Adam's Sin

eleos1954

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Is the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to his offspring (us)? Why or why not?

We have a sin nature ... we inherited from Adam & Eve ... that is it is more natural for us to sin than not too .... each of us are guilty for the sin we each commit and that includes Adam & Eve.
 
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Tree of Life

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We have a sin nature ... we inherited from Adam & Eve ... that is it is more natural for us to sin than not too .... each of us are guilty for the sin we each commit and that includes Adam & Eve.

What do you think about the question asked in the OP?
 
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PuerAzaelis

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We shall now show what, in the text, is opposed to the three Pelagian positions:

(1) The sin of Adam has injured the human race at least in the sense that it has introduced death — "Wherefore as by one man sin entered into this world and by sin death; and so death passed upon all men". Here there is question of physical death. First, the literal meaning of the word ought to be presumed unless there be some reason to the contrary. Second, there is an allusion in this verse to a passage in the Book of Wisdom in which, as may be seen from the context, there is question of physical death. Wisdom 2:24: "But by the envy of the devil death came into the world". Cf. Genesis 2:17; 3:3, 19; and another parallel passage in St. Paul himself, 1 Corinthians 15:21: "For by a man came death and by a man the resurrection of the dead". Here there can be question only of physical death, since it is opposed to corporal resurrection, which is the subject of the whole chapter.

(2) Adam by his fault transmitted to us not only death but also sin, "for as by the disobedience of one man many [i.e., all men] were made sinners" (Romans 5:19). How then could the Pelagians, and at a later period Zwingli, say that St. Paul speaks only of the transmission of physical death? If according to them we must read death where the Apostle wrote sin, we should also read that the disobedience of Adam has made us mortal where the Apostle writes that it has made us sinners. But the word sinner has never meant mortal, nor has sin ever meant death. Also in verse 12, which corresponds to verse 19, we see that by one man two things have been brought on all men, sin and death, the one being the consequence of the other and therefore not identical with it.

(3) Since Adam transmits death to his children by way of generation when he begets them mortal, it is by generation also that he transmits to them sin, for the Apostle presents these two effects as produced at the same time and by the same causality. The explanation of the Pelagians differs from that of St. Paul. According to them the child who receives mortality at his birth receives sin from Adam only at a later period when he knows the sin of the first man and is inclined to imitate it. The causality of Adam as regards mortality would, therefore, be completely different from his causality as regards sin. Moreover, this supposed influence of the bad example of Adam is almost chimerical; even the faithful when they sin do not sin on account of Adam's bad example, a fortiori infidels who are completely ignorant of the history of the first man. And yet all men are, by the influence of Adam, sinners and condemned (Romans 5:18, 19). The influence of Adam cannot, therefore, be the influence of his bad example which we imitate (Augustine, "Contra julian.", VI, xxiv, 75).


CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Original Sin
 
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Presbyterian Continuist

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Adam and Eve, before the fall, had the Holy Spirit. The Bible doesn't expressly say it, but it explains a lot about how they changed within themselves when they disobeyed God. When they rebelled against God and allied themselves with Satan by following him instead of God, they lost the Holy Spirit, and therefore reverted to their flesh nature which was corrupted by their sin.

This was the amazing thing about the Day of Pentecost. It was the final act to restore believers to where Adam and Eve were - filled with the Holy Spirit and in intimate fellowship with God. (Now, when I say "filled with the Spirit", I mean being controlled by the Spirit, and not some emotional or sensory experience.) This was more than just speaking in tongues. It was a complete restoration of the believers' standing with God.

Conversion to Christ is the restoration of the relationship and fellowship that Adam and Eve had with God before the fall. Paul defines conversion as "having the Holy Spirit" in Galatians 3:2.

So, Adam and Eve had the Holy Spirit, then lost Him through disobedience and siding with Satan. Converted believers regain the Holy Spirit because they side with God against Satan.

