Bes gluttony. Signs and symptoms of gluttony. Reflections on the Divine Liturgy. N.V. Gogol

Date: 2014-06-05

Today we will analyze one interesting question related to food culture and eating behavior. These will be the traditional, religious and scientific aspects of gluttony. Indeed, Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit. And if they managed to curb their senseless appetite, perhaps humanity would still be walking along heavenly tabernacles? I’ll say right away that we are talking about traditional knowledge, which we will discuss separately from religious aspects, so take the text accordingly, agreed? You probably know that traditional knowledge is an important source of health information for me. I believe that knowledge, skills, and practices that are beneficial to health survived and became fixed because they gave an advantage to their carriers (like genes in evolution). Why is gluttony (gluttony) included in the list of mortal sins?! Who seems to feel bad because of what I eat? But everything is not so simple.

What is gluttony?

Drinking water, breathing oxygen, and eating are essential to everyday survival. However, it is difficult to imagine that a person suddenly began to greedily swallow air or drink hecalitres of water without a rational reason. But there is such a problem with food, and her name is gluttony. What it is, by their own example, residents of developed countries are becoming more and more convinced. And Russia is no exception.

What is gluttony in Orthodoxy?

In Orthodoxy, gluttony is considered one of the seven deadly sins.

There are several signs, each of which is reflected in the pages of Holy Scripture:

• Eating before traditional meal times to stimulate digestion. King Saul's son Jonathan sipped some honey before dinner, for which his father punished him by fasting until dark;
• Finding better quality food. The Israelites asked the Almighty for meat, because they were fed up with fish and other food. God fulfilled their request, but punished the people after 500 years;
• Add seasonings to bring a new taste to ordinary grubs. Eli's two sons found death after cooking meat in a different way from the traditional;
• Eating with too much zeal, even when very hungry. Esau sold his birthright to eat lentil stew.

The last sin is considered the most serious among the Orthodox, because it demonstrates a craving for pleasure - unacceptable in the Christian world.

Overeating as a mental problem

Science rarely finds common ground with the Christian faith. The situation with gluttony is one of the rare exceptions. International classification diseases, an eating disorder leading to obesity is officially recognized. Gradations of the disease can be many: from mild to severe bulimia nervosa.

Among the most typical symptoms of the disease:

• Periodic loss of control over the process of eating;
• Multiple increase in portions and frequency of eating during stress;
• Weakening of subjective sensations regarding the volume of portions and the time of their absorption;
• Relapses can sometimes be pre-planned: buying large amounts of food for late-night meals;
• Patients, as a rule, are embarrassed to show weakness to their stomach in public. For simple pleasure, they retire and are very shy if they are caught at this time;
• Memory lapses regarding meals: the inability to remember the diet for the previous and even the current day;
• Feelings of guilt for every extra piece stuck in the throat.

Why is gluttony a sin?

None of the religious prohibitions would have ever been observed by billions of people for thousands of years, if it had not even the slightest relation to common sense.

From the point of view of faith, every Orthodox should limit himself to daily meals for the following reasons:

• Reveling in a huge number of dishes beyond measure, a person forgets about those in need. Our absurd world is arranged in such a way that while some overeat, others cannot find themselves even a loaf of bread. Every extra piece of food should go to the hungry and only to them;
• Hedonism is the worst enemy of any world religion. That Catholicism, that Orthodoxy, that Protestantism - they are all equally based on the idea of ​​self-denial for the sake of a great idea. Receiving pleasure is regarded as a sin, whether it be carnal pleasure or an extra fruit eaten;
• Even people who are far from religious prohibitions admit that gluttony is not in the best way affects the state of health. Owners of impressive belly sizes are regulars in clinics and do not live longer than average life expectancy.

Proper orthodox nutrition

So, we figured out how not to eat. Now the only thing left is to figure out how to properly organize a meal according to all the canons of Orthodoxy.

