SIN [Heb śin (שִׂן) ]. Alternate form of šin, the twenty-first letter of the Hebrew alphabet.
SIN, SINNERS. This entry explores the concept of sin—of human deviation from the expressed will and desire of God—as it is developed and presented in the OT and NT.
OLD TESTAMENT
The elaborate conception of sin in the Hebrew Bible reflects the influence of Semitic culture and the strongly ethical-moralistic character of ancient Israelite religion. The complexity of sin as a doctrine in the Hebrew Bible is heightened because different literary genres depict sin in various ways. The richness of these ideas will be illustrated in the following sections:
A. Terminology
1. The Term ḥṭʾ
2. The Term pšʿ
3. The Term ʿwn
4. Other Terms for Sin
B. Origins and Universal Extent of Sin
C. Cultic and Unintentional Sins
D. Sin as Disobedience
E. Sin without Conscience: The Sinner
F. Consequences of Sin
G. Removal of Sin
A.Terminology
Like Hittite, Sumerian, and Akkadian literature, Israelite literature draws upon a rich thesaurus for terminology relating to sin. One may count over fifty words for “sin” in biblical Hebrew, if specific as well as generic terms are isolated (DBSup 7:407–71). The plethora of Hebrew terms and their ubiquitous presence in the Hebrew Bible testify to the fact that sin was a dominant concern of the Israelite theologians. Indeed, their highlighting of human failure, deficiency, or offense in the cultic, ethical, and moral spheres constitutes a central theme of OT theology. A survey of major Hebrew words for sin will illustrate how the Israelite writers conceived of sin in terms of their own language.
1. The Term ḥṭʾ. The three most important Hebrew roots for sin (ḥṭʾ, pšʿ, ʿwn [ʿwy/w]) have been studied in detail by R. Knierim (1965). Of these, the root ḥṭʾ is by far the most frequent, occurring some 595 times in the Hebrew Bible. The primitive sense of Heb ḥṭʾ, as confirmed by Akkadian and other Semitic cognate evidence, is simply “to be mistaken, to be found deficient or lacking, to be at fault, to miss a specified goal or mark.” Thus Judg 20:16 tells of Benjaminite archers who could sling stones at a hair and not “miss”; Prov 19:2 speaks of a hasty person who “misses” the correct road; Job 5:24 uses the verb of finding nothing “missing” among one’s property; Prov 8:36 speaks of someone who “fails” to find wisdom. The root ḥṭʾ frequently expresses the ethical failure of one person to perform a duty or common courtesy for another, as in the failure of a vassal to pay tribute to his overlord (2 Kgs 18:14; cf. Gen 31:36; 43:9; 44:32; Exod 5:16; Judg 11:27). The theological sense of ḥṭʾ comes into play when the offense is committed against God, or when failure (even unconscious, inadvertent, or unavoidable) takes place in the sphere of the cult. Sin against God is of utmost seriousness, so that punishment and compensation (expiatory sacrifices) must be exacted. The close relationship between sin (ḥṭʾ) and its consequences is illustrated in the use of the nominal derivatives, which may signify “guilt,” “punishment,” or “sin/guilt offering” (ḥēṭʾ; ḥăṭāʾâ; ḥaṭṭāʾt); similarly, two of the derived verbal conjugations may signify the purgative of sin, “to purify or cleanse from sin through sacrifice and ritual.”
2. The Term pšʿ. A second Hebrew root for “sin” (pšʿ) occurs about 135 times, and signifies willful, knowledgeable violation of a norm or standard. Normally it would not refer merely to “a[n inadvertent] mistake,” as might be the case with ḥṭʾ. The verb pšʿ is thus translated “to rebel, revolt, transgress.” The meaning “revolt” is illustrated by the use of the verb in the realm of international politics, where pāšaʿ signifies the breach of allegiance through violation of a covenant (1 Kgs 12:19; 2 Kgs 1:1; 8:20, 22). These political connotations were imported into the theological sense of the term to mean “rebellion” against Yahweh as Israel’s suzerain (1 Kgs 8:50; Isa 1:2; Jer 3:13; Hos 7:13; 8:1). The noun péšaʿ (“rebellion, revolt”) is translated “transgression” in some modern versions of the OT, but this rendition fails to communicate the idea of “rebellious deeds” which is probably to be understood. Other terms for religious “rebellion” against God include mārad (“act insolent, rebel”; e.g., Num 14:9; Josh 22:19; Ezek 2:3), mārâ (“contend, revolt, rebel”; e.g., Num 20:24; Ps 105:28; Lam 3:42), and sārar/sûr (“be stubborn, rebellious”; e.g., Isa 30:1; Hos 9:15; Jer 6:28).
3. The Term ʿwn. A third important Hebrew term for “sin” is the noun ʿawôn, which finds some 229 attestations in the Hebrew Bible. Though the etymology of the presumed root (ʿwy/w) is disputed, the general meaning of the noun “error, iniquity” is accepted. Hebrew ʿawôn is a deeply religious term, almost always being used to indicate moral guilt or iniquity before God (rarely, of guilt before a human: 1 Sam 20:1, 8; 25:24). Metonymic usages of the term illustrate clearly the relationship in Hebrew thought between “sin” and resultant “guilt” and “punishment,” since ʿawôn may denote any of these three senses (or all three meanings) in a single passage. In Gen 4:13, for example, it clearly signifies “guilt” (forensic and psychological) or “punishment,” (penal), and probably connotes both. When used in the plural, ʿawôn often refers to a person’s iniquitous deeds or crimes against God (e.g., Job 13:23, 26; Dan 9:13). The distinction between the nuances (sin, guilt, punishment) is frequently difficult to ascertain in a specified instance of ʿawôn. In at least eight passages, ʿawôn is used alongside both ḥṭʾ and pšʿ in simply designating “sins” (Knierim 1965:229–35; DBSup 7:339–40). In such cases, especially if the texts are late or liturgical, we may suppose that the individual terms have lost some of their crisp distinctiveness, and are employed as virtual synonyms.
4. Other Terms for Sin. The OT writers describe human evil or “sin” with a wide range of additional terms. The root ršʿ signifies criminal wrongdoing or wickedness; the substantival adjective rāšāʿ is a common word used collectively for “the wicked.” Ethical and moral badness are designated by the root rs̆ʿ; various forms of the root indicate “evil, distress, injury, misery, calamity.” The root ʿbr, “cross over,” may be used in the religious sense of transgressing divine statutes, hence “transgression.” To disobey God is to “despise” him (bāzâ), “spurn” him (nʾṣ), “refuse” (mʾn), or “reject” (mʾs; znḥ) his rule. The person who rejects religious values is “godless, profane” (ḥānēp), “wicked, base, irreverent” (bĕlı̂yáʿal), or “wanton” (nbl). Sometimes sins are designated by words which describe how loathsome and abhorrent they are to God, and thus constitute terms for taboo (tôʿēbâ; šiqqûṣ; šaʿărûrâ; cf. Humbert 1960; L’Hour 1964). Criminal violence, dishonesty, treachery, oppression, and injustice were ceaselessly denounced by the prophets (ḥms; šdd; zmm; bgd; rṣ; ʿšq; lḥṣ; ynh; ʿwl; etc.). Such crimes against persons were judged as abominable and abhorrent to God as specifically cultic sins (Hallo 1985:21–40). Religious apostasy was depicted in terms of sexual promiscuity nʾp; znh). Cultic inadvertences (šgg/šgh) and sacrilege (mʿl; cf. Milgrom 1976a) were counted as serious sins even though they might result from negligence. Hebrew words for “trouble, calamity, sorrow” frequently overlap with sin, since in Hebrew thought sin inevitably leads to hardship and suffering (e.g., ʾáwen; rāʿâ; ʿāmāl). The richness of the Hebrew lexicon in terms for sin (only sampled above) cannot fail to impress the reader that human failure in the religious realm was of central importance to the OT theologians.
B. Origins and Universal Extent of Sin
Israelite theologians shared with their 1st-millennium Hittite and Mesopotamian contemporaries several fundamental assumptions about sin. Of first importance: sin was a universal moral flaw, pandemic in the human race. A few citations from Mesopotamian religious texts will establish the context for Israelite thought on this doctrine. In an early Sumerian wisdom text we hear the penitent plead for leniency with his god: “Never has a sinless child been born to its mother, … a sinless workman has not existed from of old” (ANET, 590, lines 102–3). An Akkadian incantation for appeasing an angry god employs a similar argument: “Who is there who has not sinned against his god? Who that has kept the commandment for ever? All humans who exist are sinful” (Lambert 1974:281–82, lines 132–43; Seux 1976:207, lines 12–14). Rhetorical questions of this sort were popular forms of expression for this universally acknowledged dogma, reminding the gods that they should not expect too much: “Mankind, as many as there are, Which one of them comprehends his faults? Who has not transgressed, and who has not committed sin? Which one understands the way of the god?” (Ebeling 1953:72–73, lines 8–11; cf. Seux 1976:170 and similarly, BWL, 40–41, lines 33–38); “Whoever was there so on his guard that he did not sin? Whoever was so careful that he did not incur guilt?” (Lambert 1959–60:57, lines 105–6; Seux 1976:176; CAD N/ 1:3); “Where is the wise person who has not transgressed and [committed] an abomination? Where is he who has checked himself and thus not ba[ckslid]?” (Langdon 1927:23, lines 15–18; cf. BWL, 16).
The ubiquitous nature of sin emerges with equal clarity from the OT, even on the most superficial reading: disobedience, punishment, and the forgiveness of sin constitute major themes in nearly every book from Genesis through Chronicles. Explicit declarations about universal sinfulness are encountered less frequently in the Hebrew Bible than in Mesopotamian sources, but are nevertheless clear. In the primeval history of Genesis 1–11, God himself is the first to accept this moral verdict against humankind. Having seen that the human race was “only evil continually,” and having come to regret “that he had made humankind,” God ordered a flood to destroy every living thing, resolving to start anew with the family of Noah (Gen 6:5–7). Yet the catastrophe did not alter the fundamental human problem (sin), as God later conceded: “I will never again curse the ground on account of man, though the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth” (Gen 8:21). The Israelite theologians never doubted that sin was an intrinsic character trait of the human species (Prov 20:9; Qoh 7:20, 29), for they frequently appealed to this fact in petitions for mitigated punishments or leniency. Thus we read in a lament psalm: “Enter not into judgment with your servant; for no person living is righteous before you” (Ps 143:2), or in the dedicatory prayer of Solomon, “If they sin against you—for there is no one who does not sin …” (1 Kgs 8:46 = 2 Chr 6:36). See similarly Pss 103:3; 78:38–39; 155:9–10 (= 11QPsa column 24, lines 6–7).
What could be the cause and origin of this monstrous human evil? Though the problem of sin’s “origin” did become a matter of theological speculation in the intertestamental period and afterward, it was apparently of little importance to the Israelite theologians. The tradition of the “fall” preserved in Genesis 3, which became so important in early Christian thought, was not alluded to in the classical Hebrew writings. Instead, human sinfulness was related merely to creatureliness. Humans were made of dusty chthonic substance (hence, frail and ephemeral), born of impure women in a tainting birth process (hence morally tainted) and made to inhabit a polluted, lower-than-celestial realm called earth (hence, having even more natural proclivity to sin than celestial creatures, who themselves all too frequently fall into error). The relationship of sinfulness to creatureliness is elaborated most fully in the book of Job, where it forms a literary topos (Job 4:17–21; 15:14–16; 25:1–6). The argument is found in the mouth of Job’s friends, but no doubt would have represented a dominant Israelite belief (Lévêque 1970:1:259–77; Habel 1981:373–92; Urbrock 1974:1–33). Job himself agreed with the major premises of this argument (Job 14:1–6; esp. 14:1, 4) but disputed its relevance to his own outrageous “punishment.”
