The next deadly sin I want to discuss is lust. Lust is the absence of love and chastity. It is selfish and concerned with sexual self-gratification. It is interested in using others for sexual pleasure. Lust is a sin that is practiced by both men and women. It is common to both sexes.
There are three aspects of the soul: the intellect, the incensive aspect, and the appetitive aspect. The intellect is that part of the soul that receives divine revelation from God. With the intellect, one is able to perceive spiritual truth. The incensive aspect of the soul is that which generates vehement feeling, such as anger or ire. The appetitive aspect of the soul is that which desires food, sex, drink, pleasure, sleep, and things.
When we deal with the sin of lust, we become concerned with the appetitive aspect of the soul.
Before I discourse any further on this sin and its remedies, I will first say what lust is not. Lust is not looking at nude bodies. It is true that one may commit the sin of lust while looking at a naked person, but that does not always have to be the case. There are professional people, such as, doctors and nurses, who look at genitals and breasts on a daily basis without lusting after their patients. There are people who look at their children when they are nude without lusting after them. A man might look at his naked wife without committing the sin of lust. A woman might look at her naked husband without lusting after him.
However, I am not condoning pornography when I say this. People often develop an addiction to looking at pictures of nude people when they look at porn, but that does not always have to be the case. A law enforcement officer might look at child pornography without lusting after the children depicted in the pictures and become irate that someone would produce such filth. He would keep the pornographic pictures so that they could be used in court to prosecute the people responsible for using children in pornographic material.
Elderly people usually lose interest in sex because they have low levels of sex hormones. There are products on the market which are supposed to help them regain their sexual desire. An elderly man or woman who has low levels of a sex hormone might be able to look at a nude person or a picture of a nude person without having any significant reaction to it. They might be able to look without lusting. I think that this sin of lust is partially caused by a biochemical reaction produced by sex hormones.
It is possible to advance so far enough spiritually that one does not lust when one sees a nude person. St. John of the Ladder mentioned someone in his book who had advanced to that degree.
I was once told about an astonishing level of chastity attained by someone. "There was a man who, having looked on a body of great beauty, at once gave praise to its Creator and after one look was stirred to love God and weep copiously, so that it was marvelous how something that could have brought low one person managed to be the cause of a heavenly crown for another. And if such a man feels and behaves in similar fashion on similar occasions, then he has already risen to immortality before the general resurrection." ("Step 15: On Chastity," The Ladder of Divine Ascent, by St. John of the Ladder, p. 179)
So then, looking at nude people is not necessarily lusting after nude people, but looking at them might lead to the sin of lust.
In the Book of Job, Job says:
I made a covenant with mine eyes, and I will not think upon a virgin. (Job 31:1, LXX)
Although looking at a nude person may not be sinful, it may very well lead to this sin. Therefore, it is a good idea to refrain from doing so. Looking at pornography can lead to an addiction to porn. Looking at naked people can lead to some unhealthy form of voyeurism. Like Job, we should make a covenant with our eyes not to look, unless we have jobs like those in the medical profession that require us to look. Solomon said:
Let not the desire of beauty overcome thee, neither be thou caught by thine eyes, neither be captivated with her eyelids. (Prov. 6:25, LXX)
Jesus the Son of Sirach said:
Turn away thine eye from a beautiful woman, and look not upon another’s beauty; for many have been deceived by the beauty of a woman; for herewith love is kindled as a fire. (Ecclesiasticus 9:8, LXX)
and:
Stumble not at the beauty of a woman, and desire her not for pleasure. (Ecclesiasticus 25:21, LXX)
The sin of lust begins in the mind. Jesus said:
Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man. (St. Matt. 15:17-20, NKJV)
Lust is the thought and desire of committing a sexual sin, such as fornication or adultery. Fornication is premarital sex. Adultery is sex with someone else's spouse. Lust leads to sins such as these. This is why it is important that it be conquered.
