Seven Social Sins
Mohandas Gandhi's list of negative qualities
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Key Takeaways
- Seven Social Sins is a list by Frederic Donaldson that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi published in his weekly newspaper Young India on 22 October 1925.
- Gandhi listed the sins as: Wealth without work.
- Knowledge without character.
- Science without humanity.
- Politics without principle.
Seven Social Sins is a list by Frederic Donaldson that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi published in his weekly newspaper Young India on 22 October 1925. Later he gave this same list written on a piece of paper to his grandson, Arun Gandhi, on their final day together shortly before his assassination.
Gandhi listed the sins as:
- Wealth without work.
- Pleasure without conscience.
- Knowledge without character.
- Commerce without morality.
- Science without humanity.
- Religion without sacrifice.
- Politics without principle.
History
The list was published by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in his weekly newspaper Young India on 22 October 1925. An almost identical list had been published six months earlier in England in a sermon at Westminster Abbey by Fredrick Lewis Donaldson. Gandhi wrote that a correspondent whom he called a "fair friend" had sent the list: "The... fair friend wants readers of Young India to know, if they do not already, the following seven social sins," (the list was then provided). After the list, Gandhi wrote that "Naturally, the friend does not want the readers to know these things merely through the intellect but to know them through the heart so as to avoid them." This was the entirety of Gandhi's commentary on the list when he first published it.
Influence
In the decades since its first publication, the list has been widely cited and discussed. Some books have also focused on the seven sins or been structured around them:
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