TPPM (9): Dante and Sloth

[Tim Strzechowski]

[...] Sloth, according to Damascene (De Fide Orth. ii, 14) is an oppressive sorrow, which, to wit, so weighs upon man's mind, that he wants to do nothing; thus acid things are also cold. Hence sloth implies a certain weariness of work, as appears from a gloss on Ps. 106:18, "Their soul abhorred all manner of meat," and from the definition of some who say that sloth is a "sluggishness of the mind which neglects to begin good." 
Now this sorrow is always evil, sometimes in itself, sometimes in its effect. For sorrow is evil in itself when it is about that which is apparently evil but good in reality, even as, on the other hand, pleasure is evil if it is about that which seems to be good but is, in truth, evil. Since, then, spiritual good is a good in very truth, sorrow about spiritual good is evil in itself. And yet that sorrow also which is about a real evil, is evil in its effect, if it so oppresses man as to draw him away entirely from good deeds. Hence the Apostle (2 Cor. 2:7) did not wish those who repented to be "swallowed up with overmuch sorrow." 

Accordingly, since sloth, as we understand it here, denotes sorrow for spiritual good, it is evil on two counts, both in itself and in point of its effect. Consequently it is a sin, for by sin we mean an evil movement of the appetite, as appears from what has been said above (10, 2; I-II, 74, 4)."

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/303501.htm


For Dante, Sloth is a sin that may be "worked off" over time along the Mount of Purgatory:

"Sloth (technically called accidia) describes a lax (or tepid) love and pursuit of what is good and virtuous. To correct themselves of this fault, the slothful now show great vigor in running around the terrace, shouting famous examples of slothful behavior and its contrary virtue (decisive zeal) as they go along. One such hurrying soul is the "abbot in St. Zeno," of whom little is known besides what he says to Dante (18.113-29): he was the abbot of the church of St. Zeno in Verona at the time of Frederick Barbarossa (12th century), and he predicts that Alberto della Scala (father of Dante's benefactor, Can Grande) will regret the decision to select his depraved and deformed son Giuseppe as abbot of the church, a position he held from 1291 to 1314."

http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/purgatory/06sloth.html

http://danteworlds.laits.utexas.edu/purgatory/gallery06.html 

http://www.wsu.edu/~delahoyd/medieval/inferno6.html
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