Theories of humility

Abstract

Both historically and in contemporary times, the virtue of humility has received attention from theologians as well as from philosophers. In this chapter, I offer an overview of philosophical theories of humility. A brief nod to the history of philosophical thinking about humility is given in the first section, with an eye to highlighting its influence on contemporary theories. In the second section, a review of work on humility in contemporary philosophy from 1985 to the present is offered. It should be noted that Julia Driver’s work gave rise to a separate stream of philosophical thinking about ‘modesty,’ in which that term is used interchangeably with ‘humility.’ The third section of the chapter examines this line of thought, in which a number of philosophers use Driver’s work as starting points for developing their own ideas. Throughout the chapter, efforts are made to identify convergent themes, areas of overlap, and issues for further investigation.