Stoicism and Christianity On Dealing with Sinful Acts
The thing that Jesus and Marcus Aurelius taught us when facing demon
Recently, I’ve had a bothersome experience with one of the local authorities.
I was going to do some administration stuff with my wife since we’ve just married recently, and we need to do some family registration and change our ID cards.
We couldn’t go there early in the morning, so we decided that we were going to go there after lunch. Usually, government officials are supposed to open until 3 pm so, there should be enough time to do our registration. Or at least that’s what we’ve thought referring to all our prior visits to the other offices.
The irritating experience
After lunch, we get appropriately dressed and head there to arrive at 1 pm, right after lunchtime. But unfortunately, when we were waiting for the officer to go back from lunch when suddenly one of them came and begrudgingly asked me:
“What do you want?”
“We just want to apply for a new family registration, sir,” with a smile on my face.
“It’s close, read! it’s only 8 am until 12 pm!” While sighing, look away from me and pointing to a printed sign outside the office’s door.
I looked at my wife, shrugged my shoulder, and we walked back to our car. I still couldn’t believe it, so I called their headquarters (which is far from my place and doesn’t do small works like family registration) to ask whether the government office near our place was supposed to be open until 3 pm or if the regulations had changed.
It turns out they are supposed to be open until 3 pm, which means they were cheating their working hours. But when I went back and asked them about it, they refused to explain and said that it was the higher-up’s decision.
My wife was quite furious; she would curse them down, but then I calmed her by saying.
“Well, we couldn’t help it; we need their help. But if the government officials are going to lie in front of our face and break the law as they pleased, it’s their loss. They have done their sin; let them be, just don’t let it provoke us.” I smile.
When I got home, my father heard our story from my wife and went on a rampage of hateful comments about the government officials here. Every animal from the zoo came out of his mouth—every curse from Avada Kadavra to Crutio (just kidding).
And it got me thinking.
Sinful act begets sin
I didn’t know that knowing someone did sin and not get punished for it arouses others’ eagerness to do another sin. It’s like an infectious disease.
This is why I believe that we all have to have virtue and ponder on it day and night.
What Jesus said about facing sin
In Galatians 6:1, Jesus said,
“Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.”
When you see someone doing sin, you know it was a sin. Then why do you have to follow their steps into hell?
When you know it’s a sin, you have only two choices: either tell them the truth or help them. Or pray for them and not let yourself gets tempted by the rage.
What the Stoics said about facing wickedness
Marcus Aurelius, one of the most famous Stoic Philosopher also said something about dealing with rude people:
“Is a world without shamelessness possible? No. Then don’t ask the impossible. There have to be shameless people in the world. This is one of them.”
There are mean people in the world; there are sinful and wickedness surrounding this world we live in. We know it and can’t go in our lives without ever meeting one.
Accept this; accept the fact that it is normal to meet unrighteous people when we’re still living in this world. And when we meet with one, know that all we got is knowledge of how not to act.
How the Stoics said we should feel
Another critical point preached by Epictetus was,
“another person will not do you harm unless you wish it; you will be harmed at just that time at which you take yourself to be harmed.”
Someone wicked will just act as he is. It’s not meant to be personal to us. The important thing is how we react to it and respond to his nature.
We could only feel humiliated or ashamed if we allow it to be. We can only feel those feelings if we allow our value and worth to be placed upon the action of others. But as long as we know our worth, we hold our virtue, and we don’t allow others to harm us, nothing can hurt us.
Bullet points to remember
- There are times people will be rude to us, that’s for sure
- Jesus said that we only need to do two things: help those who fall into sin and watch our reactions
- Marcus Aurelius reminds us that the world is filled with wickedness, and we should always expect to encounter one
- Epictetus reminds us to not put other’s judgment and demeanor on the pedestal of our value and worth
- These are the importance of keeping virtue as we go through life
