Thread: Kerygmania: Original Sin Board: Limbo / Ship of Fools.
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Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
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What's your take on original sin? Genesis 2:4a - 3:24
More specifically, how do you understand the transmission of sin from Adam to us as newborn babes?
I've never really considered this deeply because I've always been of the opinion that a newborn can't possibly be a broken, fallen creature. But as I get older it rather seems to make more sense.
Are we born with things that require removal and healing from the grace of God? Or are we simply a tabula rasa and therefore learn by imitation (e.g. Pelagius) and our developing sins are simply a product of environment.?
Then there's those weird contradictory passages in the OT that say the sins of the fathers are visited on the children. ( that surely makes sense - imitation wise) vs the later exilic versions that speak of this no longer being the case, but that each will be accountable for themselves.
How do we square the transmission of original sin with such exilic passages from Jeremiah and Ezekiel and (from memory) Chronicles. ?
Are we born with "desires of the flesh" or our baser natures that require taming? I mean, surely childrearing teaches you that's the case (e.g. sharing, emotional intelligence - delay of gratification etc) ?
[ 08. April 2017, 08:08: Message edited by: Alan Cresswell ]
Posted by churchgeek (# 5557) on
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I think what happens is we learn to do wrong before we can know right from wrong. In fact, that not only happens to us as individuals - it happened to us as a species. Evolution is amoral, and has gifted us with some nasty habits as well as good things. And, I think, it's all down to being creatures; only God is perfect. Which is why the Incarnation saves us: it joins God and creation.
I think it's important to remember that Christians read "original sin" into the Genesis text. The closest the Bible comes to teaching it is in Paul, where he says "sin entered the world because a man sinned..." But even that passage can be read other ways.
Hopefully one of our Orthodox friends will show up - I believe they don't have the dogma of original sin, and that it's only a Western idea anyway. Jews certainly don't find it in their Bibles.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
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The writers of the texts themselves read all sorts of ignorant nasty stuff in to their reaching for the light. It's nobody's fault. Evolution in the light, to the light, thanks to the Light of the World has brought is through that this far: All will be well.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
The writers of the texts themselves read all sorts of ignorant nasty stuff in to their reaching for the light. It's nobody's fault. Evolution in the light, to the light, thanks to the Light of the World has brought u{i}s through that this far: All will be well.
Posted by Moo (# 107) on
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Our shipmate Amos, who was raised Jewish, gave this statement of the way Jews see the Garden of Eden myth.
We are poor because our grandparents squandered the family fortune. We did not do anything wrong, but we suffer because of their actions.
Moo
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
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Nice, but the truth is that no one did anything wrong of course.
Posted by ThunderBunk (# 15579) on
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otherwise known as the augustinian heresy. It's a libel on God as creator and on us as God's beloved creation.
We have a tendency to be less than we can be, that much is clear. It's the fundamental condemnation of our own humanity, specifically its physical and sexual aspects, which to me constitute the heresy. Either God didn't create our physical selves, but only some kind of spiritual essence, in which case God isn't the creator of everything that exists, or our creation as physical sexual beings is a terrible mistake on God's part.
The traces of this debate can be seen in the "innocent until....." - human sexuality is assumed to be unclean, need controlling etc.. We need to start from the assumption that sexuality is a gift of God's creative love, and re-imagine everything from there on. We can't go on assuming that it was a mistake - that way madness and paranoia lie.
Posted by Siegfried (# 29) on
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quote:
Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
otherwise known as the augustinian heresy. It's a libel on God as creator and on us as God's beloved creation.
Sorry--which is the heresy--Original Sin, or denial of it?
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
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quote:
Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
otherwise known as the augustinian heresy. It's a libel on God as creator and on us as God's beloved creation.
Let's blame Augustine for the bits he's actually responsible for, shall we?
Many of the Greek Fathers believed that sexuality only entered the world after the fall. That Adam and Eve, if they had remained in the garden, would never have been sexually active.
Augustine disagreed. He thought sexuality existed pre-fall(*). He just thought that our sexuality is now sufficiently messed up that we can trace all the rest of our tendency to be less than we can be to the circumstances of our conception. (Larkin's: They fuck us up, our mum and dad, is literal.)
Now I think Augustine was obviously wrong about conception as the medium of transmission of original sin. But the thought that our fucked-upness is passed on before we are capable of choosing otherwise seems to me true. As obnoxious as that may appear to an individualistic society.
(*) As it happened Augustine thought that Cain must have been conceived post-fall, which meant that Adam and Eve must have fallen before there was time to get around to conceiving anyone. So they never had sex pre-fall. But that was, Augustine thought, a contingent fact of history, just the way things fell out.
Posted by David Goode (# 9224) on
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It's clearly allegorical. Surely no one believes it is factual.
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
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Sex is one of those areas where ancient and historical ideas are simply foundationally factually wrong. And thus the ideas built on them must be thrown out.
Sex is the basis for most reproduction across species. Babies are not moral agents, nor are children until at least midteens. They had poppycock ideas way back when. We must reject the bad examples from the bible and church parents (far too few church mothers, ever since Paul).
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
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Original sin has no necessary connection with sex, though popular culture thinks so. It has to do with the nature of human beings, and would apply even if every baby born was conceived in a test tube.
When I have to explain this (like in confirmation class) I usually use the analogy of infection or disease. There are certain diseases that can be transmitted from parent to child and have devastating effects on the child even before birth. I believe the point of the original sin doctrine is to emphasize that the human "problem," whatever we want to call it, is more than superficial. It goes all the way to the heart, and it affects life from its very beginning to its very ending. It's the spiritual equivalent of cancer or Tay-Sachs--not acne or worts.
(as for being a moral agent--I can say of my own experience that I certainly was one (and knew I was one) during primary school, and probably long before. And I caught my son lying to me, deliberately and knowingly, when he was preverbal, at eight months. (That was awkward--you don't want to encourage it, but I couldn't help laughing)
Posted by Stercus Tauri (# 16668) on
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The most practical definition of original sin that I have come across is from a rather unlikely source, Rev Ron Ferguson's book, Black Diamonds and the Blue Brazil:
“The churches of the Reformed tradition have a slogan 'Ecclesia semper reformanda' - the church in need of perpetual reformation. The Reformers well understood that unchecked, unaccountable, unredeemed power corrupts and corrupts absolutely, in the church as much as in politics or any other sphere. Cynicism and lies. The doctrine of original sin - mocked by the intellectually slothful as being some kind of melancholy religious pathology - has got nothing to do with literal gardens or snakes or fig leaves, and everything to do with the grain of humankind in the raw.”
Whenever I test that statement, it works, especially those last few words.
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Original sin has no necessary connection with sex, though popular culture thinks so. It has to do with the nature of human beings, and would apply even if every baby born was conceived in a test tube.
When I have to explain this (like in confirmation class) I usually use the analogy of infection or disease. There are certain diseases that can be transmitted from parent to child and have devastating effects on the child even before birth. I believe the point of the original sin doctrine is to emphasize that the human "problem," whatever we want to call it, is more than superficial. It goes all the way to the heart, and it affects life from its very beginning to its very ending. It's the spiritual equivalent of cancer or Tay-Sachs--not acne or worts.
Yes. That's pretty much my take. And sex is irrelevant ISTM.
Apparently one of the main arguments on the issue was between Pelagius and Augustine. Pelagius thought original sin transmitted through imitation (after being born) whereas it seems Augustine thought it went deeper - so before that.
Is an analogy between genetics (ancestral inheritance ) and behaviourism (or the idea that we become what we are through our environment) relevant here?
[ 01. January 2017, 09:33: Message edited by: Evensong ]
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
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Seems Purgatorial ter me! But what do I know?
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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My take on this is that although there having been a state of grace in which there was no death, pain or need to work is impossible to reasonably sustain, I agree with Diarmaid MacCulloch in his History of Christianity that “Original Sin is one of the more plausible concepts of Western Christianity, corresponding all to accurately with every day human experience”. The notion of Original Sin, particularly the idea that there is something fundamentally morally flawed about human beings that is hard-wired into our nature, preventing us doing what we know to be right, summed up by Paul’s exasperated confession: “I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.” (Romans 7:19) helps us to make reasonable sense about human nature and the possibilities for the communities and institutions we construct. The challenge for modern Christianity is not to ignore Eden but to make sense of it to the contemporary world, and to rescue the biblical account from the shackles of arid literalism and to seriously consider its essential truths.
To my mind, the “originality” of of sin lies in our genetic inheritance. Evolutionary biologists have suggested that what we call “selfishness” was/is a quality essential to the process of evolution. Amongst creatures with no moral sense this inherent “selfishness” is associated with neither virtue nor vice, a state of innocence. The problem with the human species is that the development of consciousness, and self-awareness, leading to an appreciation of mortality and insecurity, impacting on an intrinsic “selfishness” can have harmful and negative consequences both for individuals and society. It can become dysfunctional to the survival of the species. From a Christian perspective, that mix of consciousness, insecurity and selfishness deep-rooted in our make-up produces a bias towards what we call sin. To my mind this is not too far from Genesis: “You may eat the fruit of any tree in the garden, except the tree that gives knowledge of what is good and what is bad. If you do you will die that same day”? I would suggest the “fall” (for want of a better word) is enacted in the development of all human beings: that we begin life as innocent babies and young children and only become sinful as we develop self-awareness and a knowledge of what is good and bad.
Posted by Jengie jon (# 273) on
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Humans are social animals. We require the pack to survive; hermits are never from birth to death unless their life is very short. That means we are all participants (technically co-creators) in human culture and human culture is compromised, partial and full of power struggles.
Jengie
Posted by Moo (# 107) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
Seems Purgatorial ter me! But what do I know?
Host hat on
Martin, stop junior hosting.
Host hat off
Moo
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
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Eeek! Ma'am.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Apparently one of the main arguments on the issue was between Pelagius and Augustine. Pelagius thought original sin transmitted through imitation (after being born) whereas it seems Augustine thought it went deeper - so before that.
