Greed: A Crisis of Confidence

Don Friesen
February 24, 2002
Ottawa Mennonite Church

www.ottawamennonite.ca

As I indicated last week, I found the Mennonite guides for Lenten worship too upbeat and the bulletins too colourful for Lent and have therefore decided to focus on something as bleak and basic as sin, and not just any sin, or sin in general, but the specific sins honoured by the tradition of the Church--the Seven Deadly Sins! And by way of introduction to all seven sins, let me give you five reasons to focus on these sins.

1) The first reason is that these sins provide a decidedly negative focus. This may not appeal to you, and I share the feeling. A warm sun does much more to melt people's hearts than a blast of cold wind. (Aesop's Fable, The North Wind and the Sunday) Most often it's best to take a positive approach to faith--to emphasize personal growth rather than personal greed, and inner peace rather than inner pride. I even toyed with the idea of using the Latin names for these sins. Instead of pride, we could talk about superbia; instead of sloth, we could talk about acedia; instead of gluttony, gula; instead of lust or lechery, luxuria. It makes them sound almost pleasant, certainly less harsh!

I was at the Cancer Clinic this week visiting John L, and while the staff there try to make the clinic as positive a space as possible, the truth of the matter is that the twenty to thirty people seated around the room have cancer, and in an effort to slow down the run-away cells that can cause you to die, poison is dripped into their veins!

The Seven Deadly Sins are just that--deadly--not because they cause physical death--though they could--but because they kill the soul. The seven sins represent more than just "Seven Really Bad Things". They constitute sin, which means they offend God! They damage our relationship with God and with others, and they damage us. Someone has compared them to furtive saboteurs in the back alleys of our souls who seek to damage, if not prevent our communion with God.

2) A second reason to focus on the Seven Deadly Sins is that they represent a time-worn conviction. The list of the seven sins is not a product of puritanism. The list precedes even medieval times. It's a very old list. The Early Church fathers often suggested that some sins were worse than others, and it was a 4th century man named Evagrius (364-399) who wrote a treatise "On the Eight Evil Thoughts," a theme common in the 4th century monastic communities in the Egyptian desert, and he wrote his thesis with particular concern for the temptations that beset believers living in monastic community.

I'm not sure how eight sins got whittled down to seven, but Evagrius' work was expanded upon in the same century by a fellow named John Cassian (360-435), and a century and a half later Saint Gregory the Great (c. 540-604) wrote an influential commentary on the book of Job in which he expounded on the seven vices. The idea endured through the Middle Ages, and while the influential Thomas Aquinas (1225-74) didn't spend a lot of time on the seven sins, he developed what he considered their corresponding virtues. The seven sins caught the imagination of less scholastic writers, and a host of sermon books, penitential treatises, and confessors' manuals included the list. In fact, one 13th century work designed to inspire the examination of conscience (Guilelmus Peraldus, Summa de Vitiis, 1236) is considered a likely source for Chaucer's presentation of the sins in The Parson's Tale and a certain source for Dante's organization of the sins (The Divine Comedy). Both of those works came out in the 14th century.

Some medieval treatments of the seven sins get rather complicated, one of them featuring adult sins who have baby sins, who in turn give birth to another generation of sins! (John Gower, Mirour de l'omme) It was all a bit much for the Reformers, who rejected the list. I checked Menno Simons' Complete Writings and could find no reference to them, though Menno was seldom at a loss for words when it came to sin! Whatever the initial Protestant response, the traditional list of sins continued to have literary currency among Protestant writers.

3) A third reason to focus on the Seven Deadly Sins is that the idea of this list has worked its way deep into our psyche, capturing the artistic and literary imagination of Western thought. (David Lyle Jeffrey, ed., Dictionary of Biblical Tradition in English Literature) I already mentioned Chaucer and Dante. In Christopher Marlowe's (1564-93) Doctor Faustus, Lucifer presents Faustus with the seven sins, and when asked how he likes the spectacle, Faustus replies, "O how this sight doth delight my soul". Rather than elicit confession, it led to his inexorable degradation.