According to the Holy Fathers, the process should look like this:

1. If a person has realized that he eats wrong and sinful of Christian morality, then everything can still be corrected;
2. First of all, you need to limit the use of spices and spices in everyday food;
3. Then comes the turn of the rejection of sweets;
4. Then follows the rejection of fatty foods;
5. You need to leave the table when the first urge to hunger is satisfied, but you still want to eat;
6. While eating food, one must remain silent. During an interesting conversation, much more can be eaten than usual;
7. It is recommended to repeat the prayer to yourself in order to distract the brain from mortal and sinful thoughts.

Harm from overeating

Storing kilograms of excess food in the stomach can lead to very deplorable consequences for the body:

• Millions of people in our time are engaged in mental work. Calories do not have time to be spent, which leads to the formation of body fat and an increase in overweight. Which, in turn, can be the source of a whole bunch of new diseases;
• Regular exposure to departments nervous system, responsible for the feeling of satiety, can negatively affect the concentration of glucose in the blood. Thus, the feeling of hunger increases for a longer period;
• There is an increased load on the digestive organs responsible for the synthesis of biologically active catalysts. Failures in their work can lead to stomach ulcers, liver disease and the formation of kidney stones;
• If there is a significant amount of sweet in the diet, then the pancreas is under attack. Problems with this organ lead to disruptions in the endocrine system and the development of diabetes;
• In advanced cases, the natural metabolism is disturbed. Then it will be doubly difficult to return to a normal diet: the body is already accustomed to serious stress.

How to overcome gluttony?

The volume of world food consumption is growing at the same time as the desire to look good. The most popular way to get good figure are:

• diets. This method is popular only on the Internet. For the consistent implementation of all the prescriptions of strict diets, remarkable willpower is required. And the effectiveness of a number of methods is questionable. Harm to health cannot be ruled out either;
• So future beauties can choose more easy way - pharmaceuticals . The latter are of several types: burning fat, reducing appetite and slowing down the rate of absorption of food by the body;
• food coding. This mysterious phrase hides a hypnotic effect on the human psyche to wean him from the addiction to kiss the plate;
• Usage folk remedies . Obesity was not a popular disease in Rus' for obvious reasons. But even for her there are special decoctions and tinctures of medicinal herbs. For example, it is known to use tinctures of dandelion, marshmallow and burdock for this purpose.

For most of the history of mankind, there was no such situation that the vast majority of the population did not suffer from hunger, but from the complete opposite of this phenomenon. Not a century passed without a hundred or two thousand people perishing in one part of the world or another from lack of food. They heard the word "gluttony" only from the sermons of the local priest. This is more a blessing than a sin, whatever the Abrahamic religions may claim.

Death from cardiovascular disease in early adulthood - what could be sadder for a spouse, children and friends? Common cause such diseases - overeating and related complications in the form of overweight, advanced level cholesterol and inactivity (with overweight, you don’t want to move, the vicious circle is absurdly closed). And the reason for the abnormal attitude to food in Christian asceticism is called gluttony. This is a grave sin in both the Orthodox and Catholic traditions. Why?

Satiety as the goal of life

It is believed that a person infected with this disease of the spirit puts his satiety and pleasure from eating above everything in life, including above the Lord God. This submission to the lower needs of the body is, in fact, a form of bondage. How many people want to lose weight without trying to overcome the cause of this trouble - an abnormal relationship with food!

Not only gluttony

In the view of many, gluttony is an excess consumption of food. In fact, gluttony is just one of the demons that torment the soul. The second is the addiction to delicious food. Such a social phenomenon as gourmetism, the desire to "understand" tasty things, is very dangerous from a spiritual point of view.

Anorexics are also gluttons

You have probably noticed that many people who are losing weight begin to be painfully attentive to food, plan each meal and imagine for hours what exactly they will eat tomorrow morning, when it will already be “possible” to eat what is forbidden in the evening? They are obsessed with gluttony! Bulimia and anorexia are also manifestations of an abnormal attitude towards physiology.

How should you eat?

So, there is only No need for extremes, we are not monks, and therefore absolute strictness is beyond the reach of many. You just need to try to eat especially attractive food on holidays, preferably church holidays, and limit yourself to just one small portion without additives. Then we won't make a mistake. The main thing is not to dream about a holiday a month before the event, making gastronomic pleasures the most important thing in the "program".

