original sin doesn't make sense

[fhansen]

Interesting. Death is what came out of what Adam and Eve did however. I think pride came into the equation before the sin of partaking of the fruit. In any case we don't really know. I will say I go more toward the Eastern Ancestral Sin and away from the Western Original Sin.

Death was one consequence; pride was the sin itself. And pride has continued to flourish and spread its ugliness throughout the history of human affairs-it certainly seems to be alive and well-and opposed to the original innocence of man and the humility we never seem to have enough-or too much-of. Something is wrong with the picture we call human life. And it's more than our environment.

 

[FireDragon76]

Death in the Eastern sense also means a darkening of the intellect and heart and the loss of the spiritual communion with God. We are not talking about some kind of Pelagianism here where people can will their way back to Paradise, but neither are we talking about some kind of "total depravity".

The disease analogy is a good one.

In theory, I guess one could soften "original sin" into a kind of brokenness, which is what I have seen some liberal/mainline Protestants do. But there's still the juridical baggage of the past that conservative evangelicals use to make God into a legalist uninterested in personal relationship.

 

[hedrick]

Calvin, at least, denied that we are guilty of Adam’s sin. The problem with infants isn’t that they are guilty of some particular thing, but that their wills are fallen, and will be unable to do as God demands on their own. However, God still sees himself in us, and wants to save us.

FireDragon76: “Brokenness” is a reasonable reading of Calvin. He spoke of corruption of our nature. Corruption in this context means being prone to sin, and unable to do what God demands until he intervenes.

 

[Berean777]

The original sin is an imputed sin onto the accounts of the family members connected to Adam from generation to generation.

For God said:

Exodus 20:5
for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.

God regards disobedience as people hating him and once the fathers are said to sin against Him, then all the generations that follow from the symbolic expression of the third and fourth will be regarded as having the sins of their Father's imputed onto thier accounts.

It doesn't mean that an infant has literal sin when a child has no consciousness of what sinning means. Rather God deems that child condemned along with his fathers to which his fathers are declared as having the infants blood on their hands.

We know that the first Adam brought spiritual condemnation on all of humanity, yet the last Adam brought reconciliation onto salvation to a once previously fallen and condemned generations of Adam.

2 Corinthians 5:18-19

Colossians 1:20-21

1 Corinthians 15:22

Romans 5:14-19
Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. And not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offences unto justification. For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.)
Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.

Original sin is an imputed sin onto the account of every generation irrespective of whether they literally sin or not. We by Adam were ALL condemned without impartiality in mind, which also even included sinless infants, yet by Christ we are reconciled to God and imputed onto our accounts his righteousness.

Romans 4:22-25
And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.
Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

We are looked upon by God with GRACE!

 

[Rick Otto]

So you believe a hungry baby is guilty because he's hungry?

I do believe, and the Orthodox Church does teach, than man's spiritual faculties and will are damaged in the fall. I simply do not believe we are born guilty and that everything we do can be called rightly, "sin".

I don't believe Adam and Eve were perfect... God alone is perfect. they were sinless, sure, but that doesn't mean they were perfect.

You also completely ignored the biblical, exegetical evidence I gave that the edifice of original sin is built on straw.

By the way Augustine and the Catholic Church in general rejected Pelagius for rejecting OS and considered him a heretic and thus those who don't believe in Original Sin believes in Pelagianism which is classified in most Orthodox churches as heresy.

That is true, but they accepted his notion that we are born with a free will which has redemptive value if exercised according to their prescriptions.

 

[fhansen]

That is true, but they accepted his notion that we are born with a free will which has redemptive value if exercised according to their prescriptions.

Yes, they did. Pelagius believed man could save himself, that he could make himself worthy, or just. The RCC rejects this; 'apart from God man can do nothing', to paraphrase John 15:5. The will is involved only in that man can refuse grace; he can refuse to allow God to work in him. God allowed Adam to fall; he doesn't force us to rise now. We can't raise ourselves-as Pelagius taught-but we can say "no" to our rising, or stop and turn back at any point along the way.

This brings to mind another possible way to characterize OS; it's simply to see man as down, in need of being raised. If we admit to this general notion, then the concept of OS begins to make sense. In what way is man down? Well, he lacks the knowledge of God to begin with, a knowledge which is vital to his welfare according our faith. And this means he's lost- in a world of evil: pain, suffering, and death, mixed up with all the goodness of creation, not knowing in any case where he came from, if anywhere, what he's here for, if anything, and where he's going, if anywhere. He needs to be lifted up; He needs communion-or recommunion-with God.

