They Loved Themselves with Harmful Love
They Loved Themselves with Harmful Love¹
There are people who, while wanting to build themselves, destroy themselves! And while working to achieve their own selves, they lose them! They are those who love themselves with a wrong love that harms them. Who are they? And what are the kinds of their errors?
-
Among them are those who love themselves by making themselves live continually in an atmosphere of wrongful pleasure—the pleasure of the senses, and of the body and its comfort. This pleasure, whose fault is that it leads to desire and to sin, may even lead to the defilement of soul and body, and to immersion in amusement. By all this a person loses himself. He also does not know the value of his time, so he wastes it, while time is part of his life. Thus he degrades his life without realizing it!
-
And there are those who do not gratify themselves through the senses, but through thought—and thought has a much wider domain. What cannot be attained in reality through senses or body, it is enough for him to close his eyes and compose tales, stories, imaginations, and daydreams, and he thinks he is delighting himself with all this. He says in his mind: “I shall become and be,” or, “I shall do and do.” He may sink in such thoughts for long periods, then awaken from them to emptiness and loss, from which he gained nothing.
-
Another type of people wants to build himself through greatness that takes an external form which is neither true nor spiritual. It does not build them, but destroys them. Such people may fall into vanity, bragging, and pride, which others do not accept from them. They may also fall into love of appearances, and love of people’s praise; and if they do not find someone to praise them, they praise themselves and explain situations that glorify them! Yet people love the meek, who—no matter how high they rise—live in self-denial. But true greatness is none of this; it is in the strength of character, in its virtues, in its abilities and talents.
Yet those who think they build themselves with false greatness remind us of the saying of one of the spiritual fathers: “He who seeks after honor, it flees from him. And he who flees from it with understanding, it pursues him and directs all toward him”… -
The worst thing in loving greatness is what some reach in terms of paranoia—delusions of grandeur—where one who falls into this feeling thinks he is greater than all, with none who competes with him in greatness! He imagines in himself qualities of loftiness and superiority that he does not possess, and demands that everyone treat him according to what befits his greatness!! Thus he loses himself in what he thinks exalts it…
-
And the one who wants to build himself through greatness may put himself forward for positions and roles for which he is not qualified. And if he succeeds in reaching them, the practice will reveal his weakness, bringing upon himself criticism he could have spared himself, diminishing his worth in reality while he intended to elevate it…
-
There are also those who try to build themselves through what they imagine to be leadership or heroism tied to a kind of aggression—always in conflict and confrontation, like a flame of fire, in constant enthusiasm for criticism, demolition, and destruction!! Without performing any positive constructive work… You hear from their mouths only the phrase: “This is wrong, and this one is wrong.” Their delight is in criticizing the great, and their ideal is (Tarzan), who jumps on mountains and strikes this one and that one—like youths who love cinema films filled with gunfire, overturning cars, killing… and they call them hero films.
These people have a fiery nature—always attacking, always aggressive, always angry and storming in. He rejoices that he embarrassed someone, that he triumphed and prevailed. In his attempt to destroy others, he sees himself a hero whose might they fear. And while thinking he is destroying others, he is only destroying himself, and gains nothing in this life or the next.
He is like the troublesome student in class who thinks that by causing difficulty to teachers and disturbing them and not respecting them, he becomes noticeable—thinking this is courage and strength of personality! Usually this student fails, while his quiet classmate succeeds… Pitiful is the one who sees himself a fighter while he is destroying himself!
And the strange thing is that destruction is easier and faster than building. As the world proverb says: “A well which the wise man digs in a month, the fool fills in a day!” It is easy for a building of twenty floors to be demolished by an evildoer in moments with a bomb! Yet building remains the glorious work… but destroyers destroy only themselves! -
Another type loves themselves with wrong love by granting themselves freedom in everything! One of them wants to do whatever he wishes, whenever he wishes, however he wishes!! Trying to rid himself of every authority, system, and law! He sees traditions as shackles upon him and does not accept guidance or advice. He even says: “I am free. I do not accept interference in my freedom!” Yet he does not know the true meaning of freedom—freedom from all error and all deficiency. But the freedom he claims leads him to loss. And there is a big difference between freedom and laxity… in which a person loses the virtue of self-control…
-
This reminds us of the existentialists who find themselves through liberation from God and His commandments. One’s slogan is: “It is good that God does not exist, so that I may exist!”—feeling that God stands against their whims and desires.
And among the most dangerous types of freedom in religious thought is when some boast of having a new thought in matters of religion, and this distorted freedom has led many to atheism or to forming private doctrines! More than this is their attempt to draw others to their way of thinking. -
There are other people who want to build themselves through a special glory of wealth, status, fame, and some outward appearances—while the true glory of the self is in its purity, its wisdom, and the holiness of its conduct. But outward appearances never build the soul, nor do they accompany it into eternity.
-
Some try to build themselves by appearing righteous and without fault in the eyes of others. Thus they cover their errors with self-justification and seeking excuses in every fall! And in this defense of the self, they may at times resort to lying or hypocrisy or blaming others! Thus they commit further errors. But the spiritual condition for building the self is its purification from errors, not covering over its faults.
Finally, I say: it is strange that some try to affirm their existence in a way that cancels their existence or diminishes their worth.
¹An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III, published in Al-Ahram newspaper on 13-1-2008.
For better translation support, please contact the center.
