How are mortal sins interconnected?
The synodal translation of the Old Testament containsthe list of God's commandments - their 10. Mortal sins by two less. Here they are: pride, vanity, anger, despondency, sadness, adultery, avarice, gluttony. In some cases, the notion of sadness and despondency is united into a single whole, although these are somewhat different concepts.
Mortal sins are called so because the lack of will and desire to fight them leads to spiritual death.
As a rule, their list contained in the beginningany prayer, begins with pride or pride, which sometimes try to distinguish. Indeed, very often the expressions "we are proud of our country" or "proudly flies on the flag of the motherland homeland ..." are used very often, etc. Like any sin, pride derives from feelings typical of most people, called virtues. There is even a very expressive and imaginative comparison of such emotions with a dog that is good when it guards the house, and becomes harmful if it bites everyone in a row or commits outrages in the house. Deadly sins are related. A person who believes that his homeland is beautiful, and happy with the fact that he lives on his native land, should not consider all foreigners to be second-class people, whom he has the right to urge. Otherwise, he will fall into the sin of pride, and then of unrighteous anger, that is, anger. An example of this attitude to the world around us can be the actions of the leadership of Nazi Germany, who considered themselves entitled to humiliate and exterminate "racially inferior" peoples.
Pride is the sister of vanity
Other mortal sins also separate fromrighteous deeds with a fine line. The need for nutrition, laid down by human nature itself, sometimes becomes a hypertrophied desire to eat as many of the most refined dishes as possible and grow into gluttony.
Sadness, experienced with the loss of loved ones, can cause a complete loss of interest in life.
Thrift and economism are sometimes transformed into avarice, because avarice is peculiar to greedy people.
There are other "cross" links thatmortal sins feed each other. For example, a glutton quickly enough begins to feel the desire in other pleasures and becomes an adulterer. The proud man does not tolerate objections and usually responds to any criticism of his own outbursts of anger. Excessive sadness grows into despondency. Greed is often the result of vanity and the desire to prove to others their superiority and to show wealth and luxury.
An interesting approach to this problem is the well-knownphilosopher and biologist Konrad Lorenz. In his book "The Eight Deadly Sins of Civilized Humanity", an Austrian scientist examines theosophical concepts from a rational point of view, bringing the social and scientific basis to the motivation of human actions and establishing parallels with the behavior of animals. In his view, the Christian concepts of good and evil, at first glance abstract and abstract, have deep rational roots containing recommendations, the observance of which is necessary for the survival of all mankind.
