Knowledge of Self Gives us a Powerful Weakness for Knowledge of Others

From Book 1, Chapter 2, paragraph 4, Good saint Thomas finishes his thoughts on having an humble opinion of oneself:

4. This is the highest and most valuable lesson: to truly know yourself and to have a low opinion of yourself. To think always well and highly of others is great wisdom and high perfection.

Knowing ours frailties gives us the empathy to understand the weaknesses in others. This is different than sympathy, which is mildly compassionate.  Empathy is more of "walking in their shoes" understanding.  Think of the line from The Prayer of St. Francis'  "O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console; to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love...."

Thomas continues, explaining that, like St Paul, we should all consider ourselves as capable of being chief among sinners (1Tim 1:15):

If you should see another person openly sin or commit some wicked crime you ought not think of yourself as better since you do not know how long you may remain in a good state of integrity and grace. We are all frail and weak but see that you do not think of anyone more frail than yourself.

Like St. Paul, we often are at the height of our spiritual pursuits when The Lord sends some thorn in the flesh to humble us.  For me, that's usually after I look down my spiritually pure nose at some other sinner, knowing full well that person is hell-bound.  Thankfully, the thorn brings me back into the breach, where I realize my own weakness and then turn to Confession and His Grace. The Lord also tells us in this same passage that His Grace is sufficient for us (2 Cor 12:9).

Thomas succinctly brings all these prayerful thoughts together in Chapter 2, laying out the natural desire to know things, and then putting perspective on that knowledge, putting value on that knowledge, adding wisdom and humility to that knowledge to reach an humble opinion of ourselves, and empathy toward others.

Next, I will prudently turn to Chapter 4, since I treated Chapter 3 in some detail back in January.

In a short while, I'll have all of these posts, along with a podcast, loaded onto a new site that my friend Dave is helping me set up.  I'll keep you posted.

The podcast will likely come at the end of each chapter, so I can wade through the whole chapter and perhaps go into a little more detail.

Thank you for reading and praying along with me. 'Til next time, be Imitators of Christ!

tim