Root Of Sin

[Huldah]

The sins of mankind began with the awareness of self (self-awareness) Genesis 3:7. With this awareness has come the deadly "I". If the "I" offends thee pluck it out. We have become a world of self worshipers. I want--I need--I must have. It is this that comes between us and a close relationship with God. We have become so self absorbed that we can no longer hear him. It has caused selfishness, self-centeredness, and self love to the extreme that it has led to greed, jealousy, hatred, envy, sloth, etc. of monstrous proportions. (If you are not guilty--then DO NOT attack me for my point of view) In his truth/word--minus I--you can come to have a very tangible relationship with him--by which he will give you clarity on many levels.
It is said that Satan and his angels fell from grace for this same thing. I heard a story once that Satan saw his reflection in a pool of water and thought "I" am beautiful. This led him to self-awareness that became so extreme that the creation decided that he was more important than the creator. One-third of heaven fell. Is this not the major problem with the world today? The world has become idolators of self.(1st commandment--OT)
As christians we are never an "I" but a we with Jesus as head. The process of plucking my offending "I" is one of the hardest of processes that I'm working on. I have been working very hard at placing myself last instead of first--putting my fellow man before my wants and need--placing God and worship first in my life. Asking for nothing in faith that God keeps his promises that in doing so He will clothe, house, feed and meet my needs. He has, can and does. In this process I lost a very good career but gained an income that far exceeds what I would have had--with many LESS hours of work--It is in the field of serving others.
"I" IS the root of sin. (love of money came after love of I)
Thank you Yeshua
Amen

 

[Forge3]

We serve, we do the work of ministry that God calls us to do. We can not claim credit: "Look Oh Lord at the works of my hands, the things I have wrought!" The Lord can judge our works in the fire and see if they stand. He can say:

I was hungry and you fed me, I was thirsty and you gave me to drink, I was naked and you clothed me.

We have attachments, this is part of the "I' in our life. Any attachments that serve our carnal desires, our need to 'possess' and these are to be stripped away until we are naked before the Lord, totally abandoned to Him in poverty of spirit; as we make ourselves totally dependent on Him and His Word.

To do this we need Him to begin with so that God can be the all in all and we can truly say from our spirit:

"My God and my all"...

Yes I agree the spirit of selfishness is not a trusting spirit. We rely on ourselves alone. It is not in our power alone to strip the "I" away from the picture. We have a self and that self is not an evil in and of itself, though it needs to become smaller "That he may become greater".

 

[Rao]

I agree that the "I"-driven mentality can be seen as the main condition for evil behaviour to stem from. In fact, individualism and selfishness is after all the main mantra of a lot of satanists (the type that claims that being satanists is not evil but is just "doing yourself a favour"). Just by accident, I am currently mid-way into a book entitled "I and God", the author explaining that the title is to be meant as two opposites as in "I vs God", so hopefully I will understand something new after I finish it.

However I also think that the myth of the Genesis is much larger than we can understand, it looks like a trivially simple tale to learn-and-repeat, but it harbors complicated concepts... and raises really hard theological questions. Some examples of conceptual questions related to human self-awareness:

- if being self-aware is what allows to choose evil, isn't it also what allows to choose good? There is merit in the choice, did we have any merit when we (i.e. Adam & Eve, or whoever) were not able to choose? What if we were supposed to become self-aware, lest nothing truly great would have blossomed from humankind but we would have remained trivial creatures in a state of bliss (a good feeling but nothing more than where animals stand?)
- in the contrary case, are we then going to lose self-awareness when we return to heaven?
- is God self-aware? And aren't we in fact created similar to Him? This brings back to question if we weren't supposed to be, so that while one consequence was to fall from paradise, then the Genesis tale is not simply a tale of something bad but also something good happened there
- are animals self-aware? Most Christians believe animals have no souls, but animals can definitely behave with greed, jealousy, hatred, envy, sloth. The only bad thing that animals don't seem to have is pride, which looks like a human-only sin (and in fact is often regarded as the worst of the seven sins). And some animals are capable of "feelings" and selflessness (it is rare, but for example dogs may give their lives to save human lives), but as far as we know at least they aren't fully aware of their own self

These are questions that we don't really need to answers, they are just food for thought. For our own lives however, it's good to remind each other that Goodness comes from changing our thoughts of "I" into "we"! That is after all within Jesus' final commandment.

 

[CGL1023]

The sins of mankind began with the awareness of self (self-awareness) Genesis 3:7. With this awareness has come the deadly "I". If the "I" offends thee pluck it out. We have become a world of self worshipers. I want--I need--I must have. It is this that comes between us and a close relationship with God. We have become so self absorbed that we can no longer hear him. It has caused selfishness, self-centeredness, and self love to the extreme that it has led to greed, jealousy, hatred, envy, sloth, etc. of monstrous proportions. (If you are not guilty--then DO NOT attack me for my point of view) In his truth/word--minus I--you can come to have a very tangible relationship with him--by which he will give you clarity on many levels.
It is said that Satan and his angels fell from grace for this same thing. I heard a story once that Satan saw his reflection in a pool of water and thought "I" am beautiful. This led him to self-awareness that became so extreme that the creation decided that he was more important than the creator. One-third of heaven fell. Is this not the major problem with the world today? The world has become idolators of self.(1st commandment--OT)
As christians we are never an "I" but a we with Jesus as head. The process of plucking my offending "I" is one of the hardest of processes that I'm working on. I have been working very hard at placing myself last instead of first--putting my fellow man before my wants and need--placing God and worship first in my life. Asking for nothing in faith that God keeps his promises that in doing so He will clothe, house, feed and meet my needs. He has, can and does. In this process I lost a very good career but gained an income that far exceeds what I would have had--with many LESS hours of work--It is in the field of serving others.
"I" IS the root of sin. (love of money came after love of I)
Thank you Yeshua
Amen

I think that the flesh cannot be left out of this discussion. Idolatry arises from lusts of the flesh. The flesh must be dominated.