Psalm 5:11

nothing but a gaping void

Their throat is an open sepulchre: they dealt deceitfully with their tongues: judge them, O God. Let them fall from their devices: according to the multitude of their wickedness cast them out: for they have provoked thee, O Lord. (Psalm 5:11 DR)

The Scriptures are replete with admonitions against causing scandal, especially when one is in authority. St. James cautions that those who teach will be judged more harshly (James 3:1), St. Paul warns that those who are prelates will have to render an account of the souls under their charge (Hebrews 13:17), and our Lord says that causing scandal to little ones is worse than being drowned in the sea (Matthew 18:6).

The Psalmist in this verse continues the thought of the previous verse and fills out the picture of the wicked more fully. It is interesting that he ascribes the sins they have committed against him to being things that provoke God; sin is not just something committed against others but ultimately against God. The Psalmist elsewhere recounts this truth and applies it to himself:

To thee only have I sinned, and have done evil before thee: that thou mayst be justified in thy words and mayst overcome when thou art judged. (Psalm 50:6 DR)

St. Augustine considers this verse as not only in the sense of sin generally, but specifically of in the sense of gluttony, taken here as rapacious desire for that which is evil:

It may be referred to signify gluttony, for the sake of which men very often lie by flattery. And admirably has he said, an open sepulchre: for this gluttony is ever gaping with open mouth, not as sepulchres, which, on the reception of corpses, are closed up. This also may be understood hereby, that with lying and blind flattery men draw to themselves those whom they entice to sin; and as it were devour them, when they turn them to their own way of living. (St. Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, 5, 12.)

This gluttony is not something merely personal or somehow unconnected from others—it can be a stumbling block to others. And if one is in a position of authority, this can lead to not only one’s own spiritual ruin, but also of those one leads:

And when this happens to them, since by sin they die, those by whom they are led along, are rightly called open sepulchres: for themselves too are in a manner lifeless, being destitute of the life of truth; and they take in to themselves dead men, whom having slain by lying words and a vain heart, they turn unto themselves. (ibid.)

St. Augustine no doubt has in mind our Lord’s woes against the scribes and Pharisees in which he describes them as

…whited sepulchres, which outwardly appear to men beautiful but within are full of dead men's bones and of all filthiness. So you also outwardly indeed appear to men just: but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. (Matthew 23:27 DR)

The danger of this sort of spiritual gluttony is that those engage in it can seem to have it all together or to be holy, which may cause some to follow or listen to them, to their own spiritual peril. The last few decades have seen (sadly) no end of examples of this, in which great sin and hypocrisy comes to light in those who have seemed holy or were in positions of authority or influence. For many without a well-founded faith the disillusionment can cause a shipwreck of their faith. This is why Jesus also warns:

You shut the kingdom of heaven against men: for you yourselves do not enter in and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter. (Matthew 27:13 DR)

These realities form the Psalmist’s cry to the Lord for judgement, a cry and warning all we who desire influence should take heed of.

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This animation was entirely premised on the image I found. I knew I wanted a head eating stuff, but I found this striking (not in a good way) image of a statue of Marx and thought it would be a perfect metaphor for a throat being an open sepulcher, as perhaps no ideology has unleashed so much misery and destruction as that of its eponymous progenitor.

I cut out the head in Photoshop and then separated out the mouth to be able to animate it. I found some images of macarons which I liked mostly for the color, but I (for some reason) perceive them as a somewhat decadent snack (probably not true), and so I thought that a constant stream of them being eaten would be apropos for both the ravening and unsatiated appetite of Marxism and the nice things no one can have because of it.

In After Effects I simply animated the macarons sliding into the mouth and masked them appropriately as the mouth closes. The mouth animation was pretty simple, and I added some anticipation and overshoot on the head’s biting movement to give the consumption some weight and add more heft to the animation as a whole.

Enjoy.

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View a higher quality version of this gif here: