Greed : The Deadly Sin

The vices are as much part of a man as are his virtues, yet some among them seem to stand out with alarming resolution. A man with no vice is very hard to come by. As the world we live in is slowly succumbs to temptations of them, the good at heart are crumbling to a trace minority. A vice is like a disease, it catches you without you knowing it, it feeds on to your thoughts and grows stronger every second and finally when it grows powerful enough, it just takes over your life. Finally it takes you on a very lonely journey to your grave.

jamin brenn and his share of the spoils - 1893

An intriguing paradox of the 1990s is that it isn't called a decade of greed.

- Paul Samuelson

Greed among them is the most evil and most widespread. In fact it is so widespread that we have started to think of greed more as a way of life than as the capital sin it is. Our everyday life is so stuffed with signs of greed, from the sky scrapers aching to touch the heaven to the deep oil wells that borrow down to hell. Greed is all around us, greed is there in everyone around us. In fact most of the problems that humanity now faces can be drawn straight back to man’s greed. Let it be the rising problems of global warming or the severe shortage of usable water, it all ties back to the greed of one man or the other. As men so thoughtlessly engaged in the pursuit of wealth and power he has endangered everything that sustained his arrogance and greed and in turn endangered his very existence and the existence of the planet earth.

There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed.

- Mahatma Gandhi

One man’s greed not only does destroy himself but also the whole lot of people near and dear to him, His thoughtless actions will forge the chains that he will eventually be chained in. In his frivolous pursuit as he annexes one kingdom after the other to his empire, what he is doing is scripting his on eventual decline. But still men tend to be greedy and from this greed stems his other sins, as he forgets who he is and what his virtues are in his pursuit for the fools gold he end up doing things that he might otherwise have looked down at  in contempt and disgust.

Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, 

one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people.

- Garrison Keillor

Greed has claimed his many victims from time immemorial and hence greed is the capital sin, All it takes is a few minutes in ones very busy pursuit to think, think about what is it that they are really chasing. All it takes is to ask oneself if this mirage you chase really your dream. All it takes is these few seconds of contemplation and greed will vanish for ever. When you realize that what you have been chasing all your life is but fallacies then you realize what that is really important to you and what is that you really wish for yourself.

Third Fisherman: Master, I marvel how the fishes live in the sea. 

First Fisherman: Why, as men do a-land; the great ones eat up the little ones.

- William Shakespeare ( Pericles 2.1.69-70 )

I am a Bastard, Ain't I ?

Her words still weigh around my neck; I can hear them echo inside my head. Rewinded and replayed again and again with astonishing clarity. It’s been a couple of days and one long night and still the words persist. There was something in those words of hers that made them so heavy, may be it had to do with the way she had put it or may be it’s the simple truth it encompassed. Either be the case (though how much I ever deny it the later is the real truth, I just grow convinced of the fact) her words has stung me good and it still does stings even more.

What have you ever done? She asked

There was a flare in her eyes; it certainly was not pity. I need not see her to know that, her voice was just enough. 

What happened? 

I coughed up as innocent sounding as possible, but I knew that I was not going to get an answer and it was not going to be ending well.  Truth is that I had no idea what was headed my way!

I could start hearing her well hidden sobs grow louder; there was a sense of insecurity mounting in her heavy breaths.

Do you even love me? 

She asked through her sobs, breaking the melancholic silence that filled the air. 

All i could manage to do was to push out a slight hum through my throat that seemed to have gotten clogged almost instantly. Words were too heavy to push through.

What have you ever done for me? She continued after what seemed like eternity.

You were never there for me whenever I wanted you, 

She was no longer waiting for me to answer, as if she already knew that I would not have an answer for any of the questions she had for me.

Do you remember the time I fell down and sprained my ankle? She asked quizingly. 

How could I ever forget, it was her twentieth birthday and after all the deliberations of the celebration she was chasing her friend around her hostel veranda when she slipped and fell. Nothing serious ever happened to her. That itself was a great relief to me considering how subtle and sublime in construction she was. But worst was yet to happen, the very next day I was a total JERK, there is no point in hiding it when I myself know what I have done to her. She had a sprained ankle and I didn't even bother to look at it, may be in intoxicated illusions she was healthy as a horse, but then again I was a total 'jerk'. When every one knew she was hurt badly the one person whom she wanted by her side was not with her. And when she wanted to go to a doctor and when she asked to accompany her, I so harmlessly denied. I was an idiot then and I had no idea that I was being one. I so foolishly drew a dagger through the one heart that loved me, cared for me and looked out for me. I am a bastard, am I not? 

I knew I could get out of this with some sweet words and a lot of apologizing and some empty promises, but she is not some random fling of mine, she is the one. She deserved better, all I could think of was to let her pour out her heart and I knew that is what she wanted. Hours later we called and she seemed to have had no recollection of her words before. She had forgiven me, she had forgiven me along time ago, but when her heart got burden she just had to let it unload somewhere and I am lucky it’s me. But if that was all to it I wouldn't have been writing this at all. 

The truth is when she said those words, it moved me. It moved me because I knew in my heart she deserved better. Upon hearing her soft sob, all those illustrious letters and poems embroidered with colorful words no longer mattered; they have transcended themselves into items of no real value. What value does the word love project when there is no love involved at all? I had to ask myself was I just all words and no real material, were all those speeches of love just Musings of an empty can, was I just one of those many substitutes that inhabit the earth? Had I become what I had set out not to become. Above all this question taunted me most, could I ever love anybody, and the prospects really do scare me now more than ever. I do stare into an abyss and now with trembling fingers and a racing heart I wonder whether i could turn it around or am I weighed down by the chains that's I myself have crafted. The truth is I am a bastard and I know it, if only I could undo my doings.