Whether Backbiting Is the Gravest of All Sins Committed Against One's
Neighbor?
Objection 1: It would seem that backbiting is the gravest of all sins
committed against one's neighbor. Because a gloss on Ps. 108:4,
"Instead of making me a return of love they detracted me," a gloss
says: "Those who detract Christ in His members and slay the souls of
future believers are more guilty than those who killed the flesh that
was soon to rise again." From this it seems to follow that backbiting
is by so much a graver sin than murder, as it is a graver matter to
kill the soul than to kill the body. Now murder is the gravest of the
other sins that are committed against one's neighbor. Therefore
backbiting is absolutely the gravest of all.
Obj. 2: Further, backbiting is apparently a graver sin than reviling,
because a man can withstand reviling, but not a secret backbiting.
Now backbiting is seemingly a graver sin than adultery, because
adultery unites two persons in one flesh, whereas reviling severs
utterly those who were united. Therefore backbiting is more grievous
than adultery: and yet of all other sins a man commits against his
neighbor, adultery is most grave.
Obj. 3: Further, reviling arises from anger, while backbiting arises
from envy, according to Gregory (Moral. xxxi, 45). But envy is a
graver sin than anger. Therefore backbiting is a graver sin than
reviling; and so the same conclusion follows as before.
Obj. 4: Further, the gravity of a sin is measured by the gravity of
the defect that it causes. Now backbiting causes a most grievous
defect, viz. blindness of mind. For Gregory says (Regist. xi, Ep. 2):
"What else do backbiters but blow on the dust and stir up the dirt
into their eyes, so that the more they breathe of detraction, the
less they see of the truth?" Therefore backbiting is the most
grievous sin committed against one's neighbor.
_On the contrary,_ It is more grievous to sin by deed than by word.
But backbiting is a sin of word, while adultery, murder, and theft
are sins of deed. Therefore backbiting is not graver than the other
sins committed against one's neighbor.
_I answer that,_ The essential gravity of sins committed against
one's neighbor must be weighed by the injury they inflict on him,
since it is thence that they derive their sinful nature. Now the
greater the good taken away, the greater the injury. And while man's
good is threefold, namely the good of his soul, the good of his body,
and the good of external things; the good of the soul, which is the
greatest of all, cannot be taken from him by another save as an
occasional cause, for instance by an evil persuasion, which does not
induce necessity. On the other hand the two latter goods, viz. of the
body and of external things, can be taken away by violence. Since,
however, the goods of the body excel the goods of external things,
those sins which injure a man's body are more grievous than those
which injure his external things. Consequently, among other sins
committed against one's neighbor, murder is the most grievous, since
it deprives man of the life which he already possesses: after this
comes adultery, which is contrary to the right order of human
generation, whereby man enters upon life. In the last place come
external goods, among which a man's good name takes precedence of
wealth because it is more akin to spiritual goods, wherefore it is
written (Prov. 22:1): "A good name is better than great riches."
Therefore backbiting according to its genus is a more grievous sin
than theft, but is less grievous than murder or adultery.
Nevertheless the order may differ by reason of aggravating or
extenuating circumstances.
The accidental gravity of a sin is to be considered in relation to
the sinner, who sins more grievously, if he sins deliberately than if
he sins through weakness or carelessness. In this respect sins of
word have a certain levity, in so far as they are apt to occur
through a slip of the tongue, and without much forethought.
Reply Obj. 1: Those who detract Christ by hindering the faith of His
members, disparage His Godhead, which is the foundation of our faith.
Wherefore this is not simple backbiting but blasphemy.
Reply Obj. 2: Reviling is a more grievous sin than backbiting, in as
much as it implies greater contempt of one's neighbor: even as
robbery is a graver sin than theft, as stated above (Q. 66, A. 9).
Yet reviling is not a more grievous sin than adultery. For the
gravity of adultery is measured, not from its being a union of
bodies, but from being a disorder in human generation. Moreover the
reviler is not the sufficient cause of unfriendliness in another man,
but is only the occasional cause of division among those who were
united, in so far, to wit, as by declaring the evils of another, he
for his own part severs that man from the friendship of other men,
though they are not forced by his words to do so. Accordingly a
backbiter is a murderer _occasionally,_ since by his words he gives
another man an occasion for hating or despising his neighbor. For
this reason it is stated in the Epistle of Clement [*Ad Jacob. Ep. i]
that "backbiters are murderers," i.e. occasionally; because "he that
hateth his brother is a murderer" (1 John 3:15).
Reply Obj. 3: Anger seeks openly to be avenged, as the Philosopher
states (Rhet. ii, 2): wherefore backbiting which takes place in
secret, is not the daughter of anger, as reviling is, but rather of
envy, which strives by any means to lessen one's neighbor's glory.
Nor does it follow from this that backbiting is more grievous than
reviling: since a lesser vice can give rise to a greater sin, just as
anger gives birth to murder and blasphemy. For the origin of a sin
depends on its inclination to an end, i.e. on the thing to which the
sin turns, whereas the gravity of a sin depends on what it turns away
from.
Reply Obj. 4: Since "a man rejoiceth in the sentence of his mouth"
(Prov. 15:23), it follows that a backbiter more and more loves and
believes what he says, and consequently more and more hates his
neighbor, and thus his knowledge of the truth becomes less and less.
This effect however may also result from other sins pertaining to
hate of one's neighbor.
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