COVETOUSNESS

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jun 29, 1904

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 30, No. 26.

COVETOUSNESS is the condition of being covetous. Its root is the same as that of cupidity, capio, desire. It is used with especial reference to acquisition. It is generally used in an ill sense.

The word is akin to “avariciousness,” but worse in spirit; for the avaricious man desires to get and to hold all he can in the way of wealth, while the covetous man desires to obtain it from others.

In the commandment, “Thou shalt not covet,” the word comes from a Hebrew root, meaning “to delight in,” having all the faculties of the soul yielded to the one thing, so that others are secondary. In the New Testament, the Greek word signifies to set the heart upon, to desire with an all-absorbing passion. The very root of the word signifies to breathe hard. It means to desire with such soul-absorbing intensity that the thing desired seems necessary to life or happiness.

It means to stretch one’s self, to reach out after, till one loses balance; to desire eagerly, greedily, so that rights of others are not regarded. Thus the thing coveted becomes an object of worship, and covetousness is seen to be idolatry. Col. 3:5.

“Thou shalt not covet” forbids all longing for that which belongs to another. It forbids all inordinate desire for anything which would interfere with or affect our supreme devotion to God. There may be gold in the brine of the sea or in the mine of the mountain which belongs to no mortal, but if our heart is set upon it so as to adulterate or pervert our love for God and humanity, so as to interfere with the duty we owe to our Maker or fellow-men, we are guilty of “covetousness, which is idolatry.” The term used in 1 Cor. 12:31—“covet earnestly the best gifts”—comes from a different word zelo, meaning, earnestly desire.

God wants His children to earnestly desire all that makes for a noble character and better service; but He wishes none to set the heart’s affections and soul’s desires upon anything that is below the value of an eternally righteous character. If this low estimate be ours, if we are covetous by nature, let Christ and all His glory into the heart and life, and all else will sink into insignificance. He will be “the Chiefest among ten thousand,” and the One “altogether lovely.”