That explains how all became sinners because of the rebellion of Adam and Eve. Without the Holy Spirit, sinners are totally in the flesh and have no standing with God. They are totally bound in the works of the flesh as described in Galatians 5. But when a sinner receives Christ, he or she is brought back under the control of the Holy Spirit and lives in the Spirit, with the fruit of the Spirit, and there is a developmental turning away from the works of the flesh toward sanctification and holiness.
 
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RaymondG

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Is the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to his offspring (us)? Why or why not?
Yes and no. Adam, used in the story of the garden is synonymous with Mankind......and is not a Pronoun. Therefore mankind ate/is eating this fruit.....with includes you and me....therefore we now sit outside the garden trying to make our way back in...... In comes the redemption of Adam.
 
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Pavel Mosko

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Is the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to his offspring (us)? Why or why not?

It is or is not based on the Soteriolical theory the believer subscribes to. :)


Augustine and Anselm are not how I prefer to think of these things. There is juridicalism in the Bible in the OT and with saint Paul and that sort of thing needs to be covered. But I think a lot of the soteriological theories should be harmonized to get a more complete picture of things kind of like the parable of 8 Blind Sufi wisemen and the Elephant if you have ever heard or read that tale.

Salvation in Christianity - Wikipedia
 
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PuerAzaelis

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I answer that, According to the Catholic Faith we are bound to hold that the first sin of the first man is transmitted to his descendants, by way of origin. For this reason children are taken to be baptized soon after their birth, to show that they have to be washed from some uncleanness. The contrary is part of the Pelagian heresy, as is clear from Augustine in many of his books [For instance, Retract. i, 9; De Pecc. Merit. et Remiss. ix; Contra Julian. iii, 1; De Dono Persev. xi, xii.]

In endeavoring to explain how the sin of our first parent could be transmitted by way of origin to his descendants, various writers have gone about it in various ways. For some, considering that the subject of sin is the rational soul, maintained that the rational soul is transmitted with the sperm, so that thus an infected soul would seem to produce other infected souls. Others, rejecting this as erroneous, endeavored to show how the guilt of the parent's soul can be transmitted to the children, even though the soul be not transmitted, from the fact that defects of the body are transmitted from parent to child—thus a leper may beget a leper, or a gouty man may be the father of a gouty son, on account of some seminal corruption, although this corruption is not leprosy or gout. Now since the body is proportionate to the soul, and since the soul's defects redound into the body, and vice versa, in like manner, say they, a culpable defect of the soul is passed on to the child, through the transmission of the sperm, albeit the sperm itself is not the subject of the guilt.

But all these explanations are insufficient. Because, granted that some bodily defects are transmitted by way of origin from parent to child, and granted that even some defects of the soul are transmitted in consequence, on account of a defect in the bodily habit, as in the case of idiots begetting idiots; nevertheless the fact of having a defect by the way of origin seems to exclude the notion of guilt, which is essentially something voluntary. Wherefore granted that the rational soul were transmitted, from the very fact that the stain on the child's soul is not in its will, it would cease to be a guilty stain binding its subject to punishment; for, as the Philosopher says (Ethic. iii, 5), "no one reproaches a man born blind; one rather takes pity on him."

Therefore we must explain the matter otherwise by saying that all men born of Adam may be considered as one man, inasmuch as they have one common nature, which they receive from their first parents; even as in civil matters, all who are members of one community are reputed as one body, and the whole community as one man. Indeed Porphyry says (Praedic., De Specie) that "by sharing the same species, many men are one man." Accordingly the multitude of men born of Adam, are as so many members of one body. Now the action of one member of the body, of the hand for instance, is voluntary not by the will of that hand, but by the will of the soul, the first mover of the members. Wherefore a murder which the hand commits would not be imputed as a sin to the hand, considered by itself as apart from the body, but is imputed to it as something belonging to man and moved by man's first moving principle. In this way, then, the disorder which is in this man born of Adam, is voluntary, not by his will, but by the will of his first parent, who, by the movement of generation, moves all who originate from him, even as the soul's will moves all the members to their actions. Hence the sin which is thus transmitted by the first parent to his descendants is called "original," just as the sin which flows from the soul into the bodily members is called "actual." And just as the actual sin that is committed by a member of the body, is not the sin of that member, except inasmuch as that member is a part of the man, for which reason it is called a "human sin"; so original sin is not the sin of this person, except inasmuch as this person receives his nature from his first parent, for which reason it is called the "sin of nature," according to Ephesians 2:3: "We . . . were by nature children of wrath."


