The discussion can become complicated - my starting point is “sin is breaking God’s command/law”. This is so even if we break the Law intentionally or not, or if it is articulated by Moses or some other way. That is why Paul says all have sinned and are without excuse.
We need to obtain greater insight on “the Law of God”. On this site often comments refer to the law of gravity and other notions, so to use such analogy, I would say, what if you or me were to break the law of gravity, even if we did not fully understand it, and others did not seek to break it? The result will inevitably be: planets would get out of orbits, suns may explode, and generally the universe would be broken.
So, this ‘what if’ illustrates the point, that the spiritual law that may lead those with the image of God to lawful attributes, was broken, and instead humanity formed sinful attributes (these are discussed in the bible).
The fairness comes from Christ, who understood that we could not keep the Law (we are deceived), and so He made sure that we can be saved.
My point is that your term ‘sin’ has a twofold meaning:
Adam’s sin was “breaking of God’s commandment knowingly and intentionally”.
This Adam’s transgression resulted in a sin as “an attribute of human nature”, a sinful condition by which “we are all sinners”, however NOT as if we had knowingly and intentionally transgressed .
The condition of “being sinner” in the sense of 2 of its own, does NOT entail eternal separation from God after death.
I would be thankful to know whether you agree to this.
If YES we would have common ground for discussing in depth the really interesting question you raise:
What does “a sin as an attribute of human nature” mean?
I said that the discussion becomes complicated. The complexity and instability found in a community is problematic. A means for addressing the problematical is via the law of God and a discussion is required on the notion of law. This cannot be carried out without a detailed consideration of freedom. A human being is assumed to have a capacity for choice to act in some manner within our understanding of the notion of law. If the law of God is comprehended as active concepts accepted by a human being based on, or because of, intent ‘to love God’, intention and act need to be considered. If we consider a separation of intent and act, this would introduce a possibility of an act actualising different to the intent. For the requirement of a one-ness of intent and act to be met, an additional attribute is required from a human; I use the term for this attribute “of being lawful”.
Such an attribute would require an intrinsic aspect of lawfulness within a human being – i.e. the human being can only be lawful in that he is that person. The Gospel teaches us that all have sinned and have come short of the Glory of God. This shows that even if we view the Law of God as intrinsic via a human attribute, in practice, human beings would comprehend the negation of an attribute (e.g. if a person committed murder, he would be understood as “without a lawful attribute”, i.e. a criminal). Such a negation may be understood within a judgement that intent, and act, were not realised, and the result is comprehension of error (i.e. the person unintentionally killed another human being); otherwise a judgement would be required on the falsehood of a stated intent; for example, if the intent of such a person was to harmed another person, and then denies that intent, such a human would be “without a lawful attribute regarding deceit” by uttering a falsehood, and so on. By this reasoning, the attribute of a person who intended and acted correctly, would be a “lawful attribute”; however, if a person did not intent, nor act, to harm another person, this in itself could also be non-activity (or if an act occurred, an examination for other causes would be warranted). This would require a judgement, and on the possibility of an intrinsic aspect to a human.
I would say thought-provoking, rather than complicated!
The “Gospel quotation” you refer to comes from Romans 3:23-24:
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
It is worth matching this passage with these two other Romans’ verses:
God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all. (Romans 11:32).
Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who is a pattern of the one to come. (Romans 5:14).
These three passages together lead us straightforwardly to the following insights:
Adam sinned by “breaking a command of God” and lost the original state of grace in which he was created by God. However, God in his mercy did not damned Adam to join the devil but allowed him to remain on earth to have opportunity to atone and reach justification through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.
After Adam’s transgression, God creates everyone short of the glory of God, that is, lacking the original grace offered to Adam. For this reason, after the first transgression, “death reigns over every human person on earth, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam”. In this sense it holds that “all have sinned”, i.e. “everyone is bound over to disobedience” and shares the same fallen condition of Adam.
