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God is Dead but Envy Isn't

Nietzsche was an interesting guy. Other than his rampages about God being dead and his morbid existentialist rants, I kind of like him. What struck me most interesting in Beyond Good and Evil was his critique of Christianity. Okay, well, I like to think of myself as a Christian, so I wasn't very much convinced by his longing for complete obliteration of religion. Nietzsche mentions that Christianity has become a religion of resentment, because it started off as a religion of the poor, and its doctrines emphasize the goodness of the meek and the corruption of the rich and powerful. Hence, Christians are jealous of those who flaunt their excess, and wish them to hell (according to him). Christian "anger" hence stems from envy. What he failed to point out was that the rich can also be jealous of the poor...and that in fact the powerful are weaker because they are always afraid of having their goods stolen, while the poor have nothing and so they have nothing to lose. The Christianity argument (?) is true in terms of its origin, but I disagree that the fundamental Christian doctrine says: hate thy neighbour, right?

But, I did agree with him on this point: that all of our anger and resentment stems from jealousy. How did I never realize this before? Why did it take me twenty years to learn this simple fact from a lecture? I went back through times when I had been angry in my life, and it always, in the end, was just envy in disguise. But one always refuses to admit that he is envious, for this shows that he is weak (and envy is one of the seven deadly sins). Anger, on the other hand, makes you uncontrollable, unable to take account for your own feelings. Envy is well thought out and directed towards something. Anger is obviously the easier emotion to cope with. But anger makes us weak and prideful: I'm so angry with her! I didn't do anything wrong. At least when we are envious, we can acknowledge our sin and ask for forgiveness.

So, even though Nietzsche was a good ol' atheist, he sort of supports Christianity by saying jealousy is the Christian's downfall. Because it is. Hence, to be a good Christian, or universally, a good person, we must not be jealous of other peoples' successes or wish others ill will. Why does seeing people who are smarter, better looking, richer than you irk you so much? Why does seeing their downfall bring you so much joy? Envy and resentment... the erroneous belief that we are better off if we see others fail. That we feel more alive when people who have wronged us are in misery. We all feel this way sometimes.

Maybe Nietzsche is right that God is dead in modern society, but your heart is not. Anger stems from jealousy. Forgiveness stems from humanity (benevolence/good will). Which seed would you rather plant in your heart?


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