There are several things that one can do to prevent the commission of sexual sins. One of them I have already mentioned. Avoid looking at nude people and pictures of nude people. Another thing to do is to avoid places where people dress immodestly. This can be difficult to do, especially during the summer months. So many women and girls walk around in shorts and halter tops on hot days. Waitresses in some restaurants wear tight fitting short dresses. The beaches and the pools are populated with people who are wearing bathing suits. One must be aware that going to such places might result in one committing the sin of lust. Another thing that one can do is to pray whenever the thought of committing a sexual sin enters the mind. The Jesus Prayer is a good prayer to pray during such moments. "O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." Making the sign of the Cross is also good thing to do during such times. The sign of the Cross is a physical act of prayer that the demons do not like to see us make.
A woman who allows men to have intimate contact with her is not highly respected by the men who do so and by others.
A shameless woman shall be counted as a dog; but she that is shamefaced will fear the Lord. (Ecclesiasticus 26:25)
A woman who dresses immodestly is also ill-esteemed by others. Modest women command more respect than immodest women. So, a woman should not do anything to inflame the sexual passions of men. She should dress modestly and limit any contact with her body to a bare minimum. Intimate contact should be reserved for marriage.
Since lust pertains to the appetitive aspect of the soul, sins such as gluttony and greed help to fuel it. Periodic fasting can help one gain victory over this sin of lust. Fast from certain types of food for a period of time and focus your thoughts on God and spiritual things during the fast. Fasting is good for helping one to break a sexual addiction. Married people can purify their sex by practicing marital fasting. Marital fasting is the practice of abstaining from sex by mutual consent of both partners. (I Cor. 7:5)
Although we usually think of lust as being a sin common to single people, even married couples can lust for one another. Lust can even exist within a marriage. In the Book of Tobit, Tobias prayed:
And now, O Lord, I take not this my sister for lust but uprightly. (Tobit 8:7)
He realized that one can marry out of lust. A man can marry a woman out of lust and spend the marriage desiring to have sex with her so that he can selfishly satisfy his sexual appetite. She can become to him nothing more than an object of sexual desire. A woman can likewise do the same with a man that she marries. He can become to her nothing more than her "hunk" who keeps her happy in bed. Lust is not love. It is selfish. Love "does not seek its own." (I Cor. 13:5, NKJV) It is unselfish.
Sex does not have to be selfish. That, I think, is one of the lessons to be learned from the Book of Tobit. Tobias married Sarah uprightly and not for lust. (Tobit 8:7) He made love to her. They had children. (Tobit 14:3,12) Lust was not a part of their lovemaking.
I have recently read an article on sex on Orthodox Wiki on the internet. (http://www.orthodoxwiki.org/Main_Page) This is a very good article. In this article, it says that one of the reasons for having sex is to achieve spiritual union. A couple should strive to become one soul with one another and not just one flesh with each other when they make love. So, sex can be a spiritual exercise between a man and his wife. It is possible to have sex unselfishly, thinking about the other person while doing so and not preoccupying oneself with egoistic desires and self-gratification.
Blessed Augustine wrote about what would have happened if Adam and Eve had never sinned. They would have made love to each other and had children. They would have had sex without experiencing any lust for one another.* Lust does not have to be a part of the sexual act. God never intended it to be so when He created sex. As Ashley Reynolds says, "Sex was God's idea."
Another reason for having sex is to express intimate affection toward one's spouse.** Sex is an intimate act that should be practiced by a man and his wife. The unmarried should abstain from sex. One Orthodox priest wrote that sex is a language. I think that this passage in Proverbs teaches that sex is for expressing intimate affection toward one's spouse:
Let thy fountain of water be truly thine own; and rejoice with the wife of thy youth. Let thy loving hart and thy graceful colt company with thee, and let her be considered thine own, and be with thee at all times; for ravished with her love thou shalt be greatly increased. (Prov. 5:18,19, LXX)
Before I discourse any further on this sin and its remedies, I will first say what lust is not. Lust is not looking at nude bodies. It is true that one may commit the sin of lust while looking at a naked person, but that does not always have to be the case. There are professional people, such as, doctors and nurses, who look at genitals and breasts on a daily basis without lusting after their patients. There are people who look at their children when they are nude without lusting after them. A man might look at his naked wife without committing the sin of lust. A woman might look at her naked husband without lusting after him.
