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Glittering Vices: A New Look at the Seven Deadly Sins and Their Remedies

Publisher:
, 2009
ISBN: 9781441226389
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Overview

“Moral formation” and “character development” are popular buzzwords, but they are ineffective concepts without an understanding of what good character is and how to cultivate it. The traditional teachings on the “seven deadly sins,” or capital vices, compiled by saints such as Augustine, Pope Gregory I, and Aquinas, offer a strong foundation for recognizing virtues to cultivate and vices to avoid.

Unfortunately, contemporary culture trivializes, psychologizes, or even dismisses the seven vices as if they have no serious moral or spiritual implications. Glittering Vices clears that misconception with a brief history of the vices and an informative chapter on each “deadly sin.” Readers gain practical understanding of how the vices shape our culture and why gluttony, lust, sloth, and others are, in fact, incredibly destructive. Through this eye-opening book, readers will be able to correctly identify and eliminate the deeply rooted patterns of sin that are work in their lives.

Winsome and wise, Glittering Vices is intriguing for any reader interested in spiritual disciplines and character formation. Its rich content makes it useful in undergraduate and seminary ethics courses as well.

In the Logos edition, this volume is enhanced by amazing functionality. Important terms link to dictionaries, encyclopedias, and a wealth of other resources in your digital library. Perform powerful searches to find exactly what you’re looking for. Take the discussion with you using tablet and mobile apps. With Logos Bible Software, the most efficient and comprehensive research tools are in one place, so you get the most out of your study.

Get this title, more books, and a larger discount with the Baker Academic and Brazos Press Ethics and Spiritual Formation Collection (37 vols.).

Resource Experts
  • Defines moral character clearly
  • Shines light on the harsh consequences of the seven deadly vices
  • Draws on historical Christian theology to make application for ethical life in the present
  • Gifts from the Desert: The Origins and History of the Vices Tradition
  • Envy: Feeling Bitter When Others Have It Better
  • Vainglory: Image is Everything
  • Sloth: Resistance to the Demands of Love
  • Avarice: I Want It All
  • Anger: Holy Emotion or Hellish Passion?
  • Gluttony: Feeding Your Face and Starving Your Heart
  • Lust: Smoke, Fire, and Ashes

Top Highlights

“Vainglory is the excessive and disordered desire for recognition and approval from others.” (Page 60)

“Why count these seven as the main sources and most fruitful of the vices? Aquinas’s explanation is that they aim at the things that most attract human beings, the goods which we most long to possess.42 Because each good on the list above holds a close affinity to human fulfillment, we are tempted to substitute them for true fulfillment as the goal of our lives. The vices offer subtle and deceptive imitations of the fullness of the human good, what we often simply call ‘happiness.’” (Page 38)

“Two spiritual disciplines in particular pull some weight against vainglory—silence and solitude.” (Page 75)

“and how sloth has more to do with being lazy about love than lazy about our work.” (Page 82)

“The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle called this the difference between acting according to virtue—that is, according to an external standard which tells us what we ought to do whether we feel like it or not—and acting from the virtue—that is, from the internalized disposition which naturally yields its corresponding action.17 The person who acts from virtue performs actions that fit seamlessly with his or her inward character. Thus, the telltale sign of virtue is doing the right thing with a sense of peace and pleasure. What feels like ‘second nature’ to you?18 These are the marks of your character.” (Page 16)

This book is a treat for the mind and a tonic for the soul, recovering and refining riches in the Christian tradition almost lost from view. It is not often that one reads a work that is as intellectually deep and sharp as this one, but which is also intensely practical: helping its readers become the persons they were created to be.

—C. Stephen Evans, professor of philosophy, Baylor University

Rebecca DeYoung’s Glittering Vices gives us the seven words we need to name the deep-rooted distortions of love of God and neighbor—both within ourselves and in our culture. This lively introduction to the Christian psychology behind the capital vices, or ‘deadly sins,’ engages contemporary film and fiction even as it sifts the wisdom of Aquinas, Gregory, and Cassian.

—Robert B. Kruschwitz, director, Center for Christian Ethics, Baylor University

Glittering Vices is a lucid, historically informed, and well-illustrated exploration of the seven deadly vices. DeYoung’s book will unquestionably help teachers, students, and laypersons toward the Socratic and Christian goal of self-examination

—W. Jay Wood, professor, Wheaton College

Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung is associate professor of philosophy at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She wrote “Seven Deadly Sins” for the Encyclopedia of Christianity and collaborated with two of her seminary students to develop a high school/college curriculum on the subject. She is also the author of Vainglory: The Forgotten Vice.

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    $18.99