What Does God Say About Jealousy?

What God says about jealousy is hard and plain: the disordered kind of jealousy is the sin of envy, sorrow at another's good — and Scripture lays death itself at its door. "By the envy of the devil, death came into the world" (Wisdom ii. 24). So yes, this jealousy is a sin, and a grave one: the Church numbers envy among the seven capital sins. But Scripture also speaks of a "jealousy" that is holy — the jealousy of God for His people — and the two must never be confused.

Is jealousy a sin?

Sinful jealousy is. The thing Scripture and the Church condemn under the name of envy is a real sin, and one of the deadliest. Envy is sadness at another's good, as though his good were our own loss. It is named among the capital vices — pride, covetousness, lust, anger, gluttony, envy, and sloth — which the Catechism of Saint Pius X calls capital "because they are the source and the cause of many other vices and sins." Envy is one of the seven heads from which whole families of sin grow.

What makes envy so dark is that it gains the envious man nothing. The covetous man at least wants something for himself; the envious man wants only that his neighbour have less. He is grieved not by his own poverty but by another's wealth, not by his own failure but by another's success. Saint Thomas defines it exactly: envy is sorrow over another's good in so far as that good is reckoned to diminish one's own excellence or glory (Summa Theologica II-II, q. 36, a. 1). It is therefore a sin directly opposed to the love of neighbour, which rejoices in the good of others.

By its kind envy is a mortal sin, because it is contrary to charity; but it can be venial when the movement is sudden and not consented to, or the matter slight. For the difference, see our article on mortal and venial sin.

What does the Bible say about jealousy?

The Bible treats envy as one of the oldest and most ruinous of sins. It is there at the beginning of the world and at the foot of the Cross. "By the envy of the devil, death came into the world: and they follow him that are of his side" (Wisdom ii. 24). The first murder was envy's work: Cain killed Abel because his brother's sacrifice was accepted and his own was not. The brethren of Joseph sold him out of envy. And the Evangelist tells us plainly why Christ was handed over — "for he knew that for envy they had delivered him" (Matthew xxvii. 18). Envy, the Bible shows, does not stop at sorrow; it moves the hand to destroy the good it cannot bear to look upon.

Scripture also shows what envy does to the man who harbours it. "Envy is the rottenness of the bones" (Proverbs xiv. 30) — it corrodes the one who holds it, a joyless and self-consuming sin. Saint Paul lists envy among the works of the flesh which shut a man out of the kingdom of God: "Envies, murders, drunkenness... they who do such things shall not obtain the kingdom of God" (Galatians v. 21).

Against all this the Bible sets the one remedy. In the great hymn of charity, Saint Paul writes: "Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not" (1 Corinthians xiii. 4). Charity envieth not — there is the cure named in a single phrase, and we treat it at length in our study of love is patient, love is kind.

Envy in the Bible — a capital and a deadly sin

We should be exact about how grave the Church holds this sin to be. Envy is not only a capital vice; in one hardened form it stands among the sins against the Holy Ghost. The Catechism of Saint Pius X lists six such sins, and the fourth is "to envy the graces of others" — sins committed, the Catechism says, "through pure malice." When envy stops grieving over a neighbour's earthly goods and begins to grieve over the very graces God pours into another soul — to be saddened that God is good to someone else — it has become malice in its purest form, and a sin of the most dangerous kind.

This is the answer to those who treat jealousy as a small thing, a harmless human weakness. It is no such thing. The Church places it beside despair and final impenitence. It is the sin that turned an angel into the devil, and the devil's envy that brought death into the world. We do not flatter ourselves that this is a minor fault; we name it for what it is and root it out. The same firmness is owed to every grave sin — to hatred, to revenge, and to envy alike.

The jealousy of God — zeal, not envy

Here a real confusion must be cleared away. Scripture says, again and again, that God is "jealous": "I am the Lord thy God, mighty, jealous" (Exodus xx. 5); "the Lord his name is Jealous, he is a jealous God" (Exodus xxxiv. 14). How can God be jealous if envy is a sin?

Because the word covers two utterly different things. Sinful envy is sorrow at another's good. The jealousy attributed to God is the opposite movement: the zeal of love that will not share its beloved with a rival, nor stand by while the beloved is destroyed. God is "jealous" for His people as a husband is rightly jealous for the fidelity of his wife — He has bound Himself to them in covenant and will not tolerate the idolatry that ruins them. This jealousy desires nothing for itself that another lacks; it desires everything for the one it loves. It takes nothing away; it gives. It is the very heart from which the love of God flows, and it asks of us the undivided love commanded by the First Commandment.

So the two must never be run together. When a man is jealous because he cannot bear his neighbour's happiness, that is envy, the devil's sin. When God is jealous because He will not give up the soul He loves, that is zeal, the fire of charity. The same English word names a vice in us and a perfection in God.