The basic injustice inherent in fallen man is this separation from God, which Adam initiated and which obviously persists in his descendants, however it's "transmitted". It's not humanity's fault, but it is our burden, one that God saw fit that we should struggle under, so that an ultimate good might be derived from it apparently. And that good would be that we decide, not without the help of grace, that Adam was wrong, so that we may begin to will rightly, now seeing clearly, now knowing where we came from, now risen to newness of life. Or we can remain in darkness. Freedom from God's control means freedom from control for man; we cannot consistently maintain moral behavior/righteousness apart from the One from Whom our righteousness flows.

 

[Winepress777]

Watch this video

This guy uses a baby crying as an example of original sin. The so-called "selfishness" is somehow an example of a baby's sinfulness, and presumably, their condemnation by God. I just a few works for that: sick, and Manichean in its contempt for the natural world.

Elsewhere, I've seen John MacArthur say that nowhere is man's depravity more evidenced than in the male member during sex. Again, sounds creepy and Manichean.

I actually disagree with this guy in the video, even though he obvious understands how repulsive it is, he appeals to Biblicism . Yet, it's not really scriptural, and Romans 5 nowhere implies God holds it against us that we are born "messed up" due to Adam. If he did, he wouldn't be sending Christ into the world to fix things. He would just throw us all into the lake of fire and be done with it. Clearly, he has mercy on our condition and doesn't count it against us that we came from Adam. This whole thing is based on Augustine being ignorant of the original Greek text and the Vulgate mistranslating Romans 5:12. Augustine read it that in Adam, we all sin, something not at all supported by the Greek text: http://biblehub.com/text/romans/5-12.htm Eph' ho means "for that" or "because", but the Vulgate translated this expression as in quo, "in whom".

God created us with bodies. Having a body with needs is not in itself sinful. I can understand a conservative confessional Lutheran not wanting to confront that reality, but I wonder how widespread this belief is in Reformed/Lutheran Protestant and Catholic circles?

We were formed as a vanity creature, naturally filled with "lusts". Adam didn't obey God, instead, he ignored His Word and went with the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, which is NOT of God, but is of the "world". That is sin. Aka, "the wicked one". Repent and be baptized for the remission of those sins is God's desire for us. This question is utterly void of such an understanding.

(1Jn 2:15) Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.


(1Jn 2:16) For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.


(1Jn 2:17) And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

 

[SkyWriting]

This guy uses a baby crying as an example of original sin. The so-called "selfishness" is somehow an example of a baby's sinfulness, and presumably, their condemnation by God. I just have a few words for that: sick, and Manichean in its contempt for the natural world.

The natural world is not your best friend either. That kid? I stood in a graveyard
over the death of a nephew. They knitted him a tiny little hat. So who was this
celebration of life for that nature is offering? The baby? The mom? Dad? Me?
The ground? Was nature happy about taking the flesh back in?
Did you want us to dance? Would that be "not sick" if we danced on the grave?

You want some more natural to celebrate? Google "Tsunami videos."
I just watched some the other day. Go natural. Many bodies were stripped of their clothes.

 

[FireDragon76]

God has ordained that through the natural world, and not apart from it, we are saved. He became flesh and blood to save us, he baptizes each of us in water by his Spirit, and he gives himself in bread and wine today. So yes, I do think this Manichean view is literally damning.

As painful as mortal life is, the frailty and mortality of life has been taking up into our salvation and exists as our sanctification, our struggle, so even the struggle is in some sense, for our good.

On the contrary, MacArthur is slandering the very thing, marital relations, that God has given us for our salvation, as a sign of Christ and the Church. And the crying baby is also part of our salvation, a plea from God for justice, because he too was once a crying baby.

 

[Berean777]

Original sin is an imputed sin compliments of Adam.
Righteousness is an imputed righteousness by the Grace of God and his Christ and nothing to do with our free will to sin or not to sin.
We are imputed righteousness meaning justified by the blood as the first calling of baptism but that is not the seal to our salvation.
The seal of our salvation is through the sanctifying works of the Holy Ghost who completes the baptism by fire.
For many are called to Christ yet very few are sealed by the Spirit.