The literary acknowledgement of the seven sins runs deep. John Milton (1608-74) found a place for them in both Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. William Blake (1757-1827) refers to them as the "diseases of the soul". T.S. Eliot (1888-1965) acknowledges them (The Rock, 1934). Dorothy Sayers' (1893-1957) works include theological studies and works on Dante as well as translations of his Divine Comedy (1949 & 1955). C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) also refers to the seven sins, not surprising, given that he was a professor of medieval literature.

The Seven Deadly Sins seem to appeal to the artistic mind. They have been the subject of paintings (Hieronymus Bosch, 1485; Otto Dix, 1933); they have been set to music (Robert Xavier Rodríguez, The Seven Deadly Sins: Ballet for wind ensemble, 1984); they have even been choreographed for dance! (George Balanchine, 1933; Jacob's Pillow, 2001)

4) The fourth reason to focus on this traditional list of sins is the biblical roots of the list. Though the classical list is not a biblical list, per se, the individual sins that compose the catalogue of seven all occur in the Bible, and early exegetes found it relatively easy to provide scriptural warrant for the list.

5) A fifth and final reason to focus on the list is the modern trivialization of these sins. James Joyce (1882-1941), in Ulysses, portrays a cardinal attended by "seven dwarf simian acolytes" who giggle, nudge, and ogle each other with a decidedly irreverent regard for the list of sins. H.G. Wells (1866-1946) argued that pride is not a sin but rather the virtue of "intellectual integrity". And George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) detested hell as "the home of honour, duty, justice and the rest of the seven deadly virtues". (Man and Superman)

It may be heresy to question the genius of literary giants, but their recent treatment of sin simply reflects the devaluation of sin in general and these seven sins in particular. People now talk blithely of the "Seven Deadly Sins of Education"; the "Seven Deadly Sins of Business Plans"; the "Seven Deadly Sins of Information Design"; and the "Seven Sins of Deadly Meetings," which sounds like fodder for Dilbert cartoons.

There are facile suggestions that the seven characters on the old television show, Gilligan's Island each represent one of the seven sins. And there is even a Norwegian fellow who claims that he was able to commit the seven sins in a mere 32 minutes and 19 seconds! This has all the makings of a new sport for the Olympics! You can even get Seven Deadly Sins T-shirts! And several years ago MTV did a special on the Seven Deadly Sins which involved interviewing various well-known entertainers from the music and television industry, who all agreed that these were not vices and that the list was "dumb". (Seven Deadly Sins: An MTV News Special Report, 1993)

While many of the current allusions to the Seven Deadly Sins threatens to trivialize them, the frequency of their mention shows that the idea still has coinage and is an integral part of our language and culture. Though references to the "seven deadlies" may be dismissive in nature, they may prove a good vehicle for biblical content and helpful in engendering a biblically-formed conscience.

Greed--The First Sin

Without further ado, then, let me get to the first sin, in the four minutes that remain to me. The sin is greed, or avarice, if you wish; avarice doesn't sound quite as naked and raw as greed. Greed is the excessive desire to acquire or possess more than one needs, but of course, the word, "excessive" allows us lots of wiggle room. It's much easier to spot greed at a distance. No society or economy is immune to greed, and while communist economies offered no shortage of opportunities for greed, our own economic system, which has prevailed, has made greed into an art form!

For example, I would be tempted to use the word "greed" when I read of the exorbitant salaries that many corporations pay their chief executive officers and which bear little relevance to inflation, to profits, or to the wages of those who produce these profits.

I am tempted to use the word "greed" when I see the excessive salaries of professional athletes, who do little more than hit a ball with a stick or manage to stay upright on ice for an hour!

I am tempted to use the word "greed" when some service professions garner enormous salaries and in so doing work to the disadvantage of other noble service professions in attracting recruits.

I would use the word "greed" when I see governments' increased use of lotteries, encouraging the wanton acceptance of an ethos that rewards those who"want something for nothing".

I am also tempted to use the word "greed" when I read of mergers, take-overs and acquisitions that move a lot wealth around without producing any!

Then there's the Enron debacle. Someone recently sent me a humourous piece comparing various economic systems, like feudalism, fascism, pure communism, applied communism, and so on, explaining the various systems on the basis of what happens to a farmer with two cows. And under "Enron Venture Capitalism" it works this way: You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report indicates that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more!