I don't think Pelagius believed in original sin at all.
It's hard to reconstruct Pelagius' views, since they're mainly transmitted to us by Augustine and others arguing against them. But the argument started off when Pelagius objected to Augustine's prayer for grace to follow God's commands. Augustine shouldn't need to wait for God's grace; he should just follow them, said Pelagius, and it was defeatist to imply otherwise. I don't see any room for original sin in a view that argues that all we need to follow God's commands is the resolution to do so.
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on
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quote:
More specifically, how do you understand the transmission of sin from Adam to us as newborn babes?
Can this be understood? The essence of who we are? I think it is depraved innocence. As we gain experience the depravity accentuates and the innocence retreats. Quite small children can be calculatedly cruel and selfish. Quite old adults can be calculatedly kind and selfless. The potential in us IMV is not for goodness but for regeneration. As Paul says, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" and, Romans 7, "Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift". This regeneration is only understood if experienced..like the taste of chocolate.
This is what I believe ..but I do not understand it.
[ 01. January 2017, 18:23: Message edited by: Jamat ]
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
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Kwesi, thank you for that. It fits what I believe about this. For me, it's driven as much by experience and observation as by doctrine. Back long ago, Original Sin was one of the things that drew me back to an adult faith. Christian teaching seems to fit how we are, how the world experiences itself, so much better than any other explanation.
It struck me, and still does, that without Christian faith, the real problem isn't where sin comes from. Why not just pursue self-interest and grab every advantage you can - whether for success or pleasure? Why not just be selfish? Why not exploit other people? The real problem is where virtue comes from. How was it that I found myself sometimes instinctively doing the right or unselfish thing?
It is self evident that unless we have managed totally to dull our inner moral sense, we all know that we are not as good as we feel we could be. We are inherently flawed. But that is the point. That is not all we are. We are a flawed version of something that could be better. That is one of the fundamentals of the human condition. It's part of 'our hearts being restless until we find our rest in thee'.
And, the more conscious we are of God's existence, the more obvious that gets.
It seemed to me then, and still does, that none of the other explanations have anything like the credibility of the standard Christian one. The alternatives are bland, falsely benevolent, don't explain where virtue comes from, don't recognise virtue, don't recognise moral responsibility or try to pretend the human will is just an illusion.
I'm not terribly bothered about how this gets into human nature or how its transmitted. Like it or not, by the time we're conscious, it's there. It's how we are.
Incidentally, I don't think 'total depravity' originally meant we're all just totally wicked, filthy rags and no more. That's a rhetorical abuse of something much more profound. It may be that the phrase was originally ill-chosen, or has become misunderstood. But what I think it actually means is that there is no part of human nature that is untainted. We don't have the opposite of an Achilles heel, a bit that somehow escaped being dipped in the dirty water. Even our reason, our conscience, our spirituality and our moral sense, even the bit that challenges us to wake up, each is flawed.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
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quote:
Augustine disagreed. He thought sexuality existed pre-fall(*). He just thought that our sexuality is now sufficiently messed up that we can trace all the rest of our tendency to be less than we can be to the circumstances of our conception. (Larkin's: They fuck us up, our mum and dad, is literal.)
My understanding is that Augustine speculated that the sexuality that existed before the Fall was without lust. Now, a generous reading of Augustine would say that his understanding of lust isn't what we might consider "normal sexual desire", but rather it refers to the excessive me-oriented, pleasure at all costs, drive within the human psyche that is the root of many evils.
Seen in this light, one could say that Freud's view of human nature is a secular version of Augustine's original sin. The infant, isn't born "good", but born with an emperor syndrome believing that the entire universe revolves around Him. It's not that the baby is EVIL, it's because that at that infant stage, he or she is unable to understand that other people exist and have value other than him or her.
Augustine's famous illustration of this in the Confessions where he uses the example of twin baby brothers who want to kill each other when they realize that the other is hogging all of mother's milk.
[ 01. January 2017, 19:38: Message edited by: Anglican_Brat ]
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
My understanding is that Augustine speculated that the sexuality that existed before the Fall was without lust. Now, a generous reading of Augustine would say that his understanding of lust isn't what we might consider "normal sexual desire", but rather it refers to the excessive me-oriented, pleasure at all costs, drive within the human psyche that is the root of many evils.
I suspect that the reason Augustine is particularly concerned about lust is the obsessive quality: the way it not only grabs your attention but then doesn't let go even when you would rather turn your mind to something else.
Though I suspect he would refuse the idea that the obsessive quality is separate from the me-oriented drive you talk about.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
quote:
Augustine disagreed. He thought sexuality existed pre-fall(*). He just thought that our sexuality is now sufficiently messed up that we can trace all the rest of our tendency to be less than we can be to the circumstances of our conception. (Larkin's: They fuck us up, our mum and dad, is literal.)
My understanding is that Augustine speculated that the sexuality that existed before the Fall was without lust. Now, a generous reading of Augustine would say that his understanding of lust isn't what we might consider "normal sexual desire", but rather it refers to the excessive me-oriented, pleasure at all costs, drive within the human psyche that is the root of many evils.
Seen in this light, one could say that Freud's view of human nature is a secular version of Augustine's original sin. The infant, isn't born "good", but born with an emperor syndrome believing that the entire universe revolves around Him. It's not that the baby is EVIL, it's because that at that infant stage, he or she is unable to understand that other people exist and have value other than him or her.
Augustine's famous illustration of this in the Confessions where he uses the example of twin baby brothers who want to kill each other when they realize that the other is hogging all of mother's milk.
Interesting citation of the emperor syndrome, although Freud's actual phrase (written in English), was 'His Majesty the baby'. He also makes some interesting points about the baby's apparent exemption from natural processes:
"Sickness, death, renunciation of enjoyment, and restrictions on his own will shall not be valid for the child; the laws of nature, like those of society, shall come to a halt before him; he shall really be the center and heart of creation, His Majesty the Baby, as we once thought ourselves to be."
The interesting point about this, well, one of many interesting points, is that this is appropriate for a baby, but not an adult. I suppose some adults preserve it as an underlying attitude.
But the basic narcissistic stance of the baby is healthy and indeed, indispensable to survival, one would think. Most individuals are weaned off it, gradually. I'm not sure about the theological ramifications of this.
Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on
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I should have said that that citation is from the essay, 'On Narcissism', in the Penguin Freud, Vol. 11, although I think Penguin have rejigged their editions of Freud.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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Do we do wrong things because we are sinners, or are we sinners because we have done things?
Is it that we are 'neutral' - neither sinless nor sinful until that very first sin and then suddenly we are tainted?
I feel for Paul when he cries out 'I do not understand myself at all, for I really want to do what is right, but I can’t. I do what I don’t want to—what I hate. 16 I know perfectly well that what I am doing is wrong, and my bad conscience proves that I agree with these laws I am breaking. 17 But I can’t help myself because I’m no longer doing it. It is sin inside me that is stronger than I am that makes me do these evil things.
Romans 7 v 15 - 17 TLB
It's the 'I do not understand myself at all' bit that gets me because similarly I don't understand me either!
If I do something - and habitually do it - which is the real 'me'? Am I the sinner trying in vain to go against my nature, wanting to be good, or am I the good person who often simply chooses to do the thing that is alien to me?
My doctrine says that because of the fall of my first parents who lost their purity, I am 'totally depraved' - which simply means that my whole being, in total, is affected by sin, and that is what causes me to fall.
Does original sin, therefore, not describe the inability we all have to live without sinning?
And is the provision of a redeemer, a saviour, only necessary if we are helpless to cease from sin?
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
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quote:
And is the provision of a redeemer, a saviour, only necessary if we are helpless to cease from sin?
Not necessarily, Jesus as a Teacher, redeems us by teaching us the right way to live and shows us by example, the way to live in right relationship with God.
To say that salvation is only to be understood in the narrow forensic model of substitutionary atonement dismisses the entire ministry of Jesus.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
quote:
And is the provision of a redeemer, a saviour, only necessary if we are helpless to cease from sin?
Not necessarily, Jesus as a Teacher, redeems us by teaching us the right way to live and shows us by example, the way to live in right relationship with God.
To say that salvation is only to be understood in the narrow forensic model of substitutionary atonement dismisses the entire ministry of Jesus.
Where did anyone mention substitutionary atonement?
And as for your first point about Jesus teaching us the right way to live and showing us by example how to live in right relationship with God - I would simply say that what you say is the work of Christ is actually the work of the Law. The Law reveals what is right, tells us how to live, gives examples on what is righteous and what is sin, but it is powerless to save us.
What is the point of knowing what is right and seeing the example of what is right, when we are powerless to do anything about it?
Jesus came to redeem us, to actually forgive our sins and empower us to be holy because not one of us is able to keep the law of follow the example that has been set.
We need a saviour, not just a teacher.
If that were the case, then all we would need would be Moaes.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
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quote:
What is the point of knowing what is right and seeing the example of what is right, when we are powerless to do anything about it?
Jesus came to redeem us, to actually forgive our sins and empower us to be holy because not one of us is able to keep the law of follow the example that has been set.
We need a saviour, not just a teacher.
If that were the case, then all we would need would be Moaes.
I don't distinguish between justification, sanctification, nor do I separate the saving work of Christ on the Cross from the saving work of Christ as Teacher.
But then I am attracted to the moral influence theory of atonement which might reflect my skepticism of total depravity. Christ on the Cross changes our hearts, if our entire being is completely depraved, this would not happen.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Mudfrog quote:
Where did anyone mention substitutionary atonement?
I agree with Mudfrog although, as he well knows, I disagree with on atonement theory. I didn't think his remarks on Original Sin necessarily imply PSA. If they do I think shipmates should indicate why that is the case.
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
quote:
What is the point of knowing what is right and seeing the example of what is right, when we are powerless to do anything about it?
Jesus came to redeem us, to actually forgive our sins and empower us to be holy because not one of us is able to keep the law of follow the example that has been set.
We need a saviour, not just a teacher.
If that were the case, then all we would need would be Moaes.
