What is Sin?

[mark kennedy]

First of all I'd like to deal with sin in general, this is not about what acts or offenses are sinful. The Old Testament seems to indicate a sin is against God while a trespass is an offense against another person. The Greek word in the New Testament has this interesting etymology:

Harmartia arose from the Greek verb hamartanein, meaning "to miss the mark" or "to err." Aristotle introduced the term in the Poetics to describe the error of judgment which ultimately brings about the tragic hero's downfall. As you can imagine, the word is most often found in literary criticism. However, news writers occasionally employ the word when discussing the unexplainable misfortune or missteps of übercelebrities regarded as immortal gods and goddesses before being felled by their own shortcomings. (Hamartia)
​

Apparently the term is developed more specifically in the New Testament, some excerpts from Vine's:

a principle or source of action, or an inward element producing acts...the seat of sin is the will... (Vine's Dictionary. Sin: ἁμαρτία hamartia g266)
​

To me it's an attitude, at the seat of moral reflection, opposed to and lacking the righteousness of God. I'm not really spoiling for a debate or looking to pit different theological ideas against one another. Just inviting discussion on the nature of sin, the attitude of the heart as it exists in the mind and conscience of humanity.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[gadar perets]

There are at least four NT definitions of sin;

1) 1 John 3:4 Whosoever commits sin transgresses also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
2) 1 John 5:17a All unrighteousness is sin:
3) Romans 14:23 And he that doubts is damned if he eat, because he eats not of faith: for whatsoever is not of faith is sin.
4) James 4:17 Therefore to him that knows to do good, and does it not, to him it is sin.
​

Sin is brought forth through lust.

James 1:14-15 But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
Then when lust has conceived, it brings forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, brings forth death.​

Lust causes us to break YHWH's laws. Faith causes us to keep them and avoid sin.

 

[Halbhh]

First of all I'd like to deal with sin in general, this is not about what acts or offenses are sinful. The Old Testament seems to indicate a sin is against God while a trespass is an offense against another person. The Greek word in the New Testament has this interesting etymology:

Harmartia arose from the Greek verb hamartanein, meaning "to miss the mark" or "to err." Aristotle introduced the term in the Poetics to describe the error of judgment which ultimately brings about the tragic hero's downfall. As you can imagine, the word is most often found in literary criticism. However, news writers occasionally employ the word when discussing the unexplainable misfortune or missteps of übercelebrities regarded as immortal gods and goddesses before being felled by their own shortcomings. (Hamartia)
​

Apparently the term is developed more specifically in the New Testament, some excerpts from Vine's:

a principle or source of action, or an inward element producing acts...the seat of sin is the will... (Vine's Dictionary. Sin: ἁμαρτία hamartia g266)
​

To me it's an attitude, at the seat of moral reflection, opposed to and lacking the righteousness of God. I'm not really spoiling for a debate or looking to pit different theological ideas against one another. Just inviting discussion on the nature of sin, the attitude of the heart as it exists in the mind and conscience of humanity.

Grace and peace,
Mark

While you are probing the cause, another side is also 'what is sinful' meaning what actions are sinful, and this has an interesting angle, I think, because isn't it the case that every sin breaks this rule -- "So in everything to do others as you would have them do to you, for this is the law and the prophets."

And that opens the interesting angle of why would a person want to do to someone what they would not want that someone to do to themselves? And of course love is bound up in that. It reminds of 1rst John where we find --

"Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love."

 

[mark kennedy]

While you are probing the cause, another side is also 'what is sinful' meaning what actions are sinful, and this has an interesting angle, I think, because isn't it the case that every sin breaks this rule -- "So in everything to do others as you would have them do to you, for this is the law and the prophets."

And that opens the interesting angle of why would a person want to do to someone what they would not want that someone to do to themselves? And of course love is bound up in that. It reminds of 1rst John where we find --

"Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love."

I understand what you are saying here, at some point how sin is expressed in offenses is critical. My first interest in this is the attitude and inclination toward sin. There is no real question that it's a lack of righteousness that is at the heart of it, but my first question is what is it in the heart that is opposed to God and wrapped itself around our collective egos making us conceited enough to oppose the things of God.

