Those enemies of good sense, prudent action, good judgment, reason: arrogance, ego, hatred, temper, malice, envy, lust, laziness, impulsiveness, etc.

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Those enemies of reason, good sense, prudent action, good judgment: arrogance, ego, hatred, temper, malice, envy, lust, laziness, impulsiveness, etc.

There are a number of things that are great enemies of reason, good sense, prudent action, good judgment, intelligent action. Because of their tendency to persist in a person, these things that I am talking about are often viewed as character traits. Let me name them: arrogance, high ego, high pride, vanity, anger, temper, hatred, bitterness, resentfulness, argumentativeness, maliciousness, vindictiveness, envy, jealousy, lust, laziness, impulsiveness, impatience, fear, “love” (romantic infatuation), greed, selfishness. Because the content of our lives is so determined by the great multitude of decisions that we make every day, anything that affects the way our mind works and causes us to make poor decisions has a powerful influence on the content of our lives and on our personal happiness. A well-functioning mind free of distorting influences is an asset of gigantic value in life. How much damage do these above listed “personality traits” do to a person? Well, I believe that these things are the reasons so many people have so many problems in life — the reason so many people have such messed up, unhappy lives. Most people just don’t know how to live life. They lack understanding. They blunder their way through life going from one mistake to another. And the above listed are the main reason for this. They acquired their particular set of outlooks, attitudes and values as they moved from childhood to adulthood by some process that they don’t really understand and now they have their own set of personality traits and these traits are causing them all kinds of problems. (And people assume they are stuck with their particular set of traits because they don’t know how to change them.) Let me point out that the most of these things don’t just affect us occasionally, causing us to make some mistakes here and there. Most are demons that affect our entire mentality and personality. They have a pervasive influence on our mind, our thinking, our behavior. They represent wrong attitudes, wrong values and wrong outlooks. They cause wrong thinking and lead to wrong behavior. And wrong thinking and wrong behavior has consequences. It has consequences for the content of one’s life. Wrong ideas, wrong thinking, wrong attitudes, wrong behavior has consequences in our relationships with other people. Wrong attitudes and behavior affects how other people respond to us. No one likes the arrogant, presumptuous person. They like humble, modest people. No one like a nasty, malicious person. No one likes a selfish, greedy person. What we give out in life gets projected back to us. If we send out badness, we get it back. Now all that I have said has a connection with Christianity. Here we are talking about wise action and foolish action, how to live life and how not to live life. Jesus said,

I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. John 14:6

I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. John 6:35

Jesus taught a life of modesty, humility, peacefulness, avoidance of argument and strife, “turning the other cheek”, living right, doing right, consideration for your neighbor, simplicity, contentment with little, moral purity, virtue, goodness. He preached against excessive pride, argument, strife and anger. In Galatians 5 we read:

19 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, 20 idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, 21 envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, 23 meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. 24 And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. 25 If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. 26 Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another.

The above “mental maladies” are all sins from the Biblical point of view. I think it is interesting that all of these Biblical sins are also enemies of reason, good sense, prudent action, rational judgment, intelligent action. The way taught by Jesus is very closely connected with the “Way of Wisdom and Understanding” that one finds in the Book of Proverbs in the Old Testament.

What is the cause of things like excessive pride, anger, hatred, malice, envy, jealousy, etc.? Underneath it all is wrong outlooks, attitudes, values; wrong ways of looking at things, wrong mental habits. I would suggest that all of these various sins are all cut from the same cloth and tend to be found together. In the same way the virtues are cut from the same cloth and tend to occur together. This suggests that there is something more basic and fundamental that is underneath it all.

The way of true Christianity is a way that is devoid of all of the “mental maladies” listed above. It is a “higher way”. It is the way of Jesus. He who will follow Jesus rejects the way of wickedness, foolishness, and sin and follows the higher way of goodness and righteousness.

See the following:

Impediments to the proper working of the rational mind

Stay away from these demons: Pride, Anger, Hatred, Lust, Envy and Jealousy

Demons that can take possession of a person and destroy him

Let your conduct always flow from a calm, quiet, humble mind

Spiritual maladies of man

Mar 2018