Is honor really admirable?

I’ve always been one for the tragic hero.  As I grew up I enjoyed reading stories about the valiant man who bravely died due to this or that.  I remember reading the Dragonlance Chronicles novels (a rite of passage for any true gamer geek) as a kid and being drawn to Sturm Brightblade.  Sturm was a member of a disgraced order of knights; they were once respected but had fallen into shame and disrespect.  Sturm clung to his honor and the honor of this order, and eventually got himself killed by standing on the battlements of a castle challenging a dragon he really had no prayer at all of beating.  (According to the story, Sturm’s stand against the dragon allowed his friends to escape and defeat an enemy army but I was never sure how that worked…it would take the dragon two seconds to kill him.)  Honor was a huge part of Sturm’s character and it was an ideal I looked up to as a child.

My favorite heroes were always those who would do anything to preserve honor; as time went on this didn’t change but my view of honor began to.  Red Branch, one of my all-time favorite novels, is about Cuchulain, the Hound of Ulster in Irish myth.  There’s a portion near the end where Cuchulain is obligated by honor to engage in single combat to the death against his best friend.  Here’s part of it:

There is no way out for either of us, Cuchulain thought bitterly.  Sencha the brehon had once taught him, convinced him: Honor is the treasure no one can take from you; honor is the shield no one can penetrate unless you let him.  Now, honor had brought the two of them to an icy river on a bitterly cold day to try to kill each other for something neither could touch or taste or hold in his hands.  Honor has somehow failed us, Cuchulain thought, wishing he had time to puzzle it through.  But there was no time left.

What was the ideal of honor I was so admiring?  It was this sense of dignity that no one could take from you.  It was demanding respect from others.  It was others knowing if they insulted you, they would have to apologize or pay the price.  It was never letting weakness show.  

It was stupid.

I think I admired this so much in my heroes because I grew up getting made fun of and disrespected and never did much standing up for myself.  I was walked over all the time but never did anything about it.  My heroes had the strength I didn’t.  The strength to make someone pay if they impugned you or something you loved.  The strength to demand respect and homage from others.  As I grew up I realized my impression of honor was entirely immature and selfish.  Honor was about me (or the hero, me by extension) getting the respect and admiration of others.  It wasn’t about the defense of others, the upholding of something else that is truly noble – it was about getting people to like me.

In this sense of the word honor, the sense of the word I admired most of my life, honor is just another name for human pride and ego.  We build fortresses around our pet causes, construct monuments to ourselves, and call them honor.  True honor is something greater than a man refusing to be insulted.  It is a man being insulted and refusing to exact revenge.  It is too easy for us to use concepts like honor and justice to achieve whatever ends we want and try to increase our standing in the eyes of others.

The truly honorable man is the one who is able to move beyond the perception of others have of him and his honor, and do what is right.  I would be hard pressed to think of a situation where the right thing to do would be “demand satisfaction” (read that would a southern accent, please) from someone who has wounded my pride or made me look foolish in front of others.  I can’t praise the ending my life or someone else’s for the sake of admiration and respect.  Admiration, respect, and honor (for an individual) should be the byproduct of their taking admirable, respectable, and honorable actions.  Honor should not be the goal, or it is simple self-indulgence, ego, and pride.

I constantly have to check my motivations.  I get way too much validation from the compliments of others.  I pray regularly for God to rid me of the sin of pride, the desire to be liked and respected by others, and for the heart not concerned with my own honor or recognition.  It’s going to be a life long process.  But as someone way smarter than me has said, it’s more important to focus on being honorable than being honored.