However, I am not condoning pornography when I say this. People often develop an addiction to looking at pictures of nude people when they look at porn, but that does not always have to be the case. A law enforcement officer might look at child pornography without lusting after the children depicted in the pictures and become irate that someone would produce such filth. He would keep the pornographic pictures so that they could be used in court to prosecute the people responsible for using children in pornographic material.
Elderly people usually lose interest in sex because they have low levels of sex hormones. There are products on the market which are supposed to help them regain their sexual desire. An elderly man or woman who has low levels of a sex hormone might be able to look at a nude person or a picture of a nude person without having any significant reaction to it. They might be able to look without lusting. I think that this sin of lust is partially caused by a biochemical reaction produced by sex hormones.
It is possible to advance so far enough spiritually that one does not lust when one sees a nude person. St. John of the Ladder mentioned someone in his book who had advanced to that degree.
I was once told about an astonishing level of chastity attained by someone. "There was a man who, having looked on a body of great beauty, at once gave praise to its Creator and after one look was stirred to love God and weep copiously, so that it was marvelous how something that could have brought low one person managed to be the cause of a heavenly crown for another. And if such a man feels and behaves in similar fashion on similar occasions, then he has already risen to immortality before the general resurrection." ("Step 15: On Chastity," The Ladder of Divine Ascent, by St. John of the Ladder, p. 179)
So then, looking at nude people is not necessarily lusting after nude people, but looking at them might lead to the sin of lust.
Righteous Job the Longsuffering
In the Book of Job, Job says:
I made a covenant with mine eyes, and I will not think upon a virgin. (Job 31:1, LXX)
Although looking at a nude person may not be sinful, it may very well lead to this sin. Therefore, it is a good idea to refrain from doing so. Looking at pornography can lead to an addiction to porn. Looking at naked people can lead to some unhealthy form of voyeurism. Like Job, we should make a covenant with our eyes not to look, unless we have jobs like those in the medical profession that require us to look. Solomon said:
Let not the desire of beauty overcome thee, neither be thou caught by thine eyes, neither be captivated with her eyelids. (Prov. 6:25, LXX)
Jesus the Son of Sirach said:
Turn away thine eye from a beautiful woman, and look not upon another’s beauty; for many have been deceived by the beauty of a woman; for herewith love is kindled as a fire. (Ecclesiasticus 9:8, LXX)
and:
Stumble not at the beauty of a woman, and desire her not for pleasure. (Ecclesiasticus 25:21, LXX)
The sin of lust begins in the mind. Jesus said:
Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is eliminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. These are the things which defile a man, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man. (St. Matt. 15:17-20, NKJV)
Lust is the thought and desire of committing a sexual sin, such as fornication or adultery. Fornication is premarital sex. Adultery is sex with someone else's spouse. Lust leads to sins such as these. This is why it is important that it be conquered.
There are several things that one can do to prevent the commission of sexual sins. One of them I have already mentioned. Avoid looking at nude people and pictures of nude people. Another thing to do is to avoid places where people dress immodestly. This can be difficult to do, especially during the summer months. So many women and girls walk around in shorts and halter tops on hot days. Waitresses in some restaurants wear tight fitting short dresses. The beaches and the pools are populated with people who are wearing bathing suits. One must be aware that going to such places might result in one committing the sin of lust. Another thing that one can do is to pray whenever the thought of committing a sexual sin enters the mind. The Jesus Prayer is a good prayer to pray during such moments. "O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." Making the sign of the Cross is also good thing to do during such times. The sign of the Cross is a physical act of prayer that the demons do not like to see us make.
A woman who allows men to have intimate contact with her is not highly respected by the men who do so and by others.