 

[Wordkeeper]

http://www.vision.org/visionmedia/article.aspx?id=227


Quote
Though Augustine was convinced by the arguments of his earlier patristic peers, he made use of the apostle Paul’s letters, especially the one to the Romans, to develop his own ideas on original sin and guilt. Today, however, it is accepted that Augustine, who had never mastered the Greek language, misread Paul in at least one instance by using an inadequate Latin translation of the Greek original.In Romans 5, Paul addresses the matter of sin. In verse 12 he states, “Therefore . . . sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned” (NRSV). Later in the chapter, Paul juxtaposes the sin of Adam with the righteousness of Christ: “Just as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous” (Romans 5:19).

In contrast to his contemporary theologians, Augustine drew from his reading of these scriptures that sin was passed biologically from Adam to all his descendants through the sexual act itself, thus equating sexual desire with sin. But why should he have reached this interpretation when marital sexual relations in Jewish society at the time of Christ and Paul were considered honorable and good?Augustine’s outlook on sex was distorted by ideas from the world outside the Bible. Because so much philosophy was based on dualism, in which the physical was categorized as evil but the spiritual as good, some philosophers idealized the celibate state. Sexual relations were physical and therefore evil.Augustine’s association with Neoplatonic philosophers led him to introduce their outlook within the church. This had its effect in the development of doctrine. For example, Jesus was considered immaculately conceived—without sin in that His Father was God. But because His mother, Mary, had a human father, she suffered the effect of original sin. In order to present Jesus Christ as a perfect offspring without any inherited sin from either parent, the church had to find a way to label Mary as sinless. They did this by devising the doctrine of her immaculate conception, though this inevitably leads to further questions.Other babies were not so fortunate. Some eight centuries later the Catholic theologian Anselm extended the implications of Augustine’s concept of original sin and claimed that babies who died, did so as sinners; as sinners, they had no access to eternal life but were condemned to eternal damnation.

 

[Berean777]

...

 

[FireDragon76]

A few weeks ago I had a discussion with an ELCA pastor and it was remarkably similar to the video I posted about earlier, even though the video was from an LCMS pastor . And to top it off, basically the ELCA pastor said there was no real difference between the Eastern Orthodox and western understanding of original sin except a "language issue". I just told him I wasn't so sure, I think how we talk about it makes all the difference.

But the ELCA pastor did use the example of two babies fighting over a toy as an example of original sin.

I guess sin isn't so important in my understanding of God. It exists but I don't think of a baby struggling into selfhood as some kind of sign for all that is evil in the world. I look at grown adults that should know better, but fight over toys... to me that's sin.

I see big problems with this idea of equating sins with the self. For one thing its a potentially very damaging message to people that have been dehumanized. But, as a wise pastor told me a long time ago "God does not make junk". Every human being is created in the image of God and God doesn't make mistakes.

 

[ChristsSoldier115]

Watch this video

This guy uses a baby crying as an example of original sin. The so-called "selfishness" is somehow an example of a baby's sinfulness, and presumably, their condemnation by God. I just a few works for that: sick, and Manichean in its contempt for the natural world.

Elsewhere, I've seen John MacArthur say that nowhere is man's depravity more evidenced than in the male member during sex. Again, sounds creepy and Manichean.

I actually disagree with this guy in the video, even though he obvious understands how repulsive it is, he appeals to Biblicism . Yet, it's not really scriptural, and Romans 5 nowhere implies God holds it against us that we are born "messed up" due to Adam. If he did, he wouldn't be sending Christ into the world to fix things. He would just throw us all into the lake of fire and be done with it. Clearly, he has mercy on our condition and doesn't count it against us that we came from Adam. This whole thing is based on Augustine being ignorant of the original Greek text and the Vulgate mistranslating Romans 5:12. Augustine read it that in Adam, we all sin, something not at all supported by the Greek text: http://biblehub.com/text/romans/5-12.htm Eph' ho means "for that" or "because", but the Vulgate translated this expression as in quo, "in whom".

God created us with bodies. Having a body with needs is not in itself sinful. I can understand a conservative confessional Lutheran not wanting to confront that reality, but I wonder how widespread this belief is in Reformed/Lutheran Protestant and Catholic circles?