Some have pointed out that these examples of greed are more than isolated examples, and that we are affected--perhaps infected--at least suffering from a "greed syndrome". (The Greed Syndrome: An Ethical Sickness in American Capitalism, reviewed by Carl Kreider, "A sickness called greed," The Marketplace, September/October, 1991) There's even a web site called "greed-dot-com" at which you can buy T-shirts that have the "Selfish Inc." trademark printed on them. There's no longer any shame to be found in greed. Ivan Boesky, who made millions of dollars before he was caught for illegal insider trading in 1985 told a business school graduation class, "Greed is all right.... I want you to know I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself." It's the sentiment echoed a few years later in the movie, Wall Street (1987), in which Gordon Gekko, the ruthless tycoon in the movie says, "Greed is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed cuts through, clarifies, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit."

A person who was accosted by an enthusiastic Amway "evangelist" was sceptical about this way of making money, but the Amway salesman was not deterred. He offered a battery of tapes and free attendance at Amway lectures given by inspirational speakers! He said, "If you only had an open mind and saw how easily the profits could start flowing, you'd soon share the dream!" Says the person being accosted, "Sadly, he may be right. Addiction to material gain seems less self-destructive than (addiction to) cocaine, constant sexual novelty, or bloodshed." But he laments, "...we just don't seem able to build protective walls (that) money can't dissolve like so much flood water." (Stephen Hare, "Amway evangelists spread the gospel of the good life," Ottawa Citizen, October 17, 1997) Greed is a deluge that sweeps away any alternative values in its path.

The Bible Says Greed Is Dangerous

Well, perhaps God knew that we would need lots of protective wear to withstand the floodwaters of greed, for the Scriptures provide a deluge of warnings about the dangers of greed. Greed is a serious sin, says the Apostle Paul in Romans, speaking of "greed" in the same breath as "wickedness," "depravity," and "murder"! (Romans 1:29) In Ephesians Paul tells believers, "...among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God's holy people." (Ephesians 5:3, NIV) In Colossians Paul calls greed "idolatry" (Colossians 3:5). In 1 Corinthians the greedy are lumped together with "thieves" and "drunkards" (1 Corinthians 6:10) and are among those who will not inherit the kingdom of God. The Apostle Peter especially cautions church leaders not to be "greedy for money" (1 Peter 5:2, NIV); I guess church leaders were paid very well in New Testament times! Peter pointed to the false teachers plaguing his church as "experts in greed" (2 Peter 2:14, NIV); "they have hearts trained in greed," he warned the church.

The Apostle Paul tells young Timothy twice that those who are greedy are not fit to be officers of the church (1 Timothy 3:3, 8), a warning he follows with the familiar biblical passage, "For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains." (1 Timothy 6:10) Or, as another translation renders it, they have "spiked themselves on many thorny griefs." (NEB)

Paul goes on to advise Timothy: "As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather on God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life." (1 Timothy 6:17-19)

There's lots more in the New Testament Epistles, but the apostles were simply building on Jesus' words. In the Gospel passage presented by the drama group, Jesus cautions a person concerned about family inheritance, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." (Luke 12:15) Whereupon he tells the story of a rich man whose greed was tempered by nothing! The man didn't have a clue about what constitutes enough! This is the root of Leo Tolstoy's story, How Much Land Does a Man Need? To which the answer is: "Six feet of it." Enough for burial.

Jesus said that God looks upon people like this as fools! (Luke 12:20) The Early Christians took his perspective seriously. In the passage from the book of Acts we have a couple who ends up looking ridiculous because they want to appear super-spiritual and generous, but they can't completely let go of their possessions, and in their case greed is quite literally a "deadly sin". (Acts 5:9-10)

The New Testament, of course, builds on the wisdom of the Old Testament, and John Milton finds evidence of greed in the Garden of Eden already, when he depicts Eve's indulgence; he writes, in Paradise Lost:

". . . . for Eve
Intent now wholly on her taste, naught else
Regarded, such delight till then, as seem'd
In fruit she never tasted, whether true
Or fancied so, through expectation high
Of knowledge, nor was God-head from her thought,
Greedily she ingorged without restraint,
And knew not eating Death." (IX, 785-92)