Caput XXV. De humana laude non quaerenda
The Warning Against Hollow Righteousness
The Lord warns against performing good works for human praise, declaring that those who seek applause from others have already received their only reward, and instead calls believers to boast only in the Lord.
The Lord says in the Gospel: Be careful not to practice your righteousness before other people, so that they can see you (Matthew 6:1)—that is, don't do good with the intention of gaining empty praise from others. Whatever good a person does, let it be done for the love of God, for the salvation of his own soul, and out of love for his brothers and sisters.✦ That is why the Lord himself spoke about certain people who give alms, or pray and fast, in order to receive praise from others: I tell you truly, they have already received their reward (Matthew 6:2).✦ 6:2). Whoever does whatever good he does in order to be praised by others—that is the reward he was looking for, and he has no recompense to hope for from God. He didn't do it for God's love, but for the empty boasting of human praise, just as hypocrites are accustomed to doing. This fault of trying to please people in good works, the Lord Jesus Christ deeply detests, and time and again he strikes the Pharisees—who were like this in Judea—with a terrible curse, saying: Woe to you, hypocrites! (Matthew 23:13).✦ 23:13). But let us not imitate them. Instead, following the Apostle: Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord (1 Corinthians 1:31).✦ 1:31).
True Good Pleases God, Not the Crowd
One who does not chase praise is also unshaken by blame, for God alone inspects the heart; whoever labors to please people rather than God works in vain, while the Apostle reminds us that all good comes as a gift received from God.
Someone who doesn't chase praise isn't shaken by insult either. So no one should consider himself good just because someone else praises him, since God is the one who inspects the heart. What good does it do a wicked person to be spoken well of? Then truly what a person does is good, when they desire to please God — the one from whom they have whatever good they have or do. Whoever seems to do good, yet through these things wants to please not God but other people, labors in vain and sows to the wind.1 Let each person strive to be great in their own works, but let them not seek human approval for their greatness, lest what they had slip away and they end up diminished. Whatever good a person does, they should know they have it not from themselves, but from God. The blessed Apostle Paul rebukes those who boast in their own good deeds, saying: What do you have that you did not receive?2
Glory to God Alone
To turn God's gift into one's own praise is to change virtue into vice and mercy into sin; rather, every good work should direct all glory to God, so that others may see and glorify the Father in heaven.
But if you received it, why do you boast as though you hadn't? (1 Cor.✦ 4:7)?✦ Whoever turns a gift of God that he has earned into his own praise undoubtedly transfers virtue into vice, and the good he did into sin. For when a poor person is fed for the sake of boasting, even the work of mercy itself is turned into sin. Whatever good a person does, let him seek praise for God, not for himself, as the Lord himself says in the Gospel: Let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven (Matt.✦ 5:16).✦
Read the original Latin
Dominus dicit in Evangelio: Attendite, ne justitiam vestram faciatis coram hominibus, ut videamini ab eis (Matth, VI, 1), id est, ut ea intentione non faciatis bona, ut ab hominibus vanam laudem habeatis; sed quidquid homo facit boni, pro Dei amore et salute animae suae, et fraterna charitate faciat. Ideo ipse Dominus dixit de quibusdam, qui eleemosynas faciunt, vel orationes et jejunia, ut ab hominibus laudem accipiant: Amen dico vobis, receperunt mercedem suam (Matth. VI, 2). Qui pro eo bonum quodlibet facit, ut ab hominibus laudetur, haec est merces illius quam quaesivit, et nullam a Deo sperare habet retributionem; quia pro ejus amore non fecit, sed pro vana humanae laudis jactantia, sicut hypocritae facere solent. Quod vitium hominibus placendi in bonis operibus, Dominus Jesus Christus multum detestatur, et saepius Pharisaeos, qui tales fuerunt in Judaea, terribili percutit maledictione, dicens: Vae vobis, hypocritae (Matth. XXIII, 13)! Nos autem non eos imitemur, sed secundum Apostolum: Qui gloriatur, in Domino glorietur (I Cor. I, 31).
Qui laudem non appetit, nec pro contumelia conturbatur. Nec ideo se bonum existimet homo, quamvis ab alio laudetur, quia Deus inspector est cordis. Quid enim prodest malo homini, si bonus praedicetur? Tunc veraciter hoc quod agit homo bonum est, quando Deo placere desiderat, a quo habet quidquid boni habet vel facit. Qui bona agere videtur, et per haec non Deo, sed hominibus placere cupit, in vanum laborat, et in ventum seminat. Magnum se unusquisque esse studeat in suis operibus; sed de magnitudine sua humanum non quaerat favorem, ne perdat quod habuit, et sit parvus factus. Quidquid enim homo boni faciat, hoc se sciat habere non a se, sed a Deo. Increpat eos beatus Paulus apostolus qui in suis gloriantur benefactis, dicens: Quid habes, quod non accepisti?
Si autem accepisti, quid gloriaris, quasi non receperis (I Cor. IV, 7)? Qui aliquod donum Dei quod meruit, in suam laudem convertit, procul dubio virtutem in vitium transfert, et bonum quod fecit, in peccatum. Cum enim causa jactantiae pascitur pauper, etiam ipsum misericordiae opus in peccatum convertitur. Quidquid homo boni agit, Deo quaerat laudem, non sibi, sicut ipse Dominus in Evangelio ait: Sic luceat lux vestra coram hominibus, ut videant opera vestra bona, et glorificent Patrem vestrum, qui in coelis est (Matth. V, 16).
Scripture echoes
- ↩Matt.6.1 — Beware of practicing your righteousness before people, to be seen by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in the heavens.
- ↩Matt.6.2 — So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by people. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward.
- ↩Matt.23.13 — But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. For you yourselves do not enter, nor do you allow those who are trying to enter to go in.
- ↩1Cor.1.31 — so that, as it is written, 'Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.'
- ↩1Cor.4.7 — For who makes you different? And what do you have that you did not receive? But if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you had not received it?
- ↩1Cor.4.7 — For who makes you different? And what do you have that you did not receive? But if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you had not received it?
- ↩Matt.5.16 — In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in the heavens.
- ↩Matt.5.16 — In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in the heavens.
Notes
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