A Return to Chivalry
Or, the Seven Deadly Sins and How They are Conquered by the Seven Holy Virtues:
An Introduction to Book 3 of Mere Christianity
C. S. Lewis was steeped in Medieval literature and had a deep love for the Arthurian romance stories of King Arthur and his knights of the Roundtable (see Lancelot, The Necessity of Chivalry, and That Hideous Strength) who manifested the great virtues of the High Medieval period. Lewis sought to evoke those virtuous strengths that he found in the knightly traditions in his readers through his many colorful characters throughout his writings.
The origin of the listing of virtues and vices is quite ancient going back the early Greek philosophers and possibly even earlier. Plato (427-347 B.C.) gave structure to basic categories of vices and virtues. Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) discussed the virtues in great lengths in his Rhetoric and Nichomachean Ethics. Zeno, the founder of the Stoic school of philosophy at Athens is usually known as the first philosopher to formulate the first formal catalog of virtues and vices. Most societies in Paul's day had various sets of ideals of good and evil behavior set down in writing by figures such as Seneca (4 B.C.-A.D. 65), Epictetus (A.D. 50-120), Cicero (106-43 B.C.), Dio Chrysostom (A.D. 40-120), and Plutarch (A.D. 46-120).
There are various summaries or lists of vices and virtues found throughout the Old Testament such as found in Proverbs 6:
There are six things which the LORD hates, yes, seven which are an abomination to Him: 17 haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, 18 a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that run rapidly to evil, 19 a false witness who utters lies, and one who spreads strife among brothers (Prov. 6:16-19; cf. Ps. 15:1-5; Prov. 8:13-14; Jer. 7:5-9; Ezek. 18:5-17).
The New Testament also has many collections of sins that are especially heinous and even warns that those who practice such things will not enter into eternal life (cf. Mk. 7:21-22; Rom. 1:29-31; 13:13; 1 Cor. 5:9-11; 6:9-10; 2 Cor. 12:20-21; Gal. 5:19-23; Eph. 4:31-32; 5:3-5; Col. 3:5-8; 1 Tim. 1:9-10; 2 Tim. 3:2-5; Tit. 3:3; James 3:13-18; 1 Pet. 2:1; 4:3, 15; Rev. 21:8; 22:14-15). Gal. 5 is representative of some of these lists:
Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, 21 envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you just as I have forewarned you that those who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law (Gal. 5:19-23).
While all sins are transgressions of divine and natural law, some sins in church history eventually were considered so severe, and were thought to be at the root of all other sins, that they became known as "deadly," "mortal" or "capital" sins (as opposed to "venial" sins, which were less serious). Augustine provided three categories -- carnal pleasure, pride, and unnatural curiosity -- which comprehended all sins.
By the fifth and sixth centuries, authors like John Cassian (d. c. A.D. 433) began to make a set number of vices. Cassian lists "eight principal vices": gluttony, fornication, avarice, anger, dejection, languor (or sloth), vainglory, and pride. But it was Pope Gregory the Great (A.D. 540-604) who gave Christendom the settled list of what is now commonly known as the "Seven Deadly Sins," seeing pride as the root of all the deadly sins (see his commentary on Job -- Moralia in Job). His list contains: vainglory, envy, anger, dejection, avarice, gluttony, and lust.
By the 7th century sin was viewed as a sickness of the soul, with the priest acting the role of the doctor, and with contraries (or virtues) curing the vices. The virtues were seen as the opposites of the vices and were meant to provide a remedy if practiced.
Plato and Aristotle spoke primarily of four main virtues, or "cardinal virtues" as they were latter known in the writings of Augustine, Ambrose, and especially Aquinas (prudence, temperance, fortitude, and justice). Probably because of the number "7" of the vices, the three "theological" virtues (faith, hope, and charity [or love]; cf. 1 Cor. 13:13) were added to these to make up the "Seven Holy Virtues" to counteract the "Seven Deadly Sins."
Pride (superbia) vs. Faith (fides): The first of the deadly sins is always Pride as the root of all the vices. Pride is placing oneself above God and therefore its contrary virtue is Faith to place oneself under God and trust in Him alone. Under pride would be included disobedience, bragging or ostentation, hypocrisy, contempt, arrogance, impudence, and taking pride in one's bad deeds.
Envy (invidia) vs. Charity (charitas): Envy consists of two categories: sadness at another's good fortune and glee at another's misfortune. Its contrary virtue is charity or love, which wishes your neighbor good will.
Wrath (ira) vs. Hope (spes): Wrath includes madness, blasphemy, insanity, provoking other to wrath, spreading scandal, homicide, and ferocity. Its contrary virtue is Hope because it rejoices in the future rather than dwelling on the turmoil of the past/present.
Sloth (accidia) vs. Fortitude (fortitudo): Sloth includes pettiness, cowardice, negligence, being remiss in one's duties, mistrustfulness, indolence, and sluggishness. Its contrary virtue is Fortitude, whose active forms include magnanimity and constancy and passive include security and good faith.