I don't distinguish between justification, sanctification, nor do I separate the saving work of Christ on the Cross from the saving work of Christ as Teacher.
But then I am attracted to the moral influence theory of atonement which might reflect my skepticism of total depravity. Christ on the Cross changes our hearts, if our entire being is completely depraved, this would not happen.
The operative word in this post is "I" implying Walt Whitman's statement in the famous poem that one is the captain of one's own soul but there is also the question of what 'depravity' signifies in the sense Mudfrog uses it here. Does it suggest evil desires or merely the inability to live up to good ones? If it is the latter, then The gospel enables that since it is the power of God unto salvation. Ro1:16.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Can we please stick to the subject of the nature of Original Sin and its transmission? Isn't that enough to keep us occupied without discussing salvation, atonement, sanctification, or whatever? ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
... But then I am attracted to the moral influence theory of atonement which might reflect my skepticism of total depravity. Christ on the Cross changes our hearts, if our entire being is completely depraved, this would not happen.
My apologies, but you might not have notice that I did not say 'completely depraved'. It's my understanding that the whole of us is flawed. We are still in the image of God, but a cracked image. That does not make it impossible for us to respond, but we do require God's help to get there (i.e. we need his grace, his help, his favour, his assistance).
Going back to the OP though, is there any shipmate who claims that they are free of sin, and can do it all by themselves?
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
quote:
What is the point of knowing what is right and seeing the example of what is right, when we are powerless to do anything about it?
Jesus came to redeem us, to actually forgive our sins and empower us to be holy because not one of us is able to keep the law of follow the example that has been set.
We need a saviour, not just a teacher.
If that were the case, then all we would need would be Moaes.
I don't distinguish between justification, sanctification, nor do I separate the saving work of Christ on the Cross from the saving work of Christ as Teacher.
But then I am attracted to the moral influence theory of atonement which might reflect my skepticism of total depravity. Christ on the Cross changes our hearts, if our entire being is completely depraved, this would not happen.
If there is not original sin or total depravity, if a human being can ever be born into this world in a neutral state that can choose to do right or choose to do wrong, then that human being is, in effect, sinless.
The Bible uses different terms for sin:
Sin that is our nature - it's iniquity.
Sin that is a falling short of the Glory of God - missing the mark - a moral failing, even though we try.
Sin that is trespass - those things we do deliberately, knowing we are rebelling.
As the liturgy says, "We have sinned against you through negligence, through weakness, through our own deliberate fault."
There is no health within us, and I would challenge anyone, from the Pope down to myself, to claim that simply by being a human being they have the innate ability to always live without sinning, to be able to exercise the choice in every situation to always think, say or do the right thing and never ever to give in to a temptation from wherever it might come.
The moral influence is a powerful atonement metaphor because it calls us to look and be impressed by the dying example of Christ, but in and of itself it cannot save us anymore than a child being impressed by the actions of a man diving into the river to save him can actually save the child. The rescuer has to be more than an example of bravery and swimming ability, he has to actually rescue the child by his own actions!
The Saviour we need therefore, because of our total depravity, cannot merely show an example of love in the face of death and hatred, etc, he's actually also got to forensically remove my sin (whether by substitution, sacrifice or ransom is a matter for another discussion).
If there is no such thing as a 'bent to sinning' or a sinful nature that is the fount of my sinful actions, then have to wonder why Jesus came to give his life a ransom for many, to redeem them, and as the Nativity stories relate, to "save his people from their sins", and "to you is born this day a Saviour."
I repeat that it was the Torah that was given to show what sin is.
But only the cross can forgive sin and sanctify us.
We didn't need another Jewish teacher who would expand on the Torah (and don't forget there is hardly anything that Jesus taught tat was not already taught by the Rabbis), we needed a Saviour from sin.
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
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The idea of original sin is tied to free will and grace.
It seems historically there is a spectrum of we can turn to God on our own steam alone (Pelagius) to we can't turn to God alone at all without the help of God ( total depravity? - I admit I don't know much about this).
But the standard would seem we can turn to God (we still have some element of free will) yet we require the Holy Spirit to help us in our sanctification. Indeed that's the Holy Spirit's job. We can't do it alone.
I think the natural corollary to the idea that we are completely unable to turn to God with our own free will simply leads to double predestination. There can be no other explanation in the thought process. And most of us find that quite a difficult concept to accept considering the scriptures do mostly imply that we are capable of turning. Otherwise why bother proclaiming the good news that the Kingdom of God is at hand, repent and believe in the gospel.
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
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I quite like this answer of Marilynne Robinson's btw. I think it works in terms of original sin.
quote:
Do you believe in sin?
Well, it depends how you define the word. The way I would read Genesis is a phenomenon . . . what it describes is a human predisposition to what amounts to self-defeat — to be given a wonderful planet and find yourself destroying it. Or, to have a wonderful civilization and then engage yourself aggressively in ways that destroy your civilization and another besides. If you look at human history or practically any human biography, it’s very hard to say that people don’t incline toward harmful and self-destructive acts, whether they intend to or not.
So I believe in sin in the sense that people do harm. I believe in grace in the sense that we cannot make final judgments about the meaning or the effect of what we do.
Source
(Robinson is a Calvinist defender btw. Quite haven't got my head around that).
[ 03. January 2017, 10:35: Message edited by: Evensong ]
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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If we all can answer the question, 'why can I not escape my weakness and yielding to temptation?' then we will be on the way to understanding original sin.
None of us stand neutrally before a choice of right and wrong and are equally able to do one or the other. we all have a natural inclination towards the selfish, the disobedient.
How can anyone disagree with that?
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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I don’t see why a belief in Original Sin necessitates a belief in ‘total depravity’ in any common sense, empirically supported, meaning of the term. Original sin invites one to be sceptical about the purity of human motivation and the unattainability of perfection in individuals and institutions in this life, with the notable exception of Jesus Christ, but that does not imply that individuals cannot exhibit varying balances of virtue and vice, good and evil.
The problem that I have with ‘total depravity’ is that it fails to differentiate between the behaviour of one individual and another, which does not accord with experience, and seems to question the possibility of sanctification, whereby an individual might improve morally and spiritually. Similarly, while all human institutions are far from perfect some seem to be preferable to others in marked ways, particularly when we reflect on political institutions from a contemporary and historical perspective- St Paul was proud to be a citizen “of no mean city,” implying there were others of a lesser virtue.
I suppose one could dogmatically assert without offering evidence that humans are totally depraved so that if they exhibit any virtuous traits it is not of their own volition but that of God who has entered them uninvited. Equally, I could dogmatically assert without offering evidence that humans are naturally good so that if they exhibit any evil traits it is not of their own volition but that of evil spirits that have entered them uninvited. Personally, I prefer a theology that makes sense of the world I and others experience.
Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
I don’t see why a belief in Original Sin necessitates a belief in ‘total depravity’ in any common sense, empirically supported, meaning of the term.
A technical term doesn't need to have a common sense meaning.
As said above, in this case, 'total' is a quantifier, not a qualifier. It means that all our faculties suffer from the effects of original sin, rather than that all our faculties suffer entirely. In particular, it means that the Platonic model in which we control disordered passions through reason is out. And that means that the political analogue in which an ideologically and morally pure governing class governs a sinful populace for their own good is also out.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Mudfrog quote:
None of us stand neutrally before a choice of right and wrong and are equally able to do one or the other. we all have a natural inclination towards the selfish, the disobedient.
Does not a distinction have to be made between (a) action: doing right or wrong, and (b) motivation (selfish or unselfish)? One might do the right thing for the wrong reason, or the wrong thing for the right reason.
I think most individuals like to do the right thing because to do so induces positive feelings about oneself and invites the approbation of others. The problem, of course, is that much of the time individuals find it difficult to do good when it conflicts with self-interest.
The thought does occur that if individuals are “totally depraved” they would only get satisfaction by doing what is generally held to be morally wrong. I don't think that is the case with most human beings.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
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quote:
If we all can answer the question, 'why can I not escape my weakness and yielding to temptation?' then we will be on the way to understanding original sin.
But the problem is your premise. The fact remains is that we do not always yield to temptation. Otherwise, all marriages would fail because no one would resist the temptation to commit adultery and our streets would be more littered with blood because no one would resist the temptation to strike back in violence.
Yes, all human beings struggle with the choice between good and evil, but unless there is an element of choice, there can be no accountability for sin. Otherwise every murderer and adulterer can simply assert "It's my nature" and God would be cruel to condemn someone who is unable to choose good.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Mudfrog quote:
None of us stand neutrally before a choice of right and wrong and are equally able to do one or the other. we all have a natural inclination towards the selfish, the disobedient.
Does not a distinction have to be made between (a) action: doing right or wrong, and (b) motivation (selfish or unselfish)? One might do the right thing for the wrong reason, or the wrong thing for the right reason.
I think most individuals like to do the right thing because to do so induces positive feelings about oneself and invites the approbation of others. The problem, of course, is that much of the time individuals find it difficult to do good when it conflicts with self-interest.
The thought does occur that if individuals are “totally depraved” they would only get satisfaction by doing what is generally held to be morally wrong. I don't think that is the case with most human beings.
Kwesi, I think that is a better understanding of the reality we are talking about that I find it often unhelpful to label "original sin", primarily because the original Augustinian understanding gets conflated with the later Calvinist interpretation.
Good acts committed by humans may contain a taint of selfishness, i.e. the person who gives to charity out of a sense of moral superiority which is a form of pride. It doesn't mean that the good act wasn't "good", but rather it wasn't perfect, in the sense that God is perfect.
I like to think of Our Lord's perfect nature this way. Jesus' acts were wholly good, without the taint of self-concern or self-aggrandizement. In this way, Jesus' goodness I think is perfect in a way that our goodness is not.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Anglican_Brat quote:
Kwesi, I think that is a better understanding of the reality we are talking about that I find it often unhelpful to label "original sin", primarily because the original Augustinian understanding gets conflated with the later Calvinist interpretation.
