Who’s the Pharisee Here?

I recently finished Morality and Situation Ethics by the dynamic von Hildebrand duo.  My reading of the text was quite timely as it followed a conversation in which a good friend was accused by a colleague of being a pharisee for otherwise devout behavior during Mass.  (Actually the accusation probably had more to do with diverging liturgical views, but it is often easier to accuse someone of impure motives and legalism that it is to engage the conversation about the nature of liturgy.)  The von Hildebrand book had been sitting on my shelf for well over a year, and I picked it up simply more as a self-chastisement for violating my “one-year” policy (in which I try to read a book within a year of its purchase, a strategy that tempers my book purchases), than as a remedy for my acquaintance’s situation.  Nevertheless, it has proved to be quite helpful in this matter.  One purpose of the text is to outline various “types” of sinners.  (I think the philosophical jargon is “to make distinctions.”)  One of the prominently discussed figures is that of the pharisee.  Never have a read a more thorough description of what a pharisee is, but more importantly what a pharisee is not.

I don’t intend here to go into the various categories presented by the authors.  If you wish to know the difference between the pharisee and the self-righteous man, or the tragic sinner and the mediocre man, I suggest picking up a used copy of Morality and Situation Ethics.  (It is, I believe, out of print.)  Instead, I intend briefly to point out, by means of heavy plagiarism (otherwise known as quoting) some of the more insightful points that I found in the text.

We begin with the money quote.  Many of us have often been in situations where we are accused of being a pharisee.  In the often anti-legalistic culture found in the Church today, it is hardly possible to mention any love for rubrics or laws without facing such an accusation.  Now, I have, in the past, made the point that those who are quick to render the judgement of legalism tend to be legalistic themselves.  (Those who are quick to criticize others for adhering to liturgical rubrics will be the first to turn to the rubrics to read the in an overly literalistic manner in order to find loopholes they can exploit to justify any and all antics during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  See my post on Legalism for more details.)  Yet in true von Balthasar style, we read,

“It must be stressed, however, that self-righteousness is often met with even among those people who believe themselves to be the protagonists in the fight against pharisaism.  The very same people indulge in an indignation resembling that of self-righteous zealots when it comes to their hatred of mediocrity.  They are prone to view every thrifty person as a potential miser and are always eager to detect a lack of heroism in their neighbors.

“It is very important to stress this type of self-righteousness because it is very widespread today.  In their fight against bourgeois mediocrity and conventionalism, they feel themselves superior.  They believe they are the sincere representatives of the true Christian spirit.  They do not pretend to be correct, without sins.  No, they pride themselves on being true Christians notwithstanding their sins, because, as they say, pharisees alone care much about not sinning.  They not only feel superior, but like the self-righteous zealot, they gloat over their indignation about mediocre bourgeois and self-righteous Christians.  When they rage about the self-righteousness of others, it makes them feel free, great, deprived of all pettiness and mediocrity.  The kind of vices they generally suspect is characteristic.  Whereas the self-righteous zealot prefers to be on the scent of sins against the sixth commandment, of dishonesty, of unreliability, this revolutionary type of self-righteous man everywhere suspects avariciousness, lack of charity, mediocrity, conventionalism, hypocrisy, and insincerity.

“Like the self-righteous zealot, he lives on the qui vive to find an object for his indignation, and like the self-righteous zealot, he makes no differentiation between an ascertained fact, in which the intention is laid bare, and mere appearances that might eventually be interpreted in the direction of something to be indignant about.

“As with the self-righteous zealot, the slightest appearance suffices for him to make a ‘judgement’ on other people.  The mere rumor of avariciousness, of lack of charity, of mediocrity - unfounded as it may be - seems to entitle him to pass a final sentence.  This type also shares hypocrisy with the self-righteous, inasmuch as, by his manner of condemning self-righteous people, he himself becomes self-righteous.

“We can see to what unfortunate results the fight against pharisaism has led.  Instead of opposing to self-righteousness the humility and charity of the saint, one slips into sin mysticism, a glorification of sinning.  One ends by fighting the devil with Beelzebub, and by becoming pharisees of sinning” (page 112-113).

There is a similar critique of those who feel it “judgmental” to point out any sin and are quick to level criticism at those who do.  (Of course, we are called to never judge the sinner, yet it is part and parcel of the Christian ethos to call evil by its name.)

