Seven Sins - Lust in Translation

... I'll see if I can finish this up before I have to head out.

Pope Gregory I is probably my favorite pope of all time. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that without him, none of the songs you know and love would exist - he's that important to the history of music. But one of the things that bothers me about him is his work on the seven deadly sins.

The origin of the seven deadly sins comes from the eight "evil thoughts", written in Greek. They were translated to Latin by monks, and Gregory changed them a bit and encouraged his revised list to be taught to help everyone avoid sin. Sounds good to me! There are just a few problems: for one, they were originally written by and for monks, people who have left society in order to peacefully worship. For another, calliing them sins makes it something you get punished for if you get caught. Originally, they were just mental demons to be avoided or defeated because they got in the way of contentment; now they're evil acts. And also, as time went on...

Some of the meanings have changed a lot since the 4th century monk wrote his list, haven't they?

1) Gluttony (greek gastrimargia, latin gula). Well, over-eating is a concept in any culture, huh? As an evil thought, it makes sense - it's hard to stay at peace and pray whole-heartedly when you have a craving for french fries. As a sin... it makes sense if it's about eating too much, but the seven deadly sins aren't really about action, they're about thoughts and emotions. So when Oliver Twist asked for seconds at the orphanage after getting served his gruel, that was a sin of gluttony and he's going to heeeeeell for it.

2) Lust (greek porneia, latin luxuria). Originally, it meant "pornography" or maybe "prostitution". HMMM. As an evil thought, it makes sense - it can take over your life if you let it. In fact, there's a very NSFW song/video by daoko about that called ME!ME!ME! I couldn't easily find a version with both video and lyrics, so I won't post it, but it's really good. *cough* Anyway, it went from "being obsessed with sex keeps you from being content so you can focus on prayer" to "feeling desire at all is bad". If I've already sinned just by having hormones, I might as sin some more... or so it goes.

3) Greed (greek philargyria, latin avaritia). The meaning is still pretty much the same, it's just... it's too easy to call people greedy if they want anything more than what they have right now. It's become almost meaningless at this point. Wanting more is one of the prime motivators in life. Greed as an evil thought, yes, it makes perfect sense - when you start thinking about things you don't have, it's hard to be content, and it can lead you to daydreaming or hurting others if you can't come up with a good way of getting it. As a sin, it can work, if you're very careful defining it - not wanting to give up anything when you need to, or trying to get too much all at once, it's good to avoid those. But mostly, "greed" is what I call it when other people want to take things from me or don't want to give things that I want to me. Or maybe that's me being greedy, but I guess the winner gets to decide that.

4) Pride (greek hyperēphania/kenodoxia, latin superbia). But pride is a good thing! Seriously, it's a good thing! Pride makes people do their best, work hard to improve themselves, it lets them feel good about doing good... but the original greek term kenodoxia was more about empty boasting or over-estimating yourself. And the term hyperēphania is more about arrogance. Which is actually an appropriate evil thought, since thinking you're better than you actually are leads to procrastination or attempting projects that you have no chance of succeeding in. I mean, it's not bad to try hard tasks, but if you go into it thinking they'll be easy... And arrogance is about ignoring other people's thoughts and feelings. Anyway, it's the weirdest sin as of today because people who boast and overestimate what they can do often end up with wealth and power, don't they? I wonder how they try to teach kids to avoid the sin of Pride. "Don't try to be like the rich, powerful, and famous people! Because... because..."

5) Sloth (greek lypē/akēdia, latin tristitia/acedia). Sloths are cute, aren't they? Wait, no, the sin. Don't be lazy! Laziness is bad! *looks up the actual meanings of the words* O-oh... it's not actually about laziness at all... lypē/tristitia are... sadness. Which is a powerful evil thought, honestly, it's hard to escape from sad thoughts. Sad thoughts become depression, which can lead to all sorts of bad things, so it's a Good Idea to learn to recognize those sad thoughts and deal with them before it gets worse. akēdia/acedia is actually carelessness or negligence... Okay, I can see the laziness connection. As an evil thought, it's actually not thinking at all when you should. You can be working extremely hard, but if you cut corners in order to get the job done faster, that's Sloth. Which is... entirely different from what you'll see in anime, manga, or light novels. Even the Lazy King is more of a Pride type, honestly - he doesn't act sloppy or careless in any way; he just does what he enjoys to the utmost, and shows an utter lack of regard for others (arrogance). As a sin... I can see why Gregory took out the Sadness part, yeah, suicide being a sin would be meaningless if being suicidally depressed is also sinful. Laziness being a sin is good, but most people see it as "lack of action" rather than "not planning their actions".
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I'll stop here for now, it's time to leave. I'll do a part 2 eventually. I might even edit this post to have pictures later~