 

[inquiring mind]

I just see the wrong attitude as being the result of a lack of God in your life. I guess I'm saying it's what "is not" in your heart.

 

[mark kennedy]

I just see the wrong attitude as being the result of a lack of God in your life. I guess I'm saying it's what "is not" in your heart.

Very true, sin isn't just offenses against God, it is, but ultimately it's the lack of righteousness.

 

[~Anastasia~]

First of all I'd like to deal with sin in general, this is not about what acts or offenses are sinful. The Old Testament seems to indicate a sin is against God while a trespass is an offense against another person. The Greek word in the New Testament has this interesting etymology:

Harmartia arose from the Greek verb hamartanein, meaning "to miss the mark" or "to err." Aristotle introduced the term in the Poetics to describe the error of judgment which ultimately brings about the tragic hero's downfall. As you can imagine, the word is most often found in literary criticism. However, news writers occasionally employ the word when discussing the unexplainable misfortune or missteps of übercelebrities regarded as immortal gods and goddesses before being felled by their own shortcomings. (Hamartia)
​

Apparently the term is developed more specifically in the New Testament, some excerpts from Vine's:

a principle or source of action, or an inward element producing acts...the seat of sin is the will... (Vine's Dictionary. Sin: ἁμαρτία hamartia g266)
​

To me it's an attitude, at the seat of moral reflection, opposed to and lacking the righteousness of God. I'm not really spoiling for a debate or looking to pit different theological ideas against one another. Just inviting discussion on the nature of sin, the attitude of the heart as it exists in the mind and conscience of humanity.

Grace and peace,
Mark

Interesting.

I'm not quite sure what you're looking for in this thread (or if you have a specific aim), but there are some interesting posts here.

Definition of sin is important in many discussions. If we have different ideas, we can deeply misunderstand one another. So to me this seems a good discussion.

Sins can be more that actions, and words. We know from the words of Christ that our thoughts can be equally sinful. Taken further, our very attitudes and way of being can be sin. It is worth noting that for those of us who set our efforts on cooperating with God to be transformed into the image of Christ, these are also the stages. Actions can be easiest, words harder to control. Thoughts can be a lifelong battle to master. Attitudes (at least vestiges of them) are just about impossible to be fully transformed while in the flesh. But I would say they all represent sin.

This is why I actually like hamartia/missing the mark as a "definition". The mark being Christ, it is simple enough to see that every way in which we don't conform to Christ Himself, is sin. In the life of the age to come, we will be free of what we wrestle with, in our flesh and from the enemy. We will finally be fully transformed to be like Christ (though Orthodoxy does not view even this perfection as static - because Christ is a goal we will never fully attain, being creaturely and Himself being God ... but sin will no longer be a factor). But until we attain that full freedom from all sin, which we don't expect while our bodies are fleshly, we have sins. Thankfully God desires always to cleanse and heal us from these.

 

[HARK!]

1) 1 John 3:4 Whosoever commits sin transgresses also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.

EXACTLY!

Don't let anyone deceive you into believing that the Law was abolished, or that now that Messiah has come, that we can practice lawlessness.

(CLV) Mt 7:23
And then shall I be avowing to them that I never knew you! Depart from Me, workers of lawlessness!'



Shabbat shalom.

 

[Devin P]

First of all I'd like to deal with sin in general, this is not about what acts or offenses are sinful. The Old Testament seems to indicate a sin is against God while a trespass is an offense against another person. The Greek word in the New Testament has this interesting etymology:

Harmartia arose from the Greek verb hamartanein, meaning "to miss the mark" or "to err." Aristotle introduced the term in the Poetics to describe the error of judgment which ultimately brings about the tragic hero's downfall. As you can imagine, the word is most often found in literary criticism. However, news writers occasionally employ the word when discussing the unexplainable misfortune or missteps of übercelebrities regarded as immortal gods and goddesses before being felled by their own shortcomings. (Hamartia)
​

Apparently the term is developed more specifically in the New Testament, some excerpts from Vine's:

a principle or source of action, or an inward element producing acts...the seat of sin is the will... (Vine's Dictionary. Sin: ἁμαρτία hamartia g266)
​

To me it's an attitude, at the seat of moral reflection, opposed to and lacking the righteousness of God. I'm not really spoiling for a debate or looking to pit different theological ideas against one another. Just inviting discussion on the nature of sin, the attitude of the heart as it exists in the mind and conscience of humanity.