At a wrong time

The third demon that torments the soul of the glutton is impatience with regard to meal times. That is, when a person eats earlier than the time that is usually or appointed for him. It turns out that the ideal Christian is the one who is able to do without "goodies", he eats moderately and on schedule. Gluttony is a disease of the soul because it makes the sinner dependent on food. All the diversity of the phenomena of the world for a person turns out to be obscured by the opportunity to enjoy "here and now".

mother of passions

Gluttony is a mortal sin because it is from it that all other passions begin. In particular, a person who has allowed himself too much develops excessive or inappropriate sexual desire, laziness, leading to idleness, despondency (from being overweight, for example). Things can even come to pride (when a person is hurt by the fact that he, the "titan of will", took and was defeated).

Is there a specific one, but it makes sense to pray to Mary of Egypt, who was pursued by passions for many years of torment in the wilderness. But magic “from God” does not exist, it is best to pray for the help of Christ himself, remembering that it is impossible to completely defeat the passion of gluttony, even great ascetics failed to do this. You just need to try to keep yourself within the limits every day. And ask God for strength to fight. Gluttony is also non-observance of fasts ...

Gluttony is such a sin that makes us eat and drink only for the sake of pleasure. This passion leads to the fact that a person, as it were, ceases to be a rational being and is likened to cattle, which does not have the gift of speech and understanding. The teachers of the Church tell us that gluttony is a great sin. It made Adam taste the forbidden fruit, it also became one of the causes of the Flood, every time it distracted the Israelites from honoring the true God and inclined them to serve idols and so on.

Thus, "giving free rein" to the womb, we harm not only our health, but also all our virtues, especially chastity. Gluttony kindles lust, as excess food contributes to this. Lust, on the other hand, leads to a fall, and therefore it is so necessary that a person be well armed against this passion. You can not give the womb as much as it asks, but only what is needed to maintain strength.

Extremes, as the holy fathers say, are equally harmful on both sides - both the excess of fasting and the satiety of the womb. We know some who, not having been conquered by gluttony, were cast down by immeasurable fasting and fell into the same passion of gluttony because of the weakness resulting from excessive fasting. Moreover, immoderate abstinence is more harmful than satiety, because from the latter, due to repentance, one can proceed to right action, but not from the former. The general rule of moderation in abstinence is that everyone, in accordance with his strength, body condition and age, should eat as much food as is necessary to maintain the health of the body, and not as much as the desire for satiety requires.

The stomach should be given only what it needs to take, and no more. After all, the Lord created man not for food, but created food for man, so that he would have the strength to live and work. Food is like medicine: if you drink as much as the doctor prescribed, there will be only benefit, and if more, then harm. Gluttony is the beginning of many sins, and he who constantly struggles with this sin and overcomes it, can rule over other sins. Therefore, all the saints who labored in the wilderness, first of all, forced themselves to take the upper hand over gluttony, knowing that, having conquered this passion, they would get rid of all the others.

According to Gregory Dvoeslov, there are five types and ways in which gluttony tempts us. These are the intention, the method, the quality, the quantity, and the situation (time). Time forces us to anticipate the next meal without benefit or necessity. Thus we eat much earlier than the proper hour. The amount of food makes us eat and drink more than we should. Quality - look for gourmet dishes. The way we eat tempts us to eat with passion, voraciously, greedily and predatory. The idea is to cook food with imagination, so that it delights our palate.

Through gluttony, various passions are born, therefore it is ranked among the seven deadly sins. Gluttony coarsens the mind, because stench rises from the stomach, clouding the mind, making a person lethargic and incapable of contemplation. Lulling the rational part of the spirit, gluttony inflates passions, making a person a deceitful, talkative dreamer, speaking inappropriate and absurd speeches.