Anglican_Brat, I thoroughly agree. I allowed myself to get pulled down a Calvinistic path that I didn't wish to follow.
Posted by David Goode (# 9224) on
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To translate a well-known Cambridge man and former Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity in his work In praise of marriage:
"I have no patience with those who say that sexual excitement is shameful and that venereal stimuli have their origin not in nature, but in sin. Nothing is so far from the truth."
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Anglican_Brat quote:
Kwesi, I think that is a better understanding of the reality we are talking about that I find it often unhelpful to label "original sin", primarily because the original Augustinian understanding gets conflated with the later Calvinist interpretation.
Anglican_Brat, I thoroughly agree. I allowed myself to get pulled down a Calvinistic path that I didn't wish to follow.
I appreciate that as well.
An advantage to seeing it Augustine's way is that it makes sin a hereditary tendency. It is therefore possible that it is augmented or decreased with the passage of human history.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Dafyd quote:
Dafyd Originally posted by Kwesi:
I don’t see why a belief in Original Sin necessitates a belief in ‘total depravity’ in any common sense, empirically supported, meaning of the term.
Dafyd: A technical term doesn't need to have a common sense meaning. As said above, in this case, 'total' is a quantifier, not a qualifier. It means that all our faculties suffer from the effects of original sin, rather than that all our faculties suffer entirely.
The problem is that when technical terms become divorced from their common sense meanings their technical meaning can be misleading and confusing.
I wonder how your explanation might be applied to Romans 1: 18-32?
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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Perhaps "all-pervasive depravity" would be more accurate then? Because when you say "total depravity" it sounds like the quality possessed by someone who is "totally depraved" and it's hard to read that as anything other than "bad all the way through." As theological phrases go, it's screamingly, boneheadedly inept.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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I am not a Calvinist - yet I believe in total depravity. That's because I am a Wesleyan. I believe that, as Scripture says, the heart is deceitful and we are all dead in trespasses and sins.
The claim above that belief in total depravity precludes the possibility of sanctification is false. Indeed, what is ironic about that assertion is that in Wesleyanism the possibility, in fact the availability of holiness here in this life is taught clearly as the antithesis of depravity.
You might quibble about the terminology, (and I beg readers not to veer off into the waters of perfectionism), but the opposite of 'total' depravity is 'entire' sanctification; the words 'total' and 'entire' having the same meaning in this regard - i.e. in the same way that sin affects the total person, so the grace holiness affects the entire person.
Posted by BroJames (# 9636) on
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Yes. Total depravity has come to have a common usage meaning rather different from the theological concept.
IMHO there's a 'both and' here. It is clear that the creation is seen as a good thing, and human beings as very good, and however one reads the first few chapters of Genesis, that the consequences of human disobedience had a fracturing consequence which went well beyond its impact on the two humans immediately concerned.
Original sin is the belief that the fracture runs through every human person, and that it is closely tied up with our propensity to do what is wrong, or to fail to do what we ought to do (in thought, word and deed). It is something which we receive simply as part of being human, irrespective of anything we do or don't do - so it is there even in the newborn baby.
Total depravity is the belief that there is no part of our life which is wholly free from the effect of this sin. Not that all our actions are wholly bad, but that none of our actions are wholly good and untainted by sin.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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If TD doesn't mean bad through and through, then do we need to create this soteriology in which man is incapable of choosing to follow God, and therefore God must reach inside a man and throw a switch? Or are we just enough tainted with Original Sin that we require God to force us to be saved?
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Is an analogy between genetics (ancestral inheritance ) and behaviourism (or the idea that we become what we are through our environment) relevant here?
Except that this is not a binary. Genetics are not declared at conception, nor at any one point. Subject a human to stress or various life events, and some genes turn on or turn off because of those events. They call this epigenetics. Thus, original sin cannot be genetically inherited, like, say hair colour. Now you could say that simply having DNA or a particular DNA sequence is a problem, but that gets us down a rabbit hole. Was it the gene sequence for upright posture, the ability to understand grammar in language, or what?
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
If TD doesn't mean bad through and through, then do we need to create this soteriology in which man is incapable of choosing to follow God, and therefore God must reach inside a man and throw a switch? Or are we just enough tainted with Original Sin that we require God to force us to be saved?
It's called prevenient grace. All people have enough of the light which, if they follow it, will lead them to salvation.
They can of course reject or ignore it.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
If TD doesn't mean bad through and through, then do we need to create this soteriology in which man is incapable of choosing to follow God, and therefore God must reach inside a man and throw a switch? Or are we just enough tainted with Original Sin that we require God to force us to be saved?
It's called prevenient grace. All people have enough of the light which, if they follow it, will lead them to salvation.
They can of course reject or ignore it.
That doesn't sound like Calvinism as it's been presented to me before.
Posted by Stercus Tauri (# 16668) on
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What does all the theological jargon actually mean to the simple creature in the pew who wants to know, like me? I think we need to get the message that sin may come naturally to us, but confession and forgiveness are things that the church genuinely believes and practices. That's why I quoted Ferguson earlier - the reality of the human condition, which might be called original sin, may be ugly at times, but according to the church, it's not hopeless.
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
The challenge for modern Christianity is not to ignore Eden but to make sense of it to the contemporary world, and to rescue the biblical account from the shackles of arid literalism and to seriously consider its essential truths.
If we're bringing up authorities like Augustine, may I suggest that people like him are no more authoritative than anyone else from an ancient and thinking culture? So let me reinterpret this, outside of the Euro-centric assumptions running through this thread.
The indigenous peoples of Canada, many of them still living hunter-gatherer lifestyles at least in part, would locate Eden as a settlement and as a farm. A walled garden, owned by someone (convenient that Jesus is also later a gardener Easter morning). Eden implies ownership of plants, viz., the tree of knowledge, and it constrains the normal human relationship of many more thousands of years with the environment, where no-one 'owns' the plants, the animals, nor the land itself. We are to take what we need and respectfully not destroy what we don't, nor are we to hoard and profit. We should consider everyone part of the tribe, extended family group or community, such that we should share with all. Thus, the original sin is to seize ownership of special knowledge that would allow the lording over others and over planet. We continue on this path. To our peril. It wasn't God's plan that we did the settled walled off farm thing, we just did it. Probably in part because it meant that conquest of others was possible. The real Eden is the natural world where we are integral partners with all that breathes, grows and is. Which is why also so many seek connection with nature and describe things like thin places where the natural world connects with their perception. Original sin disconnects us from the natural world, and places anxieties in our minds, about things unnatural for us to worry about.
Do we have to stay with Euro and Mid-east cultures to understand?
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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No Prophet quote:
Do we have to stay with Euro and Mid-east cultures to understand?
Fair point, but can I remind you that Augustine was an African.
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Dafyd:
A technical term doesn't need to have a common sense meaning.
As said above, in this case, 'total' is a quantifier, not a qualifier. It means that all our faculties suffer from the effects of original sin, rather than that all our faculties suffer entirely. In particular, it means that the Platonic model in which we control disordered passions through reason is out. And that means that the political analogue in which an ideologically and morally pure governing class governs a sinful populace for their own good is also out.
Bingo. ![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
No Prophet quote:
Do we have to stay with Euro and Mid-east cultures to understand?
Fair point, but can I remind you that Augustine was an African.
But very much culturally European.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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mousethief quote:
But [Augustine was] very much culturally European.
But wasn't that European culture shaped by Augustine?
What would European culture be without its North African influences?
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
If TD doesn't mean bad through and through, then do we need to create this soteriology in which man is incapable of choosing to follow God, and therefore God must reach inside a man and throw a switch? Or are we just enough tainted with Original Sin that we require God to force us to be saved?
It's called prevenient grace. All people have enough of the light which, if they follow it, will lead them to salvation.
They can of course reject or ignore it.
That doesn't sound like Calvinism as it's been presented to me before.
That's because it isn't Calvinism; it's Wesleyanism.
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
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Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
Jesus appears to negate the idea that the sins of the fathers are visited on the children.:
quote:
John 9:1-3
9 As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth.
2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.
[ 04. January 2017, 10:13: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
Jesus appears to negate the idea that the sins of the fathers are visited on the children.:
quote:
John 9:1-3
9 As he went along, he saw a man blind from birth.
2 His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
3 “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.
Should hope so. It's a hideous idea.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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..........However, the sins of the fathers continue to be visited on the Germans; there are those who seek compensation for trans-atlantic slavery on the present generation; and others seeking compensation for various historic "injustices", often of an inter-ethnic nature, committed by forebears. The Sins of the Fathers
syndrome, in other words, is very much alive and kicking.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
..........However, the sins of the fathers continue to be visited on the Germans; there are those who seek compensation for trans-atlantic slavery on the present generation; and others seeking compensation for various historic "injustices", often of an inter-ethnic nature, committed by forebears. The Sins of the Fathers
syndrome, in other words, is very much alive and kicking.
In the eyes of those who want unreasonable repentance.
I'm waiting for the Italians to apologise and make reparations for the Roman invasion of Britain in 55BC AND from the French for invading England in 1066.
And from the Danes for the Viking invasions AND the Germans for the Saxon invasions.
In fact, most of England seems to be occupied territory - I think we Celts and Britons should make representation to the UN to get those occupying forces out. I mean if it's good for the Palestinians, it's good for us too!
We want Britain back!
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
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A man commits adultery and contracts AIDS. He passes it to his wife. She passes it to their children. That is not just, but it happens.
Neither sin, nor Satan, do justice. It isn't their territory.
Posted by Freddy (# 365) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Jesus appears to negate the idea that the sins of the fathers are visited on the children.
Yes He does. The question is just what that means.
It clearly does not negate the family characteristics that we inherit from our parents. Nor the consequences of their choices.
Nor does it negate the concept of the Fall, and its effect on humanity.
I think that it just means that God does not hold our parents' faults against us.
Posted by BroJames (# 9636) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
My take on that is that it is about more than where the natural consequences of wrongdoing fall. The exilic prophets are not saying that if the parents are idle and waste all their money the children will no longer suffer. Those direct natural consequences of our actions continue to hold good.
