mammon

mammon, biblical term for riches, often used to describe the debasing influence of material wealth. The term was used by Jesus in his famous Sermon on the Mount and also appears in The Gospel According to Luke. Medieval writers commonly interpreted it as an evil demon or god. Since the 16th century, mammon has been used to negatively describe the pursuit of wealth and has been used in both religious and secular contexts.

Etymology

The etymology of the word is somewhat debated by scholars, but it seems to be derived from the Aramaic māmōnā. The word is rendered mamōnas in Greek and mammona in Late Latin and was left untranslated in the Vulgate. In English, mammon was used in the King James Version of the Bible and persisted as a word in other literature, though most modern Bibles variously use “wealth,” “riches,” or “gain.”

It is sometimes argued that the Aramaic word is transliterated from Hebrew, which is not unreasonable given Jesus’ Jewish background. In Mishnaic Hebrew the word mihamon is a contraction of mi, meaning “from,” and hāmōn, meaning “accumulation,” and connotes wealth or money. This word is used neutrally in the Hebrew Bible as the equivalent to gain and is found in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Talmud.

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Mammon in the New Testament

There are two passages in the New Testament that use mamōnas. The most famous is part of the Sermon on the Mount from Matthew 6:24 (King James Version), in which Jesus asserts, “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” A similar, longer passage is found in Luke 16:9–13 (King James Version), which states,

And I say unto you, make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations. He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much. If therefore ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to your trust the true riches? And if ye have not been faithful in that which is another man’s, who shall give you that which is your own? No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

In both Gospels the term is associated with unrighteousness and represents something that is at odds with service to God. Given that both passages are contextualized within a discussion of one’s treasures in heaven, the word is usually understood as the acquisition of material wealth or the idolatry of material riches.

Evolution of the term

Over time, the somewhat abstract concept of mammon became more fully personified in art and literature. Some scholars, such as St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. John Chrysostom, and Peter Lombard, understood Mammon to be a demon. Medieval theologians assigned seven archdemons to the seven deadly sins, and Mammon became the demon of greed. Similarly, Mammon was also sometimes conflated with the Greek god Plutus and depicted as the seductive god of riches. Famous personifications of mammon are found in Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist, John Milton’s Paradise Lost, and Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene. The word eventually gained a secular connotation as an all-consuming pursuit of wealth and was often used in critiques of capitalism or of wealthy individuals.

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