Envy, The Big Green Monster

So it has actually been a while since I finished Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood and I wanted to do one final post. If you recall, in my last post I said briefly that I would like to talk about the homunculus and their names. I won't talk about all of them, but rather I will focus on one.

The thing that makes the homunculus so interesting is that you know that these characters are the bad guys and yet by the time that they start dying you can't help but feel something for them. Why is that? Is there is some sort of goodness in sin (if you didn't know, the homunculus are named after the seven deadly sins). No, far from it. Sin is that which separates us from God, who is the source of all goodness; it is bad! The reason that the deaths of these homunculus seem so tragic is because sin itself is tragic. It is often said that sin is the distortion of love; that it actually stems from a place of good will and just misses the mark. We desire that which is good but in our brokenness are not able to pursue goodness the way we ought to. It is important to understand this because in understanding this we are able to see how sin can be undone in our lives.

The homunculus I want to examine in this post is Envy. Oh Envy, how you were so annoying throughout the show (you killed Hughes 😡), yet by the end I could not help but feel pity for you. I think Ed's reaction to envy in the end is exactly how I felt about him as a character, but we'll get to that after.

Let's start with, what is envy? Envy is (as a noun) a feeling of discontented or resentful longing aroused by someone else's possessions, qualities, or luck; or (as a verb) the desire to have a quality, possession, or other desirable attribute belonging to someone else (Thanks Google!). Why would we want something that belongs to someone else? Because it is a good thing and we are meant to have good things. We are often jealous of the good things other people have because we desire good things for ourselves. But envy does not desire out of utility or even sentimental value, it simply wants out of spite (see, the desire for good that becomes distorted). It says straight to the face of God, I deserve all good things and You should be giving them to me. It is in trying to accumulate, that the envious one tries to fill the hole in their heart. This is dangerous because this attitude makes us think that we can, and should, make God serve us all good things on a silver platter.

Now wait, doesn't this sound like another sin: Greed? It does and it doesn't. Greed also seeks to collect but comes out of a different place of the heart. Greed acknowledges the longing of the heart to love God but it confuses the love of God for the love of things. Greed mixes up the creator for the created. Greed, in fact, is more a problem of prioritizing which or who should be loved first and most. Now does this mean that the two can never overlap? No, of course they can; sin begets sin. This is to say, however, there are differences, even subtle ones, between envy and greed.

Now, back to envy. We spoke about what envy is, but what kind of devastating effects does it bring with it? Envy teaches us to focus on others in a negative way. Also, envy blinds us to our own faults. Why? Let's take a look at the character Envy. He is actually responsible for two very big deaths in the show (here's your spoiler warning, but seriously, just watch the show if you haven't yet).

The first person that Envy kills (in historical order) is the Ishvalan child, and that leads to the extermination of the Ishvalans and eventually, the rise in notoriety of Scar. As a result of being robbed of all that he has, Scar sets out on a quest of revenge against all Armestrians, especially state alchemists.

The second person that Envy kills is Maes Hughes (queue the water works). What did this result in? Well from Envy's point of view, Colonel Mustang also became hell bent on revenge, to the point he "murdered" Lieutenant Maria Ross. Later on we also see the accumulation of hatred in Mustang's heart.

(It is important to note that I am now comparing the effect Envy the character has on other characters to the effect envy as a sin has on us personally. In saying that, it does not mean that I am looking at characters like Scar and Mustang as characters suffering from the sin of envy but from the character Envy.)

Envy teaches us to focus on others in a negative way...

Now what do these two murders (that Envy committed) have in common? They resulted in the the brokenness of others. And actually, as we said before, as sin begets sin, their brokenness leads them to lose who they are and stray away from the right path.

For Scar, he became obsessed with avenging his own people. He accused a whole race of people because of the deceptions of the homunculi. It did not matter to him that Edward is a young state alchemist who did not participate in the war (because he was young and not yet a state alchemist). Scar still wanted to kill him.

Mustang also became obsessed with revenge. One of Mustang's goals throughout the series is to find Hughes' killer (we see this as he asks Lust upon meeting her for the first time who is Hughes' killer).