Grace and peace,
Mark

As someone has posted, scripturally, sin is one of two things.

Either the transgression of the Torah (the law), or directly breaking a commandment that comes straight from the mouth of the Creator.

In both cases, it requires a heart that desires to go our own way, and not the way He has given us, either by His own mouth to us Himself, or His mouth, through another.

Heart-wise, it requires a heart that desires not Him, and His ways. When He blesses you with faith, and you're saved, and you then walk the best you can in His commandments and Torah, then it becomes the sin that lives in you and your flesh. Our heart may be right, but because we are still in our corruptible bodies, it's impossible not to sin. One day when He gives us our new bodies, incorruptible, then we'll be able to keep Torah without sin, because we won't be able to be corrupted.

 

[mukk_in]

First of all I'd like to deal with sin in general, this is not about what acts or offenses are sinful. The Old Testament seems to indicate a sin is against God while a trespass is an offense against another person. The Greek word in the New Testament has this interesting etymology:

Harmartia arose from the Greek verb hamartanein, meaning "to miss the mark" or "to err." Aristotle introduced the term in the Poetics to describe the error of judgment which ultimately brings about the tragic hero's downfall. As you can imagine, the word is most often found in literary criticism. However, news writers occasionally employ the word when discussing the unexplainable misfortune or missteps of übercelebrities regarded as immortal gods and goddesses before being felled by their own shortcomings. (Hamartia)
​

Apparently the term is developed more specifically in the New Testament, some excerpts from Vine's:

a principle or source of action, or an inward element producing acts...the seat of sin is the will... (Vine's Dictionary. Sin: ἁμαρτία hamartia g266)
​

To me it's an attitude, at the seat of moral reflection, opposed to and lacking the righteousness of God. I'm not really spoiling for a debate or looking to pit different theological ideas against one another. Just inviting discussion on the nature of sin, the attitude of the heart as it exists in the mind and conscience of humanity.

Grace and peace,
Mark

Great post and thank you. I'd like to think of sin as anything that violates God's holy and sovereign will. Peace in Christ .

 

[mark kennedy]

Interesting.

I'm not quite sure what you're looking for in this thread (or if you have a specific aim), but there are some interesting posts here.

Just inviting some general discussion on the subject, I'm interested in how people think about this.

Definition of sin is important in many discussions. If we have different ideas, we can deeply misunderstand one another. So to me this seems a good discussion.

Sins can be more that actions, and words. We know from the words of Christ that our thoughts can be equally sinful. Taken further, our very attitudes and way of being can be sin. It is worth noting that for those of us who set our efforts on cooperating with God to be transformed into the image of Christ, these are also the stages. Actions can be easiest, words harder to control. Thoughts can be a lifelong battle to master. Attitudes (at least vestiges of them) are just about impossible to be fully transformed while in the flesh. But I would say they all represent sin.

It's a bit disturbing that we were born with these attitudes, linked inextricably to our earthly nature. There is some vital insight into how this works here:

But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Rom. 3:21-23)
​

What is in view here is the righteousness of God, the only standard by which anyone can be saved. Something in us is not only detached from God but opposed to the things of God. It appears to be the first step in approaching God, understanding that we are in fact sinners. It's not so hard to identify certain sins and times when we failed, that's just a question of being honest with yourself. It's that part of sin that wraps around our ego that entices us to even corrupt our best motives that leave me feeling uncertain.

This is why I actually like hamartia/missing the mark as a "definition". The mark being Christ, it is simple enough to see that every way in which we don't conform to Christ Himself, is sin. In the life of the age to come, we will be free of what we wrestle with, in our flesh and from the enemy. We will finally be fully transformed to be like Christ (though Orthodoxy does not view even this perfection as static - because Christ is a goal we will never fully attain, being creaturely and Himself being God ... but sin will no longer be a factor). But until we attain that full freedom from all sin, which we don't expect while our bodies are fleshly, we have sins. Thankfully God desires always to cleanse and heal us from these.

