On Mon, 5 Mar 2001, John D. Giorgis wrote:
> At 03:40 PM 3/5/01 -0600, Marvin wrote:
> >
> >I think he's saying that self-righteousness is a contra-indicator of
> >genuine righteousness. :-)
>
> Which would leave us virtually without righteousness in the world.
> After all, how many people are there out there who are completely
> unwilling to say that they are doing "the right thing" in comparison
> to at least somebody else.
Self-righteousness implies a certain smugness that I don't think the truly
righteous have. The truly righteous, in my experience, tend to be a lot
more humble than that.
Think of the "hypocrites" in Mark 6:1-6; this is what I think of when I
hear "self-righteous". Acting more like Jesus exhorted his followers to
in contrast to these hypocrites is what I think of when I hear "genuine
righteousness".
(Eventually I'm going to tell someone if I've done a good deed without any
witnesses that know me, but I resolve to let a certain amount of time pass
before I do so, lest I be doing it for immediate personal glory as
acknowledged by those who know me. And it's kind of fun to have that sort
of secret.)
Julia