Most important: The reason why God “bounds everyone over to disobedience” is “to have mercy on them all”, that is, to make it possible that all reach justification. Keeping on earth persons who could feel entitled to claim to be better than others would impair the work of redemption.
So what you call a “sin as an attribute of human nature” means nothing other than a sinful condition all of humanity is bound over to because of Adam’s transgression but for the sake of redemption.
This can be better understood if one keeps in mind that God’s mercy is the ultimate reason for God’s creative act. This means: God’s mercy is an essential ingredient of human nature; you cannot define humanity (even as a biological species) without invoking God’s intervention and thus God’s mercy. So, each sin attempts against God’s mercy, but uselessly because the only thing it achieves is to enhance such mercy even more. The first sin did this and, instead of damnation for the sinner, it elicited “need of redemption” for all!
It is worth studying more in depth the reasons why “keeping on earth persons who could feel entitled to claim to be better than others” would have impaired the work of redemption. I think @Mols has inspiring ideas in this respect:
You make some useful points - the reason I have stated the discussion gets complicated is because we would then need to discuss freedom of a rational agent (human) and how this can be understood within the context of moral/sinful acts, intentions and attributes.
It is interesting to see that Genesis defines ‘human’ not using the category ‘rational agent’ but primarily with attributes like ‘being created in the image and likeness of God’, ‘having awareness of God’s commandment’ and therefore ‘being accountable toward God’.
It is also important to note that without invoking God’s intervention one cannot define humanity.
In a previous post I have quoted the computational biologist Richard Durbin: It is biologically impossible to establish when the species Homo sapiens begins with anything other than arbitrary criteria.
And somewhere in another thread it has been fittingly remarked:
“To even want to detect ‘a first human being’ in the context of evolution is in the neighborhood of madness”.
In other words, to establish the moment when humanity begins, and hence sharply defining humankind, even as a biological species, requires invoking an intervention coming from outside biology.
Certainly evolution laid the groundwork to God’s intervention by producing a sharp difference between humans and non-human animals. However, this difference would have been meaningless without God’s intervention to define mankind.
It is in this very moment that the category ‘human species’ becomes meaning-ful, and thereby all the other species acquire meaning and can be named: “man gave names to all the livestock”, “whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name” (Genesis 2: 19-20).
As we have seen, Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God, “is the visible image of the invisible God” (Colossians 1:15). All other humans are image of God because they share the same type of body Jesus Christ has.
This means that in the moment God makes a human in the image of God, all other anatomically modern humans living at this time, become the image of God as soon as they are called to love God, and reach eternal life by doing God’s will.
You very well say:
Genealogy is a simple way to express two things:
Humankind (“Adam and his descendants”) is in the image of God because humans share the same type of body Jesus shares.
After the first transgression in human history (“Adam’s transgression”) all humans sharing the image of God are created in the fallen condition of Adam (i.e.: lacking Adam’s original Grace).
On the basis of evolutionary science, we can establish the very same without invoking genealogy.
The amazing thing is that both meanings can appropriately be considered revealed by Genesis: Scripture grows with the new questions we ask as we read it, very much as science does!
Genesis deals with beginnings, especially those leading to Abraham.
Humanity is defined by acts of individuals and communities, and these cannot be based on whatever version of biological evolution (BE) people subscribe to.
The bible deals with works of the flesh and attributes due to guidance from the Holy Spirit. This is how we understand what it means to be human.
I understand (? somewhat) that there may be a need for some Christians to try and ‘fit’ BE into a narrative that meshes it with Genesis; I do not subscribe to such a view. It is sufficient to consider science from first principles (esp maths), intelligibility, and the theology of creation, to establish a harmony of science and faith.
This would need a new topic and I cannot find the time for that - however, an example that is both interesting and shows the beauty of maths is how the Schrödinger equation is discussed from Newton and Hook’s law, leading us to the wave equation.
