(Originally written July 24, 2007 in Notebook 17)
When I search the faces of men, women and even children I see two things. IN the honest people I see hatred, selfishness, stupidity, envy and a whole host of vices. In the dishonest folks I see masks that scarcely hide these vices.
Man, above all things, is a selfish brute. All of us are more concerned with ourselves than with anything else. It is written that I should love all men as I love myself, but as I am a man I too share all of these selfish vices. On the one hand I love myself and indulge my selfish wants. On the other I loathe myself for being selfish. Should I love and hate all men as I love and hate myself?
The goodness of man is a myth, a fable, and aspiration that is unachievable by every individual ever born or who will be born. We lie, cheat, kill steal and rape for pleasure. If we do not do these things in act we most assuredly do them in thought.
Our normalcy is cruelty. Our modus operandi is meanness.We are all sharks and dogs. We are even more dangerous when we hunt together. Our selfishness can be combined and we grow in greed exponentially when we are left with no outside intervention. We destroy all that we touch, or we consume it and hoard it to satisfy our insatiable lust.
But is there no good in man? How can we explain altruism at all? If what I wrote was the case then we would never see a single good deed and yet we do see such deeds.
When was the last time you witnessed the goodness of man? Prove me wrong! I beg of you! I want so badly to be wrong, but fear I am correct. When we witness a good deed or the goodness of man we witness no act of man at all. Every act, thought or desire of man is utterly selfish. A good deed is truly selfless. There can be no combination of selfishness and selflessness. There must be one or the other. They cannot coexist.
In times of tragedy such as 9/11 or Hurricane Katrina we were all witnesses to the goodness of men. We saw at times of great tragedy truly selfless deeds that involved the apex of selflessness: giving one's life for another. There, there is the goodness of man! In times of tragedy a selfless nature can overcome the normal of selfishness.
But how can a truly selfish being forgo all of his instincts. How can he act against his nature? He cannot! It would be like seeing fish flying in the air and birds living in water. It is an impossibility. But nonetheless there are good deeds and goodness.
When a good deed happens, when selflessness overcomes selfishness we are no longer ourselves. It is the very notion of selflessness that allows for good deeds to happen. We lose ourselves, our selfish nature, if only for a moment, and do not ourselves act. Something selfish cannot do something selfless, likewise something selfless cannot do something selfish.
When we become selfless we are not ourselves. We cannot be. Yet we seem to act. We are all fashioned in the image of God. We all have the divine imprint in us somewhere. It is like a beautiful diamond that is recovered from the charred remains of a home.
At one time the home was beautiful and the diamond was placed in the house on display for everyone to see. It shined and reflected light throughout the whole house. But we insulted the builder and keeper of the house, for He is one and the same. The perfect house, the gorgeous furniture, the luxurious landscape, and most precious that diamond he gave us was not enough. We saw it all and were ungrateful. Ingratitude became selfishness and then self-idolatry.
In agner and righteous rage the Builder cursed the house, the landscape and the furniture; but, in mercy he left us our lives and that diamond. The landscape grew wild and overtook the house. Without the keeper we could not maintain the house. Slowly but surely the house turned to ruin, until finally it burned down.
When we scrounged through the rubble frantically searching of our accumulated possessions we happened upon the diamond. Its brilliance remained exactly as it was the day it was given to us. We remembered the Builder, we remember the glory of the House and for that moment we are one with the Builder again. He acts through us for a moment until we return to normalcy.
The image of God in us is untainted. Though our bodies, our minds, and our world has fallen into disrepair the image remains as new as ever. It takes tragedy for us to remember this image, even if it is done so subconsciously. It is out of that image we act in goodness. The image of God overwhelms the corruptness of selfishness and we lose ourselves to God. God's goodness is enacted through men and when we come to our senses we are selfish again.
The goodness of man is a myth. It is another selfish ideal of a selfish creature. Whatever is good must belong to good. Man is most definitely no longer good (though he can be restored! Hallelujah!through an eternal selflessness). When good shines through man it is the goodness of God, not man. So much for the goodness of man.
No comments:
Post a Comment