A shameless woman shall be counted as a dog; but she that is shamefaced will fear the Lord. (Ecclesiasticus 26:25)
A woman who dresses immodestly is also ill-esteemed by others. Modest women command more respect than immodest women. So, a woman should not do anything to inflame the sexual passions of men. She should dress modestly and limit any contact with her body to a bare minimum. Intimate contact should be reserved for marriage.
Since lust pertains to the appetitive aspect of the soul, sins such as gluttony and greed help to fuel it. Periodic fasting can help one gain victory over this sin of lust. Fast from certain types of food for a period of time and focus your thoughts on God and spiritual things during the fast. Fasting is good for helping one to break a sexual addiction. Married people can purify their sex by practicing marital fasting. Marital fasting is the practice of abstaining from sex by mutual consent of both partners. (I Cor. 7:5)
Although we usually think of lust as being a sin common to single people, even married couples can lust for one another. Lust can even exist within a marriage. In the Book of Tobit, Tobias prayed:
And now, O Lord, I take not this my sister for lust but uprightly. (Tobit 8:7)
He realized that one can marry out of lust. A man can marry a woman out of lust and spend the marriage desiring to have sex with her so that he can selfishly satisfy his sexual appetite. She can become to him nothing more than an object of sexual desire. A woman can likewise do the same with a man that she marries. He can become to her nothing more than her "hunk" who keeps her happy in bed. Lust is not love. It is selfish. Love "does not seek its own." (I Cor. 13:5, NKJV) It is unselfish.
Sex does not have to be selfish. That, I think, is one of the lessons to be learned from the Book of Tobit. Tobias married Sarah uprightly and not for lust. (Tobit 8:7) He made love to her. They had children. (Tobit 14:3,12) Lust was not a part of their lovemaking.
I have recently read an article on sex on Orthodox Wiki on the internet. (http://www.orthodoxwiki.org/Main_Page) This is a very good article. In this article, it says that one of the reasons for having sex is to achieve spiritual union. A couple should strive to become one soul with one another and not just one flesh with each other when they make love. So, sex can be a spiritual exercise between a man and his wife. It is possible to have sex unselfishly, thinking about the other person while doing so and not preoccupying oneself with egoistic desires and self-gratification.
Blessed Augustine wrote about what would have happened if Adam and Eve had never sinned. They would have made love to each other and had children. They would have had sex without experiencing any lust for one another.* Lust does not have to be a part of the sexual act. God never intended it to be so when He created sex. As Ashley Reynolds says, "Sex was God's idea."
Another reason for having sex is to express intimate affection toward one's spouse.** Sex is an intimate act that should be practiced by a man and his wife. The unmarried should abstain from sex. One Orthodox priest wrote that sex is a language. I think that this passage in Proverbs teaches that sex is for expressing intimate affection toward one's spouse:
Let thy fountain of water be truly thine own; and rejoice with the wife of thy youth. Let thy loving hart and thy graceful colt company with thee, and let her be considered thine own, and be with thee at all times; for ravished with her love thou shalt be greatly increased. (Prov. 5:18,19, LXX)
Procreation is also a reason for having sex, but making babies is not the only reason for making love. There are other reasons which are just as honorable as that of procreation.
One of the ancient heresies that the Church Fathers opposed and refuted is that of the Encratites. They taught that God created evil when God created sex. They taught that sex is intrinsically evil. Sex is not evil, but the abuse and misuse of it is. Selfish sex is evil. Sex with someone who is not one's spouse is evil. Unselfish sex in the context of marriage with one's spouse is not.***
Another thing that one can do to transfigure lust is to seek for Someone more beautiful than one is in the habit of lusting after. Longing for God who is the epitome of beauty itself and the epitome of perfection is what I am talking about. In the Wisdom literature of the Bible, Wisdom is personified as a woman who is a superior alternative to the immoral woman who leads young men into Hell.