Mathematics is the tool God uses to make the ordinary world where we live and move. God uses maths in order we can calculate and predict the world and so live in comfortably.
The richness of maths is unfathomable. It reveals us new truths, when we ask new questions, as the example you give wonderfully demonstrate: Equations that were thought to describe a deterministic world acquire suddenly a much deeper probabilistic meaning in the light of the new data we have today.
My point is that this is very much the case with Scripture too: The Genealogy from Adam to Jesus acquires today a new deeper meaning: humans are humans and in the image of God not because they biologically descend from Adam but because they share a body like the body of Jesus Christ and are called to reach eternal life by doing God’s will.
An even deeper meaning is that humanity cannot be defined without invoking God’s mercy.
In my papers you find a view of “Original Sin” and the meaning of Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross which is very much related to your idea.
It seems to me that we both take as basic assumption the following:
God wants to redeem the sinners and for this reason they are allowed to remain on earth to have opportunity to atone and convert to God.
I would like to expand on this:
As Scripture tells us the first sin is a sin of pride: The sinner wants “to be like God” but not “to be with God”; he wants to be a lonely God. This is a big delusion, as it arises because the sinner sees only God’s glory and power and overlooks what God really is: interpersonal relationship, love.
So a first point that allow us to better understanding what “Original Sin” is all about may be this: to shape an appropriate framework for overcoming pride God leads the sinner to realize his/her own limits through pain and death. This happens on the physical level automatically (so to speak) once the sinner rejects the primeval gift of God, Original Grace, and can no longer master the animalistic Darwinian propensities and parameters of life. And on the moral level through the experience of evil resulting from human misuse of freedom.
A second point is that God decides “the great sacrifice of Himself, Jesus on the Cross” (as you say), to make it plain: “I am not power but love. If you want to be like God, please come with me on the Cross.” The paramount prove that the cup of pain God ask us to drink during life is not poisoned, is that “on the cross he drank, in front of the whole world, the cup of pain down to its dregs.”
A third point is this: suppose that God had kept on earth people that can claim to be better than other. This would entice the pride of all and impair the work of redemption. To redeem all God bounds everyone over to the “sinful condition” so that no one can claim: “I am unimpeachable”.
I would be thankful to know whether you may accept this line of thinking.
Hi Antoine, Thank you for reaching out again. I think your formulation makes a lot of sense. Yes, I agree that God is gracious to us, very patient with us, waiting for us to repent and turn towards Him. I also agree that the the Original Sin was pride, and that even today all people have pride and ideas of self-sufficiency within them. We think that we should be independent and do not need to follow any rules except our own. I think this is also one reason why some people become open during times of tragedy and uncertainty (like now during the pandemic). During such times, we realize how vulnerable we are and that we have very limited control over our own fates. Thus, it is comforting to know that we can trust God with our lives. And the promise of eternity with God reassures us that suffering now is only temporary, and will be relieved in the afterlife. And the Cross shows us that justice will also be complete, even if we do not receive justice on this side of eternity. The Cross also shows us that God loves us, and was willing to humble Himself and suffer with us, as a means of bringing us close to Him.
Another question I had for you: What did you think of the chapters towards the end of Joshua Swamidass’ book, where he speculates about how sin propagates through generations? He gave examples of racial and economic inequities and how those consequences affect whole communities throughout generations. The consequences of our sins are both personal, communal and long-lasting
Antoine, I have profited from your ongoing discussions with @GJDS and @MOls, because they illustrate how, even though two parties are in basic agreement with certain key words, they can still differ significantly in how thy should be put into action. The word, Pride, seems universally accepted as the basic nature of Original Sin. You have expressed it this way:
Perhaps the author of this passage in Genesis was truly inspired in using the word(s) like Pride to convey this information to future generations (and subsequent translations were equally faithful conveying God’s thoughts), but can we be so positive that the English word, Pride, CANNOT be misleading? IMHO, the important message to be taken from Genesis is that humankind fulfills God’s purpose when each of us strives to become an Image of our Creator, who is the epitome of love, empathy, and interpersonal relationships. You express these ideas in ways I find convincing:
[quote=“AntoineSuarez, post:1122, topic:35442”]
So a first point that allow us to better understanding what “Original Sin” is all about may be this: to shape an appropriate framework for overcoming pride God leads the sinner to realize his/her own limits through pain and death. This happens on the physical level automatically (so to speak) once the sinner rejects the primeval gift of God, Original Grace, and can no longer master the animalistic Darwinian propensities and parameters of life. And on the moral level through the experience of evil resulting from human misuse of freedom.