Avarice (avaritia) vs. Justice (justitia): Avarice or greed includes simony (the sale of clerical offices), sacrilege (or usurping the place of God), usury, fraud, theft, blind ambition, and desiring the goods of others. Its contrary virtue is Justice because justice gives to each his or her due, rather than stealing or retaining the things of another.
Gluttony (gula) vs. Temperance (temperantia): Gluttony includes drunkenness, gluttonous eating, and soft living. Temperance suppresses these extremes and includes abstinence, continence, and modesty.
Lust (luxuria) vs. Prudence (prudential): Lust includes fornication, adultery, incest, sodomy, sex with those in orders or under vows, masturbation, and "abuse" (any sex outside the "marital debt"). It also includes love of worldly luxuries. Its opposite virtue is Prudence which keeps the incorrupt from corruption and includes providence, circumspection, caution, and docility.
The first letter of the Seven Deadly Sins for the Medieval Latin word: saligia, which is taken from the verb saligiare (to commit a deadly sin).
The Seven Deadly Sins have been the subject of much Medieval literature but no where more popularize than in Dante Alighieri's (A.D. 1265-1321) Divine Comedy (c. A.D. 1308; includes Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso).
Summary of the Doctrine of Purgatory
The Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory is based upon a few inferences of Scripture (Matt. 5:26; 12:32; 1 Cor. 3:12, 15; 1 Pet. 1:7) as well as the apocrypha (2 Mach. 12:42-46). Purgatory is the temporary abode in the after life where repentant souls, whether repentant in life or at the moment of death, are purged of the "stain" of sin. (Those who are unrepentant when the die go to Hell forever, never to leave.) Every time you sin, your soul is corrupted, stained, made course, "roughed up."
While the guilt of sin is purged when the soul has performed "penance," (confessed their sin, shown contrition over their sin, and made satisfaction for their sin) the "stain" of sin remains. Therefore, the soul must be cleansed from the "stain" of sin. The purging process repairs the damage done to the soul (the will to rebel against God) by sin.
So purgatory is the place where we are reformed/retrained to want to obey God. It is discipline/retraining where we empty ourselves of ourselves so that we can only want and love God and to be completely satisfied in God. Only then can we truly stand before God and enjoy Him.
The purging process takes as long as it takes. It is complete when it is complete.
In the after life everybody gets what they want. You can either insist on having your own way and you will get it. In hell, you have your own way forever. But if you want God you will get it in heaven once the stain of your sin is purged in purgatory. If you truly want God, you will be willing to endure purgatory as long as it takes to get to heaven.
In Dorothy Sayers wonderful introduction to Dante's Purgatorio, she gives a summary of Dante's Mount Purgatory where each of the seven deadly sins are punished (purgative, not penal) or purified or cleansed from within of each of the deadly sins (see pp. 65-67 in Sayers). The prayers of the living avail the penitent, not to get him off, but to help and sustain him in his task of purification so that the "wound of sin" may heal more quickly.
Each Cornice is devoted to purging one of the Seven Deadly Sins, which are the well-heads from which all sinful behavior ultimately springs (or, the Seven Roots of Sinfulness; see illustration). In Dante, each of the Seven Deadly Sins, are shown to derive from love for some good, either falsely perceived, or inadequately or excessively pursued (in the tradition of Augustine who spoke of evil as a parasite upon the good which God created). All of these are parasites on the good of love (contrasts Lewis' two chapters on the Great Sin - pride - and Charity in MC 3:8-9).
At each level, you are working your way through the purging process until it brings you to true penance. Once you accomplish one level, you ascend up the mountain until each one is complete and you enter into heaven through the gate of Peter.
Lower Purgatory: Love Perverted or the love of injury to one's neighbor, springing from the evil fantasy that one can gain good for one's self from others' harm.
Cornice 1: Pride (superbia) -- love of self perverted to hatred and contempt for one's neighbor.
Cornice 2: Envy (invidia) -- love for one's own good perverted to the wish to deprive other men of theirs.
Cornice 3: Wrath (ira) -- love of justice perverted to revenge and spite.
Mid-Purgatory: Love Defective or love directed to an object legitimate in itself but errs by defect.
Cornice 4: Sloth or Accidie (acedia) -- the failure to love any good object in its proper measure, and, especially, to love God actively with all one has and is.
Upper Purgatory: Love Excessive, or love directed to an object legitimate in itself but errs by excess. One object, and one object only, is rightly to be loved "with all my heart, with all my mind, with all my soul, and with all my strength." Love for any other object must be so ordered as to remain subordinate to the love of God and the right hierarchy of the "secondary goods."
Cornice 5: Avarice or Covetousness (avaritia) -- the excessive love of money or power.Cornice 6: Gluttony (gula) -- the excessive love of pleasure.Cornice 7: Lust (luxuria) -- the excessive love of persons.So, What is the remedy in this life?
Dante's Divine Comedy, Sayers argues, was not really meant to be a treatise on the after life as much as a guide to morality for the earthly pilgrim to prepare for the after life. Think of Dante's Comedy as the Roman Catholic version of John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
Those who have done this purging process themselves on earth are the "saints" and they go immediately into God's presence at death with no need for a further purging process. The "saints" accomplish this both through penance on earth as well as following the Seven Holy Virtues in this life.
