Compassion part of a moral code
A FRIEND’S closest companion has recently died. An acquaintance (let’s call her Jay) telephoned my friend to engage her in conversation about memories of the deceased. Jay had never in the past attempted to contact my friend. She knew the deceased about 60 years ago. She engaged my friend for more than half an hour, in a seemingly jocular, giggling manner. Every memory Jay recounted was derogatory and insulting in respect of the deceased.
We wondered why Jay did that. We could come to the only conclusion that seemed sensible: that here we have a soul who is bitter about what had happened 60 and more years ago, and could not come to terms with that, and has not built up any beautiful memories about her own life afterwards. And in this bitterness she wanted to destroy my friend’s beautiful memories of the life she had lived with her beloved.
The word “compassion”, or rather lack thereof, came to mind. There was nothing remotely compassionate about Jay’s engagement with my friend, the bereaved.
This brought to mind the concepts religion, religiosity, the spiritual and spirituality, insofar as Jay professes strong religious beliefs. Religion is defined as “the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or Gods”. Religiosity is seen as being excessively religious. In fact, Jay could be regarded as being in the grip of religiosity.
My thoughts turned to the question of what spirituality entails. That which is spiritual relates to or affects “the human spirit as opposed to material or physical things”.
Spirituality is thus a state of being where there is a deep consciousness of the spirit, as opposed to material or the physical.
The question I grappled with was: are there overlaps between religion or religiosity and spirituality? Does the one necessarily include the other? My answer here is clear: while there are many persons (some of whom I know) who embrace religion and who are also deeply spiritual, there are as many who embrace a religion but who are the least likely spiritual persons.
Spirituality embraces compassion, compassion being defined as “sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others”. Another dictionary definition of “compassion” is “the feeling for another’s sorrow or hardship that leads to help”. Pity and sympathy are mentioned as accompanying emotions.
The latter definition of “compassion” is perhaps more encompassing than the foregoing one. Here, the idea of “feeling” for another’s sorrow or hardship is tied to the idea of help. Compassion is indeed the deepest basis of the relationship between oneself and others. Our relationships with one another are manifold: we may engage in purely (or almost purely) economic relationships with one another.
Then there is the special relationship with the person we love. With compassion, we firmly enter the sphere of morality. Compassion is perhaps the highest moral value.
Morality is not simply a matter of exchange-worth, or economic value. Moral value is, or should have, nothing to do with barter that is utility. It is not a matter of demand and render, but of intrinsic substance.
Here I greatly value Nicolai Hartmann’s writing on moral values, especially in his Ethics.
What is moral, of course, has to do with what we regard as right and wrong. Moral values provide guiding principles for how to conduct our lives in order that there is a flourishing of humanness.
Hartmann points out the relationship between the life of the individual and the law, as explicated by the value of justice: “All legal protection extends only to the person as such, as an individual, not as individuality (the latter being outside the pale of law, as law is impersonal).”
This is the weakness in the armour of justice as a moral value.
This is why Hartmann refers to justice as the “minimum of morality”. If we speak of compassion,
Compassion takes in what is near to us, as much as what is far away
however, we are speaking of emotions involving the maximum of morality.
Compassion holds not only for intimate, familiar relationships, but also for relationships at large, involving people we do not closely know, or even those we do not know – strangers.
Compassion – and this is why it is consummate morality – takes in what is near to us, as much as what is far away. This is precisely the essence of the emotion.
Brotherly (at times termed “neighbourly”) love, as Hartmann writes about it, covers everything Jesus intended in His pleading on the Cross with Mary, discourse with those crucified with Him, and His outreach to all people. Hartmann considers, rightly, that compassion “surpasses justice, the fundamental value of the ancient world” (Roman world, I would add). “It is undoubtedly on a higher plane”, says Hartmann.
I bear in mind that none of us can be Jesus when it comes to compassion: His “feeling with others” in their life’s travails are of an order beyond – the limit of it being the Crucifixion, a boundary of compassion which, indeed, we cannot fathom. It sets the standard, though, for us to aspire to: the Calvary of Compassion (Luke 23: 33).
The Cape Times of November 9 provides us with two reports around the theme of compassion.
One is about a profligate lack of compassion – if the accusations against the defendant are found to be true – and the other is about superb compassion. (The two reports are published literally side by side on the same page.)
The first report (it has been running for some days) is about a medical doctor who alledgedly “swindled” his “frail and elderly patient” of more than R400 000.
The patient had, according to charges laid, written cheques for sometimes exorbitant amounts in favour of the accused. If this is proved to be true, this would be a case of not only a callous lack of compassion, but also of the Hippocratic oath in force for qualifying medical doctors.
Then there is the beautiful image of “before and after” photographs of a young child.
This image is, in a different way, as beautiful as the one that appeared on the front page of the Cape Time on Monday, November 7, about the magnificent sunset over Cape Town.
As uplifting as the sunset image was, so uplifting was the image of little Entle Baleni, who had a time ago undergone surgery to address his (is this a boy?) cleft lip, and who, in the second of the two images, shows what a remarkable impact the surgery has had on his appearance – and will have on his life as he grows up.
Forty-three young patients will soon undergo corrective surgery, as part of the Smile Foundation’s Smile Week initiative. Here, all gratitude and recognition must go to the foundation, the Tygerberg Academic Hospital, and all surgeons and other medical personnel involved in the planned corrective surgery. While the Hippocratic oath does extend to compassion, the medical personnel involved go far beyond the requirements of the Hippocratic oath.
None of the persons or institutions mentioned need have been involved in any of this.
The entire initiative simply exemplifies an act of great compassion.
I conclude with a remembrance of aforementioned bereaved friend’s interaction with the City of Cape Town Municipality.
In the wake of the death of her beloved, she encountered financial travails.
She went and explained her situation, and was met with a policy that involved a protocol of compassion.
Rules were not flouted, but a workable way forward was created so that she could face and address her situation without suffering undue hardship.
The relief she experienced when a compassionate solution (albeit short term) was arrived at, also exemplifies how compassion, amongst other things, entails helping the one who is enduring sorrow and privation.