Buddhist conceptions of pride

A helpful way to get at the meaning of a concept is to think about its opposites. If we want to understand the various senses of‘real’ for example, it can be illuminating to think of its opposites, like ‘fake’ and ‘nonexistent’ — these various opposites shed light on the different senses of what we mean when we call something real.

One term often translated into English as ‘pride’ is known as mana in Sanskrit. Like the concept of pride, mana is used in both positive and negative senses. In the negative sense it is a bad quality: it’s included on the list of six descriptive mental states, sometimes called ‘afflictions’,‘defilements’, or even ‘stains’.¹¹ As we will see, it’s badness has an epistemic and moral sense: it’s a quality that’s both morally bad, a source of suffering, and one that prevents us from seeing how the world really works.

Like pride, mana is used in a positive way too. Even people who would put pride on a list of sins can say things like “You should be proud of the good work you’ve done today” or “Being able to do the right thing yesterday filled me with pride”. Santideva, for example, is explicit about distinguishing these two senses:

‘I will be the victor over all;

Nothing shall prevail and bring me down!’

The lion-offspring of the Conqueror

Should constantly abide in this proud confidence.

Those whom arrogance and pride destroy

Are thus defiled; they lack proud confidence.

They fall into the power of an evil pride,

But those with true pride will escape the enemy.

When arrogance inflates the mind,

It draws it down to states of misery,

Or else it ruins human birth, should it be gained.

Thus one is born a slave, dependent for one’s food—

Or feebleminded, ugly, without strength,

The butt and laughingstock of everyone.

Hapless creatures puffed up with conceit!

If these you call proud, then tell me who are wretched?

Those who would uphold pride, the enemy,

Are truly proud, the victors in the war.

Those who overwhelm the progress of that evil pride,

Perfect the fruit of Buddhahood and satisfy the longings of the world.¹²

Here Santideva recognizes that sometimes self-confidence, a firm conviction that you can do something, is critical for moral and spiritual success. It’s no accident that these verses appear in the chapter on keeping at the very hard task of working for others (sometimes translated as ‘zeal’ or ‘perseverance’). This good pride, associated with a deep assurance in your convictions and resolve to transform into a more selfless and compassionate person, isn’t to be confused with the bad kind that involves merely inflating your own self-satisfaction.

The Tibetan translation of mana is particularly illuminating: it is translated as nga-rgyal (pro­nounced like ‘ngah gyal’ with the initial sound like the end of the word ‘being’), a compound that contains the first person singular pronoun (nga) and the word for king (rgyal).¹³ In the good sense, the feeling that you’re a king is important if you’re not to be pushed around by your own bad qualities. In the bad sense, it sometimes means thinking you’re better than you really are or more important than others. But it has another negative sense that involves being ruled by a false sense of self.

Buddhism loves its taxonomies and pride is no exception. Mana or nga-rgyal is traditionally thought to have seven varieties.¹⁴ These include things like thinking you’re better than people who are worse than you, your peers, or even people who are really amazing. Other types include thinking you’re better than you really are, that you have special qualities that you don’t really have, or even being proud of qualities that are actually faults. These types fit nicely into the framework of contemporary discourse on humility and modesty—they’re about how you feel about your own good qualities and comparing yourself favorably with others.

There’s another type that doesn’t fit so easily into the contemporary framework. It is espe­cially important in Buddhist thought and has special relevance for understanding the different ways in which humility can operate. It’s known as the pride of the thought ‘I’.¹⁵ This might sound like simply being self-centered.After all, when I am comparing myself to others, I take a central place in my mental life; other people are relevant only insofar as they’re better or worse than me in some respect. In this sense, even someone who is constantly down on themselves, thinking about how much better everyone else is still has a self-centered mental life.

However, this type of pride isn’t just thinking about yourself often or giving yourself pride of place in your mental life.After all, this is sometimes a feature of the kind of beneficial pride that Santideva endorses (“I will be the victor over all. Nothing shall prevail and bring me down!”). It instead refers to a deep-seated tendency lurking within our own thoughts, feelings, and percep- tion.The sense that we are distinct, persisting selves. For Buddhists, there is no such self and the mind’s habit of projecting this on to the world in subtle ways reinforces a false sense of how the world really is. To understand this kind of pride and why it’s bad, it will be necessary to take a quick detour into Buddhist metaphysical views about the self.

20.3