Sounds like a marksman's term, you missed the target. Your enemy is coming for you and you missed, there are consequences for that. It's almost like our attempts to overcome and defend against our earthly nature and the natural tendency to offend God is somehow disrupted. It's almost like we miss on purpose, not really knowing what it is that threw the shot off.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[Devin P]

EXACTLY!

Don't let anyone deceive you into believing that the Law was abolished, or that now that Messiah has come, that we can practice lawlessness.

(CLV) Mt 7:23
And then shall I be avowing to them that I never knew you! Depart from Me, workers of lawlessness!'



Shabbat shalom.

Brother, your profile picture - <3

 

[mark kennedy]

I liked this part

Heart-wise, it requires a heart that desires not Him, and His ways.

That really gets to the heart of what I'm curious about here.

Either the transgression of the Torah (the law), or directly breaking a commandment that comes straight from the mouth of the Creator.

In both cases, it requires a heart that desires to go our own way, and not the way He has given us, either by His own mouth to us Himself, or His mouth, through another.

Heart-wise, it requires a heart that desires not Him, and His ways. When He blesses you with faith, and you're saved, and you then walk the best you can in His commandments and Torah, then it becomes the sin that lives in you and your flesh. Our heart may be right, but because we are still in our corruptible bodies, it's impossible not to sin. One day when He gives us our new bodies, incorruptible, then we'll be able to keep Torah without sin, because we won't be able to be corrupted.

The Law and the prophets exposes our sin, the righteous requirements being witnessed therein. After Jesus sends out the 70 and some rejected the message Jesus had this to say:

Then He turned to His disciples and said privately, “Blessed are the eyes which see the things you see; for I tell you that many prophets and kings have desired to see what you see, and have not seen it, and to hear what you hear, and have not heard it.” (Luke 10:23-24)
​

He goes on to tell the parable of the good Samaritan. So many prophets and kings couldn't understand the core message in this simple parable. The reason I like that above comment is this:

And Jesus answered and said to her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:41-42)
​

"It requires a heart that desires not Him", that's insightful.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[HARK!]

Brother, your profile picture - <3

Glory to YHWH!

 

[~Anastasia~]

Just inviting some general discussion on the subject, I'm interested in how people think about this.

Definition of sin is important in many discussions. If we have different ideas, we can deeply misunderstand one another. So to me this seems a good discussion.



It's a bit disturbing that we were born with these attitudes, linked inextricably to our earthly nature. There is some vital insight into how this works here:

But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Rom. 3:21-23)
​

What is in view here is the righteousness of God, the only standard by which anyone can be saved. Something in us is not only detached from God but opposed to the things of God. It appears to be the first step in approaching God, understanding that we are in fact sinners. It's not so hard to identify certain sins and times when we failed, that's just a question of being honest with yourself. It's that part of sin that wraps around our ego that entices us to even corrupt our best motives that leave me feeling uncertain.



Sounds like a marksman's term, you missed the target. Your enemy is coming for you and you missed, there are consequences for that. It's almost like our attempts to overcome and defend against our earthly nature and the natural tendency to offend God is somehow disrupted. It's almost like we miss on purpose, not really knowing what it is that threw the shot off.

Grace and peace,
Mark

Yes, our nature has been corrupted. We don't generally use the term "original sin" because that tends to carry with it some Catholic teaching that was added to how the early Christians saw the issue.

God created everything good. There was no sin. We had a given nature, as did all of creation, that could have cooperated with God, grown into fullness in Him, and there was no death.

Of course - that's not what our first parents chose with their free will. They chose NOT to obey the commands of God. Through this choice, sin, like a cancer on creation, was born. Death entered as a result. As a result the very creation itself was infected. And because of that, we are born with our very natures infected. We can no longer really simply choose not to sin, but because our nature is infected, it tends to want to do what our selfish desires want, from an early age. These are the basis through which various passions (which are sicknesses of the soul - pride, covetousness, selfishness, etc) grow. And the more they grow, the more subject to them we become.

(And if you view creation as a metaphor or spiritual story, the truths are still the same.)

Not only internal passions, but also temptations by demons, who are wily to know how to both tempt us and feed our passions, drawing us ever further from any desire to do the will of God.