Say that wisdom is thy sister, and gain prudence as an acquaintance for thyself; that she may keep thee from the strange and wicked woman, if she should assail thee with flattering words. (Prov. 7:4,5, LXX)
Wisdom reacheth from one end to another mightily: and sweetly doth she order all things. I loved her, and sought her out from my youth, I desired to make her my spouse, and I was a lover of her beauty. (Wisdom 8:1,2)
In the Old Testament, Wisdom often refers to the Second Person of the Trinity. St. Paul called Christ the Wisdom of God. (I Cor. 1:24) So, for a man who is struggling with lust, he can spend time with God, seek Wisdom and become a "lover of her beauty." For a woman who is struggling with lust, she can do the same. She can seek God and let Jesus be her husband. We are supposed to love God with all of our being. (Deut. 6:4,5) We are supposed to love Christ more than anyone else. (St. Matt. 10:37; St. Luke 14:26) We are supposed to love others because we love God. Prayer, Bible reading, and spending time gazing at Christ before His holy icon can help one gain victory over lust. If a man needs a female icon of God, the icon of the Most Holy Theotokos will do. She is not God, but she is a woman who bears the image and likeness of God more than anyone else who has ever lived. So, her icon is an icon of a female icon of God. If a man needs a woman's company, spend time with her. Pray Akathist prayers to her.
St. John of the Ladder said:
A chaste man is someone who has driven out bodily love by means of divine love, who has used heavenly fire to quench the desires of the flesh. ("Step 15: On Chastity," The Ladder of Divine Ascent, by St. John of the Ladder, p. 171)
St. Maximos the Confessor said:
He who has been granted knowledge of God, and fully enjoys the pleasure that comes from it, despises all the pleasures that come from the soul's desiring power. ("Third Century on Love," section 63, by St. Maximos the Confessor, The Philokalia, vol. 2, p. 93)
and:
God is said to be the originator and begetter of love and the erotic force. For He externalized them from within Himself, that is, He brought them forth into the world of created things. This is why Scripture says 'God is love' (I John 4:16), and elsewhere that He is 'sweetness and desire' (cf. Song of Songs 5:16, LXX), which signifies the erotic force. ("Fifth Century of Various Texts," section 87, by St. Maximos the Confessor, The Philokalia, vol. 2, p. 281)
St. Theodoros the Great Ascetic said that when we long for God enough we start to fear losing Him.
Fear also comes into the argument. For the greater our longing for God the greater grows our fear; and the more we hope to attain God, the more we fear Him. If we are wounded by divine love, the sting of fear exceeds that of a thousand threats of punishment. For as nothing is more blessed than to attain God, so nothing is more terrible than this great fear of losing Him. ("Theoretikon," by St. Theodoros the Great Ascetic, The Philokalia, vol. 2, p. 43)
Loving God results in loving others. A man who says he loves God, but hates others is a liar. (I John 4:20) When we love others, we do not lust after them. A man who loves a woman will not view her as a sex object or seek to demean her in any way. A woman who loves a man will not view him as a sex object either. She will not be trying to seduce him and drag him into bed with her.
A man can love another man's wife without sinning against God. The way he does this is by praying that she remain faithful to her husband and praying that her marriage to him will last. A woman can love another woman's husband in the same way and not be sinning against God. Remember, I said that love is unselfish. There is an element of self-denial in love. Love gives. It does not get.
"Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up." (I Cor. 13:4, LXX) Love is humble and meek. Those who love are willing to be last and let someone else have what is best. "Love does not envy." (I Cor. 13:4, NKJV) They do not try to break up marriages or steady dating relationships.
St. Thomais of Alexandria
There are two other remedies for lust. One is marriage. Someone who has difficulty controlling his passions is better off to marry than to live a life of fornication. This is the advice of St. Paul. (I Cor. 7:2) However, even in marriage, as I have said before, there can be lust. That is why married couples should live ascetically by fasting from food and sex periodically. They need to purify their sex through such asceticism. The other remedy is the intercession of the Saints. It helps to get the Saints and the Mother of God to help us in our ascetic struggles toward holiness through their prayers. There is one Saint who is well-known for helping men deal with lust. That is St. Thomais of Alexandria. Her prayers have helped many men gain victory over lust. St. Mary of Egypt is a former prostitute. She can help women who struggle with lust. Ask for the prayers of the Saints and the Mother of God.
