Pia fraus
Pia fraus ( Latin : pious deception ) denotes a deception or concealment of the truth with supposedly good intentions, namely popular deception for religious purposes.
The expression comes from Ovid . In the Metamorphoses he tells of a Cretan who wanted a son at all costs. He announced that if a daughter were born to him, he would kill her. After a girl was actually born, the goddess Isis advised the mother to pass this off for a boy, which was all the easier for her since the father had given the boy the name Iphis, which in antiquity applied to both sexes.
- "So the concealment remained obscure through pious deception"
- " Inde incepta pia mendacia fraude latebant".
Through this pious deception the life of Iphis was saved, the goddess later transformed her into a man.
A self-deception is sometimes referred to as “pious fraud” .
Individual evidence
- ^ Art. Pia fraus . In: Pierer's Universal Lexicon of the Present and the Past , 4th edition, Volume 13, Altenburg 1861, p. 114 ( online ).
- ^ Ovid : Metamorphoses . Iphis. Quoted from http://www.textlog.de/35360.html