Septem Mordifer
By Rudy Harris
15 Jan 2009
The seven deadly sins. No matter what culture you are from or creed you are Pride, Envy, Lust, Gluttony, Wrath, Sloth, and Greed have an affect on all of our lives that we sometimes dont even understand.
Pope Gregory the Great in the 6th century was the first to pin-point the seven deadly sins (there were 8 before that but we wont get into that). But not only does the seven deadly sins exist in Christianity but they also are present in one form or another in Islam, Judaism, and even somewhat in Buddhism which to me just lends themselves to how powerful they are.
So let take them one by one...
Pride.
This seems to be an easy thing. In fact I thought, when first coming up with this series, that the person wearing Pride would have a blindfold of red white and blue. But once researching I kind of got that all Pride isnt really a bad thing. Pride, as with all the sins, is much more about how you are making the effot to help people than it is about your own stupidity. The deadly sin of Pride is like this: If you are too proud to help out one another...too proud to come off your pedestal to see whats really going on with people and see their pains and sufferings, then you are prideful.
Envy is basically self explanatory but I think we over look it often. Envy is the reason I, as well as others, convinced myself I needed an iPod Touch. I couldnt afford the iPhone's monthly bill but knew that I wanted one so I settled for the next best thing. Why you might ask? I saw someone else with one and saw all the games and lighter applications and convinced myself that I needed it. Do I really need it? No. Do I love it? ABSOLUTELY. But still envy to control of my life for a brief moment and stiffed me with a $300 bill not to mention all the .99 cent applications that I somehow justify buying. Thanks envy!
Do I really need to go into why Lust has hurt society in one form or another? Lets go through this. How many girls do you know that got pregnant in high school? Ultimately their unwanted pregnancy was due to Lust. Sure love, I understand that, however basically that person(s) said, let's do it and they did it and they had a kid. Right? STDs, unplanned pregnancies, abortions, all of these are at their very basic are a result of Lust.
Gluttony is not just about Big Macs and supersizes. Much more, Gluttony is about absorbing too many resources. It can be eating, it could be having three cars that use way too much gas, it could be a huge house when all you need is a small one. Gluttony is about excessive behaviors and tendencies.
A step beyond Gluttony is Greed. Greed is, well duh, greediness. A good example of the powers of Greed is our current state of economy. If the banks didnt sell bad loans to make more money and if the consumers didnt believe that they needed a big house for themselves that they really couldnt afford I believe that we could all agree our economy might be a little bit different than right now.
Wrath/Anger is a beast in our society. We have road rage, roid rage and every other kind of rage you could imagine. We get mad if our burger had tomatoes or if the traffic is a little backed up. We then usually take that wrath to someone else and BLOW UP! The bible says that we are to be slow to speak and quick to listen. How often do you really do that? I know for me, sometimes there are just things or people that just bug the hell out of me and when I come in contact with them I just lose it!
Contrary to popular belief, Sloth is not being slow. You don't have to run fast to not be committing sin. However if you are a lazy with your gifts, talents and blessings your are a sloth. Your walking down the street and decide to pass the homeless person who is asking for money without saying a word. Maybe you honestly didnt have any or maybe they were just going to use it for drugs. But if you were to say "Hello How are you," your pockets wouldnt have had to take a hit or anything and you might have let that man or woman know that there are nice people in the world. But also, if you have some money to give, give it! Or if you are one of those "he'll use it for booze" people then give them a gift card to McDonald's or Wendy's or whatever. Anything less of a hello is being a sloth.
So please dont be a sloth or greedy, or a glutton, or envious, or lustful, or wrathful, or prideful. Please be giving of your time, energy, and patience.
There are many things we can learn from The Seven deadly sins. But we have to be willing to take off our blindfolds and see the other spectrum of the sins, the virtues. When creating this concept I thought long and hard on how to represent these simple words. Ultimately I decided on blindfolds. I thought they represented how we arent even aware of what we are doing most of the time and we cant see what these actions of ours actually do to everyone around us. I surrounded my subjects in light (around 3000 watts of it) to show how if we were to actually see around us, that our lives are filled with opportunities to others.
If you are a Christian or a spiritual person, "seeing the light" is probably not an unfamiliar thing to you. If you are not spiritual person, it may not have as much meaning. However, I believe that whether you are spiritual or not, following Christ or Mohammad, Buddha or Shiva, the seven deadly sins and seven heavenly virtues can show a great deal about our communities and how we can make the world a better place.
*Sigh*
2 responses
-
Michael Adams gave props (16 Jan 2009):
Great series. Wonderful shots that really tell a story! Got my vote!
-
Tammi O'Hair said (19 Jan 2009):
awesome stuff. Mr. Harris.
Why hasn't your creativity rubbed off on me yet? sheesh.
More Photo Essays
Weining, Guizhou Caohai International Photographic Competition opens
By peng nian — 16 Dec 2009
Weining, Guizhou Caohai International Photographic Competition opens