The Seven Holy Virtues which include:
The Four Cardinal Virtues (from "cardo" or hinge) -- these are the pivotal virtues upon which all others hinge -- these are the essential, primary, main, chief virtues that are common to all rational creatures and are naturally attainable.
Justice, Prudence (or Wisdom), Temperance (or Moderation), and Fortitude (or Courage) [see Mere Christianity 3:2]
Prudence (or Wisdom): Prudence opens the way to all the other virtues. Prudence gives us the right plan for conduct. Good sense is applied to conduct. Prudence chooses the best means to the good end. It seeks to answer "how" and "through what means" we ought to live to arrive at the good end. Prudence does not determine our moral duty -- that is the job of natural law. Rather, it devises a plan of conduct to attain it.
Fortitude (or Courage): Fortitude is our holding steady in the face of danger; patience.
Temperance (or Moderation): moderates one's own personal lusts and pleasures. But note that it is not avoiding all pleasure that is necessary for a man to enjoy the fruits of his labor. To avoid all pleasure is to sin against the design of the Creator.
Justice: directed to other people, to render to a man what is due him, what he is owed.
How do these four relate to one another?
The Four Rightly Related:
a. Reason governs Will -- This is Prudence or Wisdom.b. Will governs Appetites -- This is Temperance or Moderation. c. The effect of those two virtues is Justice.d. Fortitude or Courage prompts a person to honor that hierarchy.The Four Wrongly Related:a. The Appetites govern Will -- Lust, gluttony, avarice.b. The Will governs Reason -- Folly, gullible.c. Injustice is the effect of these two.d. Cowardice prompts one to dishonor that hierarchy.The Three Theological Virtues (1 Cor. 13:13) -- The Divine virtues are supernatural and are received only by God's grace:
Faith (fides or pistis), Hope (spes or elpis), and Love (agape) or Charity (charitas) (See chaps. 9-12 of Book 3 of Mere Christianity)
The greatest of these is love. All require divine grace to perform. Not natural, but supernatural, they surpass human virtue. All three are always to be fully integrated.
Faith: Faith is prior to hope and love. It is by faith that the mind apprehends what it hopes for and loves (Heb. 11:1). Faith does not destroy reason but complements it. Faith goes beyond reason and "sees" what reason cannot see. Faith is the foretaste of that knowledge which hereafter will make us happy. It is directed toward our eternal happiness in God.
Hope: Hope is the virtue of expectation. It provides confidence in the context of faith that is perfected by love. Hopes moves toward that which is not yet possessed. When what is hoped for is satisfied (only in enjoyment of God) then hope is no longer needed. Hope precedes love and needs love to complete it.
Love: Love is the form, mover, and root of all the virtues. It includes love for God and love for neighbor as yourself. Faith draws God to man, love draws man to God. Love is not the other virtues, but the essential motive behind all the virtues. Without love all the other virtues are imperfect (1 Cor. 13).
Love is founded upon trust in Christ (Rom. 5:1-5) and Jesus shows the full extent of his love by suffering for his people (John 13:34-35) therefore love related to faith is always love vulnerable to suffering.
Love and hope are related in that Christ loves the church not just for what it is, but what it shall become by His grace (Eph. 5:25-28). See Lewis' "The Weight of Glory"
Therefore, the Seven Holy Virtues were often seen as the cure or strength to fight against each of the Seven Deadly Sins and this ideal was often used among the Knightly Virtues that Lewis so loved and emulated in his own writings.
For example, Raymond Llull's Book of the Order of Chivalry (13th century) emphasizes the role of the seven virtues in the life of the perfect knight, and strength against the deadly sins. He wrote:
First and foremost, if a knight not be of good faith, all is for naught that he does, for he may never have the other virtues or good customs, but for faith all is but sin that every man does. With Faith, men have hope, charity, and are servants to truth.
Hope is a noble virtue, which causes knights to trust to have victory in battle. With hope, he has more trust in God, not in his horse, harness, or sword. Through hope, the courage of knights is reinforced, and cowardice overthrown. Hope is the principal instrument that governs knighthood in honour.
A knight that does not have charity will be cruel and evil, which does not agree with the honour of knighthood.
All knights are needful of justice, for a knight without justice is without honour, and without justice there can be no knighthood. An injurious knight is an enemy of justice, and casts himself out of the order.
Prudence is a virtue that knights must have. It is a knowledge that men have of good and evil, and though which they become the enemy of evil and friend to all good things.
The virtue of temperance is the knowledge of the middle way between too much and too little, and the knowledge of one's own measure. The knight who is temperate in largess gives neither too much nor too little; he is neither a coward nor foolhardy; in eating and drinking he is neither a glutton nor so hungry that he is wretched; in speech he does not use too many words nor so few that he is not understood; also, in his clothing he is neither excessive or wretched. Temperance is the rule of all wisdom.
With fortitude, the knight fights against his enemies though noblesse of heart, temperance, and abstinence. It makes him courageous and hardy.
