Jheronimus Bosch Table of the Mortal Sins (Accidia)

Sloth is one of the seven capital sins in Catholic teachings. It is the most difficult sin to define and credit as sin, since it refers to an assortment of ideas, dating from antiquity and including mental, spiritual, pathological, and physical states. One definition is a habitual disinclination to exertion, or laziness. Views concerning the virtue of work to support society and further God's plan suggest that through inactivity, one invites sin: "For

Satan Satan,, ; grc, ὁ σατανᾶς or , ; ar, شيطانالخَنَّاس , also known as the Devil, and sometimes also called Lucifer in Christianity, is an entity in the Abrahamic religions that seduces humans into sin or falsehoo ...

finds some mischief still for idle hands to do." ("

Against Idleness and Mischief ''Divine Songs Attempted in Easy Language for the Use of Children'' (also known as ''Divine and Moral Songs for Children'' and other similar titles) is a collection of didactic, moral poetry for children by Isaac Watts, first published in 17 ...

" by Isaac Watts).

Definition

The word "sloth" is a translation of the Latin term ''

acedia Acedia (; also accidie or accedie , from Latin , and this from Greek , "negligence", "lack of" "care") has been variously defined as a state of listlessness or torpor, of not caring or not being concerned with one's position or condition in ...

'' (Middle English, ''acciditties'') and means "without care". Spiritually, ''acedia'' first referred to an affliction to women, religious persons, wherein they became indifferent to their duties and obligations to God. Mentally, ''acedia'' has a number of distinctive components of which the most important is affectlessness, a lack of any feeling about self or others, a mind-state that gives rise to boredom, rancor, apathy, and a passive, inert, or sluggish mentation. Physically, ''acedia'' is fundamentally with a cessation of motion and an indifference to work; it finds expression in loth can also be referred as ''Laziness'' idleness, and indolence. Two commentators consider the most accurate translation of ''acedia'' to be "self-pity," for it "conveys both the melancholy of the condition and self-centeredness upon which it is founded."

Catholicism

In his ''

Summa Theologica The ''Summa Theologiae'' or ''Summa Theologica'' (), often referred to simply as the ''Summa'', is the best-known work of Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274), a scholastic theologian and Doctor of the Church. It is a compendium of all of the main th ...

'',

Saint Thomas Aquinas Thomas Aquinas, OP (; it, Tommaso d'Aquino, lit=Thomas of Aquino; 1225 – 7 March 1274) was an Italian Dominican friar and priest who was an influential philosopher, theologian and jurist in the tradition of scholasticism; he is known w ...

defined sloth as "sorrow about spiritual good" and as "facetiousness of the mind which neglects to being good... tis evil in its effect, if it so oppresses men as to draw him away entirely from good deeds." According to the ''

Catechism of the Catholic Church The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' ( la, Catechismus Catholicae Ecclesiae; commonly called the ''Catechism'' or the ''CCC'') is a catechism promulgated for the Catholic Church by Pope John Paul II in 1992. It aims to summarize, in book ...

'', "acedia or sloth goes so far to refuse joy from God and is repelled by goodness." Sloth ignores the seven gifts of grace given by the

Holy Ghost For the majority of Christian denominations, the Holy Spirit, or Holy Ghost, is believed to be the third person of the Trinity, a Triune God manifested as God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, each entity itself being God.Gru ...

(

wisdom Wisdom, sapience, or sagacity is the ability to contemplate and act using knowledge, experience, understanding, common sense and insight. Wisdom is associated with attributes such as unbiased judgment, compassion, experiential self-knowledg ...

understanding Understanding is a psychological process related to an abstract or physical object, such as a person, situation, or message whereby one is able to use concepts to model that object. Understanding is a relation between the knower and an object ...

counsel A counsel or a counsellor at law is a person who gives advice and deals with various issues, particularly in legal matters. It is a title often used interchangeably with the title of ''lawyer''. The word ''counsel'' can also mean advice given ...

knowledge Knowledge can be defined as awareness of facts or as practical skills, and may also refer to familiarity with objects or situations. Knowledge of facts, also called propositional knowledge, is often defined as true belief that is distin ...

piety Piety is a virtue which may include religious devotion or spirituality. A common element in most conceptions of piety is a duty of respect. In a religious context piety may be expressed through pious activities or devotions, which may vary among ...

, fortitude, and fear of the Lord); such disregard slows spiritual progress towards life—to neglect manifold duties of

charity Charity may refer to: Giving * Charitable organization or charity, a non-profit organization whose primary objectives are philanthropy and social well-being of persons * Charity (practice), the practice of being benevolent, giving and sharing * C ...

towards the

neighbour Neighbour, Neighbor, Neighbours or Neighbors may refer to: * Person who lives in one's neighbourhood * The subject of the Great Commandment Films * ''Neighbors'' (1920 film), a short film starring Buster Keaton * ''Neighbours'' (1952 film), a ...

, and animosity towards God. Unlike the other capital sins, sloth is a sin of omission, being a lack of desire and/or performance. It may arise from any of the other

capital vices The seven deadly sins, also known as the capital vices or cardinal sins, is a grouping and classification of vices within Christian teachings. Although they are not directly mentioned in the Bible, there are parallels with the seven things ...

