Philippians 3:6 · World English Bible
Philippians 3:6 Meaning Concerning Zeal
concerning zeal, persecuting the assembly; concerning the righteousness which is in the law, found blameless.
What does Philippians 3:6 mean?
A man who needs to be blameless will always find someone to be blameless against. Significance is the costliest need of the personality, because it can only be measured against other people.
From the Self-Help reading below.
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A man who needs to be blameless will always find someone to be blameless against.
Significance is the costliest need of the personality, because it can only be measured against other people. A record counted as flawless delivers certainty about where a man stands, that certainty becomes an identity, and an identity under threat converts instantly into rage at whoever threatens it. Zeal is what that rage feels like from the inside, and the action it drove was hunting believers down.
The worst thing this man ever did came out of the strongest thing in him, which is why the turn in his life was not a loss of drive. The same intensity moved onto growth and contribution, needs that no longer require anyone else to come out beneath him.
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Live Philippians 3:6 today
- Find the one person you keep being right about in your head, the relative, the coworker, the ex. Spend two minutes today imagining their version of the story without correcting it.
- In your next disagreement, say out loud the part where they have a point, before you say yours. Watch what happens to the temperature of the conversation.
- When a group chat or a comment thread gets going about someone who did something wrong, do not add the line that would put you clearly on the good side. Leave your clean record unmentioned.
Whose being wrong have I been quietly depending on to feel alright about myself?
The same truth in other traditions
Tao Te Ching 38
When a person must insist loudly on their own virtue, the real thing has already gone. The display is what grows in its place.
Zen · the finger and the moon
Zen warns about mistaking the pointing finger for the moon. People defend their practice most fiercely at exactly the moment it has become about them rather than about what it pointed to.
Stoicism · Epictetus
Epictetus said that when someone harms you, they are acting from their own picture of what is good. Rage at them is a confession about how much you needed that picture to be wrong.
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