The remedy: charity that rejoices in another's good

The Church does not merely tell us to stop envying; she names the virtue that displaces the vice. "Over envy" one triumphs "by brotherly love," says the Catechism of Saint Pius X — the love by which we rejoice in the good of our neighbour and will his welfare as our own.

This is the whole strategy of the spiritual combat: a vice is not conquered by staring at it but by labouring at the opposite virtue until the soul is bent the right way. When we are tempted to envy, we are to thank God for the good He has given our neighbour, to pray for him, and to do him some kindness — for a man cannot long hate the brother for whom he prays and to whom he gives. To keep the Ninth and Tenth Commandments, the Roman Catechism teaches, is to be "content with what he possesses," to desire not the goods of others, but to "rejoice in their advantages." There is the portrait of the soul that has put envy to death: not poorer for his neighbour's wealth, but richer, because he loves. Because envy is a root, it belongs in every honest examination of conscience — it tells us where to dig, and where our uncharity, our detraction, and our secret gladness at another's fall all spring from.

Conclusion

What God says about jealousy is two things, and we must hold both. The jealousy that is envy — sorrow at another's good — is a capital sin and, in its worst form, a sin against the Holy Ghost; it brought death into the world and nailed Christ to the Cross. The jealousy of God is not this at all, but the zeal of a love that will not give up its own. We are to crucify the first and to answer the second. The remedy is charity, the love that envieth not. To name our envy, to confess it, and to put brotherly love in its place: this is the road back to God.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does God say about jealousy?

God says two distinct things under the one English word. The disordered jealousy of envy — sorrow at another's good — is condemned as a capital sin, for "by the envy of the devil, death came into the world" (Wisdom ii. 24). Yet Scripture also calls God Himself "jealous" (Exodus xx. 5), meaning the zeal of a love that will not give up its own; this is a perfection, not a vice.

What does God say about jealousy in relationships?

The jealousy that grieves at a beloved's happiness, or seeks to possess and diminish another, is the sin of envy and is opposed to charity, which "envieth not" (1 Corinthians xiii. 4). But the rightful zeal of a husband for his wife's fidelity mirrors God's own jealousy for His people — a love that wills the good of the other and guards the covenant. The remedy in every bond is charity that rejoices in another's good.

Is jealousy a sin?

Sinful jealousy is. Envy — sadness at another's good as though it were our own loss — is one of the seven capital sins and by its kind a mortal sin, because it is contrary to charity. It can be venial when the movement is sudden and not consented to, or the matter slight.

What is the difference between jealousy and envy?

In common speech the words overlap, but the sin Scripture and the Church condemn is envy: sorrow over another's good in so far as that good is reckoned to diminish one's own glory (St Thomas, Summa II-II, q. 36, a. 1). "Jealousy" can also mean a righteous zeal of love — as when God is called jealous — which desires everything for the one it loves and takes nothing away.

Why is envy one of the seven deadly sins?

The Catechism of Saint Pius X calls the capital vices "capital" because they are "the source and the cause of many other vices and sins." Envy is one of these seven heads from which whole families of sin grow, and in its hardened form — grieving at the graces God gives another — it stands among the sins against the Holy Ghost, committed "through pure malice."

How can God be jealous if jealousy is a sin?

Because the word covers two opposite things. Sinful envy is sorrow at another's good; the jealousy attributed to God is the zeal of love that will not share its beloved with a rival nor stand by while the beloved is destroyed. It desires nothing for itself and takes nothing away — it gives — and so it is the very heart from which the love of God flows.

What is the remedy for jealousy and envy?

The Church names the virtue that displaces the vice: "over envy" one triumphs "by brotherly love" (Catechism of Saint Pius X). When tempted to envy, we are to thank God for the good He has given our neighbour, to pray for him, and to do him some kindness — for a man cannot long hate the brother for whom he prays. This is the whole strategy of the spiritual combat: labour at the opposite virtue until the soul is bent the right way.

The Iter Fidei app carries the Douay-Rheims Bible, the catechism, the prayers and devotions — for the examination of conscience and the daily combat against envy. Download it here.

Sources. Douay-Rheims Bible: Wisdom ii. 24; Matthew xxvii. 18; Proverbs xiv. 30; Galatians v. 21, 26; 1 Corinthians xiii. 4; Exodus xx. 5, xxxiv. 14. Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica II-II, q. 36, a. 1 (envy as sorrow over another's good). Catechism of Saint Pius X, Part V, Chapter 6 ("Vices and the Other Very Grave Sins"): the seven capital vices, the virtue opposed to each ("over envy by brotherly love"), and the sins against the Holy Ghost ("to envy the graces of others"). Catechism of the Council of Trent (Roman Catechism), on the Ninth and Tenth Commandments (contentment with one's lot and rejoicing in another's good).