; for example, a son may omit his duty to his father through anger.

Henry Edward Manning Henry Edward Manning (15 July 1808 – 14 January 1892) was an English prelate of the Catholic church, and the second Archbishop of Westminster from 1865 until his death in 1892. He was ordained in the Church of England as a young man, but conv ...

argued that while the state and habit of sloth is a

mortal sin A mortal sin ( la, peccatum mortale), in Catholic theology, is a gravely sinful act which can lead to damnation if a person does not repent of the sin before death. A sin is considered to be "mortal" when its quality is such that it leads t ...

, the habit of the soul tending towards the last mortal state of sloth is not mortal in and of itself except under certain circumstances. Italian poet

Dante Alighieri Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian poet, writer and philosopher. His '' Divine Comedy'', originally called (modern Italian: ...

contemplates the nature of sloth as a capital vice in Canto 18 of ''

Purgatorio ''Purgatorio'' (; Italian for "Purgatory") is the second part of Dante's ''Divine Comedy'', following the '' Inferno'' and preceding the '' Paradiso''. The poem was written in the early 14th century. It is an allegory telling of the climb of D ...

'', the second canticle of the ''

Divine Comedy The ''Divine Comedy'' ( it, Divina Commedia ) is an Italian narrative poem by Dante Alighieri, begun 1308 and completed in around 1321, shortly before the author's death. It is widely considered the pre-eminent work in Italian literature a ...

''. Dante encounters the slothful on the fourth terrace of Mount

Purgatory Purgatory (, borrowed into English via Anglo-Norman and Old French) is, according to the belief of some Christian denominations (mostly Catholic), an intermediate state after physical death for expiatory purification. The process of purgatory ...

, where his guide, the Roman poet

Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: th ...

, explains that sloth can be seen as the effect of an insufficient amount of love. Following the logics of

contrapasso In Dante's ''Inferno'', contrapasso (or, in modern Italian,''Encyclopedia Dantesca'', Biblioteca Treccani, 2005, vol. 7, article ''Contrapasso''. ''contrappasso'', from Latin and , meaning "suffer the opposite") is the punishment of souls "by ...

, the slothful work to purge themselves of their vice through continuous running.

Orthodoxy

In the

Philokalia The ''Philokalia'' ( grc, φιλοκαλία, lit=love of the beautiful, from ''philia'' "love" and ''kallos'' "beauty") is "a collection of texts written between the 4th and 15th centuries by spiritual masters" of the mystical hesychast tr ...

, the word '' dejection'' is used instead of ''sloth,'' for the person who falls into dejection will lose interest in life.

Others

Sloth has also been defined as a failure to do things that one should do, though the understanding of the sin in antiquity was that this laziness or lack of work was simply a symptom of the vice of apathy or indifference, particularly an apathy or boredom with God. Concurrently, this apathy can be seen as an inadequate amount of love. Emotionally and cognitively, the evil of ''acedia'' finds expression in a lack of any feeling for the world, for the people in it, or for the self. ''Acedia'' takes form as an alienation of the sentient self first from the world and then from itself. Although the most profound versions of this condition are found in a withdrawal from all forms of participation in or care for others or oneself, a lesser but more noisome element was also noted by theologians. From ''tristitia'', asserted Gregory the Great, "there arise malice, rancour, cowardice, nddespair..."

Geoffrey Chaucer Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for '' The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He w ...

, too, dealt with this attribute of ''acedia'', counting the characteristics of the sin to include despair, somnolence, idleness, tardiness, negligence, indolence, and ''wrawnesse'', the last variously translated as "anger" or better as "peevishness". For Chaucer, human's sin consists of languishing and holding back, refusing to undertake works of goodness because, he/she tells him/her self, the circumstances surrounding the establishment of good are too grievous and too difficult to suffer. ''Acedia'' in Chaucer's view is thus the enemy of every source and motive for work. Sloth not only subverts the livelihood of the body, taking no care for its day-to-day provisions but also slows down the mind, halting its attention to matters of great importance. Sloth hinders man in his righteous undertakings and becomes a path to ruin. According to Peter Binsfeld's ''Binsfeld's Classification of Demons'',

Belphegor In Christian demonology, Belphegor (or Beelphegor, he, בַּעַל-פְּעוֹר ''Báʿal-pəʿór'' - Lord of the Gap) is a demon. In later Kabbalah Belphegor is a demon who helps people make discoveries. He seduces people by suggesting to ...

is the chief demon of the sin Sloth. Christian author and Clinical Psychologist Dr. William Backus has pointed out the similarities between sloth and depression. “Depression involves aversion to effort, and the moral danger of sloth lies in this characteristic. The work involved in exercising one’s will to make moral and spiritual decisions seems particularly undesirable and demanding. Thus the slothful person drifts along in habits of sin, convinced that he has no willpower and aided in this claim by those who persist in seeking only biological and environmental causes and medical remedies for sloth.”

References

Bibliography

* * * * Bible, English Standard Version Revised, 1971, Biblegateway.com, http://www.biblegateway.com/ *

Thomas Pynchon Thomas Ruggles Pynchon Jr. ( , ; born May 8, 1937) is an American novelist noted for his dense and complex novels. His fiction and non-fiction writings encompass a vast array of subject matter, genres and themes, including history, music, scie ...