The point of the prophecies is that sin is no longer to be looked as if it operated on a nation basis, the sins of (e.g.) Judah in one generation will not be punished in Judah in the next generation. IMHO the troubling text is Ex 34.7 quote:
keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation,
forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin,
yet by no means clearing the guilty,
but visiting the iniquity of the parents
upon the children
and the children’s children,
to the third and the fourth generation.
The words in Ezekiel and in Jeremiah which seem to undo this are ambivalent about whether the proverb about the parents eating sour grapes and the children's teeth being set on edge was ever true.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by BroJames:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
My take on that is that it is about more than where the natural consequences of wrongdoing fall. The exilic prophets are not saying that if the parents are idle and waste all their money the children will no longer suffer. Those direct natural consequences of our actions continue to hold good.
The point of the prophecies is that sin is no longer to be looked as if it operated on a nation basis, the sins of (e.g.) Judah in one generation will not be punished in Judah in the next generation. IMHO the troubling text is Ex 34.7 quote:
keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation,
forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin,
yet by no means clearing the guilty,
but visiting the iniquity of the parents
upon the children
and the children’s children,
to the third and the fourth generation.
The words in Ezekiel and in Jeremiah which seem to undo this are ambivalent about whether the proverb about the parents eating sour grapes and the children's teeth being set on edge was ever true.
Ah, but look again; look closely.
How many generations does his love last?
And compare that to the limited reach of the sins - how many generations does that last?
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
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I know where you're going with this Muddy (and I've taken notice of the contrast here myself elsewhere) but it's still a moral problem if God is beating me for my grandfather's sins, if not my great-great-grandfathers ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on
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Is it God, or is it life? If my grandfather dissipated the family fortune by gambling, I am poor. If my mother had herpes, she may have transmitted it to me when I was born. If my father is a notorious con-man, I have to either labor under the Trump odium all my life, or change my name.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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I think the problem of inter-genertional responsibility lies in deciding what is the entity responsible for a particular action. Is it the individual or the group (family, nation or ethnic group)? Present day Germans are held responsible in some measure for Hitler because the present day collective, Germany, is seen as a continuing entity that brought him to power. Are present day Americans, or those born after the Vietnam war, responsible for the use of Agent Orange in Vietnam? The West's highly individualised culture is loathe to accept responsibility for what ancestors have done in the past, but it seems to me not entirely tenable.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Evensong quote:
Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
An interesting question, but my problem is what has this to do with Original Sin, which is peculiarly Christian insight?
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
Is it God, or is it life? If my grandfather dissipated the family fortune by gambling, I am poor. If my mother had herpes, she may have transmitted it to me when I was born. If my father is a notorious con-man, I have to either labor under the Trump odium all my life, or change my name.
The problem is that Exodus (quoted above) quite clearly says it's God vindictively squashing children for what their ancestors did.
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
I think the problem of inter-genertional responsibility lies in deciding what is the entity responsible for a particular action. Is it the individual or the group (family, nation or ethnic group)? Present day Germans are held responsible in some measure for Hitler because the present day collective, Germany, is seen as a continuing entity that brought him to power. Are present day Americans, or those born after the Vietnam war, responsible for the use of Agent Orange in Vietnam? The West's highly individualised culture is loathe to accept responsibility for what ancestors have done in the past, but it seems to me not entirely tenable.
It seems even more untenable to me to suggest that someone deserves to suffer because of what another person did, over which they had no control, and which they could not have prevented.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Karl: Liberal Backslider quote:
It seems even more untenable to me to suggest that someone deserves to suffer because of what another person did, over which they had no control, and which they could not have prevented.
Would you say that the United States and its citizens electorally enrolled after the conclusion of the Vietnam war have no moral responsibility for the continuing consequences of the use of agent orange in Vietnam, and it would be unreasonable for the Vietnamese to claim compensation?
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Karl: Liberal Backslider quote:
It seems even more untenable to me to suggest that someone deserves to suffer because of what another person did, over which they had no control, and which they could not have prevented.
Would you say that the United States and its citizens electorally enrolled after the conclusion of the Vietnam war have no moral responsibility for the continuing consequences of the use of agent orange in Vietnam, and it would be unreasonable for the Vietnamese to claim compensation?
I would say the US Government has responsibility, but individual US citizens who didn't themselves support the action - or weren't even born at the time? No.
The logical conclusion of this collective responsibility is where in the book of Samuel God kills David's son to punish David. Does anyone really think that's in any way reasonable?
[ 04. January 2017, 15:08: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Karl: Liberal Backslider quote:
I would say the US Government has responsibility, but individual US citizens who didn't themselves support the action - or weren't even born at the time? No.
My guess is that the Americans who didn't support the action would be among the first to recognise that their taxes should be used to compensate the Vietnamese.
More generally, I think that most people would think that the American people, whether they approved or disapproved, were liable for the continuing consequences of actions taken by their government, especially one democratically appointed. Otherwise, it would be practically impossible for national governments to be held to account for their actions. Clearly that is not your view, and I respect your reasoning, though I think it exposes the limitations of liberal individualism in this context.
Incidentally, I think the most egregious example of misplaced collective responsibility is the slaughter of the Amalekites (I Samuel 30:1-20).
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
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I think there's a distinction to be made between what might be necessary compensation for historical wrongs and holding people guilty and deserving of punishment, which seems to be what the Exodus passage is driving at - God persuing a vendetta through generations because of the sins of an ancestor. A well-off Liverpudlian may recognise that he partly owes his position to gains made by his ancestors from the slave-trade, and that therefore he is the recipient of ill-gotten gains that in a fair world he would never have had, but that does not make him personally guilty of slavery. What I cannot countenance is punishment of a person or people who could not have actually prevented the wrong for which they are being punished because it was done by someone else. It's a bit like the school deciding to put my son in detention because they found out who changed "pens" to "penis" on the pen jar in 1978.
I've also heard this collective responsibility argument used to justify killing Achan's entire household. This story is actually doubly horrific; firstly God punishes the entire Israelite tribe by causing them to lose at Ai, and then the Israelites massacre Achan's entire extended family. I come out of the story feeling (a) sick, and (b) that Achan is guilty of far less wrong than God and whoever ordered the stoning. But that's just me.
[ 04. January 2017, 16:14: Message edited by: Karl: Liberal Backslider ]
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
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Re sins of the father and consequences for subsequent generations.
I have sometime wondered about other things that are possibly re-intepretable, like marriage vows "until death us do part", which for some of my divorced friends is not a promise, but perhaps a threat and a statement of fact (not ended with the divorce), and not a crime unless one of the partners wants to do something about the death part.
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on
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Karl, perhaps one could consider where in Job, God set the 'attack dog' devil on a righteous man who duly squealed his innocence for 36 odd chapters but then then repented despite having none of the 'why me' questions answered. What satisfied Job so that he could say, 'I have spoken in ignorance'?
I have often wondered what was the point of the speech of God from the whirlwind and without the insight of having suffered as Job did, have concluded that for him, it must have been the increased awareness of who God actually was. His nature and his power.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Just to clarify. I don't think that Original Sin is about the innocent being sanctioned for the sins of the father, rather that all human beings have inherited a tendency to sin. Consequently, an individual is not in the dock for a sin committed by Adam but for sins of her/her own. Punishment for the sins of one's ancestors, therefore, is a separate topic.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Just to clarify. I don't think that Original Sin is about the innocent being sanctioned for the sins of the father, rather that all human beings have inherited a tendency to sin. Consequently, an individual is not in the dock for a sin committed by Adam but for sins of her/her own. Punishment for the sins of one's ancestors, therefore, is a separate topic.
I believe you may think of those as separate, but I can assure that for many people, the latter is what Original Sin is. We get punished for Adam's sin, because in him we, somehow, sinned.
Posted by Planeta Plicata (# 17543) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
I have often wondered what was the point of the speech of God from the whirlwind and without the insight of having suffered as Job did, have concluded that for him, it must have been the increased awareness of who God actually was. His nature and his power.
Yes, I think this must be it; I don't see how one can read Job's final statement any other way: "I had heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees thee."
As Eleonore Stump explains it: quote:
If you could see the loving face of a truly good God, you would have an answer to the question why God had afflicted you. When you see the deep love in the face of a person you suppose has betrayed you, you know you were wrong. Whatever happened was done out of love for you by a heart that would never betray you and a mind bent on your good. To answer a mistaken charge of betrayal, someone who loves you can explain the misunderstanding or he can show his face. Sometimes showing his face heals the hurt much faster.
[ 05. January 2017, 00:22: Message edited by: Planeta Plicata ]
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I believe you may think of those as separate, but I can assure that for many people, the latter is what Original Sin is. We get punished for Adam's sin, because in him we, somehow, sinned.
A terrible thing that. We'd all have eaten the forbidden fruit one day, if we'd had eternity. Imagine an eternity of days, and seeing the fruit. If there's an eternity, eventually everything will happen. Which makes the god of that story a bad bad god, because he would know that eternity would eventuate the disobedience. So in this thinking, isn't it God's plan that Adam would do the naughty and here we are today, still doing it, though just a little nastier naughty. Though freewill and perhaps randomness made it be Eve who'd instigate, which is nice for men because then women get extra punishment and domination and pain. And lets the men identify God as a man who shares male attributes.
It might be interesting to see a speculative rewrite with Adam drawing Eve into fruit eating, and what this god might have cursed him for in Genesis 3:16.
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Just to clarify. I don't think that Original Sin is about the innocent being sanctioned for the sins of the father, rather that all human beings have inherited a tendency to sin. Consequently, an individual is not in the dock for a sin committed by Adam but for sins of her/her own. Punishment for the sins of one's ancestors, therefore, is a separate topic.
I believe you may think of those as separate, but I can assure that for many people, the latter is what Original Sin is. We get punished for Adam's sin, because in him we, somehow, sinned.
