09/08/2024
Death entered the world with envy. This is one of the motives for evil behavior. Often a person thinks that he is very kind, does not wish anyone any harm, and that there is no envy in him. "Maybe I am hot-tempered," he says, "but quick to forgive, maybe I am frivolous, or something else, but I am not envious."
In fact, if you look deeper, you can find in yourself a strange sadness from the success of another person.
When someone else is successful or happy, then you feel sad, you lower your face.
This is a sure sign that not everything is in order in you.
For example, at work: it seems that everyone worked equally and you are no worse than everyone else, but someone else was noted, and you are not. Or does the Lord distribute wealth, talents to people, like he gave to this one, and gave to that one, but for some reason he did not give to me? Here begins what Pushkin described in "Mozart and Salieri", which is actually the story of Cain and Abel.
Cain lowers his face and is saddened by God's blessing on his brother.
Sadness from someone else's well-being is called envy. Death entered the world through the envy of the devil. The devil envies man because he himself foresees his sad and eternal end and our eternal glory in Christ Jesus, our Lord.
Therefore, his motive is to deprive man of happiness, to deprive man of eternal bliss and to make man a participant in his own misfortune.
Only this is the motive of a syphilitic woman who, out of resentment that she herself was infected, tries to infect as many people as possible.
But these are extreme forms of envy that make Cain kill, syphilitic women - share the disease, or the devil - drag everyone else to hell with him. And just a stamp of someone else's well-being, just such a muttering "why is it for him, but not for me?", "Where do they get all this from?", "Why are some lucky, and others unlucky?" - this is a very common thing. Because of this, wives often "gnaw" at their husbands.
From these grumbling envious motives a lot of sadness and troubles in the world are born.
And envy is a widespread thing.
Entire nations envy entire nations.
In the history of Europe, the Germans were terribly envious of the English, the English - of the French, so they were constantly at war with each other.
Our fools looked "with bated breath" at Europe and America, but it all ended very sadly.
This is no longer personal envy, but national: to scold one's own, to praise someone else's.
If we check our lives for the presence of these states (sadness and grief), we will notice that we are not completely free from this either.
And we will have something to repent of and something to fight against.
Fr. Andrei Tkachev
