Resentment and envy from the standpoint of Max Scheler

Abstract

The article analyses the emotional mechanism of resentment, which springs up from interpersonal alienation. The source of it is the phenomenon of annoying envy. This annoying envy together with other negative emotions causes an overthrow of values (Werteumsturz). For this reason people gripped by anger fail to appreciate and push out of sight the positive values of love, self-cognition, and self-control that foster harmony. This gives rise to negative social phenomena, including an exaggerated interest in the Kedys crime story, the powerlessness of judicial agencies in the case of Viktor Uspaskich, and their hesitation to reach a final verdict. Resentment reveals the connection between the nation’s social problems and changes in values. Unemployment and structural problems of emigration only intensify the negative emotions of fear, anger, and envy. Resentment also negatively affects emotional relations among persons; it also influences creative impulses and forms of inferiority complex. An antidote to resentment is self-knowledge, which makes a person given over to anger aware of positive spiritual values.