Hello, guys. I would like to analyze the psychological, cultural, religious and anthropological patterns that characterize these two opposite sentiments that are hidden in the recesses of human psyche.
First of all, Schadenfreude. A word that literally means "joy for the damage, the disgrace (of others)". That is, an individual is happy when others are unhappy. Or he is unhappy when others are happy (as a consequence). It is probably the psychological scheme that results in sadism.
Secondly, mudita. A Sanskrit word that means to define the sentiment of joy for others' happiness. That is the individual is happy when others are happy. Or that their own happiness is directly proportional to other people's happiness. As a consequence, the person is sympathetic towards the others who are unhappy or suffer.
Nice thread.
Muditha simply means Joy or happiness. I mean in Pali. Mudithasahagatha means 'with happiness'. udithasahagathena chethasa means 'with thoughts filled with happiness'. The Muditha in the Buddhist philosophy actually is a reference. to "with thoughts filled with happiness" which is not the etymological meaning but a philosophy described by one word.
Schadenfreude is called Shamaathah in Arabic. And it's very interesting that you took the Muditha and "Guilty Joy" in the same post. They are the actual polar opposites.
Muditha is something like a joy or "The Joy" that is not interested in anything. Am I explaining it right? For example, Maithri or Metta is an aggressive joy. A proactive or active joy or happiness. You project it to someone else, as in the story of Angulimala where the Buddha would go and project his Metta to him to calm him down, change him and save him. Same with the Nalagiri tusker. But Muditha is uninterested joy.
You are absolutely right. There is a sign of Empathy in both of this. But does not really mean that you sympathise with someone's suffering.
In the Islamic tradition Shamaathathun or Schadenfreude had lengthy philosophical discussion. Even in a Jewish prayer in the interpretation or commentary of Philo's works, there was a part that helps avoiding Schadenfreude. Just that the word may not be one word but an explanation. In the arabic language this word seems to have been invented at some point purely for the discussion. The discussions seems to have been on whether this is a phenomena or nature? Is it diabolical or ultimate? Is it ontologically evil? Well, this is the same discussion happening in western discourse. Exactly the same thing.
You spoke of sympathising with others' suffering. See, one person can be very sympathetic with a lot of people's suffering, but be joyful in some other people's suffering. This is also moral question. Is it immoral? Well, hell, with the Christian virtue of "no envy" built in to people in the west, it is not easy to publicly discuss the morality of Schadenfreude. Schopenhauer in the early 19th century declared it "the work of the devil". The irony of Christian societies having Christian values is that even an atheist like Schopenhauer can't escape using the word devil in his pronunciations. He even demanded if the city people find someone who is joyful in other's demise they should throw him out. In the same time period, maybe a bit later there was a Christian Bishop who is known to have been the first to publish the word. He said this word should not be allowed into the English language.
One thing is clear. People clearly say that they cannot agree on a moral evaluation of Schadenfreude.