Well I think this is putting it a bit crudely. Everyone gets held to account, certainly, but for their own sins unless forgiven in Christ. The 'original' sin concept is essentially Catholic and deceptive. They expunge it with Baptism do they not? ISTM that the Biblical concept of what we receive from Adam is a tendency towards evil that ensures we will sin but I doubt that this is the basis of judgement. In Adam, one's will is corrupted so that immoral choices follow but until they have then there is no accountability. Otherwise, a small child who dies cannot be saved.
Posted by Stercus Tauri (# 16668) on
:
This thread is converging nicely with the one on "What puts you off from setting foot inside a church?" Being subjected to a mixture of obscure jargon and obsolete doctrine will do it for some of us.
Posted by churchgeek (# 5557) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
The traces of this debate can be seen in the "innocent until....." - human sexuality is assumed to be unclean, need controlling etc.. We need to start from the assumption that sexuality is a gift of God's creative love, and re-imagine everything from there on. We can't go on assuming that it was a mistake - that way madness and paranoia lie.
YES a thousand times. I follow something of a more Iranean line of thought, that, as Alex Garcia-Rivera writes, innocence is a virtue to be gained. Ireneaus' idea that God foresaw human sin and worked it into God's plan fits pretty well with evolution, too.
BTW, I'm really digging what Kwesi's saying throughout this thread, especially his first post.
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
(as for being a moral agent--I can say of my own experience that I certainly was one (and knew I was one) during primary school, and probably long before. And I caught my son lying to me, deliberately and knowingly, when he was preverbal, at eight months. (That was awkward--you don't want to encourage it, but I couldn't help laughing)
That's a funny story! I'm sure your son knew he was lying, in the sense that he knew he was "telling" you something that wasn't true or something like that, but the question is, did he understand the morality of it? Knowing what you're doing is necessary, but not sufficient, for a moral agent to have moral culpability. But I'm not a moral philosopher (though I've had classes in it).
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
Anyone have any thoughts on how to understand the differences between the sins of the father's being visited on the children vs this being revoked in exilic writings that I posted in the OP?
What if the later writing - the "evocation" of the earlier passage - is actually a reinterpretation? What if it's correcting the original assumption, that God is punishing subsequent generations for their forebears' sins, and is saying, "No, God's not doing that; you're just suffering because of what people did"?
Maybe that can't be supported by the texts...and it would also depend on how one reads Scripture. If you think of Scripture as infallible, then later portions of it can't really correct or argue with earlier portions. But I don't read the Bible that way, personally.
quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Anglican_Brat, I thoroughly agree. I allowed myself to get pulled down a Calvinistic path that I didn't wish to follow.
You couldn't have done otherwise. ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Karl, perhaps one could consider where in Job, God set the 'attack dog' devil on a righteous man who duly squealed his innocence for 36 odd chapters but then then repented despite having none of the 'why me' questions answered. What satisfied Job so that he could say, 'I have spoken in ignorance'?
I have often wondered what was the point of the speech of God from the whirlwind and without the insight of having suffered as Job did, have concluded that for him, it must have been the increased awareness of who God actually was. His nature and his power.
I'm not sure what question you're addressing here, Jamat, but I'm pretty sure it's not one I'm asking.
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Karl, perhaps one could consider where in Job, God set the 'attack dog' devil on a righteous man who duly squealed his innocence for 36 odd chapters but then then repented despite having none of the 'why me' questions answered. What satisfied Job so that he could say, 'I have spoken in ignorance'?
I have often wondered what was the point of the speech of God from the whirlwind and without the insight of having suffered as Job did, have concluded that for him, it must have been the increased awareness of who God actually was. His nature and his power.
I'm not sure what question you're addressing here, Jamat, but I'm pretty sure it's not one I'm asking.
It is a question you pose in almost every post. How can a just God perpetrate injustice or seem to do so?
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
:
My understanding of original sin is that it is something we all inherit. And that our individual sins (later) come out of that well. There is no such thing as individual sin without original sin.
So for example: an infant baptised is not responsible for any individual sin, as they have yet to have any. But they are still broken somehow - so require the Holy Spirit to redeem them.
So individual sin is not separate from original sin.
Re original sin being a Christian thing Kwesi and the relation of the Old Testament text to it.
The exile is considered a punishment for Israel's collective sin (as BroJames has helpfully pointed out).
This is the sins of the fathers.
But the tide changes after the exile. The punishment of the sins of the fathers is spent. I think it's somewhere in Isaiah that God says the punishment is done through the exile.
So that's how I see the change of heart with the exilic writers.
The exile was The Big Punishment. Now they will start again - no longer punished for the sins of the fathers (This is Grace). Only individual sins will count now.
So let's look at that image and look to the New Testament.
1) The "sins of the fathers" strikes me as an OT corollary or analogy to original ( or inherited ) sin. Does the fact that this changed in the OT have any bearing on the NT and us today?
2) The second thing about the sins of the fathers and punishment no longer applied in the OT after the exile is that it makes a mockery of the idea of Jesus being punished for our sins - or more specifically our original sin (as opposed to our individual sins). This of course affects scriptural understandings in atonement because the idea of Jesus being punished for our collective sins comes from Isaiah in the form of the suffering servant (an exilic text).
But according to the OT, no punishment is required, for the sentence is spent.
Now that doesn't mean to say I think original sin isn't real. I do. I'm just comparing some interesting ideas in the OT and NT
Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Karl, perhaps one could consider where in Job, God set the 'attack dog' devil on a righteous man who duly squealed his innocence for 36 odd chapters but then then repented despite having none of the 'why me' questions answered. What satisfied Job so that he could say, 'I have spoken in ignorance'?
I have often wondered what was the point of the speech of God from the whirlwind and without the insight of having suffered as Job did, have concluded that for him, it must have been the increased awareness of who God actually was. His nature and his power.
I'm not sure what question you're addressing here, Jamat, but I'm pretty sure it's not one I'm asking.
It is a question you pose in almost every post. How can a just God perpetrate injustice or seem to do so?
Well, it's a bloody good question and figures very very highly in my issues with much of Christianity. And no, Job doesn't answer it. Not one bit.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
I can't believe that I used to believe that Job was literal in to middle age. It's still my co-favourite (MUST we have an American spellchecker?) book of the OT. As it says that we can't understand, there are no answers that can possibly work, that existence cannot possibly be explained to us but all will be well. That God is great and good. Just wait. That He is trustworthy.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
<snip> In Adam, one's will is corrupted so that immoral choices follow but until they have then there is no accountability. Otherwise, a small child who dies cannot be saved.
This is why in the Catholic system unbaptised babies go to Limbo and not to either Heaven or Hell. Inherited sin keeps them out of the pearly gates.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
<snip> In Adam, one's will is corrupted so that immoral choices follow but until they have then there is no accountability. Otherwise, a small child who dies cannot be saved.
This is why in the Catholic system unbaptised babies go to Limbo and not to either Heaven or Hell. Inherited sin keeps them out of the pearly gates.
Which is why they need a doctrine of blamelessnes.
A most wonderful verse - which forms part of The salvation Army's article of faith on holiness is 1Thessalonians 5 v 23:
We believe that it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified, and that their whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Doctine 10, Salvation Army Doctrines)
What this means is that sanctification with justification leads to the state where there is nothing in my life for which God might lay blame upon me.
Sins are the wilful breaking of a known law - a transgression which comes from sin in my heart - and these can be forgiven.
But a child - born even with original sin - cannot choose to trespass against God's will and laws. Surely then, there is a blamelessness here ascribed. Yes, there is a heart with a potential to sin, but as that child can't choose to trespass, neither can s/he choose to repent.
God, therefore, who is not unjust, will treat the child as blameless.
I do not believe that baptism removes original sin. Only grace through faith can do that. If a child cannot exercise faith in the grace of God then mercy covers that child until choice can be made.
[ 05. January 2017, 14:15: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
Posted by Jamat (# 11621) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
quote:
Originally posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
Karl, perhaps one could consider where in Job, God set the 'attack dog' devil on a righteous man who duly squealed his innocence for 36 odd chapters but then then repented despite having none of the 'why me' questions answered. What satisfied Job so that he could say, 'I have spoken in ignorance'?
I have often wondered what was the point of the speech of God from the whirlwind and without the insight of having suffered as Job did, have concluded that for him, it must have been the increased awareness of who God actually was. His nature and his power.
I'm not sure what question you're addressing here, Jamat, but I'm pretty sure it's not one I'm asking.
It is a question you pose in almost every post. How can a just God perpetrate injustice or seem to do so?
Well, it's a bloody good question and figures very very highly in my issues with much of Christianity. And no, Job doesn't answer it. Not one bit.
Precisely the point. NO ONE gets that question answered, in the Bible or anywhere else, not Job, not Habbukuk. Both however, go away satisfied.
Posted by leo (# 1458) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Jamat:
<snip> In Adam, one's will is corrupted so that immoral choices follow but until they have then there is no accountability. Otherwise, a small child who dies cannot be saved.
This is why in the Catholic system unbaptised babies go to Limbo and not to either Heaven or Hell. Inherited sin keeps them out of the pearly gates.
I thought the last pope abolished limbo.
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I thought the last pope abolished limbo.
So the souls in there just vapourized or deapparated or whatever totally annihilated souls do?
Posted by Callan (# 525) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
I can't believe that I used to believe that Job was literal in to middle age. It's still my co-favourite (MUST we have an American spellchecker?) book of the OT. As it says that we can't understand, there are no answers that can possibly work, that existence cannot possibly be explained to us but all will be well. That God is great and good. Just wait. That He is trustworthy.
I think that Job makes more sense if you think of it as shifting between genres. The bet between Satan and God is satire, the immediate aftermath is black comedy, the debate between Job and his counsellors is philosophy and the voice of God at the end is apocalyptic. And the moral is that we can hope and trust and love but not know, at least not to our satisfaction in this world. Or, to anticipate the conclusion of Back To Methuselah, it is enough that there is a beyond...
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I thought the last pope abolished limbo.