I am pretty sure Augustine knew how to read Greek, seeing as he was being trained in rhetoric prior to becoming a Christian.

I was always understood we inherited Adam's sin nature along with his guilt. It is the Greek/Western Civilization idea of how justice works or should work that God does things on an individual level, but if you read the OT you can clearly see that God works in a communal/family in punishment/blessings. Zadok's[sp?] family line, for example, was allowed to be in charge of the sacrifices after the exile because he remained loyal during Israels self-apostasy from God before the exile. God also punished all of Israel because David decided to do a census.

 

[bling]

God created us in perfection. Adam-Eve walked away from it, doing their own thing. That was disobedience. That's sin. We inherited it.

The Bible says we were made "very good" by God's standard but that is not perfect (like Christ is perfect).
We did obtain the knowledge of "good and evil", so is knowledge sin?

 

[bling]

I am pretty sure Augustine knew how to read Greek, seeing as he was being trained in rhetoric prior to becoming a Christian.

I was always understood we inherited Adam's sin nature along with his guilt. It is the Greek/Western Civilization idea of how justice works or should work that God does things on an individual level, but if you read the OT you can clearly see that God works in a communal/family in punishment/blessings. Zadok's[sp?] family line, for example, was allowed to be in charge of the sacrifices after the exile because he remained loyal during Israels self-apostasy from God before the exile. God also punished all of Israel because David decided to do a census.

Scholars say:

From references that Augustine made in his early writings, scholars generally hold that he was adequately instructed in Greek grammar.

He may have been a subtle interpreter of Greek words.

Beyond that, however, his knowledge was insufficient for a thorough comprehension of Greek books, and especially of those written in the Hellenistic dialect.

In later life he became much better at Greek, and was at least able to check Latin translations competently against their Greek originals.

At this stage, Augustine listed in his Retractions some the mistakes that he made in his early works through his ignorance of Greek.

The effect of his having had in his childhood a teacher of Greek who was cruel to his students far outlasted the seventy six years that Augustine spent on this earth.

Because Augustine was such an influence on the thought and scholarship of the Church in the West during the Middle Ages, his dislike of Greek unfortunately had lasting consequences.

 

[topcare]

I am pretty sure Augustine knew how to read Greek, seeing as he was being trained in rhetoric prior to becoming a Christian.

I was always understood we inherited Adam's sin nature along with his guilt. It is the Greek/Western Civilization idea of how justice works or should work that God does things on an individual level, but if you read the OT you can clearly see that God works in a communal/family in punishment/blessings. Zadok's[sp?] family line, for example, was allowed to be in charge of the sacrifices after the exile because he remained loyal during Israels self-apostasy from God before the exile. God also punished all of Israel because David decided to do a census.

The East says Adam is the one with guilt but that we inherit the consequences so even though David did the bad thing Israel wasn't guilty only David but Israel inherited the consequences of his sin. As far as I understand it

 

[ChristsSoldier115]

The East says Adam is the one with guilt but that we inherit the consequences so even though David did the bad thing Israel wasn't guilty only David but Israel inherited the consequences of his sin. As far as I understand it

I actually like that wording.

 

[keembo]

God created us in perfection. Adam-Eve walked away from it, doing their own thing. That was disobedience. That's sin. We inherited it.

Perhaps what original sin is referring to is that with the fall of Adam, all people will eventually sin. That doesn't mean that necessarily would one say that a newborn is sinful or has sin, but it would rather mean that given time, as this tad begins to be aware and grows, it will then sin or harbor sinful thoughts, and that all of mankind is subject to that when given enough time from birth.

 

[Tangible]

So you believe a hungry baby is guilty because he's hungry?

I do believe, and the Orthodox Church does teach, than man's spiritual faculties and will are damaged in the fall. I simply do not believe we are born guilty and that everything we do can be called rightly, "sin".

I don't believe Adam and Eve were perfect... God alone is perfect. they were sinless, sure, but that doesn't mean they were perfect.

You also completely ignored the biblical, exegetical evidence I gave that the edifice of original sin is built on straw.

No, a hungry baby is not necessarily sinning by crying. Jesus said that it is not what the body does that makes us sinful, sin proceeds from a sinful heart - a condition of sinfulness that is bound up in the flesh we inherit from Adam, according to St. Paul. Or, another way, we are not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners.