The moral irony of humility

Logos - Journal of Catholic Thought and Culture

Volumn 6, Issue 1, 2003, Pages 131-150

  Spiegel, James S ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 29144465483     PISSN: 10916687     EISSN: 1533791X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/log.2003.0015     Document Type: Review

References (21)

1. Robert C. Roberts, "Sense of Humor as a Christian Virtue," Faith and Philosophy 7, no. 2 (1990): 190
2. Gabrielle Taylor, Pride, Shame and Guilt (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985), 17
3. Norvin Richards, Humility (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1992), 2
4. Max Scheler, "Humility," Aletheia 2 (1981): 210
5. Nancy Snow, "Humility," The Journal of Value Inquiry 29 (1995): 210
6. Richards, Humility, 189
7. Snow, "Humility," 211
8. John Calvin quotes Chrysostom as saying that the "the foundation of our philosophy is humility" (John T. McNeill and Ford Lewis Battles, eds., Institutes of the Christian Religion, vol. 1 [Philadelphia, Pa.: The Westminster Press, 1960], 268)
9. Augustine observes that "the first sin of man was pride" and that the essence of God's first commandment to human beings was that "humility was always to be held onto; that is, that the lowliness of man placed under God should be preserved" (John E. Rotelle, ed., Sermon 159b in The Works of Saint Augustine, vol. III/11 [New York: New City Press, 1997], 150)
10. St. Bernard defines humility as "that thorough self-examination which makes a man contemptible in his own sight" (George B. Burch, trans., Steps of Humility, [Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1940], 125). St. Bernard expounds on the Benedictine rule for development of humility: fear of God, suppression of desire, submission to a superior, perfect obedience, complete confession, admission of inferiority, belief in one's inferiority, conventionality, silence, gravity, restrained speech, and downcast eyes. These steps are precisely the opposite of the steps of vicious pride, which begin with curiosity, then proceed to frivolity, mirth, boastfulness, etc. So to find humility, St. Bernard explains, one need only traverse the path of pride in the reverse direction
11. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (New York: Benziger Brothers, Inc., 1947), 1848
12. Thomas à Kempis, Of the Imitation of Christ (Pittsburgh, Pa.: Whitaker House, 1981), 82
13. Clifton Wolters, trans., Cloud of Unknowing, (Baltimore, Md.: Penguin, 1961), 70
14. John Calvin, Sermons on Job, lxxx
15. quoted in Calvin's Institutes, 269
16. Jonathan Edwards, The Works of Jonathan Edwards (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1974), 294
17. Andrew Murray, Humility (New Kensington, Pa.: Whitaker House, 1982), 12
18. For an illuminating philosophical examination of faith, see Robert Adams's essay "The Virtue of Faith" in The Virtue of Faith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987). He identifies the essence of faith as a trust in God that directly opposes the vice of lust for control over one's own life
19. John Hick, Evil and the Love of God (New York: Harper and Row, 1966), 292
20. John Edelman, "Suffering and the Will of God," Faith and Philosophy 10, no. 3 (1993): 383
21. Marilyn McCord Adams, "Redemptive Suffering: A Christian Solution to the Problem of Evil," Rationality, Religious Belief, and Moral Commitment, eds. Robert Audi and William J. Wainwright (Ithaca, N. Y.: Cornell University Press, 1986), 260