'Vice' is a practice or habit that is considered immoral, depraved, and/or degrading in the associated society. Vice can also refer to conduct that is seen as depraved or degrading such as incest or pedophilia. The term can also be used to refer to a particular form of immoral conduct as in 'drug abuse is a vice'. In more minor usages, vice can refer to a fault, a defect, an infirmity, or merely a bad habit. Synomyms for vice include fault, depravity, sin, iniquity, wickedness and corruption. The modern
English term that best captures its original meaning is the word ''vicious'', which means "full of vice." In this sense, the word ''vice'' comes from the
Latin word ''vitium'', meaning "failing or defect". Vice is the opposite of
virtue.
Vice is also a generic legal term for criminal offenses involving prostitution, lewdness, lasciviousness, and obscenity. Illegal forms of gambling are also often included as a vice in law enforcement departments that deal with vice as a crime.
Overview of religious views on vice
One way of organizing the vices is as the corruption of the virtues. A virtue can be corrupted by nonuse, misuse, or overuse. Thus the cardinal vices would be
lust (nonuse of
temperance),
cowardice (nonuse of
courage), folly (misuse of a virtue, opposite of
wisdom), and
venality (nonuse of
justice). See:
The four virtues.
The Christian vices
Christians believe there are two kinds of vice: those which originate with the physical organism, as perverse instincts, such as lust; and those which originate with false idolatry in the spiritual realm . The first kind, although sinful, are believed to be less serious than the second. Some vices recognized as spiritual by Christians are
blasphemy (
holiness betrayed),
apostasy (
faith betrayed),
despair (
hope betrayed),
hatred (
love betrayed), and
indifference (scripturally, a "hardened
heart"). Christian theologians have reasoned that the most destructive vice equates to a certain type of
Pride or the complete idolatry of the self. It is argued that through this vice, which is essentially competitive, all the worst evil comes into being. In Judeo-Christian creeds it led to the
fall of man originally, and as a purely diabolical spiritual vice it outweighs anything else often condemned by The Church.
Roman Catholic teachings concerning vices
The
Roman Catholic Church distinguishes between vice, which is a habit inclining one to sin, and the sin itself, which is an individual morally wrong act. (Note that in Roman Catholicism, the word sin also refers to the state which befalls one upon committing a morally wrong act; in this section, the word will always mean the sinful act). It is the sin, and not the vice, which deprives one of God's
sanctifying grace and makes one deserving of God's
punishment. St.
Thomas Aquinas therefore taught that "absolutely speaking, the sin surpasses the vice in wickedness"
[1]. On the other hand, even after a person's sins have been
forgiven, the underlying habit, the vice, may remain. Just as vice was created in the first place by repeatedly yielding to the temptation to sin, so vice may be removed only by repeatedly resisting temptation and performing virtuous acts; the more entrenched the vice, the more time and effort needed to remove it. St. Thomas Aquinas says that following rehabilitation and the acquisition of
virtues, the vice does not persist as a habit, but rather as a mere disposition, and one that is in the process of being destroyed.
Examples of vices
Some vices recognized in various
Western cultures of the world include:
Popular usage
The term ''vice'' is also popularly applied to various activities considered
immoral by some; a list of these might include the use of
alcohol and other
recreational drugs,
gambling, smoking, recklessness, cheating, lying,
selfishness. It is also used in reference to police
vice units who prosecute crimes associated with these activities. Often, vice particularly designates a failure to comply with the sexual
mores of the time and place such as
sexual promiscuity.
Behaviors or attitudes going against the established virtues of the culture may also be called vices: for instance,
effeminacy is considered a vice in a culture espousing
masculinity as an essential element of the character of males.
See also
★
Vice unit
★
Virtue
★
Sin
★
Golden mean (philosophy)
★
Roman decadence
Bibliography
★ ''Virtues and Vices'', Aristotle, trans. H. Rackman, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, l992. Vol #285.
Sources
★ All
etymologies are according to the ''
Oxford English Dictionary''.
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