Paul and the Fall: What’s It Really About? | The BioLogos Forum

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As an analogy, compare what Paul says with the following fictitious statement that one could imagine being in a contemporary editorial: “Just as Dr. Frankenstein could not see the grave consequences of his action in creating his ‘monster,’ we must be very careful before undertaking any sort of human genetic engineering.” Surely, we would not take the editorialist as asserting that Frankenstein really existed, but rather as using the well-known story of Frankenstein as a vehicle to make a point about the dangers of genetic engineering. Or, suppose that in one of the epistles Paul made a statement such as “just as the Prodigal Son had to experience the depths of suffering among the pigs before coming to his senses, we must all ....” Surely, we would not take Paul as asserting that there was a real Prodigal Son, but rather we would immediately understand that Paul was using Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son as a vehicle to make a theological point.

This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://biologos.org/blog/paul-and-the-fall-whats-it-really-about
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Even though this series features Robin Collins, I am happy to answer thoughtful questions and comments about his ideas.

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@TedDavis I fail to see what difference it makes if Adam is the literal father of all humanity or a symbol of the first group of humans. We know that human nature is to be sinful, and that most of the misery in the world is brought on by humans mistreating each other.The Bible’s genius is in putting complex truths in clear, simple images, such as Adam, Eve, and the Fall.

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I’ll take that as a comment, @Larry_Bunce, not a question about Collins’ ideas. Thank you for the contribution.

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@TedDavis , did you write “inserted” where you meant “omitted?”

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@TedDavis Perhaps this is irrelevant, but as I’ve been wrestling through my own personal reconciliation of evolutionary science with scripture, the thing I’m having the most difficult time integrating into the discussion is the existence, role, effect, etc. of Satan and other spiritual forces. My inclination is to agree that the accounts of creation and the fall in Genesis 1-3 are mythic and symbolic (though deeply meaningful and theologically valuable), but how far does the category of “myth” stretch? If our sinful nature was developed and inherited through evolution, then we weren’t led or tempted into sin by Satan or demonic forces, right? While I appreciate Collins addressing misconceptions of Pauline theology, I think I expected a more involved discussion of Genesis 3 itself and the impact that evolution has on our interpretation of it.

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I remember a college philosophy seminar where we considered what does it mean to say we “have a sin nature?” It’s not simple to define. It doesn’t mean that everything we do is wrong, since we do plenty of good things. After much later thought, I concluded that it means that we come into the world not knowing God. Without the faith necessary to know Him, we can’t please Him, even when we do otherwise good things. (It’s still better to do the good things than not.) Not knowing Him, we will inevitably wander further off, unless we come to know Him.

This leaves the question of why we come into the world not knowing God. Evidently, God doesn’t feel obliged to start us off knowing Him, or we would. We could account for this situation by invoking an ancient act by some representative of humanity, as Augustine would have it, or we or we could say it’s simply the way God chose to do things. In either case, the observable fact that we are sinners and need forgiveness and help is of far more practical importance than why we are in this situation.

I guess this is a comment, and pretty much in agreement with Robin’s essay.

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There is an even stronger reason for not building a theology of the fall on Romans 5 than Swinburne’s distinction between assertions and presuppositions. Even if Paul thought Adam was historical (and he wouldn’t have been alone among 1st century Jews if he didn’t, Philo and Josephus didn’t take the story literally either) Paul wasn’t discussing the historical facts of Adam’s fall but purposely using the story as a figurative picture of Christ Rom 5:14 Adam is a figure of the one who was to come. All of the same imagery can be used to describe Christ whether Paul thought Adam was historical or not. Even if Paul though Adam was real, we couldn’t build a picture of Paul literal view of Adam’s fall and its consequences, because Paul isn’t speaking literally here but metaphorically and figuratively. Figurative imagery can be stretched to make a point, Heb 7:9 one might even say… and statements are made that are ludicrous if you try to take them as historical 1Cor 10:4 the rock was Christ…

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@TedDavis

I have noticed that there are several questions that have not really been addressed.

First of all, did sin come into the world when humans were created?