The unrighteousness of humankind as a function of ephemeral makeup is argued syllogistically by Eliphaz in Job 4:17–21: If God’s holy angels are not to be trusted and are occasionally charged with error, a fortiori “how much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust?” Elsewhere in genres of lament and petition, Israelite poets appeal to human frailty and ephemerality (under the figures of dust, breath, grass, shadow) in an effort to elicit God’s compassion, clemency, or intervention (Job 10:8–9; Pss 90:3–4; 89:47–49—Eng 89:46–48; 102:4–5, 12—Eng 102:3–4, 11; 39 and 103, passim; cf. Pss 78:38–39 and 130:3). These arguments from frailty and ephemerality are themselves linked to human mortality, as articulated in Gen 3:19, “Since you are mere dust, to dust you shall return.” The implications of this poetic line, though not always appreciated in modern commentaries, were correctly perceived and exploited in Job 4:19: Human mortality, tragically, was poetically foretold in earthly human origin, so that human failing is a natural and inevitable concomitant of human frailty.
The notion of humans being “impure from birth” was even more easily understood in light of the laws of the Israelite cultus. The psalmist would confess, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me” (Ps 51:7—Eng 51:5). Eliphaz could employ cultic language to argue, “What is man, that he can be clean? Or he that is born of a woman, that he can be righteous?” (Job 15:14; cf. Job 25:4 and note Job’s agreement, 14:1, 4). Levitical law and perhaps even earlier ritual customs stipulated mandatory expiatory sacrifices for the defilement of the woman incurred during parturition (Lev 12); every newborn, to that extent, had come into contact with impurity at birth, and hence had a sinful beginning. Biblical assertions about intrinsically sinful human character, such as those found in Ps 58:4—Eng 58:3 and Isa 48:8, are consistent with the explicit arguments in Job.
The argument for inherent human sinfulness found three times in Job might best be corroborated by the experience of Isaiah in his inaugural vision (Isa 6:1–7). The prophet was raptured into the divine assembly where his moral inferiority and sinfulness as merely human were immediately apparent. Only when the seraph (a heavenly creature) removed his guilt and sin with the burning coal could the prophet enter into the proceedings of the council and receive his commission as a prophetic messenger. Isa 6:5–7 is but one of many biblical passages where the lips are identified as the locus of sin, perhaps because the lips are the visible and audible gateway of the human heart (Prov 6:14) where evil originates (Gen 6:5; 8:21; Jer 17:9). At least one Mesopotamian poet thought along these lines, since the interlocutor in the “Babylonian Job” (Theodicy) concedes to the righteous sufferer in his final speech that societal injustices are irradicable, being part of the created world order: “Narru, king of the gods, who created humankind; And majestic Zulummar, who dug out their clay; And mistress Mami, the queen who fashioned them; Gave perverse speech to the human race; with lies, and not truth, they endowed them forever” (BWL, 88–89, lines 276–80).
It is highly doubtful, however, that the Israelite poets even in the midst of theodicean struggle would have ascribed the intrinsic human sinfulness to the handiwork of God. They might accuse God of meting out punishment too harsh for frail humans to bear (Job 6:12; 10:4, 9); or accuse him of covenant disloyalty (Ps 89:29–46—Eng 89:28–45); or lament that he had created human beings for mere futility (Ps 89:48b—Eng 89:47b), but they stopped short of the claim that God personally endowed them with sinful tendencies. In fact, “sin” (ḥaṭṭāʾt) makes its first and only appearance in the primeval history at Gen 4:7, where it crouches like a lurking demon, ready to spring upon unwary Cain to dominate his will. The origin of the sin-demon in Genesis 4 is never told. Despite this shadowy appearance of sin, and despite the Israelite conviction that sin and sinfulness were congenital moral defects, it must also be stressed that the OT theologians never wavered in holding humans responsible for their sins. The spontaneous eruption (origin) of sin in the human heart became a much stronger theme in the oracles of Israel’s writing prophets.
C. Cultic and Unintentional Sins
OT texts which treat sin as disobedience, rebellion, disloyalty, or crime are easily understood in modern Western culture where similar categories of ethics and jurisprudence render them immediately familiar. Yet, another vast domain of the biblical understanding of sin is foreign to modern Western religion, but critical to an appreciation of Hebrew religion. This is the Israelite conception of sin as cultic trespass, ritual impurity, sacrilege, and inadvertent sin. As with ancient Mesopotamian religious texts, the distinction in Israelite literature between sin as ethical-moral and sin as cultic-ritual is often difficult to specify. Cultic sins, like moral sins, were counted as grave offenses against the deity: similar punishments (including death) were exacted for both, and similar expiatory sacrifices were mandated for cultic and moral sins alike (e.g., the ḥaṭṭāʾt “sin offering” and ʾāšām, ʾašmâ “guilt offering”). Furthermore, in many cases it did not matter whether the sin/guilt were committed/incurred intentionally or unintentionally: the consequences, including death, would be the same.
As an approach to the cultic-ritual dimension of sin, we may summarize some representative Israelite laws which reveal the elaborate Hebrew conception of sin. The Kohathite-Levites were to be killed if they even unintentionally looked at or touched the sanctuary vessels (Num 4:13, 20). An animal raped by a human was to be judged guilty and subject to execution (Lev 20:16). The Nazirite who accidentally contacted a dead body (Num 6:9–11) was required to offer an expiatory sacrifice for his “sin.” Death was decreed for the Israelite who would eat of the peace-offering on the third day (Lev 19:5–8), and likewise for the Israelite who ate of a sacrifice while in a state of ritual impurity (Lev 7:20–21). One priestly prescription called for the burning of a red cow (her burnt skin, flesh, blood, dung) and a mixing of her ashes with cedarwood, hyssop, scarlet cloth, and water; when applied to a corpse-contaminated Israelite, this concoction was said to “remove sin” (Num 19:1–11). In the same passage it is said that the contaminated person not cleansed with this mixture “has defiled the sanctuary of the Lord” (Num 19:20). An astonishing case is found in an instance of violating a ban: both Jonathan and his father Saul agreed to Jonathan’s execution for the offense of “tasting honey” (1 Sam 14:24–44), even though Jonathan knew nothing of his father’s temporary ban on eating. Ritual texts declare that anyone with a pelvic discharge (nocturnal emission, emission of sperm during intercourse, regular menstrual flow; Lev 15:16–30) must subsequently offer expiatory sacrifices, or that such persons while “unclean” following such emissions should be removed from the camp (Num 5:1–4) or otherwise face death for “defiling the sanctuary of the Lord” (Lev 15:31). See UNCLEAN AND CLEAN.
The examples above are meant to illustrate that sin and guilt in Israelite religion were serious and complex religious problems, arising not merely from willful disobedience or malice. Sin and guilt in Hebrew terms might have nothing to do with volition, but might be as unavoidable as natural bodily function (see Toorn 1985:23–36). Sin might come through the trespass of one of hundreds of taboos, which only priestly lore could hold in complete compendium. In the case of Jonathan given above (similarly with Jephthah, Judg 11), only superhuman awareness might have averted the transgression and mandatory death sentence which both father and son were prepared to accept. In the examples from Num 19:20 and Lev 15:16–31, the sanctuary is said to be “defiled” by the impure/guilty Israelite because ritual impurity from unatoned guilt is viewed as an aerial contaminant, mystically settling down over the community to pollute it, and most heinously, it comes into contact with the residence and property of God (Frymer-Kensky, WLSGF, 399–414).
These brief glimpses of the priestly perspective on sin, or guilt as it was understood in the Israelite cultus, are essential to a balanced understanding of Hebrew religion. If these religious assumptions and values seem odd to us in the modern West, we must remember that Hebrew culture, like other ANE cultures, was dominated by belief in the supernatural and by a clear separation of “sacred” and “profane.” Hebrew conceptions of sin must be understood within a universe of thought that transcends the static, materialistic viewpoint of modern science. The Israelite understanding of cultic sin and ritual impurity is recorded mainly in the legal (priestly) sections of the Pentateuch, but also in Ezekiel and to a lesser extent in the Psalter and other prophetic books. The notion of sin as animate evil belongs to the realm of dynamistic thought (ETOT 2:382) where divine punishment of a violated taboo might be instant and mechanical. In this clearly supernatural realm, the spoken or written word (oath, vow, blessing, cursing, execration, incantation) was nearly magic. Violations against the holiness of God had a potency of their own, so that the offense of one individual could pollute the land (Num 35:33; cf. Jer 3:1–2, 9; Isa 24:5; Ps 106:38) and bring the entire community under divine wrath. Though the dynamistic conception of sin receives relatively less representation than “sin as disobedience” in the canonical biblical corpus, it must have always been a powerful religious force. Similar notions of sin and impurity are found in religious literature of the Hittites, Sumerians, and Akkadians, where they provide a context within which Israelite laws may be understood.
It was within the framework of Israelite conceptions of sanctity that sin thus became a serious religious problem: by polluting the land and defiling the temple sancta, sin rendered the entire nation susceptible to disease, injury, and direct punishment from God. The elaborate cultic system with its expiatory blood sacrifices, ritual ablutions and sacred rites was meant to counteract this form of evil. It must be stressed that the terms used for “sin” in the realm of the cult (ḥaṭṭāʾt, ʾāšām, ʿawôn) are the same terms used to denote “guilt,” and sometimes “punishment” (for sin/guilt); the irrelevance of disobedient intent is thus evident even in the nomenclature. Similarly, the root ṭmʾ “be (come) impure/unclean/defiled/polluted” often had moral and cultic components which cannot be separated. In the priestly system of thought, it was this concomitant feature of defilement (through sin/guilt) which took on the most menacing and terrifying proportions. To quote Jacob Milgrom, apropos of the Hebrew ḥaṭṭāʾt, (the sin/guilt offering):
The ḥaṭṭāʾt as the authorized purgative of the sanctuary echoes with a familiar ring for students of ancient Near Eastern cults in which temple purifications play so dominant a role. Impurity was feared because it was considered demonic. It was an unending threat to the gods themselves and especially to their temples, as exemplified by the images of protector gods set up before temple entrances (e.g., the šedu and lamassu in Mesopotamia and the lion-gargoyles in Egypt) and, above all, by the elaborate cathartic and apotropaic rites to rid buildings of demons and prevent their return. Thus for both Israel and her neighbors impurity was a physical substance, an aerial miasma which possessed magnetic attraction for the realm of the sacred … Israel thoroughly overhauled this concept of impurity in adapting it to its monotheistic system, but the notion of its dynamic and malefic power, especially in regard to the sancta, was not completely expunged from the Priestly Code (Milgrom 1976b: 392; cf. Milgrom 1983:250–51 with documentation, and Wright 1987:129–46).
Sin as a form of nonmoral or nonethical evil is also expressed clearly in the Hebrew conception of unintentional (unwitting, inadvertent, unconscious) sin. Sins committed in ignorance were of grave concern to ancient priests and penitents, as the following excerpts from three Mesopotamian prayers will illustrate. In a bilingual eršaḫunga prayer, the sufferer admits his proclivity to sin, but does not know which infractions have incited the god’s wrath: “I know not what taboo of my god I have violated; I know not how I have encroached upon the sancta of my goddess … The crime I’ve committed, I know not; The sin I have sinned, I know not; The taboo I have violated, I know not; The sacrilege I have committed I know not … Humans are stupid, and know nothing; People, whoever they might be, what do they know? Whether they’ve offended or done well, they know not at all; [So] O Lord, do not reject your servant …” (Langdon 1927:40–43, obverse lines 32–35; 42–47; reverse 29–36; cf. Seux 1976:140–42, lines 19–20; 26–29; 51–54). In an incantation for the appeasing of the angry god (DINGIR.ŠÀ.DIB.BA) the worshiper queries: “Ea, Šamaš, Marduk, what are my iniquities?… [Though] my iniquities are many, I do not know what I did” (Lambert 1974:274–75, lines 1; 29; cf. 278–79, lines 71–79; 284–85, lines 10–17). In a literary prayer to Marduk, the priest reminds the deity: “People don’t know their [faults], they don’t see them at all; A god reveals what is good and what is abhorrent; He who has a god, his sins are warded off; He who has no god, his sins are many; When you [Marduk] are at his side, his utterances are choice and his words propitious” (Lambert 1959–60:57, lines 107–12; cf. Seux 1976:176, lines 107–12). In other ritual texts, the sick or suffering penitent confesses a long list of potentially relevant offenses, moral and cultic, recognizing that one or more of them must lie at the basis of his punishment by the deity (Reiner 1956:137, lines 88–95; 143, lines 38’–59’; Reiner 1958:13–16, lines 1–128; Mayer 1976:114–15; Geller 1980:181–92). In both Mesopotamian and Israelite thought, illness was sometimes thought to be related to unintentional or secret sin (Toorn 1985:94–99; 67–87).
In the OT, guilt incurred through unintentional sin was of equal theological significance (Milgrom 1976b: 76–80 [79]) since it might have adverse consequences even for the community. Evidence may be drawn most readily from priestly materials, where “P accords completely with the historical sources that the principle of intention plays no part in violations of sacred taboos, e.g., Uzzah’s touching the Ark (2 Sam. 6:6) and the Beth Shemeshites’ viewing of it (1 Sam. 6:19) were not deliberate acts” (Milgrom 1970:20). The Hebrew root šgg/šgh signifies sin by inadvertence, or unconscious, unwitting sin; see Leviticus 4–5; Lev 22:14; Num 15:22–29; Ezek 45:20 (where mippétî means “from naivete”). Unwitting sin was of concern to the biblical psalmists as well; Ps 19:13—Eng 19:12 contains the confession and petition “But who can discern his errors (šĕgı̂ʾôt)? So clear me from hidden faults (nistārôt).” Punishment for unintentional or unconscious sin also underlies the thought in Gen 20:3–5; 26:10 (cf. Reiner 1956:136–37, line 84); 1 Sam 26:18–19; 2 Sam 16:10; Job 1:5; 11:6 (Heb tāʿălūmôt); cf. Num 22:34. The communal lament of Psalm 90, if not referring to the “sins of one’s youth,” contains the accusation in v 8: “You have set our transgressions right in front of you, and our hidden (ʿălūmı̂m, = unwitting, unconscious) sins in the light of your face.” From a cultic-ritual viewpoint, unconscious sin would have been dangerous: the menace of its contagion would continue to grow as long as the offense were undetected and unatoned.
In Israelite and Mesopotamian literature, the “sins of one’s youth” are sometimes allied with sins of ignorance. Accurate account books were thought to be kept in the heavenly court, so that sins left unpunished and unexpiated from one’s youth might later be “remembered” by the deity and brought forward as a basis for punishment. Thus an Akkadian penitential prayer to Šamaš reads: “[the sin(s) which I have commit]ted from my youth [until] adulthood—may they not pursue me. May they be removed 3600 ‘miles’ from me” (Ebeling 1953:54–55, lines 18–20; cf. Seux 1976:287), or in a prayer to Marduk: “The sins which I have committed, known and unknown, from my youth up, please forgive … The grievous transgressions which I have committed since my youth, please absolve and forgive seven times” (Ebeling 1953:72–73, line 18; 74–75, lines 36–37; Seux 1976:170, 172). A confession of the following sort is not uncommon: “When I was young and naive, I didn’t know what sin I committed; Being young and sinful, I am sure to have transgressed the will of my god” (Mayer 1976:115; cf. Seux 1976:404).
The OT psalmist could pray similarly, “Do not remember the sins of my youth” (Ps 25:7), or “Cast far from me the sins of my youth, and may not my transgressions be remembered against me” (Ps 155:12 = 11QPsa column xxiv, line 11). Job, though lacking the privileged viewpoint of the modern reader on the real cause of his suffering (a cosmic wager—known from the prologue), assumes that sins of adolescence might be brought up by God for reckoning: “You write harsh decrees against me, and make me to inherit the iniquities of my youth” (Job 13:26). Israelite literature preserves the parallel idea of children inheriting the punishment for their parents’ sins—an idea once again shared by the Mesopotamian theologians (Lambert 1974:280–81, lines 114–20; Seux 1976:171, note 22 and lines 22–24). The idea of delayed penalty seems to be consistent with other notions of corporate (national) personality in the OT (Exod 20:5–6; 34:6–7; Num 14:18; Deut 5:9–10; Jer 32:18; cf. 1 Sam 15:2–3; 1 Kgs 21:28–29), but the application of delayed punishment to individuals was less readily accepted (Scharbert 1958:22; 1957:130–50). More than once the Israelites who bore the punishment for their “fathers’ sins” were inclined to question the justice of such a principle (Jer 31:29; Ezek 18:2) and lamented its application: “Our fathers sinned, and (Heb Qere reading) now they have passed away; But (Heb Qere reading) we are the ones who bear their punishment!” (Lam 5:7). The individual application of delayed punishment (imputed guilt) may be seen in the psalmist’s imprecation: “May the iniquity of his father (!) be remembered before the Lord, and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out; Let them be before the Lord at all times” (Ps 109:14–15a; see a similar imprecation and the singular usage of ʾābôt in Isa 14:21 [HALAT 1:2 (#9, and Ps 109:14 and Isa 14:21)]). The importance for Israelite theology is that sin (guilt, punishment) would accumulate if not expiated and forgiven: it might be visited upon an individual later in life, or upon a subsequent generation.
D. Sin as Disobedience
If the priestly literature in the Hebrew Bible depicted sin in terms of injury to God’s holiness and violation of cosmic order, with deleterious consequences for the community (contamination and contagion), Israel’s prophets and historiographers more characteristically spoke of sin in terms of disobedience, rebellion, covenant disloyalty, and religious apostasy. Both conceptions are important in Israelite theology, for even the prophetic corpus shows concern for cultic-ritual sin. Sin as moral-ethical evil implicates the human being as a creature of choice in a contest of wills and allegiances: the autonomous will of the creature versus the authority and will of the Creator. Stated thus, sin is “comprehended as a conscious and responsible act, by which Man rebelled against the unconditional authority of God in order to decide for himself what way he should take, and to make God’s gifts serve his own ego” (ETOT #2:383). Students of the Bible frequently find the highest literary expression of this “contest of wills” in Genesis 3. In that profound and paradigmatic story, human curiosity, jealousy, and mistrust join with the desire for personal autonomy, leading finally to the overt act of hybris, rebellion, and disobedience. The conditions of sin inaugurated by these acts of disobedience immediately initiate the fracture of harmonious relationships within culture and the physical environment. In the remainder of the primeval history (Genesis 4–11), the reader encounters successive episodes of humans transgressing the limits established by divine revelation: fratricide (4:1–16); illicit sexual liaisons with divine creatures (6:1–4); pandemic societal violence (6:11–12); the assault of heaven itself in the building of the Babel tower (11:1–10). Described in such terms of rebellion and hybris, sin alienates humans from each other, from their earth, from its animal population, and from their Creator.
In the canonical flow of the OT, despite repeated demonstrations of divine grace in mitigated punishments, election, promise, covenants, and means of forgiveness, the propensity for human rebellion is never diminished. The covenants based upon human institutions (feudal systems of land grants, suzerainty treaties) were meant to heighten Israel’s awareness of the demands for allegiance and obedience: since God had pledged his loyal love to the nation, he could legitimately expect their obedience to his commands. Yet the biblical theologians never tire of telling how Israel sinned great sins of infidelity: failing to trust their suzerain, violating the stipulations of their sworn agreement with him, and ever being lured away by the forbidden religious practices of their Near Eastern neighbors. Sin as covenant disloyalty permeates most of the Hebrew Bible, but particularly the theology of the Deuteronomistic historians (Weinfeld 1972) as found in the books of Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, 1–2 Samuel, 1–2 Kings. The prophets likewise found a basis for indictment in the covenants, but each added his personal imprint on the description of sin, “sometimes as ingratitude (Amos) or as inner aversion and hostility (Hosea), as arrogance and self-exaltation (Isaiah), or as deep-seated falsity (Jeremiah). But they all point in the same direction, namely toward an alienation from God which, because it is a voluntary abandonment of Yahweh, breaks the bond between God and Man, and can therefore be nothing other than disruption and destruction of the divine order” (ETOT #2:387). The national religious leaders (notably the kings, prophets, priests) who by their divine election and spiritual qualifications might have restrained sin through exemplary leadership all too often, the biblical theologians tell us, actually led the Israelites in sins of religious apostasy (e.g., 1 Kgs 14:16; 15:26, 34; 16:2, 13, 19, 26; 21:22; 2 Kgs 21:11, 16). Sin at the national level (e.g., the book of Judges) or individual level (e.g., Jeroboam) could thus provide a controlling literary theme used to structure the composition or redaction of theological narrative in the Hebrew Bible (Mullen 1987:212–32).
E. Sin without Conscience: The Sinner
The Israelite doctrine of universal sin (see section 2 above) poses a certain tension for modern readers who will also encounter texts making categorical contrast between the character and fate of “the righteous” as opposed to “the sinner.” Psalm 1, for example, characterizes the “sinner” (vv 1, 5; also called “the wicked,” vv 1, 4, 5, 6) as unstable and doomed to an early death, while promising blessedness and triumphant fate for the “righteous” (v 6). If all people are indeed “sinners,” how then may some be called “righteous”? The nouns and substantives used to designate the “wicked” as a class are derived from familiar Heb roots: “sinners” (ḥaṭṭāʾı̂m = qattāl noun-of-occupation); “rebels” (pôšĕʿı̂m); “godless” (ḥănēpı̂m); “evil” (rāʿı̂m); “wicked” (rĕšaʿı̂m = unpardonably guilty), etc. The Wisdom Literature of the OT, in particular (Proverbs, Job, Qoheleth, many Psalms), contrasts the “wicked” and the “righteous” as categorical opposites. According to this conventional manner of speaking, the wisdom tradition affirmed that the “wicked” produce only evil deeds and face a calamitous end, while the “righteous” prosper under the blessing of God. According to other representatives of the wisdom tradition (Job, Qoheleth), empirical evidence shows that such optimism is naive; a major burden of theodicy (Job, Qoheleth, certain Psalms, sections of Jeremiah) was to explain the failure of this religious optimism when applied to the individual. But the prophets also spoke of those opposed to the rule of Yahweh as “the wicked,” and they prophesied eschatological doom upon these “sinners” (e.g., Isa 1:28; 13:9). In the case of corporate punishment (national disaster), it was easier to see that the political agents of divine judgment might not discriminate between the guilty and the innocent. Despite such theological tensions, generalizations about “wicked” and “righteous” are made throughout most of the OT.
The use of such categorical distinctions recognizes on the one hand a natural proclivity to sin (inherent in humanness, and predicated of all people) and on the other hand an utterly lawless orientation to life which characterized sinners without conscience. Among the latter might be irreligious, impious, sacrilegious people who refused to accept religious norms; they also might be oppressive, violent, murderous people who behaved only according to selfish interest. The “wicked” of the Hebrew Bible might also be those whose religious faith was not purely Yahwistic, or whose religious practices were not approved by the official Jerusalem priesthood. It may therefore be suggested that these characterizations as “wicked” and “righteous” were sometimes moral judgments and at other times were more fundamentally sociological categories. The conscientious Yahwist might well be guilty of sin in many respects (Ps 51:3–11—Eng 51:1–9), but could be joyful only when confession, restitution and forgiveness had brought a restored relationship with God (Ps 51:12–19—Eng 51:10–17). The wicked, by contrast, were incorrigibly bad (Prov 9:7) and utterly refused to recognize the rule of Yahweh (Ps 94:7). It was in this light that Hebrew poets writing for the cult might include embarrassing declarations of innocence and unqualified claims of righteousness (Pss 7:9—Eng 7:8; 17:1–5; 18:21–25—Eng 18:20–24; 26:1–7, 11a) as well as deep confessions of sin (Pss 25:11, 18; 32:5; 38:4–5, 19—Eng 38:3–4, 18; 39:9—Eng 39:8; 40:13—Eng 40:12). It was this ambiguity of language which Job’s friends artfully exploited to their advantage in the debate over Job’s “sin.” Job avowed his innocence (10:7a; 11:4; 13:23; 33:8–11) which the reader knows to be accurate from the prologue (1:1, 8), and he claimed to be ṣaddı̂q (“righteous”; see 12:4; 6:29; 27:6; 13:18–19); at the same time, Job admitted that in an absolute test for righteousness, no one could emerge ṣaddı̂q (9:2; cf. 9:29–31; 14:4). Job’s friends clung desperately to this latter belief, affirming that some hidden sin must stand behind his suffering.
The tendency to identify “sinners” as a class became most pronounced when Israel’s national security was threatened: the wicked were those who threatened God’s rule, or who were responsible for the weight of guilt which brought the chastisement of God. In the Psalter these wicked “workers of iniquity” become the personal enemies of the king and of Yahweh. They are inveterate sinners and incorrigible criminals, whose wickedness takes on a demonic character. Israel’s poets hurl vile imprecations against these godless, perverse, oppressive, and sacrilegious opponents of righteousness (Pss 69:23–29—Eng 69:22–28; 109:6–20; 137:7–9; 140:8–12—Eng 140:7–11; cf. Jer 20:7–12). Though the identity of the “enemies” has not been determined with precision, they are seen to be such a great menace that they are better dead than alive (Westermann 1981:188–94; Birkeland 1955; Keel 1969). The prophets of Israel, though usually in less passionate and vitriolic language, likewise looked forward to the day when these “wicked” would be eradicated from the earth or reduced to impotence.
The categorical differentiation of “sinners/wicked” from “righteous” is found in several genres of Hebrew writing. Wisdom and prophetic literature display this feature, as do the Psalms and some other liturgical texts. If this simple categorization scheme appears unrefined, it must have nevertheless provided Israelites with a powerful incentive to behave in accordance with ethical norms. The catalogs and descriptions of behavior assigned to “sinners/wicked” reminded Israelite citizens that sinners weakened the moral stability of society, and that to violate ethical principles marked one as a treacherous person and a corrupting influence. It must be stressed that the “sinner” in these texts is one who falls under divine disapproval primarily for immoral or unethical conduct toward other human beings. In Proverbs, for instance, the catalog of “abominations” (tôʿēbâ) hated by the Lord lists mainly sins against persons: deceit, dishonesty, favoritism, devious plotting against another person, punishing of the innocent, inciting quarrels (Prov 6:16–19; 26:25; see also 3:32; 11:20; 12:22; 15:8, 9, 26; 17:15; Hallo 1985:34–38; Toorn 1985:10–23). The Psalms lament and denounce disloyal citizens who vilify neighbors and colleagues with slander, gossip, lies, false accusations, and sorcery (see Toorn 1985:19–20). The Hebrew prophets indict as sinners those who selfishly abuse power and wealth to institutionalize social injustice, using political and economic oppression to maintain their own privileged positions. Thus, while “sin” as a relational concept usually sets the unethical, immoral or irreligious person against God, the specific “sins” which inform the categorization “sinner” are often violations of the dignity and rights of other persons. Toorn carefully documents a comparative study of sin in Israelite and Mesopotamian thought, clarifying how fundamental social and ethical concerns were in definitions of sin (Toorn 1985, esp. 13–23).
While some OT texts depict the wicked as unredeemably bad and unpardonably guilty, some writers held out hope for the sinner’s reform. Reform was the usual outlook in Mesopotamian prayers: the punishment of sin in chastisement and suffering (with ultimate healing) was meant to instruct other sinners to reverence the deity more faithfully. An Akkadian absolution ritual (“lipšur litany”) thus contains the following petition: “[Through] all my sins, all my errors, all my crimes, may the unbeliever [lit., “he who does not fear god”] learn from my example, whoever was neglectful, whoever committed grievous sins against his god and his goddess” (Reiner 1956:142–43, lines 50’–52’). The Babylonian “Righteous Sufferer” who has come through chastisement and healing admonishes his countrymen: “He who has done wrong in respect to Esagil (the Temple), let him learn from my example” (BWL, 56, line p; cf. Mayer 1976:307–49, esp. 327–30). Israelite psalmists entertained the same hope, as expressed in Ps 51:15—Eng 51:13, “Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will be converted to you” (cf. Ps 25:8). The prophet Ezekiel likewise pleads with the “wicked” (rāšāʿ) of Israel to avert divine punishment by turning from evil (Ezek 18:21–23; 33:10–19).
F. Consequences of Sin
The consequences of sin, according to the Israelite theologians, were manifold and always grave. Sin ruptured the relationship between the creator and the creature, and set in motion a series of consequences which, if unchecked, would eventuate in the “death” of the individual sinner. The emotion first shown by God in response to sin is told in the primeval history: he felt regret and remorse for having created the human race (Gen 6:5–7). Within the framework of covenantal theology, God’s response to sin was more commonly a visible display of “wrath” (ʾap) which “grew hot” (ḥārâ) against the sinner and led to punitive action (Considine 1969:85–159). Human sin would awaken the righteous indignation of God, and his holiness demanded further response. Divine disapproval was automatic in the case of calculated and malicious acts. Yet, a study of divine wrath would show that violations of taboo and other cultic infractions were just as likely to kindle God’s anger as were rapacious acts of violence (Lev 10:6; Num 1:53; 16:22; 18:5; Josh 22:20; 1 Sam 4:17; Qoh 5:5—Eng 5:6; cf. Milgrom 1970:21 note 75). On other occasions, divine wrath in response to human error cannot be readily explained, and though it may appear as mere caprice, can be understood as essential to divine freedom (Num 22:20–22, 31–35; 2 Sam 6:6–8; 24:1, 10 [cf. the Chronicler’s midrash in 1 Chr 21:1]; Exod 4:24). Sin is said to provoke God’s “jealousy” (Heb qnʾ; verbal, adjectival and nominal forms); it is that which “irritates” (kʿs, Hipʿil) or “antagonizes” (nsh, Piʿel) him, and issues forth in divine “vengeance” (nāqām, nĕqāmâ cf. Pitard 1982:5–25).
The OT emphasis on divine wrath and vengeance has prompted modern theologians to ponder the problem of “injury” and “harm” being done to God through sin. If God is truly transcendent, why should he feel so threatened by human misbehavior, as though sin personally harms him or takes something from him? How can the sin against him be compensated through expiatory (substitutionary) sacrifices? The question of how God is injured by sin was already a matter of speculation in the story of Job: both Job and his friends, ironically, doubted that human sin should disturb the divine agenda significantly (Job 7:20, 12; 22:2–4; 35:6–8; cf. Jer 7:19). Perhaps on the deepest level neither ancient nor modern theologians have adequately answered this question. Yet all ancient religions of the Near East maintained as axiomatic the religious principle that the gods were duty-bound to uphold the moral order of the universe by rewarding righteousness and punishing sin. Societal stability depended upon the maintenance of its moral fabric, and this the gods had to insure. If the ancient poets employed anthropological language in describing divine emotions concomitant with the discharge of this divine obligation, they can surely be forgiven; would it be less troublesome theologically to have God mete out justice in the stoic, dispassionate and uncaring manner of an executioner?
According to what principles did the OT theologians envision the execution of divine punishment? If indeed there was a consistent Israelite dogma of talionic retributive justice, why are there so many apparent exceptions—including the major voices of dissent heard in the books of Job and Qoheleth which were also endorsed as canonical by official Judaism? Did God intervene by fiat to personally administer punishment, or did he employ agents, or did he merely maintain the balance of natural events which automatically bring the sinner his just due (so Koch 1955:1–42)? Evidence for each of these modes of punishment may be found in the OT, and the narrative in 1 Kings 22 shows how convoluted schemes of divine punishment might become. However, the lack of scholarly consensus on these questions testifies to the fact that the diversity of viewpoint and the complexity of the problem even among ancient writers have not been fully appreciated. In the following broad canonical sweep we may survey some of the dominant and influential viewpoints on the topic of God’s punishment of sin.
In the primeval history of Genesis 1–11, recurrent episodes of sin result in the alienation and estrangement of humankind from God. The first episode (Genesis 3) also leads to the fracture of human society and disruption of nature: hostility now dominates the relationship between the woman and the serpent, between the woman and the man, between the woman and her sons. The man and the ground from which he was taken become mortal enemies, each struggling to take life from the other, until the ground finally gains victory. Cain’s sin (Gen 4:1–16) results in ostracism and exile; his expulsion from civilized, cultured society leads to the birth of a new restless, violent society apart from God (Gen 4:17–24; 5:28–29). Global violence and forbidden marriages with celestial potentates prompt God to decree global destruction (Gen 6:1–9:18), and even in the salvation of Noah’s family, crime leads to the enslavement of one nation by another (Gen 9:17–27). Human hybris reaches its zenith at Babel: the assault of heaven is answered by God in the dispersion of races through the confusion of language (Genesis 11). In such pictures the epic narrator unveils sin and punishment in paradigmatic form: these episodes prefigure the character of sin and suffering which will reverberate throughout the canonical telling of Israel’s history.
In the election of Israel as the covenant people of Yahweh, a new basis for the punishment of sin was established. Israel now became bound under oath to observe the terms of the covenant with Yahweh (Exodus 24), and Yahweh became the God who must uphold drastic forms of punishment if Israel wavered in covenant fidelity (e.g., Deuteronomy 27–28). Thus the Deuteronomistic historians and the prophets would ceaselessly remind the wayward nation that the rise and fall of national fortunes was a direct function of covenant loyalty: When they were under the heel of foreign oppression, it was because Yahweh had abandoned them, allowing their enemies to exact a penalty for their sins.
The doctrine of retributive justice meted out mechanistically against human sin appears simplistic to a modern read of the OT. However, parallel literary genres of the Fertile Crescent suggest that ancient historiographers and theologians adopted this construct as a didactic literary convention. We may illustrate two episodes of Israelite history with contemporary Near Eastern parallels to show how pervasive this paradigm was. In 1 Samuel 21 the narrator tells of a three-year famine which had come upon the land of Israel for unclear reasons. When King David finally inquired of the Lord to ascertain the cause, Yahweh told him it was on account of Saul’s murder of the Gibeonites, in violation of a sworn oath. Expiation for the crime was immediately made (through a reciprocal bloodbath of Saul’s descendants) and the Lord relieved the famine. A strikingly similar story is told in the prayer of the Hittite king Mursilis to the Hattian storm god. He laments that a plague which had broken out during the reign of his father had continued unabated in his own reign. Upon inquiry, the storm god revealed through an oracle that violation of a sworn agreement with the Egyptians was the basis for the divine punishment. Restitution and confession were needed to expiate the crime perpetuated by the Hittites during his father’s reign (ANET, 394–96; cf. Malamat 1955:1–12). The assumption in both accounts was that national disaster was necessarily a consequence of sin (even if committed during the reign of a previous ruler); it was imperative that the sin of the fathers be identified and expiated so that divine wrath might be assuaged.