At the same time, the mind becomes clouded as from guilt, and in this position it is no longer possible to restrain either feelings or tongue. But worst of all, the consequence of gluttony is impurity: one who reveres the womb as a god sins with a mortal sin, since his main goal in life is to eat and drink. Those who are attracted by gluttony do not think about the Lord's commandments, and there are those who, knowingly drunk with wine, commit outrages and violence. In particular, such people force others to drink and feast with them even on fasting days. In itself, the tendency to gluttony is not a mortal sin, unless it is done at the risk to one's health, to the detriment of oneself or to the temptation of others.

However, high food expenses are reflected in the material condition of the family. And it is a sin if you see that your loved ones are in need of the most necessary, and at the same time continue to enjoy food, expressing reproaches to relatives and not compassion for them. But even if gluttony would not be ranked among the mortal sins and it would not prevent us from living, it should still be avoided, since it is harmful to our body. Therefore, we should hate this sin. After all, only foolish animals eat in order to accumulate fat and be stabbed after that. And people are created in the image and likeness of God to enjoy eternity and eat God in paradise.

If you hold the flesh in a tight bridle, then it benefits the soul, as you acquire virtues.

Saint John of Kronstadt

Run such a way of life that you live only by animal urges and desires, to sleep, eat, dress, walk, then again drink, eat and walk. Such a way of life finally kills the completely spiritual life of man, making him an earthly and earthy being; while a Christian must be heavenly on earth

And if you want to remain human, hold back your womb and guard yourself with all care so that you don't accidentally be defeated by even one kind of gluttony.

If you have once been tempted by the thought of eating before the appointed time, you must resist it in every possible way, following the example of the monk described in Lavsaik. When the demon inspired the monk to eat in the morning, he said to himself: "Be patient, and at the third hour you will eat." When it was time for the third hour, he would say to himself, "Let's do needlework" or "Let's read the psalms." Then he slowly soaked the rusk in water and thus waited for the ninth hour. The monk was free from the sin of gluttony.

The second type of gluttony is the quality of food, that is, a person consciously looks for attractive outwardly and delicious dishes. Here also you need to be very careful and eat the food that does not give you pleasure: it does not pamper the body, but only keeps it alive. If simple food seems tasteless to you, then you need to eat only stale bread for a while, after which even simple but fresh bread will seem like a delicacy to you. But first of all, you need to wait for the ninth hour (according to modern - three in the afternoon), when you will be hungry enough. Only then will you be able to understand how delicious the simplest food can be.

The third type of gluttony is the amount of food. This happens when you eat more than what your body needs. This type of gluttony should be avoided no less than other types of this sin, since it is very dangerous. The abundance of food and wine darkens the rational part of the soul, and you can easily lose yourself. At heart you are cheerful, rejoicing and singing, clapping your hands and jumping up and down, defiling yourself with dirty talk. If you ate and drank enough, you wouldn't behave like this. Be careful, otherwise your heart will be weighed down with intoxication, and in intoxication you will not be able to avoid anger and possible trouble.

Reverend Abba Theon

Gluttony must be overcome not only for oneself, so that it does not harm us with burdensome gluttony, and not only so that it does not inflame us with the fire of carnal lust, but so that it does not make us slaves of anger or rage, sadness and all other passions.

The fourth kind of this sin is in the manner of eating. If you eat greedily and swallow everything quickly, then this is called nothing more than swine outrage. This is how cattle eat, but not people. And you, when you eat, should take care of yourself and listen carefully to the reading that is usual at the meal. If there is no reading, you need to raise your thoughts to God and, thinking about His saving Passion, pray. In this case, the soul will be saturated along with the body.

The fifth and last type of gluttony is excessive concern for the quality of dishes, that is, the habit of choosing only good and varied. With all your soul you must hate this habit as harmful to the soul and not be like those who, in the words of the Apostle Paul, have a womb - God. These people serve the womb with the care that is proper only in serving the true God. The teachings of the Holy Fathers of the Church can help to get rid of this passion.

But first of all, consider how much hardship drunkenness and gluttony bring to your stomach, how they oppress your body. And what is special about gluttony? What new can give us the taste of specious dishes? After all, their pleasant taste lasts only when they are in your mouth. And after you swallow them, not only sweetness will remain, but also the memory of their taste. If you do not believe, then try to ask yourself: what pleasantness and what taste do you feel from those dishes and wines that you ate and drank during your life? Surely you will not be able to remember, and the feeling will be as if you have never tried anything.

