In Orthodoxy, rancor is more often called memory malice. How familiar this feeling is to every person. At work, someone said an offensive or disparaging word to us. And we, it seems, in a Christian manner, remained silent.
But how resentment gnaws at us, how we cannot sleep for several hours or even nights, replaying what happened in our memory. We make plans for revenge, choose words, weave intrigues. The offender evokes in us a feeling of hatred and anger. I really want all possible troubles and misfortunes to fall on him. And if they happen, we rejoice in our souls, although without showing it. Or we even blaspheme: “The Lord punished.” A scary picture, but it is familiar to many, if not everyone!
"Descendant of the Count of Monte Cristo"
A vindictive person is a person who remembers in detail the circumstances associated with offensive facts towards him. A person who hides anger and feelings of grief for a long time in his soul and memory. It is difficult for him to forget, much less forgive, the insults inflicted, even if the event happened several years ago. There is such a joke: “I’m not vindictive, I’m just angry, and I have a good memory!”
Most of these people dream of getting even with those who, in their opinion, are the culprit of their bitterness.
A vindictive person is a portrait of an unhappy subject. A person who lives by past grievances, does not forgive offenders, whose bitter feelings eat away at her from the inside.
Quite often, global grievances and insults that oppress a person for years, upon reasonable analysis, turn out to be minor situations not worth attention.
A vindictive person sees the problem in a black light. A person lives in constant constraint of offended feelings and self-criticism. The life of a vindictive person is overshadowed by bad memories, which are given great importance.
Forgive us our debts
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Grudge is essentially an unwillingness to forgive. How can you be an Orthodox Christian if you cannot forget the insults and sins of other people? Reading the Lord's Prayer at home, or with the whole world in church, we ask the Lord to forgive us our sins, just as we forgive our debtors. And if we do not forgive, then the Lord will not forgive us.
In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus Christ himself tells us that if someone does not forgive people for their sins, then he will not be given God’s Mercy for his sins.
It is all the more surprising that among the Orthodox there is such a character trait as rancor. This is the path to nowhere, this is the door to the abyss that we constantly push to open.
Children's grievances
A vindictive person is a sensitive person with wounded self-esteem, who tends to see unfavorable attitudes towards him from others. Most often, children become vindictive people who observe an example of unforgiveness from harsh parents. Asking for forgiveness from a child, treating him as a full-fledged person, taking his feelings into account is not accepted by most mothers and fathers. Children are perceived as robots, obliged to show emotions and desires only when it is convenient for adults. Rare expressions of praise and encouragement, the maximum number of reproaches and complaints, unwillingness to accept parental guilt in front of the child and focusing on bad qualities in the future will raise an embittered personality.
The psychology of a vindictive person speaks of a line of behavior copied in childhood from close relatives who lived and were nearby. That's how they behaved.
What is a vindictive person?
Many people are interested in this question. To understand why a vindictive person holds a grudge for a long time, it is worth analyzing his inner world.
Rancor and vindictiveness are bad qualities; most often they belong to a weak personality who is not able to relate to other people’s opinions easily and naturally. Usually these are gloomy individuals who are unable to build friendly relationships for a long period of time. They are very demanding of those around them, not wanting to put up with other people's shortcomings, not noticing their own bad qualities.
Is grudge good or bad?
The negative aspects of rancor, as a leading personality trait in the loss of personality, a person begins to live only with grievances and past events, ceasing to develop. In addition to all this, the negative spectrum becomes the main emotional experience, which leads to the disappearance of the internal resource and the opportunity to find other positive strategies. On a more global level, it is rancor that can drive all of humanity into a spiral of constant violence and aggression, when instead of understanding others, repenting themselves, and simplifying the situation, people only escalate, cultivating negative emotions, inflaming mutual hatred.
These are not just bad experiences, this is a real load on the nervous system, and consequently on the circulatory, cardiac, and digestive systems. There have even been studies confirming that ulcerative erosions, problems with the heart muscle and early mortality are characteristic of people of the vindictive type. After all, instead of letting go of experiences and somehow transforming emotions in the outside world, people unwind them within themselves, creating stress from the past when there is no need in the present.
Such a personality trait as rancor reflects poorly on the person himself, depriving him of the opportunity for spiritual growth and realization, constantly tormenting him from the inside. Over time, such an individual loses all social connections, because building such relationships is toxic and those around them stop contacting someone who remembers any grievances for a long time. Breaks in relationships are also possible with those who are able to tolerate this kind of behavior towards themselves - usually the initiator here is the vindictive person himself, since while he is allowed this behavior, he himself escalates the situation more and more, presenting the offender as almost a devil, and deciding to stop all contacts.
For those around you, if they do not know how to abstract themselves, someone else’s vindictiveness also brings only negative aspects. You can live without knowing that you have offended someone (this trait is often associated with secrecy and the accumulation of resentment), and at some point receive a harsh response, a recollection of your wrongdoings, or outright revenge for a situation that happened more than a year ago. Usually it is impossible to come to an agreement with such people; an apology for an offense is not enough for them - this is a manipulation where those around them will forever walk in a circle of rehabilitation for their offense and will never be able to make amends for it.
