Gratitude and justice

Ethics

Volumn 109, Issue 1, 1998, Pages 119-153

  Fitzgerald, Patrick ^a  

^a NONE

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[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 26444480807     PISSN: 00141704     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1086/233876     Document Type: Article

References (51)

1. Terrance McConnell, Gratitude (Philadelphia, Pa.: Temple University Press, 1993), p. 12.
2. Claudia Card, "Gratitude and Obligation," American Philosophical Quarterly 25 (1988): 115-27, p. 117.
3. Claudia Card, American Philosophical Quarterly Ibid., p. 117.
4. See Lawrence C. Becker, Reciprocity (New York, N.Y.: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986), p. 105.
5. A. D. M. Walker, "Gratefulness and Gratitude," Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society (1981): 39-55, p. 48.
6. McConnell, p. 44.
7. Fred R. Berger, "Gratitude," Ethics 85 (1975): 298-309, p. 299.
8. Fred R. Berger, Ethics Ibid., p. 299.
9. Nancy S. Jecker, "Are Filial Duties Unfounded?" American Philosophical Quarterly 26 (1989): 73-80, p. 74.
10. Card, p. 117.
11. A. John Simmons, Moral Principles and Political Obligations (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979), pp. 171-72.
12. See also P. F. Strawson, "Freedom and Resentment," in Studies in the Philosophy of Thought and Action, ed. P. F. Strawson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968), pp. 75-76.
13. McConnell, p. 44.
14. Simmons, pp. 177, 178.
15. McConnell, p. 44.
16. Nietzsche seems to suggest an analogous position. He states, "But if you have an enemy, do not requite him evil with good, for that would put him to shame. Rather prove that he did you some good" (The Portable Nietzsche, trans. Walter Kaufman [New York: Viking, 1968], p. 180).
17. Malcolm David Eckel, "Gratitude to an Empty Savior: A Study of the Concept of Gratitude in Mahayana Buddhist Philosophy," History of Religions 25 (1985): 57-75, p. 59.
18. His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Awakening the Mind, Lightening the Heart: Core Teachings of Tibetan Buddhism, ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (San Francisco, Calif.: Harper Collins, 1995), p. 38.
19. Nichiren Daishonin, The Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, vol. 5 (Tokyo: Nichiren Shoshu International Center, 1988), p. 8; brackets in quoted translation.
20. Nichiren Daishonin, The Major Writings of Nichiren Daishonin, Ibid., p. 9.
21. Similar examples can be found in other spiritual traditions. The Sufi poet Rumi writes about a priest who prays for thieves and muggers, "because they have done me such generous favors. Every time I turn back toward the things they want I run into them. They beat me and leave me in the road, and I understand again, that what they want is not what I want. Those that make you return, for whatever reason, to the spirit, be grateful to them. Worry about the others who give you delicious comfort that keeps you from prayer" (quoted in Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart: A Guide through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life [New York: Bantam Books, 1993], p. 74). In the Christian tradition the Christian Desert Fathers use a parable that relates a similar sentiment. A student is told by his master to give money to anyone who insults him. After three years of this practice he is told to go to Alexandria and truly learn wisdom. When he gets to the gates of Alexandria he meets a wise man who insults everyone who enters. After the wise man insults the student, the student bursts out laughing. The wise man asks him why he laughs and the student says, "For years I have been paying for this kind of thing, and now you give it to me for free!" The wise man tells the student to enter the city, "It's all yours" (ibid., p. 64).
22. David Hilfiker, "Unconscious on a Corner," Journal of the American Medical Association 258 (1987): 3155-56, p. 3156.
23. Jack Kornfield, Roots of Buddhist Psychology,
24. quoted in Frederic Brussat and Mary Ann Brussat, Spiritual Literacy: Reading the Sacred in Everyday Life (New York: Scribner's, 1996), p. 327.
25. Ram Dass and Paul Gorman, How Can I Help? Stories and Reflections on Service (New York: Knopf, 1985), p. 7.
26. Nichiren, p. 8.
27. Dalai Lama, p. 17.
28. Ibid., p. 108.
29. Ibid.
30. Immanuel Kant, Metaphysical Principles of Virtue, in Ethical Philosophy, trans. James W. Ellington (Indianapolis, Ind.: Hackett, 1983), pp. 112-13.
31. Card, p. 117.
32. Kant, p. 118.
33. For a discussion of gratitude in Kant's writing, see Jean P. Rumsey, "Re-Visions of Agency in Kant's Moral Theory," in Feminist Interpretations of Immanuel Kant, ed. Robin May Schott (University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997), pp. 125-44.
34. Card, p. 117.
35. It is questionable, however, that these cases are morally irrelevant. The case of being grateful for good weather may be entirely appropriate for a deep ecologist who excludes nothing from the moral sphere. Others may think that developing gratitude to things or processes is a virtuous character trait that holds in check a tendency to exploit the environment.
36. Jecker, p. 73; McConnell, p. 13.
37. J. S. Mill, Utilitarianism, in On Liberty and Other Essays, ed. John Gray (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), p. 184.
38. Berger, p. 300.
39. Ibid., n. 1.
40. Redford Williams, The Trusting Heart (New York: Times Books/Random House, 1989);
41. Gail Ironson et al., "Effects of Anger on Left Ventricular Ejection Fraction in Coronary Artery Disease," American Journal of Cardiology 70 (1992): 281-85;
42. Lynda H. Powell, "Emotional Arousal as a Predictor of Long-Term Mortality and Morbidity in Post M. I. Men," Circulation 82, suppl. 3 (1990): 259.
43. These studies are summarized in Daniel Goleman, Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ (New York: Bantam Books, 1995).
44. Card, p. 115.
45. For a discussion of when anger may be appropriate, see Jeffrey Murphy and Jean Hampton, Forgiveness and Mercy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988).
46. Goleman, p. 59.
47. For a discussion of these distinctions, see Murphy and Hampton.
48. Walker, p. 45.
49. Ibid., pp. 45-46.
50. Ibid., pp. 51-52.
51. Ibid., p. 42.