So the souls in there just vapourized or deapparated or whatever totally annihilated souls do?
They go to heaven.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
I know Kwesi has asked us to concentrate on the original state, as it were, rather than issues of justification and sanctification etc, but I have to chime in alongside Mudfrog on the issue of Christ as Saviour as well as teacher.
That doesn't obviate the moral exemplar atonement model - that's one of the various overlapping models available to us.
Interestingly perhaps, I had lunch with Fr Gregory a few weeks ago and he observed that the aspect of the Protestant schema that continued to resonate with him as an Orthodox Christian who had formerly been Protestant, was the whole thing of divine grace and divine enabling - the 'thine eye diffused a quickening ray' thing from the well-known Wesleyan hymn.
He doesn't go in for the TULIP thing of course, and as Mudfrog says, Wesleyans don't either.
But it strikes me that however we cut it we can none of us elide the need for grace and for God's initiative in Christ.
I wish we could come up with an alternative phrase for Original Sin. It wasn't a Jewish concept. It also tends to dualism and if we're not careful a somewhat paranoid view of sex and normal appetites.
But I don't think any of us can elide the idea that sin is all pervasive and affects every area of our lives.
'Who can deliver me from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Christ Jesus our Lord.'
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
I do not believe that baptism removes original sin. Only grace through faith can do that. If a child cannot exercise faith in the grace of God then mercy covers that child until choice can be made.
I am familiar with the idea of an age of accountability, at which a child passes into, well, accountability. But where is this in scripture? I don't believe I've ever read a verse or pericope that lays out this thick black line.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
I don't necessarily think anything "removes" original sin in the sense that people certainly don't stop sinning when they get baptized or when they say the sinner's prayer. Simplistically, both can get interpreted in terms of fire insurance, i.e. you are still a rotten sinner, but God won't turf you into eternal damnation after you die for it.
I still am waving a flag for moral influence theory, because Christ as teacher teaches us to master and deal with sin and hopefully over time, we can sin a bit less causing less harm to other people and to creation.
[ 06. January 2017, 01:29: Message edited by: Anglican_Brat ]
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
:
Anglican_Brat quote:
I still am waving a flag for moral influence theory, because Christ as teacher teaches us to master and deal with sin and hopefully over time, we can sin a bit less causing less harm to other people and to creation
\
Anglican_Brat, I don’t think this is quite right, and for me seems to miss the point. There is no problem in accepting Christ as a moral and spiritual example to which we aspire. All Christians, as far as I’m aware, agree with that. The difficulty, as Paul acknowledges, is that we find it impossible to reach those standards “ I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.” (Romans 7:19). That is an essential feature and insight of Original Sin. Simply by an act of will an individual cannot rectify his or her participation in the human condition., “wretched man that I am” (Romans 7:24). It is only through the healing spirit of Christ that this can be reversed, as Isaac Watts writes “Where he displays his healing power/ Death and the curse are known no more/ In him the tribes of Adam boast/ More blessings than their father lost.” (Sadly, this verse from “Jesus shall reign…” is often excluded from the text these days). It is the saving work of Christ that is essential to rectifying the human problem so that “As in Adam all die, so in Christ willl all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15). I think we can agree to this without engaging in disagreement over various atonement theories.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
I have heard it said many times before that Judaism doesn't have a concept of original sin; but is that Judaism as has developed over the last 2000 years? i.e.pt sacrificial, post temple, synagogue Judaism? Or is it, as seems to be alleged, that the Jews never believed in original sin?
I am somewhat confused by the thought that basically Augustine invented original sin (much as he also invented the church understanding of the sacrament perhaps? But I digress...)
Anyway, if the idea of original sin means that we are all born predisposed to sin, having a sin nature that is inherent and that this was invented by Mr Augustine, then what do we do with St Paul and his assertion that 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God'? What about putting to death 'the old man'?
I've never read Augustine, but does that disqualify me from believing that the New Testament and indeed, the whole tenor of the Bible, teaches me that I am inherently a sinner and that all are sinners equally and that 'there is none righteous, no not one'?
John is quite clear when he says 'if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us'.
How does this not refer to this sin that we are all born in and with?
Did Augustine really invent OS as is conveniently thought? Convenient in that if it's his idea and not the Bible's we can conveniently forget it and choose not to believe it. Or is it not the case that it's actually in the Bible, very clearly taught, and that we would rather it wasn't there because it offends our pride?
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
:
There are righteous people in the scriptures (both Old and New Testament e.g. Noah, Elizabeth, Zechariah, Simeon) and Jesus tells us he came to save not the righteous but sinners so a blanket qualification that we are all sinners is not technically correct according to scripture.
I think the damaging thing about the doctrine of original sin historically is that it has emphasised the negative too much and forgotten that we were created Good and in God's image.
Christianity affirms both the glory and the fallenness of humanity IMO and experience confirms that.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
There are righteous people in the scriptures (both Old and New Testament e.g. Noah, Elizabeth, Zechariah, Simeon) and Jesus tells us he came to save not the righteous but sinners so a blanket qualification that we are all sinners is not technically correct according to scripture.
I think the damaging thing about the doctrine of original sin historically is that it has emphasised the negative too much and forgotten that we were created Good and in God's image.
Christianity affirms both the glory and the fallenness of humanity IMO and experience confirms that.
Righteous does not equal sinless.
Even Mary testified that God was her Saviour.
I am confused by your post; you say that Scripture does not say that we are all sinners but then you say that Christianity affirms the fallenness of humanity.
One cannot have it both ways.
And in any case, Scripture is perfectly clear:
'There is none righteous; no, not one... For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.'
'If we say that we have no sin then we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us,'
You mention the righteousness of named people. I could mention another - Abraham whose obedience was counted to him as righteousness. And yet Abraham was a cowardly liar, passing Sarah off as his sister in order to save his neck. So righteous.
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Righteous does not equal sinless.
Doesn't it?
quote:
1. in the broad sense, the state of him who is such as he ought to be, righteousness ; the condition acceptable to God
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Righteous does not equal sinless.
Doesn't it?
quote:
1. in the broad sense, the state of him who is such as he ought to be, righteousness ; the condition acceptable to God
Yes, a condition acceptable to God - which can only be by grace and forgiveness. If I am acceptable to god it is because I have been justified, not because I have any inherent righteousness.
By grace are ye saved, through faith; and this not of yourselves, it is the gift of God lest any man should boast.
[ 06. January 2017, 10:10: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
You're both right. We're sinless sinners. Our ongoing sinfulness i.e. helpless humanity, is not held against us. We are therefore righteous, pure in God's sight. In Christ's blood. We are His body, share, have His blood.
[ 06. January 2017, 11:02: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Mudfrog, I'm no expert on these matters from what I can gather, no serious theologian is saying that Augustine 'invented' Original Sin, but it is pretty much agreed that he largely shaped the viewpoint that emerged in the Western parts of Christendom from his time onwards. His influence on Eastern Christianity wasn't that great, his influence on Western Christianity considerable.
I'm not sure what you mean by him inventing the Church's notion of 'the sacrament' ...
Neither am I an expert on Judaism, but I think we make a mistake if we automatically assume that the Jews understood the Hebrew scriptures (our Old Testament, their scriptures) in the same way as we have done throughout Christian history.
We inevitably 'Christianise' the Old Testament as we see it through the filter of the New. 'The New is in the Old concealed, the Old is in the New revealed' and all that ...
From what I can gather, there were always a range of views within Judaism and a wide range of opinions were tolerated - hence the constant argy-bargying between the Rabbis. The same, I'm told, applied to Jewish views on issues like predestination and free-will.
Dare I say it, they also had - and still have - a very both/and not either/or view of some of these issues whereas we might neatly prefer to come down on one side or another.
As far as I understand it, the Orthodox Church has a view of Ancestral Sin, rather than Original Sin and yes, they do see the whole of human life being tainted by that - but in a different kind of way to how we commonly regard these things in the West.
The Fall is seen more in terms of a falling-short and a descent into immaturity - something that needs to be corrected and put straight - and that is happening through Christ - and will go on happening until the fulfilment of all things.
I suppose my own take would be that both views are two sides of the same coin and the view that comes most into prominence depends on which side we are most accustomed to looking at.
But that might just be me trying to be neat and tidy ...
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
There is argument that Augustine misread Romans 5:12.
Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned
The Eastern Orthodox view as I understand it is that Adam's consequence of receiving death is what transmitted to human beings, not "original sin." Human beings then fearing death and absolute extinction committed sin.
It is not that we are sinful and evil, it is that fundamentally we fear and dread death, and out of this dread of death, we commit sin.
To me, that makes more sense than this whole humans are nasty business.
Understood this way, Mary's praise of God as Savior has to do with His deliverance of humanity from the chains of death, not simply forgiveness of sins.
It is death that is the enemy, not simply sin.
[ 06. January 2017, 14:37: Message edited by: Anglican_Brat ]
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
That's my understanding of the Orthodox position too but am I right in thinking that they still believe the imageo dei to be marred within Fallen humanity?
I have suggested to Orthodox priests that such a view might be, to adapt a Blairite phrase, 'soft on sin, soft on the causes and consequences of sin', but they don't see how that follows and insist that they have as much of a handle on human sinfulness as anyone else.
I have to say that I do find some evangelical preaching illustrations about the pervasiveness of sin to be misguided and far-fetched. I once heard a preacher insist that a baby crying for its mother's milk demonstrated how flawed and sinful we are ...
What?!
The baby can't speak for goodness sake ...
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I'm not sure what you mean by him inventing the Church's notion of 'the sacrament' ...
There are those who don't agree with his definition of a sacrament as an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible grace.
That may (or may not be) unscriptural. I can't find any definition of 'sacrament' in the Bible other tan the Vulgate translation of 'mysterium' which is, according to Paul, simply 'Christ in you the hope of glory.'
There is nothing in any of the references to the last supper that suggest it is the outward symbol of a particular work of grace.
You said
quote:
We inevitably 'Christianise' the Old Testament as we see it through the filter of the New. 'The New is in the Old concealed, the Old is in the New revealed' and all that ...
