SLOTH | ACEDIA

Sloth : (It is attributed to Belphegor.) Parable of the Wheat and the Tares (1624) by Abraham Bloemaert, Walters Art Museum Sloth (Latin: tristitia or acedia ("without care")) refers to a peculiar jumble of notions, dating from antiquity and including mental, spiritual, pathological, and physical states. It may be defined as absence of interest or habitual disinclination to exertion. In his Summa Theologica, Saint Thomas Aquinas defined sloth as "sorrow about spiritual good". The scope of sloth is wide. Spiritually, acedia first referred to an affliction attending religious persons, especially monks, wherein they became indifferent to their duties and obligations to God. Mentally, acedia ...View all