some gossip about a prominent minister. I felt very sad and hoped it was not true. I learned later the gossip was false. But I cannot think of the minister now apart from the gossip. The stain is still there. How many times have I been the one who has passed on gossip?

Envy has many faces. Perhaps one of the most prevalent is “professional jealousy.” Long ago Aristotle said, “Envy is worst among equals,” those who are like us in class, knowledge, and stature.7 Is this not right? Saul was not envious of David’s harp playing. But when David donned armor, became a warrior and slew his ten thousands to Saul’s thousands, then “Saul eyed David.”
A doctor is not apt to envy a violinist as much as another surgeon. Ministers are more apt to envy other ministers.

When I was a young seminary student, I’d sit and listen to preachers preach in seminary chapel and nearby churches. Envy invaded my listening. Before the service was over I had critiqued the sermon, written a better one and whittled the preacher down to size (my size). The judgment of God was to call me to two consecutive seminary-related churches in Louisville and Fort Worth, full of theological students. My pulpit was my penance. The justice of the Lord is surely terrible.

How do we overcome envy? We need the grace of God. Earlier in my ministry envy crept into my heart because one of my closest friends in the ministry was superseding me. He was a better preacher that I and was enjoying more success. One day I read the journal of a saint of a minister named Andrew Bonar. In one diary entry he wrote:

This day twenty years ago I preached for the first time as an ordained minister. It is amazing that the Lord has spared and used me at all.... Yet envy is my hurt, and today I have been seeking grace to rejoice exceedingly over the usefulness of others, even where it casts me in the shade.... Lord, give more and more to those brothers I have despised.8

I began to pray for even more success and usefulness for my fellow minister, and my envy began to fade.

Westminster Choir College conductor James Jordan makes use of the social theory of René Girard to address the constructive and destructive power of envy in the music profession. Girard says that society is built on “mimetic desire,” the desire to imitate and acquire what another has.9

The musician has in her head the perfect sound. Emulating it, mimicking it is part of being a good musician.

But what happens when the sound made does not measure up to the perfect sound in your head? The conductor, Jordan says, is tempted to scapegoat the choir or a person in the choir or section of the choir and flare in anger. Or, conversely, the conductor turns to a form of self-laceration and makes himself, herself the scapegoat. On the way home from rehearsal or performance he beats himself up, makes herself perfectly miserable.

The musician must constantly, says Jordan, will him or herself to respond from the true self with love and care, with acceptance of others and acceptance of self, rather than from the false self that scapegoats others or engages in self-mutilation.

I face this as a pastor. What happens when my church doesn’t live up to the ideal church in my head? Do I scapegoat you and act out in anger? Do I scapegoat myself and turn my anger inward? Carlyle Marney once said that in his dream of the perfect church he sometimes missed the real church right in front of him.

V

Jesus told the parable of the workers hired at different times of the day: 6 a.m., 9 a.m., 12 noon, 3 p.m., 5 p.m. The master promised each a good day’s pay, and they were happy for the work and for the pay.

But at the end of the day the master lined up all the workers, and beginning with the ones hired last, began to pay them the same, as promised.

The men hired first who had worked all day began to grumble and murmur (the sounds of envy). No fair! They were happy till they saw what the others were setting.

The master looked at them and asked the key question: Is your eye evil because I am good? Are you envious because I am generous?

Here is the spiritual root of envy: We cannot stand God’s generosity to others because we have lost sight of God’s generosity to us. The glare of other’s blessings has blinded us to our own.
So perhaps an antidote to envy is a daily “gratitude journal”: to list five things a day for which we are thankful. It couldn’t hurt. I grew up with the song: “Count your blessings, name them one by one.” It can sound a little silly. But there’s some truth there, both in the counting and in the naming. In other words, to live doxologically: “Praise God, from whom all blessings flow.”

Perhaps the final antidote to envy is discovering your own belovedness in God’s eyes, your own infinite worth, your own un-comparable goodness and uniqueness. To see yourself in God’s eyes.
The culture around you conspires to inflame your envy. The household of God is here to proclaim your inner and unerasable worth.

This past Monday at the start of the P.G.A. Championship week, Jim Furyk was asked about all the constant acclaim and attention given to Tiger Woods and Phil Mickleson. Furyk, the number-three-ranked golfer behind those two, said:

You know, it’s never mattered.... I think the guys who get more attention are deserving of it and are obviously great players. I get my due.10

That’s from the true self!

The words of Titus show the way:

Once we were slaves to passions and pleasures of all kinds. We spent our lives in malice and envy.... But when the kindness and love of God ...was revealed, God saved us. It was not because of any good deeds that we ourselves had done, but because of God’s own mercy ... through the Holy Spirit, who gives us new birth and new life by washing us.
Titus 3:3-5

Come Holy Spirit, come. Wash our Envy away.

1 Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales in Great Books of the Western World (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1952), p. 516.
2 Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy, “Purgatory,” Canto IV in Great Books of the Western World (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc. 1952).
3 Solomon Schimmel, The Seven Deadly Sins: Jewish, Christian, and Classical Reflections on Human Nature, (New York: The Free Press, a division of MacMillen Inc., 1992), p.57.
4 Dante, Purgatory, Canto IV.
5 Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking, p.20.
6 Dorothy Sayers, “The Other Six Deadly Sins,” Creed or Chaos (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1949), p.771.
7 Aristole, Rhetoric, II, 10, 1387B-22.
8 Cited in Norman Macledo Caie, The Seven Deadly Sins (New York: George Doran Co., 1923), p.29.
9J ames Jordan, The Musician’s Soul (Chicago: GIA Publications, 1999), see chapter 8.
10 The Charlotte Observer, Aug. 16, 2006, p.6c.