Definitions: (1) held in reverence; respectable; honorable; (2) praiseworthy <an honest day’s work>; creditable; (3) commendable; seemly; (4) possessing integrity; truthful; trustworthy; unashamed; (5) showing fairness and sincerity; frank; (6) innocent
See also: Upright
Balancing Quality: Decisiveness
Too Far: insensitive, naive
Quotes:
• “Honesty” (absolutely indispensable in science) … is probably the least likely marvel ever to have emerged out of self-centered human minds. — Glen David Brin (1950-) Otherness {1994}
• Beautify your tongues with truthfulness and adorn your souls with the ornament of honesty. — Baha’ullah [born Ḥusayn-ʻAlí] (1817-1892) Founder of the Baha’i Faith
Consideration: If you are dishonest and you feel guilty about it, that’s good! It’s good because it shows you there is a discrepancy between what you do and what you idealize as proper behavior. Guilt is an intermediate step to honesty. It is a level of awareness essential for further progress. The guilt will disappear when honesty is in place.
Observation: A person finding themselves in a compromising situation will have their honesty tested.
Comments:
• Honesty is gentle, kind, and clear. When honesty has clarity, it also has purity.
• Honesty must be guided by wisdom. You need to know when to speak and when to hold your tongue. Honesty is like sunshine and shade. Sometimes you want one, and sometimes you want the other.
• When prejudice has been institutionalized upon a culture, race, or religion, the oppressors have a vested interest in maintaining a self-serving, “justified” dishonesty. They have lots of company in upholding the lie, and they look for any reason to prop up the injustice. When the oppressed show courage enough to speak the truth, there is a perceived threat to the oppressor. The threat is described in terms of loss of jobs, safety, and many other “reasonable” excuses, but at the base of it the lie remains.