The Virtue of Humility

Devotional Classics, Benedict of Nursia, Excerpts from The Rule

"Friends, the Holy Scriptures cry out to us saying, 'Everyone that exalts himself shall be humbled; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted.' Therefore, they show us that every exaltation of ourselves is a kind of pride." (p.178)

Benedict's twelve steps of humility cover both the negative and the positive aspects of humility. The negative is putting to death self-exaltation and the positive, a right attitude toward God and oneself.

For all his severity, Benedict begins with the positive aspects: reverence for God, doing God's will, submission to others, enduring affliction, confession, and contentment. Some of these certainly push against my desire to exalt myself because they place me under God and other people, but the focus seems to be on recovering and enjoying my relationships with God and other people. I have found much freedom in submission and confession. Although the way can be difficult, the results bring joy and peace.

The negative aspects are harder to deal with: self-reproach, obeying the common rule, silence, seriousness, simple speech, and humility in appearance. Because of the great abuses of some of these, both in my personal life and historically, some of these steps are hard to use for me. For me, self-reproach and seriousness tend to move me toward self-obsession, which is far from God or humility. However, properly understood each of these can really aid humility by limiting self-exaltation. Silence and simple speech can be quite powerful in limiting self-exaltation.

Benedict locates humility and pride on opposite ends of the spectrum. Where pride is almost the ultimate vice, humility is a very important virtue. Jesus says it is required for entry into the kingdom of God (Matthew 18:3). Efforts toward humility, then are important both in their positive outcome - entry into the kingdom - and their negative outcome - overcoming pride. An interesting point is that pride can only be overcome with humility. Perhaps another way of understanding it is that pride is the absence of humility.

For some reason, it is more natural to think of humility as the absence of pride. Most likely, this comes from a typical cultural bias that sees virtue as merely the absence of vice, peace is no war, love is no hate, etc. However, as C.S. Lewis says in The Weight of Glory

If you asked twenty good men today what they thought the highest of the virtues, nineteen of them would reply, Unselfishness. But if you asked almost any of the great Christians of old he would have replied, Love. You see what has happened? A negative term has been substituted for a positive. . . . The negative ideal of Unselfishness carries with it the suggestion not of primarily securing good things for others, but of going without them ourselves, as if abstinence and not happiness was the important point.

And so humility tends to carry the idea of low self-esteem, self-hatred, and spinelessness. A lack of pride does not humility make.

Perhaps Benedict starts with the positive aspect of humility first because of this tendency. Just as love is not merely going without good things for ourselves, but more creating good in and for others, humility is not so much about cutting ourselves down as it is bringing others up. "Do everything without selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others." (Philippians 2:3-4) Humility is the freedom to let others (including God himself) succeed and to enjoy their progress and achievement with a lack of concern for myself. I guess more simply, it is letting God exalt me.

Following such practices as doing God's will, contentment, or confession will bring quick inner objections. So to practice these without inner turmoil and pain, Benedict suggests the negative disciplines to remove the heartache of pride. Humility pushes pride out of my heart and the pushing hurts. So pride must be deflated and destroyed. Self-exaltation inflames pride. Obeying rules, silence, seriousness, and simple speech encourage humility and limit self-exaltation, the primary food of pride.

Lord, what a wonderful promise you've given! You want to exalt me. You want to exalt everyone. You want to share your glory with each of us. I do not believe it most of the time and do not leave room for your pleasure. Help to let my defenses down through training in what I say and do so that I might receive your exaltation: being lowly like Jesus. Amen.

How timely! I have an opportunity to seek humility through enduring affliction and silence in dealing with a person who has not been kind to me. No doubt I will find ways in which I have not been kind to him as well. Funny how these things come up as I write this blog. It certainly brings a sense of realism to the rather "heady" discussion. Mostly, I find that God guides me each day so that these virtues do not remain dead in a book, but can come alive in practice. Perhaps I will find a way to confess to this person and grow out of my fears.