But it is also impossible to live completely without such a trait as rancor; if you do not remember that someone is constantly doing something bad, then you can communicate with negative people. This will be a masochistic type of life, where again and again you will return to where it is bad or painful, where there is unworthy treatment. Initially, the consolidation of memory specifically for the negative is due to the survival program, which means remembering where the snake lives is more important than where to find a tasty mulberry. It’s the same in the social world - it’s more important to remember who betrays you and hurts you, destroys your ego and self-esteem, than where they treat you and tell you how great you are.
River of Bitterness
Rancor and vindictiveness did not make a single person happy. Feelings of constant bitterness, like worms, eat a person from the inside, preventing him from experiencing the taste and joy of life. Constantly thinking about his offenders, a person loses the ability to enjoy pleasant events. The habit of bitterness subsequently develops into eternal suspicion and forces one to treat the entire society with complete distrust. A vengeful person dooms himself to loneliness and dissatisfaction with life.
Rancor is fraught with some danger, as well as:
- A feeling of great resentment mixed with helplessness.
- Obsessing over insults or bitter actions toward oneself.
- Lack of forgiveness and generosity.
- Destruction of harmony, mental balance.
- Ignoring a friendly attitude, looking for enemies and adversaries.
A person who lives with old grievances, constantly replaying unpleasant situations in his memory, actually has a hard time.
Being in the oppressed world of difficult emotions, a vindictive person may realize or deny this, but at best, he will try to change his essence and attitude towards grievances.
Sin of resentment
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That's how much sin gives rise to feelings of rancor in us. One sin of memory malice has poisoned our entire soul, pouring so much dirt into it that it’s difficult to wash it off!
Consciously maintained and nurtured anger at the offender has a destructive effect on the soul of a person. The Apostle Paul understood this danger of the harmful influence of memory malice and said in his Epistle to the Ephesians:
When you are angry, do not sin: let not the sun go down on your anger; (Eph.4:26)
That is, he did not allow people to be angry and hold grudges against each other for more than one day. What kind of rancor can we talk about if, with the setting of the sun, all grievances are forgotten according to the instructions of the Apostle.
Changes needed
It is possible and necessary to fight negative feelings. With some effort, a person will learn to see the situation from a different angle, get rid of his hypersensitivity and plans for revenge.
- Positive attitude. You should not take seriously the actions of others towards you. Every person has personal motives or mistakes in relationships with people. We need to perceive offenders as inexperienced children who tend to act stupidly.
- Emphasis on the positive aspects. Observing the wrong actions of other people, you should analyze their motive, looking for something good for yourself.
- Constructive attitude. Calmly observing the offender’s unsuccessful attempts to inflict pain, a self-confident person causes him a feeling of annoyance and irritation, while protecting his own health and inner balance. Not achieving his goal, the enemy sooner or later stops delivering “moral blows”, subsequently experiencing respect for such a strong, self-controlled person.
- Indifference to the opinions of others. Gossip and criticism will not cause any moral injury to a person who is indifferent to public statements.
Holy Fathers on Memory of Malice
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The Holy Fathers saw that, despite the direct prohibition of rancor, received from the Lord under pain of excommunication from the Kingdom of Heaven, people still follow the lead of the evil spirit, who in every possible way kindles this destructive feeling in their souls. And it is not surprising, because man, compared to Satan, is a mere baby and easily succumbs to his machinations. Therefore, a lot of work is devoted to warning and teaching believers to forgive other people's sins and evil.
Here are a few quotes from the letters and works of the Optina elders.
Saint Joseph wrote:
Some took upon themselves labors and exploits in order to receive forgiveness; but the person who does not remember evil is ahead of him or them, for the saying is true: “Let a little go, and much will be given to you” (Luke 6:37; 1 Cor. 13:1–8, 13).
The Monk Macarius advised accepting insults as God’s permission, a test for us:
People who insult us do not do it on their own, but by God’s permission, and therefore they are God’s instrument.
The Monk Barsanuphius wrote that one should fight the passion of memory and malice, as with all passions, by fasting and prayer:
We will show mercy, perhaps we will even cope with our irritability, but to endure reproach and even pay for it with kindness is completely impossible for us. This is a barrier that separates us from God and which we do not try to step over, but must be crossed. Where to look for strength for this? In prayer.
The Lord commanded us to forgive our enemies. And we, forgetting his Commandments, get angry and kindle hatred in ourselves, considering our enemies the offenders, and those who are just unrestrained in their words. And such anger cannot be called righteous. We need to be angry not at people, but at Satan, who kindles in us this feeling of dislike for our neighbor. How the unclean one rejoices when he sees a vindictive person, how he rejoices at his continuous fall due to bad thoughts and feelings.