“Many people believe that the only objective, unprejudiced, and just approach is a kind of academic, cool distance, dealing with everything as if it were a merely interesting, peculiar problem and abstaining from any judgement in terms of true or false, right or wrong, good or evil.  Accordingly, they look upon any anathema as presumptuous arrogance or as merely an expression of uncontrolled emotions.  This idol of objectivity, which is nothing but a consequence either of a radical antithesis to Christianity and to the spirit of the Gospel.  The champions of this neutrality also feel themselves in some way to be specifically antipharisaical.  They consider themselves superior to the ‘judging,’ condemning spirit of the Gospel, rating themselves above the ‘judging.’ condemning people, whom they look down upon as being pharisaical.

“In truth, however, they themselves are a new species of pharisee, exhibiting a self-righteousness of pseudo objectivity, a sense of superiority because of their scientific, neutral, nonaffective approach.  Because of a certain hypocrisy also, they have some affinity with the pharisee.  Their hypocrisy lies in the fact that, on the one hand, they have a quasi-scientific approach, with the implicit claim to objectivity and the superiority proper to true objectivity, and on the other hand, they deny real objectivity by the relativism that is at the basis of their idol of neutrality.  They are in a certain way hypocrites because they put on the garments of true objectivity while in fact they deny any true objectivity.  They arrogate themselves the dignity of true objectivity and look down on prejudices, emotional people.  But simultaneously they reject the measure of objective truth that true objectivity necessarily presupposes.  Since they have substituted an emasculated neutrality for true objectivity, they are hypocrites for glorifying themselves because of their scientific dignity” (pages 117-118).

The purpose of the book is actually a full critique of “circumstance ethics” which, in short, espouses that all morality is relative to individual circumstances, and that no general moral norm can ever actually be formed.  It is, in reality, one step away from pure relativism.  The critique that circumstance ethics often levels at a system based on moral norms is one of legalism.  The von Hildebrands respond,

“Paradoxically enough, circumstance ethics leads, through an absolute formalism, to a much more radical ‘legalism’ than the one against which it protested.  It arose originally as a protest against an undue ‘legalization’ of morality, against a disregard for of the qualitative plenitude of morality.  Yet in denying the existence of general morally relevant and moral values, as well as the existence of moral commandments and moral laws rooted in these values, in effacing the difference between a moral commandment and a mere positive commandment, it leaves no other beacon for our moral life than a private revelation of God’s will, referring exclusively to a concrete, unique situation.  The only norm left would be orders that we have to follow blindfolded, instead of commandments that reveal to our mind that something is evil or that something is good” (page 149).

Regarding those who will say, “But I love God and have a personal relationship with him, so it doesn’t matter what I do,” the authors respond,

“The love of God requires imperatively a respect for all the commandments of God and for the natural moral law.  It necessarily implies an adequate response to all morally relevant goods in our habitual and actual attitudes, as well as in our actions.  On the one hand, every moral commandment shows us the path that God wants us to follow and which is the path truly consistent with our love of God; on the other hand, obedience to those commandments is a test of the genuine and true character of our love of God.  The one who really loves God, far from believing that he no longer needs the commandments referring to actions, far from thinking, ‘If I love God, it does not matter what I do,’ on the contrary, will be eager to consult the commandments of God and those of His Holy Church in all details, and will always orient himself anew to those commandments.  He will be eager to understand more and more all morally relevant values, which precisely imply a call of God, and he will love the commandments of the God whom he loves above all” (page 160).

The alternative is an authentic Christian reality,

“Yet true Christian humility implies also a readiness to take every small formal obligation seriously.  And the spirit of holy obedience that permeates the true Christian life gives to every task - formal as it may be - another significance.

“Thus not only do the walls crumble that enclose moral obligations in the framework of formal liabilities or any other extramoral bonds, but the very formal obligations themselves are transfigured by the love of God and stripped by charity of any merely ‘legalistic’ aspect.  Every corner of the Christian moral life is pervaded by the rhythm of sacred solemnity and the breath of mercy” (page 166).”

I think I have plagiarized enough, and more than likely I have broken some copyright laws about exceeding fair use.  But I am a sucker for these kinds of arguments that turn the tables, such as the one leveling the charge of pharisaism being guilty of that which he charges.

The entire book is worth a read - perhaps even a second.