A second illustration of the pan-semitic doctrine of retribution may be drawn from the Israelite historians’ account of the fall of Judah in 586 B.C. The Hebrew prophets leave no doubt that the destruction of the temple and the “seventy-year” exile are divine punishment for sin. A similar logic is found in Esarhaddon’s report of the downfall of Babylon a century earlier (ca. 689 B.C.E.). Esarhaddon’s account is found in several editions, all of which ignore the important political realities, viz., the destruction of Babylon by Sennacherib’s armies; they offer instead a theological interpretation of the sequence of events (Brinkman 1983:35–42). According to Esarhaddon’s court historiographers, the Babylonians had become excessively evil: they constantly spoke lies and deceit to one another; they took bribes, abusing the weak and enriching the strong; they allowed murderers and oppressors to become established in the city; robbery became commonplace, as did disrespect for parents and disobedience of slaves; the Babylonians even plundered the temple treasury to make protection payments to the Elamites. The sins of the Babylonians finally became too much for Marduk their god: Marduk flew into a rage, ordering the destruction of the city through a violent flood and its return to a swamp. The gods flew up to heaven and the Babylonians themselves were sold as slaves among the foreign riffraff (Borger 1956:12–15, episodes 1–10). Though Marduk originally decreed for his city seventy years of desolation, ultimately his mercy prevailed and he reversed the number (“turned it upside down”), authorizing Babylon’s restoration in the eleventh year (LAR, 243). Though modern political historians would reconstruct the events quite differently, Esarhaddon’s version conforms to an ancient (and biblical) perspective where causality in history can be reduced to the simple matter of sin and punishment (see in addition to Brinkman’s article further examples discussed in AHG, 98–114).
An important contribution on the nature of divine punishment mirroring the sin has been published by P. D. Miller (1982). Miller demonstrated that judgment and punishment in the OT conform to a pattern of “poetic justice,” where the penalty inflicted upon the sinner constitutes a matching repayment in kind for the harm done in the offense. Thus, the king who does “evil” (rāʿâ) will suffer “calamity” (rāʿâ) of his reign as punishment (e.g., 1 Kgs 21:17–19). While the general principle of commensurate talionic punishment was found in ANE treaty curses and law codes, the literary vehicle used in the Hebrew Bible employs of a poetic form of the talion, often achieved through paronomasia and other elaborate turns of phrase.
We have already discussed some of the consequences of sin in priestly thought (see section C above). The sinner incurs guilt through transgression, and is made to “carry” (nśʾ; sbl) the weight of guilt until it is removed through cultic rites and divine forgiveness. In the interim, depending upon the precise nature of the sin, the guilt-laden sinner may expect sorrow (ʾáwen), sickness (Pss 102; 107:17–18; cf. Seybold 1973) and other forms of suffering (ʿāmāl, etc.). Israelite theologians at some periods linked sin and suffering so closely that suffering apart from sin was inconceivable (Job; cf. John 9:2). For very serious offenses the sinner might expect the death sentence (at least according to the ideals of the Law). The death penalty might be carried out by the community as part of their judicial responsibility, or administered by God himself in the law of karet (Wold 1979; Milgrom 1970:5–8; Knierim 1965:48–50, 73). The “karet formula” (“[that person shall be] cut off [from my presence]”; Lev 22:3 and often) most often envisages death through direct divine intervention, and is consistent with the many passages which cite “death” as the consequence of sin (e.g., Num 18:22; 27:3; Deut 24:16; 21:22; 22:26; 2 Kgs 14:6; 2 Chr 25:4; Ezek 3:20; 18:4, 20; Amos 9:10). If a persistent sinner did not die physically as a result of sin, living under the threat of imminent death must have itself been a terrifying punishment. In the case of a capital crime, the sinner might still hope that repentance would move God to commute the sentence (e.g., 2 Sam 12:13) or delay it (e.g., 1 Kgs 21:28–29).
G. Removal of Sin
If the OT theologians spoke of sin’s consequences in very grave terms, it must also be remembered that forgiveness of sin formed a vital doctrine in Israelite faith. Though the path to forgiveness through repentance and cultic ritual might be complicated, though compensation and expiation might be costly, and though some natural consequences of sin might be irreversible, the hope of restored relationship with God found an equally important place in the Hebrew Bible. One Israelite poet’s expression of this confidence in the Miserere (Psalm 51) provides a supreme and elegant display of such faith. On a national scale, even though punishment of sin should result in expulsion from the holy land of Israel, the exiled community could pray and hope for forgiveness and national return (1 Kgs 8:44–53). Nourished in the poems of Israel’s psalmists and writing prophets, this promise of forgiven sin formed the basis of hope for permanent national identity which would live on in the hearts of Jewish believers for many centuries.
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Scharbert, J. 1957. Formgeschichte und Exegese von Ex 34,6f und seiner Parallelen. Bib 38:130–50.
———. 1958. “Unsere Sünden und die Sünden unserer Väter.” BZ n.s. 2:14–26.
Seux, M.-J. 1976. Hymnes et prières aux dieux de Babylonie et d’Assyrie. LAPO 8. Paris.
Seybold, K. 1973. Das Gebet des Kranken im Alten Testament. BWANT 99. Stuttgart.
Toorn, K. van der. 1985. Sin and Sanction in Israel and Mesopotamia. SSN 22. Assen.
Urbrock, W. J. 1974. Mortal and Miserable Man: A Form-Critical Investigation of Psalm 90. SBLSP, pp. 1–33.
Weinfeld, M. 1972. Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic School. Oxford.
Westermann, C. 1981. Praise and Lament in the Psalms. Trans. K. Crim and R. Soulen. Atlanta.
Wold, D. 1979. The KARETH Penalty in P. SBLSP, pp. 1–45.
Wright, D. P. 1987. The Disposal of Impurity. SBLDS 101. Atlanta.
Robin C. Cover, “Sin, Sinners: Old Testament,” ed. David Noel Freedman, The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 31–40.
NEW TESTAMENT
Following Jewish usage, the NT authors consider “sin” to be an activity or a stance which is opposed to God. Since God loves humanity and commands that humans love their fellows, sins against humans are also sins against God. There are three distinguishable although partially overlapping views of sin and sinners: (1) a sin may be an individual wrong act; (2) a sinner may be a person who lives without regard to the will of God and who consequently sins by routine; (3) sin may be conceived as a “power”—some sort of active agent—which opposes God and which can capture humans and make them sinners.
A. Terminology
B. Sin as Transgression or Trespass
C. Sin as Complete Alienation from God
1. Jesus and the Sinners
2. Sinners in the View of the Early Church
D. Sin as an Enslaving Power
A. Terminology
1. Hamartia and its cognates, translated “sin,” “to sin,” and “sinners,” are the most general terms and exhibit the widest range of meaning. In the OT and other literature known in both Hebrew and Greek (such as Ben Sira), hamartia -tanein, -tōlos translate ḥātāʾ (“sin,” sometimes “impurity”) and its cognates, which gives it a wide range, but it also is used for Heb pāšaʿ, “transgress, rebel,” and especially for rāšāʿ, “wicked,” and their cognates, as well as other words (for a list of translations in the Greek OT see TDNT 1:267–71). We shall see the significance of this in section C below. In pagan Greek usage the meaning of harmartia is also quite wide. In early Greek literature “sin” can refer to almost any sort of error: missing the mark in throwing a javelin, committing a procedural mistake in sacrificing, or harming or disregarding others. In later Greek philosophy (from Plato to the Stoics and Cynics), “sin” was especially connected with ignorance: the person who really understands what he or she is doing and its consequences will do what is right (TDNT 1:293–96, 296–302; Kaye 1979:30–33).
2. Paraptōma, parabasis mean respectively “trespass” and “transgression” and thus refer to individual acts (“trespass”:Matt 6:14–15; Rom 5:15–20 and elsewhere; “transgression”:Rom 4:15; Gal 3:19; Heb 9:15 and elsewhere).
3. Parakoē is “disobedience” (Rom 5:19; 2 Cor 10:6; Heb 2:2; the verb in this meaning appears in Matt 18:17).
4. Adikia means “unrighteousness,” usually against a fellow human (e.g., Luke 13:17, where it is translated “dishonesty”).
5. Asebeia means “impiety,” usually against God. Asebeia and adikia appear together in Rom 1:18, translated “ungodliness and wickedness.” Asebeia and its cognates appear six times in Jude (vv 4, 15, 18).
6. Kakia and ponēros mean “wickedness” (e.g., 1 Pet 2:6) and “evil.” Ponēros is very common in the gospels (e.g., Matt 5:11, 37, 39, 45).
7. Opheiletēs is a “debtor,” and sometimes it and the cognate verb are used to refer to “debt” to God or the neighbor incurred by transgression (Matt 6:12; Luke 11:4; 13:4, translated “offenders”). This usage probably depends on the Aram and late Heb use of hôb, hôbâh, hôbāʾ to mean both “debt” and “sin” or “guilt” (Black 1967:140).
B. Sin as Transgression or Trespass
The general Jewish view, accepted throughout the NT, was that all people “sin” in the sense of “commit a sin at some time or other.” According to Paul, “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom 3:23), and in Rom 5:12 he traces this situation back to Adam in a difficult passage which will occupy us below. He found it hard to think of anything which he himself had done wrong, save persecuting the Church (1 Cor 15:9; Phil 3:6), but he had to grant that at the judgment, God might find some flaw in his behavior (1 Cor 4:4). The assumption of universal sinfulness is also seen in the Lord’s Prayer, where the disciples are told to say, “forgive us our debts” (Matt 6:12) or “forgive us our sins” (Luke 11:4). All four Gospels and Acts place early a passage which displays the assumption that all have sinned: “he [Jesus] shall save the people from their sins” (Matt 1:21); John the Baptist preached “a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins,” and Jesus preached, “repent” (Mark 1:4, 15); Zechariah prophesied that his son John would “give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins” (Luke 1:77); John the Baptist said of Jesus that he “takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29; on the assumption of universal sin in John, see Kümmel 1973:290); at the conclusion of the first Christian sermon there is a call to all to repent and receive forgiveness of their sins (Acts 2:28). The assumption that all humans sin can be found in the major parts of the NT: the gospels, Acts, and Paul’s letters. The same assumption is found in the other major divisions and books of the NT. In the Deutero-Pauline epistles, see Eph 2:1 (before conversion the readers were dead in their trespasses and sins); in the Catholic Epistles note James 5:16 (the readers should confess their sins to one another) and 1 Pet 2:24; 3:18. The view is reflected in Heb 2:17–18; 4:15 and Rev 1:5, and argued strongly in 1 John 1:8–10.
The passages just listed do not specify what the sins are which have been committed, but they are viewed as individual wrong thoughts or actions (for a fuller list of passages, see TDNT 1:295). There would not have been much disagreement about what counted as “wrong,” at least at a general level. Jewish sexual ethics differed in part from those of pagan society, but otherwise there was general agreement about right and wrong. In detail, of course, there would be differences from group to group. One group, for example, may have had stricter rules than another about what to do in the case of property left on deposit which was not reclaimed. Everyone would agree, however, that appropriating it for one’s use before the set date was wrong. The general view that all people transgress would strike a responsive chord everywhere even without defining what counted as sin.
Sins (or trespasses, transgressions, and the like; see the list of terms in section A), since they are individual wrong thoughts or deeds, may be atoned for. The very call to repentance implies this, and it is stated explicitly in Matt 12:31, which gives an exception to the rule: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven. In Judaism, sins were to be confessed to the priest and accompanied by a sacrifice. In the case of transgression against a fellow human, restitution should also be made (usually with an added fifth of the value of what was acquired dishonestly; see Lev 5:24—Eng 6:5). This view is continued in Matt 5:23–24, but the general Christian opinion was that the sacrificial system had been superseded. One should confess directly to God, or to other members of the Christian community, and thus obtain forgiveness. According to the book of Hebrews, forgiveness of sins requires the shedding of blood (9:22), but the sacrificial system is no longer effective (10:11). Forgiveness is obtained, rather, by the blood of Christ (9:14; 10:12). The connection between Christ’s blood and forgiveness appears also in Matt 26:28; Rom 3:25; Eph 1:7; 1 John 1:7; Rev 1:5b; 7:14; cf. Rom 5:9; 1 Pet 1:18–19.
Some Christians thought that those in Christ should be empowered to live without transgression. Paul’s view was that Christians had been freed from “the law of sin and death” (Rom 7:24–25; 8:1–8), and he urged his converts to live “blamelessly” or “without fault” (Phil 2:15; 1 Thess 5:23). The author of John could write as if those who accepted Jesus would have no sin (John 15:22, 24), and a member of the same school proposed that “no one who abides in [God] sins” (1 John 3:6). This could be stated in the positive: Those in whom God abides have love perfected in them, and this gives them “confidence for the day of judgment,” apparently the assurance that if love abides in them sin does not (1 John 4:12, 17). The author of Hebrews, thinking that sin requires atonement and that Jesus had offered “once and for all” the one satisfactory atonement (9:26), stated that those who sinned deliberately after conversion could not be forgiven (Heb 10:26–27; sexual immorality may be especially in mind: 13:4). But this ideal of perfection foundered on experience. Paul, as we saw, was not completely confident that he achieved blamelessness himself (1 Cor 4:4; cf. 1 Cor 9:27; Phil 3:11–12), and he had to reckon with quite serious transgression on the part of some of his converts (1 Cor 5:1–5, 11). The author of 1 John wrote that those who say they have not sinned make God a liar (1:10). While this possibly refers to pre-Christian sin, the perfect tense of the verb implies that the consequences of sin remain, and thus it appears that sin by Christians is granted, despite the theological principle that those who participate in Christ, who was sinless, are themselves sinless (1 John 3:5–6). Christian sin is also reckoned with in 1 John 2:1; 3:20; 5:16 (Kümmel 1973:297).
The last passage refers to a sin which is not “mortal” (pros thanaton) and states that a sin by a Christian which is “mortal” may not be prayed for—that is, forgiven. It may be that nonmortal sin is unintentional, in which case 1 John agrees with Hebrews in the view that there is no forgiveness for Christians who sin intentionally (Heb 10:26). In OT and subsequent Judaism, there is a major and obvious distinction between intentional and unwitting transgression, and in view of this it is striking that NT authors do not make more use of it. See LAW (IN JUDAISM OF THE NT PERIOD). The other principal distinction in Jewish law—between sins against God and those against one’s fellow—is not explicitly made in the NT (but cf. Luke 15:18, 21, “against heaven and before you”). Apart from the passages in Hebrews and 1 John just cited, the NT also does not rank sins as “heavy” or “light” (Bultmann BTNT 2:234). For this distinction in Rabbinic literature see Šebu. 1:6; further, Sanders 1977: 157–60.
The standard Jewish view was that sin or transgression, if not atoned for in ways prescribed in the Bible, would be punished—either in this world, by sickness, suffering, or death, or in the world to come. This view was also inherited in at least some parts of Christianity. The connection between sin and sickness is seen in John 9:2 (attributed to the disciples) and 9:24 (attributed to Jews who did not follow Jesus). In a Synoptic passage Jesus heals a sick man by telling him that his sins are forgiven (Matt 9:2–6 = Mark 2:5–11 = Luke 5:20–24). Paul explains death and sickness among the Corinthians by saying that they ate the bread and drank the cup in an unworthy manner, and he continues by saying that the Lord “chastens”—that is, punishes—those who do not adequately judge their own actions. This chastening prevents their ultimate destruction, on the standard Jewish view that sins are punished only once (1 Cor 11:27–32; cf 2 Bar. 13.10). Similarly the body (“flesh”) of the man who was committing incest was to be destroyed so that his spirit would be saved (1 Cor 5:5): punishment in this world prevents punishment in the next. That sin results in death is indicated in Rom 1:32; 5:12; 6:16, 23 (Bultmann BTNT 1:246). This assumption lies behind the view that Jesus’ death atones—he died instead of the believer (Rom 3:25 and elsewhere)—and also behind the view that the believer, by “dying” with Christ and gaining a new life, escapes death (Rom 6:2–11; cf. 7:6).
Within the NT there is no development of a standard system of atonement for postconversion transgressions. Paul, we saw, urged perfection and thought that transgressions would be punished. He knew about repentance (2 Cor 7:9–10), but in his closing admonitions he does not urge repentance and the seeking of forgiveness, but rather “blamelessness.” Even where repentance is emphasized, as in Acts, it usually refers to conversion (see section C), not to the correction of postbaptismal transgression. Since repentance, restitution, and sacrifice for transgression are major conceptions in Judaism, and were routinely expected to be offered by Jews who were generally upright and only occasionally transgressed, the relative unimportance of postbaptismal repentance in the NT must be explained. We have already seen that the emphasis was on perfection, and probably this idealism prevented the early authors from spending much time and energy on coping with transgressions by Christians. Secondly, many of them expected the Lord soon to return, and thus they were not motivated to work out a system of pastoral care for straying members of the Church. The stark position of Hebrews—no forgiveness for intentional postconversion sin—is explained by this view: Jesus offered the sacrifice for sins “once for all at the end of the age” (9:26). As centuries passed, a denial of repeated forgiveness, even for intentional sins, was difficult to maintain. The hope for or expectation of Christian perfection, so prominent in the NT, has never disappeared entirely, though in most branches of the Christian faith postbaptismal transgressions are expected and provided for. The rite of penance was a major aspect of Christianity in the late antique and medieval periods, and one of Luther’s most important views was that the Christian is at the same time “justified” in the sight of God and, in terms of actual performance, a sinner (simul iustus et peccator). The heirs of these traditions give the correction of sin, and repentance for it, a prominent place in life and worship.
The Christian authors of the NT believed that Jesus came to save people from their sins, and consequently that faith in him was required for the remission of sin (e.g., John 1:29; Matt 1:21). John puts the matter strongly and seems even to equate nonbelief in Jesus with sin (John 16:8–9; cf. 8:21–24). Jesus’ own view, however, was that “righteousness” was possible in the standard Jewish way: obedience to the Law. He did not come to call the righteous (Mark 2:17), but he did not deny that there were such. He did not disagree with the rich man who assured him that he had kept the commandments, though he told him that “perfection” required yet more: giving his possessions to the poor and following him (Matt 19:16–30 = Mark 10:17–31 = Luke 18:18–30). “Following,” however, was not a general requirement which Jesus laid on all (Hengel 1981:59). He proclaimed the nearness of the kingdom, and he urged people to prepare for it, but he did not limit “the righteous” to those who followed him, nor did he equate “sin” with refusing to do so. He saw himself, however, as having come especially to call people who were “sinners” in a worse sense than “occasional transgressors.”
The early Christians—at least those who have left literary remains—considered all non-Christians to be sinners in this worse sense. They were of the view that others needed to be converted to faith in Jesus, and thus their view of universal or common sin became more radical than Jesus’ own: all were “sinners” in the sense of “lost.” We now turn to consider people who as such were “sinners.”
C. Sin as Complete Alienation from God
While the verb “to sin” usually refers to an individual transgression, the noun “sinner” often (not always) indicates a worse state: a life which is not orientated around obedience to the will of God, but which is rather lived apart from him entirely. The cure for this condition is a change of one’s life, sometimes indicated by the word “repentance” in the sense of “conversion.”
“Sinners” as the enemies of God, and thus of the “righteous,” are prominent in the Psalms, where Gk hamartōloi, “sinners,” translates Heb rešaʿı̂m, “the wicked.” These are people who boast of the desires of their hearts, who think that there is no God, who believe that there is no retribution, whose mouths are “filled with cursing and deceit and oppression” (Psalm 10). They appear also in Ben Sira (e.g., 41:5–10), the Psalms of Solomon (e.g., 3 and 4), and elsewhere. There are lists of passages and explanations of terminology in Sanders 1977: 342–46 (Ben Sira); 398–406 (Psalms of Solomon); cf. also 352–58 (1 En. 91–104); 358–60 (some other sections of 1 Enoch); TDNT 1:320–24.
1. Jesus and the Sinners. It is sinners in this sense of whom Jesus was said to be the friend (“a friend of tax collectors and sinners,” Matt 11:19 = Luke 7:34) and whom he came to call (Matt 9:13 = Mark 2:17 = Luke 5:32; Luke adds “to repentance”). John the Baptist came “in the way of righteousness” and was not accepted, except by “the tax collectors and prostitutes” (Matt 21:32).
The use of tax collectors to represent sinners is more of a puzzle than most scholars, at times including the present author, have granted. The tax or toll collectors of Galilee in Jesus’ day were not servants of Rome, but rather of Herod Antipas. He paid tribute to Rome, but this does not necessarily mean that his toll collectors were seen as traitors, though this has often been said. It is more likely that they were regarded as dishonest and greedy. One may compare Philo’s remarks on Capito, the tax collector of Judea, a poor man who became rich (Gaium 199). He was not a toll collector in semi-independent Galilee, but rather an administrator of taxes in the province of Judea, governed directly by Rome. While he may have been worse than the Galilean toll collectors, it is probable that all tax collectors were thought of as rapacious. That is not to say that, objectively considered, they were all wicked. John, a toll collector in Caesarea, joined together with the leading members of the Jewish community there to bribe Florus (the procurator) to protect access to the synagogue (JW 2.14.4 §285–88). He does not fit the image of “outcast” which one derives from the stories in the gospels. When he was collecting money, however, he may not have been seen as a pillar of the community.
At any rate the toll collectors constitute the one named group who represent “sinners” in the Synoptic Gospels, and once prostitutes are associated with them (Matt 21:32). The meaning is that their manner of life was basically antithetical to the will of God.
Luke contains many more references to both sinners and toll collectors than do Matthew and Mark, and the author was especially concerned to emphasize that those who accepted Jesus “repented” in the sense of “changed their lives.” In Luke’s version of the call of the first disciples, Peter at first tells Jesus to depart from him, since he was a sinner (Luke 5:8), an unworthy companion for a righteous person. Matt 5:46 criticizes toll collectors, but Luke uses “sinners” instead (6:32). In Luke 7:36–49 there is a story of a woman who was a sinner. She ministers to Jesus and he announces the forgiveness of her sins. The parables in Luke 15 are told in the presence of toll collectors and sinners (15:1), and they proclaim that God rejoices over a sinner who repents (15:7, 10). In the parable of the toll collector and the Pharisee, the former confesses himself a sinner and craves God’s mercy (Luke 18:10–13). The most elaborate story is that of Zacchaeus, a toll collector who was considered by the crowd to be a sinner, and who made abundant restitution to those whom he had wronged (Luke 19:1–10).
It is probable that Luke has expanded the theme of Jesus’ appeal to toll collectors and sinners, but the theme itself reflects the ministry of Jesus. The surest fact is that his call was accepted by one Galilean toll collector, who is called Levi in Mark and Luke, while in the first gospel he is named Matthew and is probably thought of as one of the twelve (Matt 9:9 = Mark 2:14 = Luke 5:27).
The gospels represent Jesus’ association with sinners as being a subject of criticism (Matt 11:19; Mark 2:16). This was not seen as problematic so long as scholars supposed that most Jews, or at least the Pharisees, opposed the idea of God’s grace and forgiveness. According to this interpretation, Jesus told sinners that if they repented God would forgive them. The Pharisees, hating grace, repentance, and forgiveness, and even more those who believed in them, decided to kill him (so Jeremias 1963:124; 1969:267; 1971:108–21; Perrin 1967:102–3; Schweizer 1971:28–29). This school even proposed that the Pharisees thought that ordinary people were “sinners” in the extreme sense of “without hope in God’s sight” (Jeremias 1969:259; 1971:112, 118; TDNT 1:323, 328). When this is seen as historical fantasy in the service of theological anti-Semitism (e.g., Sanders 1985:200–4; cf. 1987:230–31), one is left with a question: what was the offense? Another way of asking the question is to focus on the material which is only in Luke. If Jesus’ call of sinners meant that toll collectors repaid those whom they had cheated, who would have been aggrieved? One suspects that Luke’s portrayal is too bland and that more was at stake. It is certain that Jesus favored honesty, especially in toll collectors, and that he would have liked for habitual sinners to change their lives. In that sense, Luke’s stories are true to Jesus. They do not, however, answer the historical question: Who objected to Jesus’ association with sinners and for what reason?
The prevalence of the fantasy mentioned above has left few possible answers from which to choose. The most probable is that Jesus’ offense was that he said, or was understood to say, that even heinous sinners who followed him were acceptable to God, and that he did not require of them the standard acts of atonement which are provided for in the law (Sanders 1985:204–8). It is to be noted that in no instance is Jesus said to recommend confession to a priest and sacrifice. In this case the offense was his self-assertion rather than his belief in grace; more precisely, his connection of God’s grace with response to himself (as in the story of the woman who was a sinner, Luke 7:36–50).
A striking use of “sinner” to mean one who habitually and willfully flouts God’s law is seen in John 9, where Jesus is said to have been considered a “sinner” by some, since he did not keep the sabbath (John 9:16; cf. vv 24–25, 31). It is not to be accepted, however, that Jesus actually disregarded the sabbath. The stories in the Synoptic Gospels (e.g. Mark 2:23–28; 3:1–5) prove rather the contrary, and John here as elsewhere pushes to an extreme a theme which is also found in the Synoptics. It is unlikely that during his lifetime Jesus was viewed as a “sinner” himself; he was criticized for including them, not for being one of them.
2. Sinners in the View of the Early Church. Christians viewed all who did not accept their message as sinners, totally cut off from God. The use of “sinners” to mean non-Christians or pre-Christians is seen in Rom 5:8 (“while we were yet sinners Christ died for us”; cf. 1 Tim 1:15). That the fate of sinners is eternal death unless they convert is stated in James 5:20, where it is also implied that a “sinner” has committed a “multitude of sins.” Those who had a role in Jesus’ execution are described as sinners in Matt 26:45 = Mark 14:41 = Luke 24:7; Heb 12:3. We saw above that those who do not believe in Jesus are considered sinners in John 8:21–24; 16:8–9.
Acts does not have the noun “sinner,” but repentance of sin and forgiveness are connected with baptism into the Christian faith. This is needed by all, both Jew and pagan, and thus these terms refer to conversion: Acts 2:38; 3:19; 5:31; 7:60; 10:43; 13:38; 22:16; 26:18. The first and last passages may be taken as representative. In Acts 2:38, Peter calls on the Jews to repent and to be baptized “in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.” In 26:17–18, the risen Lord tells Paul that he is to open the eyes of the gentiles, “that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.”
In the categories thus far considered, sin is avoidable. If sin is an individual wrong action, a trespass (B), it is possible not to sin, even though all authors grant that humans, being weak, inevitably sin at some time or other. One who is a sinner in the sense of “wicked” (C) can change, as Zacchaeus is said to have done. In both these categories, atonement and change, rely on God’s grace. In neither Judaism nor Christianity (at least in most forms of them) is it doubted that God loves those who sin and wishes to save sinners. The standard view in both is that atonement or conversion is always open and that God stands ready to welcome the wanderer back into the fold. A harsher view appears in Christian literature in Heb 10:26; 1 John 5:16; and in Jewish literature in 4 Ezra, where virtual perfection is required, and in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Jubilees, where some sins are not forgivable (e.g., 1QS 7.16–17; Jub. 2.27; 15.34). Rather, the typical view is that of Pseudo-Philo, who attributed to God the attitude that “even if my people have sinned, nevertheless I will have mercy on them” (L. A. B. 31:2; cf. Let. Arist. 192; Sib. Or. 4.66–70; T. Mos. 4).
D. Sin as an Enslaving Power
In the letters of Paul there is a more radical view of sin: it is an active power. This is most clearly the case when the noun hamartia, sin, is the subject of a verb other than “to be.” When hamartia is the subject of “to be,” as in Rom 5:13, “sin was in the world,” the same view may be implied; but the case is clearer in other passages. Outside the letters of Paul one sees this usage only in Heb 3:13, where it is said that Christians may be hardened “by the deceitfulness of Sin.” Here Sin is the active agent.
The usage of “Sin” as power comes mostly in Romans 5–7. According to Rom 5:12, Sin “entered the world”; thereafter one reads that “Sin reigned in death” (5:21); that Sin may “reign” in one’s body (6:12) or “have dominion” over one (6:14); that Sin found opportunity in the commandment and “wrought in me all kinds of covetousness” (7:8); that it “revived” (7:9); that it found “opportunity in the commandment, deceived me and by it killed me” (7:11); and that it “worked death in me through what is good” (7:13). Sin as power may be served (6:16–18), and thus it enslaves (6:20). It can be escaped only through “death” (6:2–11). Put another way, Sin is a “law” which lurks in one’s members and prevents the fulfilling of the law of God (7:17–23). The only escape is to leave “the Flesh” (8:8), that is, to die with Christ. Christians have died with Christ and thus to Sin (6:6, 11), and they have thereby escaped not only Sin but also the Law (which condemns) and the “Flesh,” the state of enmity toward God (7:4–6).
In this section of Romans, Sin is treated as a power which is not only alien to God but which is almost as potent; in fact, it often wins the struggle. This extreme conception of Sin in part explains Paul’s not making much use of the idea of repentance: one does not escape bondage to an alien power by repentance. The radicalness of the problem corresponds to the radicalness of the solution, escape from the “Flesh” by sharing the death of Christ.
It is important to note that Paul does not offer an anthropological, theological, or cosmological explanation of this conception of Sin. In the Jewish view, God had created the world and declared it good. This doctrine is not easily reconcilable with the view that Sin is a power strong enough to wrest the Law from God’s control or to render humans powerless to do what is good (Rom 7:11, 19). There are two principal passages which lead up to but do not account for the view that all humanity, apart from Christ, is under the power of Sin. In Romans 1–2 both gentiles and Jews are accused of gross transgression (homosexuality and “all manner of wickedness” on the part of gentiles, robbing temples and committing adultery on the part of Jews), and Paul draws the conclusion that all people, “both Jews and Greeks, are under sin” (Rom 3:9). The RSV here translates “under sin” as “under the power of sin,” and this interpretation seems to correspond to Paul’s meaning. The accusation is not only that people transgress, but that all are under Sin, governed by it. The charges of heinous immorality do not actually account for the conclusion, however, partly because they are exaggerated. Both the gentile and the Jewish worlds contained “saints,” people whose lives were largely beyond reproach. It is unlikely that Paul’s conclusion—that all are under Sin—rests on empirical observation. Further, in the midst of the catalog of charges, comes the admission that some gentiles, though without the Law, nevertheless “do by nature what the Law requires,” and these will be justified by their works in the judgment (Rom 2:13–14). The conclusion in 3:9 does not correspond to what leads up to it in any respect: the charges in chaps. 1–2 overstate the case and the conclusion is contradicted by 2:13–14. What this means is that Paul’s conclusion, that all are under Sin, was not derived from the line of observation and reasoning he had presented in the previous two chapters.
The same is true of the second passage which argues for the universality of sin. Adam, states Paul, sinned, and this introduced sin and its consequence, death, into the world; “and so death spread to all people because all sinned” (Rom 5:12). This is followed by the statements that “sin is not counted where there is no law” and that “death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam” (5:13–14). In order to make the grip of sin universal, Paul wished to make Adam instrumental. Yet he had two problems: transgressions of the Law which preceded it should not count; not everyone sinned, as did Adam, by rebelling against God’s commandment. Despite these problems, he asserted the consequence: “by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners” (5:19). His anthropology did not include the conception of inherited sin, and thus he had no logical way of proving universal condemnation by appeal to Adam. He simply asserted it, while himself citing points which count against it.
What we see in both cases is a conclusion which is independent of the arguments which precede it. Adam’s sin does not—in Paul’s own statement of it—prove that all humanity is sinful and stands condemned. The heinous sins of some Greeks and Jews do not—even in Paul’s own presentation of them—lead to the view that all humans are under Sin. This means that he held the conclusion as a fixed view and tried to bring forward arguments in favor of it, though without logical success. The conclusion, in other words, is not only independent of but is also more important than the arguments. (Some scholars still think that one must understand the human predicament in Paul’s view before it is possible to understand his soteriology: e.g., Kümmel 1973:173; others note the relative incoherence of the explanations of universal sin: e.g. Conzelmann 1969:195–98.)
If the considerations put forward in Romans 1–2 and 5 do not explain the origin of Paul’s conception of Sin, we can say where it came from? There are two principal possibilities. One is that Paul did not come to Christianity with a preformed conception of humanity’s sinful plight, but rather deduced the plight from the solution. Once he accepted it as revelation that God intended to save the entire world by faith in his Son, he naturally had to think that the entire world needed saving, and thus that it was wholly bound over to Sin. His soteriology is more consistent and straightforward than his conceptions of the human plight, and thus may show that in describing sin he had to go in search of arguments which led up to a preformed conclusion. This explanation gives a good account of why Romans 1–2 and 5 are weak as reasoned arguments but lead to a definite conclusion. The conclusion that all need to be saved through Christ, to repeat, came by revelation, and so could not be questioned; the arguments in favor of universal bondage to sin are then seen as efforts at rationalization. (For the argument that Paul’s thought ran “backward,” from solution to plight, see Sanders 1977: 442–47; 474–75.)
The second possible explanation is that Paul had imbibed aspects of a dualistic world view, according to which the created order is at least partly under the control of the god of darkness. Iranian (Zoroastrian) dualism had penetrated the Mediterranean, and it can be seen in the Dead Sea Scrolls, for example, when they distinguish between the angel of darkness and the angel of light, the children of darkness and the children of light (e.g., 1QS 3.17–4.1). There are echoes of this terminology in Paul: Satan (standing in for the angel of darkness) could disguise himself as the “angel of light” (2 Cor 11:14). “This age” is governed by another “god” (2 Cor 4:4) or by other “rulers” (1 Cor 2:6). It is probable that Paul was influenced by dualism, especially since he considered the entire created order to be in need of redemption (Rom 8:19–23), though it could not have been guilty of sin. Paul, it must be emphasized, was not a dualist. He proposed that God himself had subjected the creation to “futility,” and that he had done so “in hope,” planning its redemption. Formally, there is no admission in Romans 8 of a second power, much less a second god. Yet Paul did believe in evil spiritual forces, “so-called gods” (1 Cor 8:5); “beings that by nature are no gods,” as the RSV nicely translates a difficult phrase (Gal 4:8); “demons” (1 Cor 10:20); the “god” or “rulers” of “this age” (above). These non-gods could enslave (Gal 4:8), as could Sin (Rom 6:6).
When we add these references to evil spiritual beings to Paul’s conception of Sin as a power, and further note that even the nonhuman creation needs redemption, it must be concluded that Paul was influenced by some form of dualism. By piecing together references to hostile demons, or gods, and Sin, one could even create a dualistic theology. Satan’s deception of Eve (2 Cor 11:3) could be combined with Sin’s deception of humanity in Rom 7:11 (taking the “I” in Romans 7 to represent humanity in general), and further with the fall of Adam (Rom 5:12–13), to draw a picture of a fully personified second power, which could also be seen in the reference to “the god of this age” (2 Cor 4:4). This second power then might be viewed as the referent of “Sin” throughout Romans 6–7. This, however, would be a false construction. Paul twice employed the word “deceive” from Gen 3:13 (exēpatēsen in Rom 7:11 and 2 Cor 11:3; ēpatēsen in Gen 3:13), he inherited Satan from biblical and Jewish tradition, and he accepted the existence of “beings that by nature are no gods”; but he did not put all these together to form a dualistic theology. We shall shortly see the dominance of monotheism in his thought about sin.
It is difficult to say, in fact, just how realistically Paul conceived of Sin as a power. Röhser (1987) argues that “superhuman being” is too strong, “only a metaphor” too weak, and he proposes “a certain form of hypostatizing,” for which the term “personification” may be used. In this case, Sin in Romans 6–7 is approximately what Wisdom is in Sirach 24: personal attributes are assigned to a reality whose presence in the world can be perceived, but the step of making the reality a Being is not taken.
If there is some truth in the suggestion that Paul was influenced by dualistic thought, there is more in the view that his discussions of sin are the reflex of his soteriology. The force of the latter is most fully seen if we pursue the question posed by our consideration of dualism: Did Paul think that there was an enemy power which enslaved the universe, human and nonhuman alike? In part, we have seen, he did. But this ran into competition with one of his basic theological views, a doctrine embraced in all the surviving Jewish literature of the period: God controls what happens, both in nature and in history. This view, applied to the issue of sin, means that God intended human disobedience. That is just what Paul thought, as he thought that it was God who subjected the creation to futility. (On praedestinatio ad malum see Räisänen 1972.) In Paul’s view, God intended universal sin so that he could subsequently save everyone by grace. For this very reason he gave the law: “Scripture consigned all things to sin, in order that (hina) what was promised to faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe” (Gal 3:22). “God consigned all people to disobedience, in order that (hina) he could have mercy upon all” (Rom 11:32). God “endured with much patience the vessels of wrath made for destruction [by him], in order that (hina) he could make known the riches of his glory for the vessels of mercy …” (Rom 9:22–23).
In these passages and others, which at first seem impious—charging God with creating transgression—we see the combination of Paul’s twin convictions: the one God is the God of Hebrew Scripture, the one who created the world, who called Abraham and who gave the Law; and the same God always intended to save the world by faith in Christ. Thinking backward from the second point, he had to conclude that Creation, Election, and the Law did not save. In his black-and-white world, if they did not save, they did not even help; election and the Law were not stepping-stones to salvation in Christ. Yet God gave the Law. What is its result? Not salvation, therefore damnation. This meant that God intended the result, he “consigned all to disobedience.” One might say that humanity was consigned to iniquity as the result of prior sin, which stirred God to wrath (Rom 1:18, 24). But in Romans 1 this is used only to account for gentile corruption, and it is the result of idolatry. The giving of the Law cannot be attributed to God’s wrath in the same way. Paul’s monotheism, which included the view that God controlled everything that happened, was braver than that. God intended all of human sinfulness, just as he intended the subjection of the nonhuman world to “futility” and “travail” (Rom 8:20, 22), but throughout the intended good (8:28):the salvation of the entire cosmos.
No form of ancient Judaism directly known to us (that is, possibly excluding Sadduceeism) considered “predestination” and “freewill” to be incompatible. In Qumran the members of the community were called both “the elect” and “the volunteers”; they were gravely warned not to disobey, but wickedness was also attributed to the “angel” who governed their “lot.” Paul puts the two side-by-side as well. Most Jews, he wrote, did not accept Jesus because God “hardened” them; on the other hand, they did not “heed” (Rom 10:7, 16). When predestination and freewill are applied to sin, the result is both that God intended it and that humans are guilty of it. No ancient Jew, including Paul, worked out a consistent explanation of how human decision to sin relates to God’s determination of all that happens. Paul at least dealt seriously with the problem, as Romans 9 shows. Dualism provides an alternative: there are two powers which have different intentions, and humans are pulled first one way then the other. In Paul (as in 1QS) we get all three. Sin is avoidable transgression, and it is therefore punishable; Sin is a power external to humanity which enslaves the entire creation; sin was intended by God in order to lead up negatively to salvation through his grace in Christ.
These conflicting views naturally lead to the search for some means of harmonizing them, and, failing that, for some way of defining the “heart” or “center” of Paul’s thought, not just about sin, but about God, Christ, and the world, for these are all bound up together. Recent discussions include, in chronological order, Sanders 1977: 434–42; Hickling 1980; Beker 1980; Räisänen 1983; Sanders 1983:4–10; Räisänen 1987:xi–xxxi. We cannot hope to solve the question of the center of Paul’s thought here, but in the discussion of sin it should be noted that, despite his bravery, Paul was uncomfortable in holding that God gave the Law in order to condemn (Gal 3:22; cf. Rom 3:20; 4:15; 5:20), and that this view was temporarily retracted in Romans 7 (especially v 10), only to reappear (though without the word “Law”) in Rom 11:32 (on the movement toward Romans 7 and the retraction of the previously stated view there, see Sanders 1983:70–81). It was in trying to avoid laying the intention to condemn at God’s door that Paul shifted to a modified dualism. Sin is an external power which can manipulate the Law (7:8), or it is a power within the flesh (7:18, 23)—in defiance of the goodness of creation. The presence of dualistic influence in Romans 6–7 cannot be denied, and it is confirmed by the passages about inimical non-gods. Yet in the discussion of sin there is a more powerful theology at work, one which is seen throughout his thought: God created the world and controls history; he will save the world through Christ; everything else, even sin itself, follows from his will but is subjected to it and used for his purpose.
Bibliography
Beker, J. C. 1980. Paul the Apostle. Philadelphia.
Black, M. 1967. An Aramaic Approach to the Gospels and Acts. 3d ed. Oxford.
Conzelmann, H. 1969. An Outline of the Theology of the New Testament. Trans. J. Bowden. London.
Hengel, M. 1981. The Charismatic Leader and His Followers. Trans. J. C. G. Greig. Edinburgh.
Hickling, C. J. A. 1980. Centre and Periphery in the Thought of Paul. Vol. 3, pp. 199–214 in Studia Biblica 1978, ed. E. A. Livingstone. JSNTSup 3. Sheffield.
Jeremias, J. 1963. The Parables of Jesus. Rev. ed. Trans. S. H. Hooke. London.
———. 1969. Jerusalem in the Time of Jesus. Trans. F. H. and C. H. Cave. London.
———. 1971. New Testament Theology. Vol. 1, The Proclamation of Jesus. Trans. J. Bowden. London.
Kaye, B. N. 1979. The Thought Structure of Romans with Special Reference to Chapter 6. Austin.
Kümmel, W. G. 1973. The Theology of the New Testament According to its Major Witnesses. Trans. J. E. Steeley. Nashville.
Perrin, N. 1967. Rediscovering the Teaching of Jesus. London.
Räisänen, H. 1972. The Idea of Divine Hardening. Publications of the Finnish Exegetical Society 25. Helsinki.
———. 1983. Paul and the Law. Tübingen. Repr. 1986.
———. 1987. Paul and the Law. 2d ed. Tübingen.
Röhser, G. 1987. Metaphorik und personifikation der Sünde. WUNT 2/25. Tübingen.
Sanders, E. P. 1977. Paul and Palestinian Judiasm. Philadelphia.
———. 1983. Paul, the Law and the Jewish People. Philadelphia. Corr. ed. 1985.
———. 1985. Jesus and Judaism. Philadelphia. Corr. ed. 1987.
———. 1987. Jesus and the Kingdom. Pp. 225–39 in Jesus, the Gospels, and the Church, ed. E. P. Sanders. Macon.
Schweizer, E. 1971. Jesus. Trans. D. E. Green. London.
E. P. SANDERS
SIN, WILDERNESS OF (PLACE) [Heb midbar sı̂n (מִדְבַּר סִין)]. A desert area located between Elim and Mount Sinai which the Israelites traversed in the Exodus (Exod 16:1; 17:1; Num 33:11, 12). It is one of the seven wildernesses (Shur, Etham, Sin, Sinai, Paran, Zin, Kadesh) crossed by Moses and the children of Israel. Here the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron: “Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate bread to the full” (Exod 16:3). The Lord responded by sending manna and quail (Exod 16:4–21). From the Red Sea the Israelites went to Elim then to the Wilderness of Sin (16:1), Rephidim (Exod 17:1), and finally arrived at the Wilderness of Sinai (Exod 19:1). According to Numbers the order is Elim-Red Sea-Wilderness of Sin-Dophkah-Alush-Rephidim-Wilderness of Sinai (Num 33:10–15).
The Wilderness of Sin is not to be confused with the Wilderness of Zin. While there is no distinction made in the LXX or the Vg between Heb sîn and ṣin, both of which are rendered “Sin,” modern English translations uniformly render the distinction as Sin and Zin. The similarities of the words Sin (Heb sîn) and Sinai (Heb sînay) may suggest that Sinai is derived from Sin or that they are otherwise related.
The precise geographical location of the Wilderness of Sin, between the Red Sea and Mount Sinai, depends on where the other related stopping places and Mount Sinai are to be located. The location of all of these places is uncertain. Those who hold the view of the S location of Mount Sinai—either at Jebel Musa or in the vicinity—have identified likely locations for Elim at Wadi Gharandel, Dophkah at Serabit el-Khadem, Rephidim at Wadi Rafayid or the oasis at Feiran. This scenario would locate the Wilderness of Sin as a sandy plain, Debbet er-Ramleh, below Jebel Tih, or the plain of el-Markha—both on the SW fringe of the Sinai plateau (GP 2:210–13; GTTOT, 252–53). Those who propose a N Exodus route would locate the Wilderness of Sin in the vicinity of various mountains argued to be Sinai in central Sinai, N Sinai, the Negeb, or the land of Midian. For a review of these views see Beit-Arieh 1988. See also DOPHKAH; ELIM; REPHIDIM; SINAI, MOUNT.
It is unlikely that the Wilderness of Sin is to be associated with Sin, also Heb śin (RSV Pelusium; LXX Syene), in Ezek 30:15–16, which probably derives from an Egyptian word sìn and refers to an Egyptian stronghold in the NE corner of the Nile delta. See PELUSIUM.
Bibliography
Beit-Arieh, I. 1988. The Route Through Sinai: Why the Israelites Went South. BARev 15/3:28–37.
E. P. Sanders, “Sin, Sinners: New Testament,” ed. David Noel Freedman, The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (New York: Doubleday, 1992), 40–47.