Pleasure passes quickly, so when a thought tempts you, think about the fact that everything has already passed. Do not follow the will of the flesh, because whether you ate choice dishes in the evening or limited yourself to bread and water, tomorrow it will no longer be a difference. But only in the first case you will have the sin of gluttony, but in the second - no.

As for the harm and outrages resulting from the passion of gluttony, these are, first of all, unnecessary expenses associated with the “maintenance” of the womb, various diseases arising from drunkenness and overeating, as well as clouding of the mind. In this state, a person is not capable of doing anything, either spiritual or bodily, because he does not want anything. It is also worth thinking about the eternal hunger and thirst that you will experience after death, which is clearly stated in the Gospel of Luke.

Think about what gives you gluttony and the pleasure of the flesh. After all, after death, she will be good prey for worms. Think also of the Heavenly Meal to which everyone is invited. But if you wish to partake of this Meal, then be restrained in eating in the present temporal life. After all, even here, in this world, if you were invited to dinner, then you will not eat or drink before that, otherwise you will not want to eat where you were invited.

Reverend John Cassian the Roman

Gluttony is divided into three types: one type encourages eating before a certain hour; the other loves only to be satiated with any kind of food; the third wants tasty food. Against this, the Christian must be careful in three ways: to wait for a certain time for eating; do not get fed up; to be content with all the most modest food.

And the last thing: remember the abstinence of the Savior, Who fasted in the wilderness for 40 days. Never forget the Passion of Jesus, but always remember them with great sorrow and constriction of heart. Avoid dinner parties and feasts where there is a lot of food and it is difficult to maintain abstinence. There you will be overwhelmed by one type of holiday food. Our forefathers also endured this temptation: seeing the beautiful fruit and not being able to restrain themselves, they committed a sin. And we, their descendants, are now paying in full with them.

In order to learn abstinence, you need to remember three rules: first - living with others, you need to eat with them and at the same time; second - do not anticipate the time of eating unless absolutely necessary; third - do not be late for the table, so as not to tempt others.

The same can be attributed to the quality of food: if they cook one dish for everyone, and one person wants another, then this is not entirely good. The exception is a sick person to whom the doctor prescribed this or that diet. But if you refuse a common dish of your own free will, then this is a sin. In addition, it is impossible, while abstaining, to grumble or condemn others, because the virtue of abstinence should be accomplished in peace and joy of the heart. There is no reward for the one who fasts in order to exalt himself in the eyes of others, since the goal of any abstinence is to acquire the glory of God. And he who aspires to vanity and worldly glory will not be worthy of it. He rather inherits the torment along with the secret eater.

Everyone should abstain according to his ability, especially from the use of wine. After all, it is no secret that intoxication crowds the rational part of the soul, therefore it becomes the cause of harm: damage to the body and soul. One must beware of wine and never even drink it to those who are thirsty for salvation. And these are, first of all, women, young men, priests, judges and monks. Young people are easily led into temptation, as they have a very strong lust for the flesh. Wine, on the other hand, provokes an impulse to unbridled aspirations and outrage, as the apostle Paul says in his Epistle to Titus.

Women should also avoid wine, as they do not have the strength to resist carnal desires warmed by wine. So, according to Valery Maxim, in Ancient Rome women never drank wine. Judges who care about the welfare of the people should also not drink wine and commit excesses. In the Proverbs of Solomon, kings are forbidden from drinking wine so that they can make well-considered decisions. Clerics should also not drink alcohol in order to read with reverence, to perform services according to their order, with the fear of God and compunction, which the jaded will never be able to do.

According to the Holy Fathers, our flesh is a disorderly and impudent enemy: the more we please it, the more cruelly it fights with us. Her generals are feelings and lusts, her weapons are wines and various dishes, and those wounds that the soul receives are sins. The harm to the body is the diseases of the stomach, head and kidneys, and if you want to avoid them, fight them with abstinence. Temperance is that virtue which robs the flesh of strength and weapons, and which itself can be subjected to the dominion of reason.

