Thanks George for this interesting clarification.
In the following I compare your explanation (please correct me if I misinterpret you) to my explanation:
Your explanation:
Shortness of God’s glory is inherent to Evolution and leads to flaws of flesh and mind (cruelty, deception, selfishness, illness, pain, catastrophes, etc.)
These evolutionary flaws contaminated automatically will and intellect of the “first qualified hominids” when they were endowed by God with Immortal Soul and became capable of Moral Agency.
Thereby these human persons “were necessarily in need of Redemption” from the very beginning of their existence.
Accordingly, “the requirement of Redemption” does not depend of a first sin on the part of the primeval humans with Immortal Soul.
If one defines (as I do) “Stage of Original Sin” = Stage of being in need of Redemption,
then your explanation amounts to state that there is “stage of Original Sin” even before the arrival of the first sin.
My explanation:
The glory of God shines in Evolution along with flaws of flesh and mind.
These flaws are planned by God for the sake of Redemption (see later).
When God endowed the “first qualified hominids” with Immortal Soul, He empowered their will and intellect in order they remain unaffected by evolutionary flaws of flesh and mind.
So these primeval humans capable of Moral Agency had unimpaired freedom of decision.
Nonetheless they preferred “to be like God despising Him”.
Instead of sending them to the “eternal fire” (Matthew 25:41), God mercifully decided to give them the possibility to repent. To this aim He decided that after the first sinners all new humans endowed with Immortal Soul come into existence in “the stage of need of Redemption” (according to Romans 11:32). And to further facilitate that human sinners are moved to repent, God permits they to be affected by the evolutionary flaws in flesh and mind, so that they realize “they are not like God”.
If this comparison is correct, it seems that we actually agree regarding “the stage of Original Sin” but disagree regarding “the stage of Original Grace”: Since you accept “the requirement of Redemption”, you accept “the stage of Original Sin” after all; however you don’t accept that this stage is the consequence of the loss of “the stage of Original Grace” through the first sin.
In summary, our explanations differ from each other only for the (possibly very short) period between the arrival of the first humans capable of Moral Agency and the arrival of the first sin they committed. As well for the time before this period, as for the time after it when “the need of Redemption through the grace by Jesus Christ” matters, our explanations are equivalent for all practical purposes.
Anyway, what I refer to as “Your explanation” above seems to me not only original but also more coherent than “Homo divinus” and “Relational damage”, and respects human free-will better than the explanation proposed by J. Richard Middleton. Accordingly it would be useful we go ahead discussing pros and cons of my assumption that the first humans endowed with Immortal Soul were also endowed with “Original Grace” by God.
The question of Universalism is certainly a very interesting one but, as far as I can see, it is not necessarily related to that of “Original Grace”. So I would like to suggest we discuss it separately afterwards.
In coming postings I will address the comments by Relates and aleo: I think they are also related to the question of “Original Grace” discussed here.