Antoine, please note that your conception of Original Grace is almost opposite to how I view Original Blessing. I see this blessing as some sort of a ‘rewiring’ of the billions of neurons of the Homo sapiens brain so that it could accept learning and invent language to become Mind and conscience with freedom to choose right from wrong. That freedom, although it makes it possible for a biological Homo sapiens to aspire to God’s Image,it does have a ‘dark side’ in that choosing wrong becomes Sin–which was not possible previous to the appearance of the dual biological/spiritual nature of humankind.
The final sentence here will Not satisfy some evangelicals in the matter of atonement for Original Sin, but it does circumvent the intrinsic unfairness that God would require that His Son suffer and die in order to appease His wrath.
Al Leo
Thanks for your readiness to continue this dialogue, and confirming that we share some basic intuitions.
I absolutely agree with you that “the consequences of our sins are both personal, communal and long-lasting”, and in this sense with Joshua Swamidass’ speculation about “how sin propagates through generations”.
However, for the question of "propagation of Original Sin” I think the key to a fitting answer is this statement of yours:
Since the Fall, all of humanity is now in the same “state” such that no one person can claim to be better than another.
To the extent that this “state” is a consequence of the first sin in history (the Fall), the Fall has consequences that no other sin has.
The reason you (and I) give for the “sinful condition” of humanity after the Fall is that, for the sake of Redemption, God acts to the end that 1) sinners can remain on earth, and 2) no one person can claim to be better than another. And this amounts to say that since the Fall every human person comes into existence lacking the state of “original Grace” Adam was endowed with before the Fall.
Obviously, no sin after the first sin can cause this specific damage because the damage is already in place. However, any human sin would have been the Fall, if it had been the first human sin. In this sense it holds that we all are “Adam” when we sin: “sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned” (Romans 5:12) and “one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people” (Romans 5:18).
As such, the reason we are giving (i.e.: “no one person can claim to be better than another”) does not entail genealogical descent from the first sinner but simply the fact of being a human person in the image of God, that is, a creature sharing a body like Jesus’s body, and being called to eternally love God by doing God’s will while sojourning on earth and, therefore, accountable toward God.
If one mistakenly assumes that to be a human person (in the sense just defined) one has to be “a genealogical descendant of Adam”, then one reaches the (mistaken) conclusion that the state of “Original Sin” is bound to genealogical ancestry from Adam.
By contrast if one accepts (as I do) that God did also create human persons who are not genealogical descendants of Adam, the state of “Original Sin” emerges also any time such a human person comes into existence (as it becomes transmitted at the generation of each human person). This amounts to state that all “NON genealogical descendants of Adam” who got married with “genealogical descendants of Adam” necessarily became human personsbefore getting married and, since this very moment, shared in the state of “Original Sin” and were in need of Christ’s redemption, even if they did not genealogically descend from Adam.
Before going further, I would be very thankful to know whether so far this reasoning is clear for you, or some aspect requires a better justification.
@MOls:
As you ‘liked’ my previous post I dare to assume that we share common ground on the following statements:
God made the first human person in the image of God [i.e.: a creature sharing a body like Jesus’s body, and being called to eternally love God by doing God’s will while sojourning on earth and, therefore, accountable toward God] in recent times [later than 15,000 and not later than 5,300 BP] amid a large population [guesstimate of 14 million] of anatomically modern humans.
Then God created a primeval community of human persons through: a) creating other human persons (males and females) the same way as he created the first one, and b) marriage between human persons.
All these persons were created in a state of “Original Grace”, that is, free from pain, death, and selfish Darwinian tendencies.
One of the primeval human persons, ‘Adam’, transgressed an explicit commandment of God. This first sinner ‘Adam’ may –but must not– be the first human person referred to in point 1.
God was keen to redeem the sinners and to this aim: a) allowed them to remain on earth without “Original Grace”, and b) decided to create all human persons after the first sin lacking “Original Grace” as well.
In particular, all human persons who were not genealogical descendants of ‘Adam’ came into existence (were generated) lacking “Original Grace”, in the state of the so (badly) called “Original Sin”.
Point 1 above answers your first question: “ When did God start holding people responsible for their moral failings?”
Now we can try to answer your other very good second question: “ Did God hold the entire population responsible all at once?”
The guesstimate for “entire population” you refer to is 14 million.
Most of this population became human persons at the moment referred to in Genesis 9: 3-6, that is, immediately after the end of the Flood. This is why the Flood narrative can appropriately be considered a “second Creation” narrative, or more precisely the narrative about “the completion of mankind’s creation”.
This completion happened without marriage between non-genealogical and genealogical descendants of ‘Adam’, the same way as the creation of the first human person in point 1 before.
Before Genesis 9:3-6, the population of human persons increased as described in point 2, and there was also marriage between non-genealogical and genealogical descendants of Adam. However, the non-genealogical descendants became human persons in the state of “Original Sin” (i.e.: lacking “Original Grace” and needing Redemption by Jesus) before getting married. I think the narrative of the “sons of God” in Genesis 6: 2-4 supports this interpretation.
I would be thankful to know your opinion about this answer, which may help me to formulate things better and possibly includes further interesting questions.
the top preditor in a food chain is responsible for not eliminating his resource but to take care of it for self preservation. The point if Genesis is not to tell you your rights but to explain your obligations as we have become like God as in becoming system aware. In the law of evolution God has always held creation re
In the beginning god wants to make humankind in his image sounds like he failed.He did make us in his image, but with the fall, e.g. puberty he allowed us to become a self system that separates from God in order to come back to him in love. The issue with consciously being “selfs” is that we can turn into reflection of the God we believe in - which is the reason some do so vehemently deny the existence of God, particularly because of our logical incoherence. To those who do not do logic this is not a problem. For a child it is conceivable that God is like Santa and fulfills your wishes upon prayer because he loves you - particularly if we teach them such rubbish. It makes a great basis for the prosperity church business model.
When it comes to the modell as the fall as the poetic description of puberty,when do you start to make a child responsible for it’s actions? is it magically happening at the day they turn 18 - or 21. Forget about mankind, when do we become morally responsible for our own actions, and when did our parents and their parents …and against whom?
bringing it to a better analogy is to look at your responsibilities as a father towards your child and via versa as to debate it on a philosophical level free of the biblical narrative.
Albert, I thank you for acknowledging that my “final sentence”
Indeed, my “final sentence” follows from the view that God’s mercy is intrinsic to human nature. You cannot coherently define the very beginning of humanity without invoking God’s merciful creation. This perspective is crucial to understand the whole response of God to human sin, and in particular the state of the fallen human condition after the first sin.
In fact, this is nothing other than the theology already contained in the impressive paintings of the “Throne of Mercy” or “Throne of Grace”, which spread during the Middle Age in Central and Western Europe.
By contrast, I do not understand why you state that “my final sentence”
Could you please be more explicit on this?
Meanwhile I wish you the Holy Spirit’s blessing in tomorrow’s Pentecost day!