It is by the grace of God, and salvation through Christ alone, that we receive power to battle against this. When we succeed, the grace of God transforms us through this to become more like Christ, and we are strengthened that much more. When we choose to indulge our passions instead, feeding them, we become weaker, and more inclined to sin. It is an ever-shifting dynamic we participate in by either cooperating with the grace of God or choosing to indulge our flesh.

The "heart" matters, but the heart will almost certainly never be fully perfected in life. Even if it were, it remains susceptible to sin, if such a one were to fail. This is not loss of salvation, by the way - unless one chose to reject God (which should be unthinkable by that point). But I have to say it in order to be clear that we do not in any sense "earn" our salvation. We need only cooperate with God and not reject Him, whatever level that happens to be at.


We do need to understand both what the target is, and what throws off our aim when we miss. I'm not saying this is the basis of salvation, but simply that it is important to Orthodox understanding and practice. It has been written about by Christians since the earliest times. The early desert fathers were very prolific in this sense, as have been many of the monastics. You might be interested in those writings on some level, but I would caution that they are often expressed in an extreme, and some of it could easily be misinterpreted without context.

 

[com7fy8]

what is it in the heart that is opposed to God and wrapped itself around our collective egos making us conceited enough to oppose the things of God.

"for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God," (Romans 3:23)

Through this, I see . . . yes . . . that all of us have sinned. But . . . also . . . God does not want us to be short of His own glory; so there is good news, here, of how God desires to share His own glory with each of us.

And so . . . sin includes not having all which God desires to share with us, including of His own glory

So, it is not enough to stop certain actions of sin and get corrected of certain sin problems. God wants to personally share with us in His own glory.

it's the lack of righteousness.

"All unrighteousness is sin," we have in 1 John 5:17. And the definition of right is Jesus and how Jesus is and how Jesus relates with our Father and loves. So, in case we get busy only or mainly with stopping certain sin actions, this can have our attention away from all which matters the most. We need to be deeply corrected, in our character which makes us able to do those sins, plus which makes us not like Jesus.

And if we might stop certain sins, but without stopping the cause in our nature . . . we are likely to only do other sin things, instead. This is why we need how our Heavenly Father corrects us > Hebrews 12:4-11.

So, sin includes wrong character which makes us so we can do wrong things. Also, wrong nature makes us weak so we can give in to sinning, and be weak enough to give in to wrong feelings and evil emotional things, including "bitterness, wrath, anger" and "all malice" > Ephesians 4:31-32.

These things are love-dead. So, the death which comes with sin, now, is how we are not alive in God's love. And we have >

"But she who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives." (1 Timothy 5:6)

From this, I see what goes for men, also. If we live for pleasure, we are sinning and we are "dead". I believe this means spiritually dead . . . not alive in God's love which would keep us busy with personally sharing with Him in His love and goodness while sharing as family with our other Jesus people. And in God's love we have His curing of our nature to make us more and more like Jesus (1 John 4:17), so we are pleasing to God like His own Son Jesus is so pleasing . . . more and more as we grow in this.

And we know how we can give our attention elsewhere. There is sin of attention.

 

[SPF]

Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

I find this statement by Jesus to really encapsulate what sin is. Jesus said that the two greatest commandments were 1)Love God. 2)Love others. He said that the entire law, and everything that the prophets said were based upon these two commands.

If you take a look at the 10 commandments, you can break each commandment down into either a failure to love God rightly, or a failure to love others rightly.

I think sin, at its root is always going to be a failure to love God rightly, or love others rightly.

Thus, I think there are times where we can say that some sins are universally true. For example, cold blooded murder. It is not possible to love others rightly and also murder them in cold blood. The same could be say for other specific actions as well. Then we have Paul teaching in I Corinthians that while it's perfectly OK for the people to eat the meat that was sacrificed to idols because there is no power in it, some people have a weak conscience and therefore for them, they shouldn't. So we see that in some cases, what person X can do, person Y cannot because person Y cannot actually love God rightly by doing it.

What I have found is that in my life, I try not to focus on sin and sinning less. I try to focus on Christ and about what Christ says of me, and about how I want to trust Christ more on a daily basis. I find that the more I learn to love Christ, as a result - the less I sin. Sinning less becomes the byproduct of Sanctification (the process of becoming more like Christ).