St. Mary of Egypt receiving communion from St. Zosimas.
So, I have provided here some advice on how to deal with lust. I have mentioned fasting, marital fasting, the Jesus Prayer, making the sign of the Cross, longing for God, and the intercession of the Saints as aids in conquering lust. I have also said that we should avoid looking at nude people and pictures of nude people unless we have jobs that require that we do so. We should avoid intimate contact with those of the opposite sex that we are not married to. Men and women should dress modestly. We should develop love for others and not lust after them. Love is unselfish. Lust is selfish. May God help us all to become chaste, holy, righteous, and loving people.
Steve
* But he who says that there should have been neither copulation nor generation but for sin, virtually says that man’s sin was necessary to complete the number of the saints. For if these two by not sinning should have continued to live alone, because, as is supposed, they could not have begotten children had they not sinned, then certainly sin was necessary in order that there might be not only two but many righteous men. And if this cannot be maintained without absurdity, we must rather believe that the number of the saints fit to complete this most blessed city would have been as great though no one had sinned, as it is now that the grace of God gathers its citizens out of the multitude of sinners, so long as the children of this world generate and are generated. (St. Luke 20:34)
And therefore that marriage, worthy of the happiness of Paradise, should have had desirable fruit without the shame of lust, had there been no sin. But how that could be, there is now no example to teach us. Nevertheless, it ought not to seem incredible that one member might serve the will without lust then, since so many serve it now. Do we now move our feet and hands when we will to do the things we would by means of these members? do we meet with no resistance in them, but perceive that they are ready servants of the will, both in our own case and in that of others, and especially of artisans employed in mechanical operations, by which the weakness and clumsiness of nature become, through industrious exercise, wonderfully dexterous? and shall we not believe that, like as all those members obediently serve the will, so also should the members have discharged the function of generation, though lust, the award of disobedience, had been a wanting.? (The City of God, Book XIV, chapter 23, by Blessed Augustine of Hippo, 354-430 A.D., vol. 2, p. 279, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series)
** He shows also, by the mention of the creature (the hind), the purity of that pleasure; and by the roe he intimates the quick responsive affection of the wife. And whereas he knows many things to excite, he secures them against these, and puts upon them the indissoluble bond of affection, setting constancy before them. And as for the rest, wisdom, figuratively speaking, like a stag, can repel and crush the snaky doctrines of the heterodox. Let her therefore, says he, be with thee, like a roe, to keep all virtue fresh. (Prov. 5:19) And whereas a wife and wisdom are not in this respect the same, let her rather lead thee; for thus thou shalt conceive good thoughts. (The Extant Works and Fragments of Hippolytus, "On Proverbs," by St. Hippolytus of Rome, 170-236 A.D., vol. 5, p. 173, Ante-Nicene Fathers)
*** An husband, therefore, and a wife, when they company together in lawful marriage, and rise from one another, may pray without any observations, and without washing are clean. But whosoever corrupts and defiles another man’s wife, or is defiled with an harlot, when he arises up from her, though he should wash himself in the entire ocean and all the rivers, cannot be clean. (The Constitutions of the Holy Apostles, Book VI, section 5, chapter 29, vol. 7, p. 463, Ante-Nicene Fathers)
Bibliography
Ante-Nicene Fathers, edited by Alexander Roberts, D.D. & James Donaldson, LL.D., volumes 1-10, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody, Massachusetts
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, edited by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D., volumes 1-14, Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., Peabody, Massachusetts
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, edited by Philip Schaff, D.D., LL.D. & Henry Wace, D.D., volumes 1-14, Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., Peabody, Massachusetts
The Philokalia, volumes 1 and 2, compiled by St. Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain and St. Makarios of Corinth, translated by G.E.H. Palmer, Philip Sherrard, and Kallistos Ware, Faber and Faber, London, UK, copyright 1979 The Eling Trust
The Ladder of Divine Ascent, by St. John Climacus, translated by Colm Luibheid and Norman Russell, Paulist Press, New York, copyright 1982 by the Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle
