ENVY'S NARRATIVE SCRIPTS: CYPRIAN, BASIL, AND THE MONASTIC SAGES ON THE ANATOMY AND CURE OF THE INVIDIOUS EMOTIONS

Incorporating Martha Nussbaum's work on the intelligence of human emotions in Greco-Roman moral philosophy, Robert Kaster's analysis of the narrative scripts of rivalrous emotions in antiquity, and René Girard's insights into the role of mimetic desire in human envy, this article explores the strategies of two major early Christian bishops, Cyprian and Basil of Caesarea, to read and to cure the variant scripts of envy and related invidious passions in concrete ecclesial contexts. The article also examines certain monastic theologians in late antiquity who aspired to preempt invidious passions by encouraging salutary scripts of competition in virtue that realized equality of honor in their respective communities.