Mustang vs. Lust

But we really see the effects of such hurt manifested in his encounter with envy. Mustang begins losing himself to rage and hatred to the point that his friends actually have to intervene and prevent him from taking out their enemy. And even at this point, he threatens to raise arms against them demanding that they step aside and let him get his revenge. His friends recognized at that time that Mustang was going down a dark path where he would have no hopes of healing the deep pain he felt over losing his close friend.

Whoa he looks so dark

But why did Envy do these things? We learn at envy's time of death, he only desired to have the good things that humans had: relationships, love, peace, family. It is in wanting these things Envy became ok with trying to forcibly take them away from others. Envy is the sower of conflict.

The irony, he who demeaned humans was jealous of humans

Envy blinds us to our own faults...

When we fail to see our own faults, we either do one of two things: we elevate ourselves to a higher status or we degrade others to a lower status. Envy runs a much deeper psychological path. If we actually look at the character Envy and think about it, we might (and should) be deeply concerned. At every turn, he tries to turn others against each other. For example, when Envy was captured just before dying, he attempts to escape by reminding everyone of their distaste for each other (which he caused in the first place) so as to sow the seeds of conflict amongst them.

Envy laughs at the pains and hurts of others. He rejoices in the difficulties of others. He condemns and belittles others for struggling. And as sin begets sin, we see these psychological symptoms appear in Scar and Mustang as well. The envious one loses all care and love for his neighbour.

Overcoming envy...

So how do we defeat envy? Let's take a look at the great transformation of Scar! When we first meet Scar, he is a cold and heartless killer. But there are instances where we begin to see how the virtue of understanding undoes the knots in his heart. The very first example of humanness that Scar shows, is towards Nina (I'm so sorry for bringing this up). He says that he killed her out of mercy. Scar recognized that another was in pain and desired to respond (no matter how incorrect that was, especially from a Catholic perspective. This is like a whole other post on euthanasia and "mercy-killing", so not here guys). Later on in the series, he encounters Winry and finds out she is the daughter of the doctors who saved his life (and whom he killed). Because he understands the pain he inflicted upon her, he relinquishes to her the right to kill him (again, a bit off, but we're getting somewhere). 

But we really start to see Scar open up as more people come to understand him (the other way around now). When he starts having companions who know his story and still choose to journey with him (Yoki, May Chang, and Marcoh). One key person that he encounters who probably understands him the best is Miles. Miles is also an Ishvalan, but instead of choosing the path Scar chose, he tells him that he chose a different path: to change the country from within as opposed to subjecting it to the same pain that was inflicted upon him. This really sticks with Scar and we begin to see his transformation and freedom from Envy's grasp over him.

For Mustang we see his slow descent into the depths of hatred. Beginning with Mustang's "murder" of Maria Ross, then the provocations in his fight with Lust, these times make it seem like Mustang's fire of hatred is tepid at best. But when we come to his final fight with Envy we see that he has been festering this tepid flame into a monstrous fire of hatred. In that fight with Envy, it was Riza, Ed, and Scar that brought him back from going dark the path of hatred; they did not let him kill Envy even though he had journeyed so far just to exact revenge on Hughes' killer.

Ouuu, Riza, tell it like it is!

They stopped him by showing him they understood he was hurting, but by pointing out that this path would not bringing healing for his hurt. They reminded him of his dreams and aspirations, and how this would negatively affect those. They showed him they were there to understand him and to support him.

Well then, since Mustang didn't kill Envy, you must be wondering "how does Envy die in the show"? (spoilers!) He commits suicide. Why? Because in his last moments he feels so ashamed that someone else could understand the hole in his heart.

It is understanding and empathy that undoes the knots of the heart and defeats envy. When someone reaches out to know us and journey with us, envy fades away because the hole in the heart is filled with love.

Envy is dangerous. Often it turns us against each other and causes us to break what Jesus instructs us as the second most important commandment: "And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbour as yourself" (Matthew 22: 39). So when we encounter envy in ourselves, bring it to light, let God and your brothers and sisters be your source of healing: "Wrath is cruel, anger is overwhelming; but who can stand before jealousy? Better is open rebuke than hidden love" Proverbs 27:4. And when we are met by envy in our brothers and sisters, do not be quick to judge or dismiss, but rather, seek to understand: "He who is slow to anger has great understanding, but he who has a hasty temper exalts folly. A tranquil mind gives life to the flesh, but passion makes the bones rot" Proverbs 14:29-30.

...And with that, may God be praised!