SUMMA THEOLOGIAE: The cause of sin, on the part of man (Prima Secundae Partis, Q. 81)
 
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redleghunter

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Is the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to his offspring (us)? Why or why not?
Yes.

Why? Romans 5 directly makes the comparison of imputed guilt with justification and imputed righteousness.

Romans 5: NASB

15But the free gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many. 16The gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned; for on the one hand the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation, but on the other hand the free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification. 17For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.
 
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RaymondG

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Yes.

Why? Romans 5 directly makes the comparison of imputed guilt with justification and imputed righteousness.

Romans 5: NASB

15But the free gift is not like the transgression. For if by the transgression of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many. 16The gift is not like that which came through the one who sinned; for on the one hand the judgment arose from one transgression resulting in condemnation, but on the other hand the free gift arose from many transgressions resulting in justification. 17For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.
Wouldn't this be a case supporting the notion that the sin of the first one man, does not affect all, since it is widely believed that the sacrifice of the One Man, in direct comparison, only affects a few?
 
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Neogaia777

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Is the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to his offspring (us)? Why or why not?
The sin nature is... Why or why not is because he (Adam) was the original father of us all, until Christ came and made a way out, for those who take it, and take Him (Christ) as our new father in Him, or in God the Father, if we accept the adoption by Him (Christ and God) as His or Their sons...

Why was it necessary...? Why did we have to, as part of God the Father's plan, inherit the sin nature from Adam, only for Christ to make a way out of it for us later on...? Well, it was to learn something about God the Father and God the Son separately, that one is our Father, and the other is His or that One's Son and our Savior who is also our God also, etc, and that it was set up that way for His or that One's Son to save us and perhaps maybe all of us learn something by that in the process maybe...? Maybe...? IDK for sure what all of that is or might be, but I just know that is part of it though...

It's all supposed to be a learning experience for us, and maybe all of us or everyone, IDK...? Everyone not literally the Father God maybe, IDK...? Including angels, etc... By us, or all of us, etc...

God Bless!
 
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redleghunter

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Wouldnt this be a case supporting the notion that the sin of the first one man, does not affect all, since it is widely believe that the sacrifice of one man, in direct comparison, only affects a few?
Now that we have our Bibles open we can continue from what I posted in Romans 5 previously:

18So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men. 19For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. 20The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
 
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questionman

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Now that we have our Bibles open we can continue from what I posted in Romans 5 previously:

18So then as through one transgression there resulted condemnation to all men, even so through one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men. 19For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. 20The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

I think he was referring to the next statement after the one you underlined, which says

"one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men."

one transgression -> condemnation to "all men"
one act of righteousness -> justification of life to "all men"
one man's disobedience -> "the many" were made sinners
obedience of the One -> "the many" will be made righteous

The logic was "universalism is not orthodox doctrine, so what does Paul mean here by being emphatic and strongly equating the results of the two things". If "all men" here doesn't mean all will be saved as a result of Christ, what does "all men" mean when it comes to condemnation as a result of Adam?

To get more specific, does it truly mean (1) "all men are literally guilty because of Adam's sin - to the degree that if a man could be sinless, he would still be condemned because of Adam's sin" or (2) something else?

These are questions I struggle with too, OP.
 
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PuerAzaelis

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(2) Adam by his fault transmitted to us not only death but also sin, "for as by the disobedience of one man many [i.e., all men] were made sinners" (Romans 5:19). How then could the Pelagians, and at a later period Zwingli, say that St. Paul speaks only of the transmission of physical death? If according to them we must read death where the Apostle wrote sin, we should also read that the disobedience of Adam has made us mortal where the Apostle writes that it has made us sinners. But the word sinner has never meant mortal, nor has sin ever meant death. Also in verse 12, which corresponds to verse 19, we see that by one man two things have been brought on all men, sin and death, the one being the consequence of the other and therefore not identical with it.

CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Original Sin
 
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Neogaia777

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I think he was referring to the next statement after the one you underlined, which says

"one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men."

one transgression -> condemnation to "all men"
one act of righteousness -> justification of life to "all men"
one man's disobedience -> "the many" were made sinners
obedience of the One -> "the many" will be made righteous

The logic was "universalism is not orthodox doctrine, so what does Paul mean here by being emphatic and strongly equating the results of the two things". If "all men" here doesn't mean all will be saved as a result of Christ, what does "all men" mean when it comes to condemnation as a result of Adam?

To get more specific, does it truly mean (1) "all men are literally guilty because of Adam's sin - to the degree that if a man could be sinless, he would still be condemned because of Adam's sin" or (2) something else?

These are questions I struggle with too, OP.
One man was sinless, and was still condemned by Adam's sin, so that it was all paid for on one condition, that those who would put their faith and trust in that Man, and have faith still, regardless or irregardless of their sin, in that person as their Savior from the condemnation that would come from being born in Adam, would or could be saved for eternal life, or life everlasting, or life eternal...

I think whether it would truly be all men or just some men (or women) was a thing that was only in the Father's knowledge and/or knowing alone, whether it would be all, or few, or many, or some, etc...

But that Christ Himself sowed Himself in the hopes that it would be all, but without really knowing at that time for sure, yet or at that time, or during His time as a man here yet, etc... Just like the exact timing of the times and or seasons or time of the end, etc... (Mark 13:32) (Matthew 24:36)... Christ knew the events, but the exact timing of such, etc, and I think it was kind of the same thing for whether it would be some or many or few or all, or almost none even maybe, etc, but He sowed it and sowed Himself in hope, etc... And I think He "covered all those bases", or "all those possibilities" while He was here as a man though...

God Bless!
 
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redleghunter

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I think he was referring to the next statement after the one you underlined, which says

"one act of righteousness there resulted justification of life to all men."

one transgression -> condemnation to "all men"
one act of righteousness -> justification of life to "all men"
one man's disobedience -> "the many" were made sinners
obedience of the One -> "the many" will be made righteous

The logic was "universalism is not orthodox doctrine, so what does Paul mean here by being emphatic and strongly equating the results of the two things". If "all men" here doesn't mean all will be saved as a result of Christ, what does "all men" mean when it comes to condemnation as a result of Adam?

To get more specific, does it truly mean (1) "all men are literally guilty because of Adam's sin - to the degree that if a man could be sinless, he would still be condemned because of Adam's sin" or (2) something else?

These are questions I struggle with too, OP.
Yes, if we read the previous 4 chapters, Paul indeed does not confirm universalism. What is certain is we are all born humans. What is certain is not everyone is born again. With that in mind the 'all' and 'many' make sense.
 
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redleghunter

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No, we are not guilty of Adam's sin but we inherit the consequences.
I think when he uses the word "condemnation" that signifies guilt. Without the guilty charge there is no condemnation.
 
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RaymondG

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Yes, if we read the previous 4 chapters, Paul indeed does not confirm universalism. What is certain is we are all born humans. What is certain is not everyone is born again. With that in mind the 'all' and 'many' make sense.
Lets forget about universalism and just keep our bibles open.

You used a verse to answer the question of whether all was affected by Adam's sin... Yet that same verse stated that all were affected by Jesus' Sacrifice. Therefore, since Jesus sacrifice only saves a few.....it should all follow that Adams sin, only damned a few.....or a little more than a few....but not all as well.

So Romans 5 cannot be used to say the we are all guilty because of Adam.....unless you also say that we are all saved because of the sacrifice....being that, as you stated, a direct comparison was made.

So we need a different set of scripture to back the idea that all were guilty because of Adams sin.
 
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