The Root

      The short letter of 1 Timothy in the Bible states that the love of money is the root of all evil. Indeed, the desire for wealth has led and leads to a plethora of evils, inflicting injustices like a cancer on the body politic. But surely there are complementary motivations that lead to horrific consequences for individuals and communities. To wit, racism, revenge, power, ideology, and lust, to name a few.

      Here is the full text surrounding the oft-touted phrase:

But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless

and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of

money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered

away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.

      There is a foundation undergirding the many senseless and harmful desires built on it: SELF. Egocentricity over and against a community-oriented mindset. The foundation, the origin, the root of the lion’s share of the world’s misery is a me-first – often me-only – attitude that dominates and controls one’s whole outlook on life.

      Of course, self-interest and self-preservation is part of the equation in all living beings. But problems arise when that mode of thinking overrides, even obliterates, a concern for others as well as oneself. The apostle Paul, to whom the letter to Timothy is ascribed, also wrote in a letter to the fledging church in Philippi:

Let each of you look not to your own interests but to the interests of others.

      Imagine what a positive difference it would make if everyone, everyone, in the world embraced that way of thinking. We live as we think, and the problems arise when our thinking is askew.

      Competition vs. cooperation . . . two conflicting ways of viewing relationships with others. And it makes a difference. A 1984 book, The Evolution of Cooperation, by political scientist Robert Axelrod, University of Michigan Professor Emritus, explores how cooperation can emerge and persist even among self-interested individuals. Using game theory computer modules, the opposing approaches of competition and cooperation were pitted against each other. It was discovered that the cooperative strategy inevitably and with mathematical certainty will win. The victory did not happen quickly, but provided the game went on for an indefinite period of time, cooperation emerged as the only game in town.

      Lewis Thomas affirms this principle in his book, The Fragile Species. His scientific observations document the fallacy of the survival of the fittest assumption. Studies of the natural world with its variety of species battling for its resources, reveal that big-picture ecological balance is the result of cooperation.

      What will it take for more and more people to embrace a cooperative mindset . . . a philosophy that embraces not only my interests, but also the interests of others? It doesn’t matter from where the cooperative way of approaching life arises, which theology or philosophy is the resource. What matters is recognizing and affirming that my next door neighbor, or anyone living in Guihang, China, or Solikamsk, Russia, or Puelches, Argentina, or wherever is a human being whose interests need be considered as well as my own. When this happens, peace grows and blossoms.