Saint Basil the Great

Learn to keep the womb in a strong bridle: it alone does not give thanks for the good deeds rendered to it.

Just as drunkenness can grow into fornication, so abstinence is the guardian of chastity. Temperance curbs the flesh, making a person the master of passions and the conqueror of the enemy that confuses us. Therefore, one must hate gluttony as the root cause of all sins. Especially one should beware of secret eating - a vice with a serpentine disposition, which causes great harm to our soul. This sin is so vile to the Savior that only for it He already condemns a person, about which much has been written in spiritual literature. For this sin alone, a person will be tormented, and no other good deeds will benefit him. Therefore, drunkenness and gluttony, and especially secret eating, must be hated with all your soul, so as not to inherit eternal torment with sinners.

Gluttony, which even Christians of a high spiritual life indulge in, is often compared to an eagle. Although this bird soars in the sky, hiding from the faces of people, but at the first request of the womb descends to the ground and feeds on carrion. Therefore, gluttony cannot be stopped by any force, like other vices: it can only be limited by the power of the spirit. However, if a conquered gluttony begins to flatter you with its humility, as if begging you to indulge it, reduce the measure of abstinence and jealousy for severity, do not give up: its humility is only visible. Knowing that you have become calmer from the bestial kindling of passions, do not think that the danger has passed, and do not return to your former intemperance, because the conquered gluttony, as it were, says to itself: “I will return to my house, from where I came out” (Matt. 12:44 ).

Saint John Chrysostom

Just as a ship, loaded with more than it can hold, sinks under the weight of the load, so exactly both the soul and the nature of our body: taking food in sizes exceeding its strength ... overflows and, unable to withstand the weight of the load, sinks in the sea of ​​death and at the same time destroys the swimmers, and the helmsman, and the navigator, and the sailors, and the cargo itself. As it happens with ships that are in this state, so it is with those who are satiated: no matter how quiet the sea is, nor the skill of the helmsman, nor the multitude of shipmen, nor the proper equipment, nor the favorable season, nothing else benefits the ship so overwhelmed in this way, so and here: neither teaching, nor exhortation, [nor censure of those present], nor instruction and advice, nor fear of the future, nor shame, nothing else can save the soul so overwhelmed in this way.

And then the spirits (vices) that come from him, seven in number, will be even more evil for you than the passion from which you got rid, and very soon they will lead you to sins. Therefore, having overcome the passion of gluttony with the help of fasting and abstinence, do not leave your soul empty: virtues must settle in it. Carefully fill all the secret curves of your heart so that the spirit of gluttony, returning, will not find a place for itself. Otherwise, he will enter your soul again, taking with him all seven sins, so that "the last will become worse than the first." For there is nothing more vile and dirty than that soul, which, boasting that it has already renounced this world, gives shelter to all mortal sins. As a result, she is subjected to such severe punishment as she was not subjected to before she acquired Christian dignity.

The fact is that the seven spirits mentioned are considered more evil than the spirit that has gone out, because the desire for a womb would not be so harmful if it did not entail stronger passions - such as fornication, anger, avarice, despondency, sadness, pride, vanity, which, no doubt, are much more harmful and disastrous for the soul. And therefore, he cannot achieve perfection who, by abstinence alone, wants to achieve perfect purity. After all, abstinence is a bodily fast, after which, having pacified the flesh, one should enter into battle with the rest of the passions.

First of all, you need to suppress the sin of gluttony, but your mind must be sharpened not only by fasting, but also by reading, vigilance and contrition of the heart about what you consider yourself defeated or deceived. Then, lamenting his vices and gaining a desire to become perfect, a person finally realizes that eating is not allowed for our pleasure: it is only an inevitable need of the body. A person occupied with such reflections is able to suppress voluptuousness, which is intensified by eating food and wine, and the furnace of his body, kindled by the devil, can be extinguished by heartfelt weeping for sins. Subsequently, upon reaching true perfection, this flame will gradually be extinguished by the dew of God's grace that dwells in our hearts.