The Biblical answer is no. Humans were created and then they fell into sin. Maybe it was the same people who were created, who fell into sin, but Adam lived to be 930 years old according to Genesis. It does not say when the fall took place or when he fathered Can and Abel, but it does say he fathered Seth when he was 130. I have always thought that the dates in Genesis were approximate, but they show a definite separation between creation and the fall.

The Bible does not say that people were created sinful. On the contrary they were created in the Image of God.

Second, Can we say that our sin “nature” is the result our selfish Darwinian genes?

Many people accept Darwinian evolution by saying that the “natural man” is simply the unredeemed Darwinian dog-eat-dog animal nature. Therefore it really does not make any difference is Adam and Eve sinned or not, except they are the first humans.

I accept the Biblical view that humans are created in the Image of God and are not by nature sinful. Sin is more like a sickness that we receive from other people, than a bad gene. The story of the Fall gives human nature dignity. We choose our fate as sinners, and therefore we have the ability to choose to live for God.

Third, Science indicates that the human species developed out of a community of hominids, but does it indicate how sin came into being?

The answer is no, so I think that we need to separate these two questions. People, who believe that humanity arose from two people, can also accept that sin originated with two people created through evolution. However if God created human beings out of a community, from where does the “selfish gene” come?

Indeed the idea that home sapiens came into existence as a selfish allele which struggled to gain dominance first locally and then globally is just that a myth. God created humans in a particular community and particular ecological niche and gave them the ability to think and love and we turned against God and became selfish in order to create our world in our selfish image.

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@TedDavis

While I agree that a discussion of Adam and the ‘banishment’ from the garden and communion with God, are part of the discussion on sin and its impact on humanity and the creation, the discussion appears incomplete to me, if we ignore the importance of the Law of God, in these discussions. I do not agree with some type of fall of human nature, nor with the inference that human nature (however we define such a nebulous term) is intrinsically evil (or Nature in general). The discussion is incomplete if we do not consider the universal aspect of the Law of God – we cannot have universal sin per se – sin is the transgression of the Law in toto.

Paul discusses the Law of God throughout Romans. Commentaries (especially from US Evangelists) typically express this as, “Thus there are two heads, from whom the human race derives inheritance. From Adam all inherited a sinful tendency, which became active, so that all died. When there is no law to be broken, there can be no guilt, yet even before the Law came, death was universal, and those who had not broken any express command nevertheless died. Therefore sin and death are derived from Adam; and in this respect Christ, from whom, by union with Him, we derive righteousness and life, is Adam’s counterpart.’

Paul says that forgiveness of sins, as an act of Grace, is made possible by Christ. He also shows that the power of the Law is exercised by death – thus the impact of the Law is understated in discussions such as these, which may seek to define a human nature (and Nature in general) and then imply that sin is intrinsic to this nature. The power of the Law is shown by the end result, which is death – but Christians are ‘rescued’ from this power by participating in the death of Christ.

The role of Adam is thus seen as the starting point that displays the end result of sin. Sin and death are not derived from Adam via some type of nature he came to have, but rather he (wether he knew it or not) came under the power and impact of the Law by disobedience to God.

My scant remarks are intended to show the universal nature of the Law of God, and when we see the progression from Adam to Abraham, and then to Christ, we see that it is Grace, Faith, and forgiveness because of Christ, that connects these matters theologically.

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As it happens, historian Philip Jenkins has been doing a series of blog posts on ideas that became prominent in the Jewish literature in the centuries around the beginning of Christianity. He just posted one on the Jewish material about Adam in this period and its evident influence on Christian ideas. Interesting stuff.

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@PGarrison, no, I meant “inserted.” That is, I took a footnote and, instead of omitting it or putting it at the end of the column, I put it into the main text at the point indicated. The entire paragraph at that point is the full text of the note.

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As you point out, @GJDS , many things are left out in Collins’ essay. One could write multiple books on this particular topic, so any effort to offer just an article or two will necessary leave a great deal yet to be said. Thank you for adding your own thoughts and those of Jenkins.

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These are big questions, @JacobRyan. I won’t attempt to answer them here, but you are right to wonder about them in this context.

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