What is selfishness?

Question to Martinus quoted from Kosmos 2 – 1987:

What is selfishness?

Answer by Martinus:

Selfishness, which is the same as egoism, is a fundamental talent on which the animal's instinct of self-preservation is based. By virtue of this, the being organises all its other talents for the benefit of a protection maintained for the being itself. This causes an excessive, strengthened desire in the animal for the appropriation of all the advantages through which it can become superior to all other beings, quite irrespective of what this appropriation may cost these other beings in life and health. Thereby the principle “the right of the stronger” is likewise promoted by virtue of this, the talent for selfishness. By virtue of the unfoldment of this talent, only the strongest and most persevering animals and organisms will be able to develop and thrive, while the weakest must, of necessity, be destroyed (from a physical point of view). By virtue of this talent, evolution thus brings out the very best abilities for self-preservation and self protection in the animal. It is a life-condition for it to be as superior to other animals as possible. As only the superior could survive the weaker or inferior animals, the animal kingdom must finally consist of the most perfect species or races. We therefore see all over the world today that our present animals are superior in perfection and beauty to all the animals of the past.

But with this, the talent for selfishness culminates and the animal begins to become a totally different being. The animal characteristics, the proud and superior abilities to preserve themselves, or organic means of power degenerate. This degeneration is produced by a new fundamental principal talent for the experience of life. This talent is called “unselfishness”. With this talent, the being begins to transform itself from animal to human being. In this incipient human being there are thus two fundamentals of life which each have their sub-talents and abilities, namely, the selfish ones, which are on the decline, and the unselfish ones, which are beginning to develop. Through a long, long epoch the new being will thus still have within itself the animal talent or selfishness, whose collective release reveals the attitude to life: “Everyone for himself”.

Just as the talent for selfishness is logical and useful for the animals, so it is damaging and unhappiness-promoting for the human being. As the absolutely perfect human existence is determined by the fact that all selfishness, and thereby all animal mentality, has been cleansed from the mentality in such a way that only unselfishness, which means the happiness or the joy in living to serve other beings, remains as a universal general principle in the mentality, selfishness and all the animal or egoistic acts it gives rise to, as long as they still to a greater or lesser extent occur in the mentality of the being's psyche, become corresponding obstructions or hindrances to the attainment of the perfect human existence and the cosmic consciousness, Christ-consciousness or that epoch of life in which “everyone loves everyone else”, which comes within its sphere. Selfishness thereby, under all circumstances, becomes “the guardian of the threshold”, which in turn means a mental hindrance for access to the great initiation or birth, which in turn gives access to absolute true peace of the real kingdom of Heaven where one is one with the Father. It is that selfishness which today blocks the nations of the earth from the true and real peace or the great goodwill towards men heralded by the Christmas gospel. It is thus the selfishness in the human being which is the root of all dark fate and keeps him bound to the domain of war and pain where not only is everyone at war with everyone else, but where the individual human being is also sometimes in disharmony or at war with himself. Unselfishness here becomes evident as life's foremost talent. To fill one's soul and spirit with this talent is to bring the kingdom of heaven into one's own private relations with one's surroundings and neighbours.

(Translation MMG and HB)