The Vein of Speech 11: Is Loyalty to Friends Always a Sign of Morality?

What a noble person!

Is loyalty to friends always a sign of morality?

Preachers and scholars of ethics have repeatedly warned that one should refrain from judging others. This is, on the whole, sound advice. In principle, unless it becomes necessary, it is better to refrain from judgment, whether positive or negative, about others. But suppose you want to marry in the traditional way. In such a case, it is necessary to inquire about the person who has come to propose to you or intends to, or about the person you have proposed to or intend to. Here, moral judgment is entirely permissible and may well be necessary. Yet it is clear that even when necessary, one must not abandon caution in judgment. However, this advice to refrain from judging others is often understood only as refraining from negative judgment of others. This time, I want to pitch my tent in the vein of this very point and show that if negative judgment of others is difficult—and it is—positive judgment of others is equally (if not more) difficult, and refraining from judging others should be taken to mean refraining from all judgment, whether positive or negative.

Tolerance with enemies

When a person treats their friends, family, students, and disciples kindly, we are usually inclined to make a positive moral judgment about that person. Such a person is more likely to receive a positive moral judgment from others compared to someone who—in colloquial terms—even trips up those around them and treats friends and associates with hostility. Nevertheless, such a person is not yet moral in the strict sense of the word. For behaving morally toward agreeable associates, students, and disciples generally brings great benefit to the master or guide. This usually warms up one's market and increases the flourishing of one's circle of students and disciples. But what serves as a better touchstone and criterion for a positive judgment about a person's morality is the way that person treats their rivals. When a rival enters the scene, a person may become an entirely different person. It is here that one can truly test a person's morality. Who is meant by a rival? The rival meant here is not necessarily someone who is actually the person's rival, but rather someone whom the person considers their rival, even if they are not truly a rival. So tolerance with enemies is a better criterion for moral judgment about oneself and others than loyalty to friends. It is when facing a strong enemy or rival that a person feels all their interests might be blown away, so they may cast aside consideration and become themselves, that is, reveal their inner self better than in any other situation.

Tolerance with the harmful?

I have said all this, but not every tolerance with every enemy under every circumstance is permissible. One can imagine a situation where abandoning tolerance with an enemy is not only permissible but necessary. Wherever harm to another is involved and tolerance with the harmful person increases their harmfulness or does not diminish its intensity, abandoning tolerance is permissible and indeed necessary. The problem, however, lies in the precise definition of harming—whether it includes only physical harm or also non-physical harms—and also in identifying the situation where tolerance with the harmful person increases their harmfulness or not.

Let us cast judgments before the judge

The last point I made seems to have made judging the morality or immorality of individuals even more difficult: on the one hand, someone who is loyal to friends is not yet known to be moral in the strict sense of the word; on the other hand, someone who does not tolerate enemies is also not yet known to be immoral, because perhaps tolerance with the enemy (in the situation the person was in) was not morally permissible. If this conclusion is reached, then this is precisely what I intended to show: judging individuals, whether positive judgment or negative judgment, is a difficult task, and one should not undertake it except when necessary.

For a highly complex portrayal of the role an enemy can play in an individual's psychological disintegration (an enemy who, of course, may ultimately prove to have no external source and is in fact none other than the hidden, wounded part of the individual themselves), see the 2013 Canadian-Spanish film Enemy, directed by Denis Villeneuve, and pay particular attention to the symbolic aspect of the spider throughout the film and, most importantly, in the final scene.

Yaser Mirdamadi / The Vein of Speech 11