Reverence
Published on Nov 06, 2015
Reverence is the forgotten virtue. But it's essential to our own well-being and to our communities. Here's why . . .
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PRESENTATION OUTLINE
Reverence
The Quiet Virtue
Antigone
Sophocles - 441 BCE
In Sophocles' play, written around 441 BCE, Creon, King of Thebes, has decreed that no one shall bury the body of Polynices, his nephew, who has lead a rebellion against the city. Antigone, Polynices' sister and Creon's niece, defies the order and goes out of the city to bury her brother.
Photo by Jacob Zimmer
Creon
When this is discovered Creon explodes in a rage and orders the torture and death of Antigone.
Photo by littleblackcamera
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Antigone will not back down. She knows this desecration of Polynices by Creon is a moral outrage, a defiance of the gods, and a breaking of the customs of her people. Even enemies deserved the honor of a burial. Reverence toward all people is what the gods require. Reverence is what keeps a civilization together.
Haemon
Haemon, Creon's remaining son, tries to reason with his father. "Oh give way," he pleads. "Relax your anger--change! I'm young, I know, but let me offer this: ... It's best to learn from those with good advice." Creon scoffs and refuses any counsel. The argument escalates . . .
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Creon curses Haemon, who rushes out in despair to save Antigone. Teresias, the blind prophet, whom Creon has already insulted and rejected, prophesies that Creon shall pay for Antigone's death by the death of a loved one--and that all in the city of Thebes shall hate and curse him. At last Creon is shaken. He sets off with the curse in his ears, intending to set Antigone free, but he is too late. She has hung herself. Haemon spits in his father's face and falls upon his own sword. In a frenzy of grief and despair, Creon is led away, only to learn that Eurydice, his wife, has killed herself. Creon is alone; his family has cursed him in their death throes.
Hybris
This is what the Athenians feared most, a leader becoming a tyrant, defying the gods and overturning the ancient customs. They called it hybris--attempting to be as the gods. It was irreverence.
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Reverence
What is reverence, then? It surely is more than running in the church and talking too loudly. Paul Woodruff, in his meditation on reverence, calls it the forgotten virtue.
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"Reverence is the capacity to feel respect in the right way toward the right people, and to feel awe towards an object that transcends particular human interests."
Woodruff traces the development of reverence through the history of the ancient Greeks and of Confucius. He describes it as the capacity to feel respect . . .
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Immanuel Kant famously said, "Two things fill me with awe: the starry sky above me and the moral law within me." That's reverence.
Awe
Respect
Shame
Ceremony
Woodruff speaks of capacities for "awe, respect, and shame; it is often expressed in, and reinforced by, ceremony." 63
Virtue
to do good things . . .
"A virtue is a capacity, cultivated by experience and training, to have emotions that make you feel like doing good things." Reverence, 62
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Reverence . . . gives us the ability to shudder at going wrong."
"Unlike rules," says Woodruff, "virtues give us strength to live well and to avoid bad choices. Reverence gives us the ability to shudder at going wrong." (42)
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"The more virtue we have, the less we will need
to think
about rules . . ."
Virtue works from within, motivating us to the Good; eventually, we do not need to be compelled by rules to accomplish the good.
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Reverence is often part of true worship, but it is not limited to religion.
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In our awe at the beauty and power of the natural world, we experience reverence.
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In our struggles for justice and freedom we sense that we are in the presence of "possible greatness," and this too is reverence.
SHAME
Woodruff says shame is not a bad feeling. Shame pushes us to live better and to do better. A society without shame would be disastrous. (73)
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ISIS, like Creon, trades on the fear that arises from dishonoring one's enemies. In its contempt for reverence, ISIS humiliates and desecrates its captives, robbing them of the last dignity before death.
"Higher than the highest human thought can reach is God's ideal for His children."
One 19th-century spiritual writer, Ellen G. White, claimed that "Higher than the highest human thought can reach is God's ideal for His children."
We could read this in several ways. One is that God's expectations of us are so high that we could never reach them. Another is that we simply can't understand God.
We could read this in several ways. One is that God's expectations of us are so high that we could never reach them. Another is that we simply can't understand God.
Photo by Thomas Hawk
"Godliness
is the goal to be reached."
Can we strive to act in godly ways without claiming to be as the gods? Reverence is needed!
Photo by Pavel P.
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When we gather round our fires and tell our tales, we are in the presence of an ancient rite of reverence.
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When we destroy the trust of children as "collateral damage" we break our bonds of humanity through irreverence.
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But when we feel ourselves humbled and awed by the strength of stones and the beauty of flowing water, we draw on our capacity for transcendence, the condition of reverence.
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"If you desire peace in the world, do not pray that everyone share your beliefs. Pray instead that all may be reverent." -- Paul Woodruff, Reverence.
Photo by Frank Wuestefeld
Sources
- Paul Woodruff (2001). Reverence: Renewing a Forgotten Virtue. Oxford University Press.
- Dennis Crews, Photographer, http://www.dcrewsphoto.com.
- Aisha Patel-Smith, slide, Grand Mosque, Istanbul.