I think we also 'churchify' the New Testament by reading church tradition back into it; a little like when the recent revision of the Catholic Missal translates the cup that Jesus used as a 'chalice'.
Seriously? Weren't the revisers on the set of Indiana Jones? Methinks they've picked the wrong cup!
[ 06. January 2017, 16:07: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
Interestingly, Wesleyan teaching is more 'generous' about total depravity and original sin.
Whilst we follow Augustine's view about being dead in sin, etc, we do not follow his line (or that of Calvin) that we are totally incapable of choosing. We do not go as far as Pelagius and say that it's all down to our natural choice to follow Christ, but that all people have enough light from God to be able to follow Christ by his grace.
Yes, in Adam all die, but all (may) in Christ be made alive.
Posted by Callan (# 525) on
:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
quote:
I have to say that I do find some evangelical preaching illustrations about the pervasiveness of sin to be misguided and far-fetched. I once heard a preacher insist that a baby crying for its mother's milk demonstrated how flawed and sinful we are ...
What?!
The baby can't speak for goodness sake ...
The same analogy is used in The Confessions. Interestingly I have also seen it used by a Wee-Free turned Darwinian as evidence for The Selfish Gene.
IMO and IME babies are necessarily amoral and neither selfish nor sinful nor naturally innocent. I don't imagine that Jesus behaved materially differently to any other new born child notwithstanding Little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes. I think 'that younge child, when it gan weep' is bang on the money.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
:
Callan quote:
IMO and IME babies are necessarily amoral and neither selfish nor sinful nor naturally innocent.
If a baby is "neither selfish nor sinful" I find it difficult to see why it is not "naturally innocent".
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Callan quote:
IMO and IME babies are necessarily amoral and neither selfish nor sinful nor naturally innocent.
If a baby is "neither selfish nor sinful" I find it difficult to see why it is not "naturally innocent".
Of course a baby is sinful and selfish - in potential; it just hasn't had the opportunity to act out its sinful nature yet.
As a baby, however, it is entirely blameless.
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on
:
Have you ever -had- a baby? They are bundles of pure selfishness. They have to be, since they are not able to find food or change their own diapers. The entire process of babyhood and childhood is learning how to cope with one's own needs, and not rely upon one's haggard parents. It takes years.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Kwesi:
Callan quote:
IMO and IME babies are necessarily amoral and neither selfish nor sinful nor naturally innocent.
If a baby is "neither selfish nor sinful" I find it difficult to see why it is not "naturally innocent".
Of course a baby is sinful and selfish - in potential; it just hasn't had the opportunity to act out its sinful nature yet.
As a baby, however, it is entirely blameless.
St Irenaeus, I believe, opined that Adam and Eve were basically "infant-like" when they sinned in the Garden of Eden, his theology of original sin, dwarfed by Augustine needs to be considered.
God did in fact love Adam and Eve, and I wonder if we are too quick to judge our first parents, harshly, because of their original mistake.
Posted by Callan (# 525) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
Have you ever -had- a baby? They are bundles of pure selfishness. They have to be, since they are not able to find food or change their own diapers. The entire process of babyhood and childhood is learning how to cope with one's own needs, and not rely upon one's haggard parents. It takes years.
You are making a moral judgement about a pre-moral entity. Babies don't think "actually I could sort this out myself, but it would be less hassle if I got mum or dad to do it" which would be appropriately described as selfish. They go "wah, wah, wah!" when they are hungry or need their nappies changed. Characterising them as selfish on that account is like denouncing the morality of rabbits popping into your garden and eating your lettuces. People who are able to make moral choices are capable of selfishness and St. Augustine's famous larceny of the pears could be construed as immoral but the behaviour of babes in arms or animals, IMO, cannot.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Callan:
quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
Have you ever -had- a baby? They are bundles of pure selfishness. They have to be, since they are not able to find food or change their own diapers. The entire process of babyhood and childhood is learning how to cope with one's own needs, and not rely upon one's haggard parents. It takes years.
You are making a moral judgement about a pre-moral entity. Babies don't think "actually I could sort this out myself, but it would be less hassle if I got mum or dad to do it" which would be appropriately described as selfish. They go "wah, wah, wah!" when they are hungry or need their nappies changed. Characterising them as selfish on that account is like denouncing the morality of rabbits popping into your garden and eating your lettuces. People who are able to make moral choices are capable of selfishness and St. Augustine's famous larceny of the pears could be construed as immoral but the behaviour of babes in arms or animals, IMO, cannot.
]
It would be funny imagining a world without a Fall, I suppose baby Abel and Baby Cain, instead of fighting over mother's milk, will keep saying "After you, my dear brother" back and forth, like proper, polite British children.
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
I don't want to derail the thread by going on a tangent about sacraments, I simply wanted to know what you were referring to.
If there's precious little scriptural evidence for sacraments according to your schema, then I find myself wondering how much scriptural support there is for church leaders to have military sounding titles, for people to march round playing tubas and banging drums in military style uniforms ...
Two can play at that game.
Your more pertinent point was about 'churchifying' the OT. I agree with that to some extent, it's a tendency we are all guilty of, not just the RCs.
It strikes me though, as this is Kerygmania, that the texts most commonly cited in support of an Augustinian view of Original Sin are chiefly NT ones - notably the passage in Romans 5 that has already been quoted.
How about OT passages to support the idea? We are making a big assumption if we assume the Jews understood the Fall in the same way as Augustine and subsequent Western Christians.
What OT passages might we consider in addition to the Genesis story?
Off the top of my head, I can't think of OT passages that explicitly 'teach' the doctrine of Original Sin unless we understand the Psalm reference Find sin my mother conceived me' in that kind of way.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
Well, first of all I would suggest that our penchant for uniforms and all-things military is not doctrinal or theological - it's missional/PR
Secondly, you won't find much about Heaven or Hell in the OT either. In fact you won't find much Christian doctrine there either. That's why there is a New Testament.
As gar as texts are concerned, I would cite Psalm 51 v 1 & 2 which says:
quote:
According to the multitude of your tender mercies, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.
Transgressions = rebellion, deliberate chosen sinful actions
Iniquity = crookedness, not an action, but the character of an action. the corrupt inclination of the human heart.
Sin = failure to reach the required standard, the falling short despite our efforts.
The Bible does talk about the 'iniquity of my sn' which means the basic root cause of the wrong action - it's the crooked heart. The inate wrongness of character even before a sin is committed.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
On the Wesleyan emphasis, of course, the Orthodox regard that as the closest thing within Protestantism to their own take on these matters - they are a lot more comfortable with Wesley than they are with Calvin - although they'd part company with Wesley on various issues.
Wesley was steeped in Patristics of course. But then, so was Calvin, although with somewhat different conclusions.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Surely that's a bit of a hermeneutical leap, though, in the interpretation of that particular OT verse.
I've always understood it in the way you've outlined it there, however, is that an interpretation that is intrinsically in the text or is it one we are projecting back from our own Western Christian standpoint?
I mean, looking at those verses now it strikes me that they could be understood in several ways. They don't necessarily 'demand' the kind of interpretation thee and me both have applied to them ...
On the OT/NT thing - of course there's a development/expansion going on. I'm just intrigued as to which OT verses lend themselves to an Augustinian interpretation ...
I think you've made a good stab at it but it doesn't strike me that your way is the only way those verses could be understood. They could just as easily be interpreted differently, as simply a prayer for forgiveness for what the writer has 'done' rather than what they 'are'.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
Yes, I can see that the prayer could indeed be because of his sinful activities with Mrs Uriah, but David does go ona bit about being brought forth in iniquity and acknowledging that God demands truth in the 'inward parts.'
He does also pray for a clean heart to be created within him, which rather suggests tat his heart was unclean. I guess the question would be, did his adultery and subsequent murderous action give him an unclean heart, of was the action because of his already unclean heart?
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
It is highly problematic to read doctrine into the Psalms, their genre is poetry and such the literary genre lends itself to hyperbole and exaggeration, not intended to be read literally.
The Psalms speak of God as having nostrils, (Psalm 18:8). Surely we don't mean this literally.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Sure. As I say, it's possible to understand these things in various ways. I suspect it depends largely on which tradition within Christianity we've been steeped in.
If we are Western and Augustinian then we are going to be predisposed to interpreting David's prayers of contrition in a way that fits our theology.
If we were Orthodox then we might be less inclined to interpret it in that way.
We all approach these things through filters and lenses. There is no way around that.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sure. As I say, it's possible to understand these things in various ways. I suspect it depends largely on which tradition within Christianity we've been steeped in.
If we are Western and Augustinian then we are going to be predisposed to interpreting David's prayers of contrition in a way that fits our theology.
If we were Orthodox then we might be less inclined to interpret it in that way.
We all approach these things through filters and lenses. There is no way around that.
In a way, I wish some Christians would be honest about that in terms of their reading of Scripture, instead of insisting that their interpretation is the "right" way of reading Scripture.
The interesting question, is why is the doctrine so compelling that makes some Christians insistent that it's absolutely correct. I don't think a Protestant view of original sin, in either its Calvinist or Wesleyan interpretations, can be separated from PSA. Basically, the punishment effected on our Lord as a substitution for us can only be justified morally if we really were that bad.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sure. As I say, it's possible to understand these things in various ways. I suspect it depends largely on which tradition within Christianity we've been steeped in.
If we are Western and Augustinian then we are going to be predisposed to interpreting David's prayers of contrition in a way that fits our theology.
If we were Orthodox then we might be less inclined to interpret it in that way.
We all approach these things through filters and lenses. There is no way around that.
In a way, I wish some Christians would be honest about that in terms of their reading of Scripture, instead of insisting that their interpretation is the "right" way of reading Scripture.
The interesting question, is why is the doctrine so compelling that makes some Christians insistent that it's absolutely correct. I don't think a Protestant view of original sin, in either its Calvinist or Wesleyan interpretations, can be separated from PSA. Basically, the punishment effected on our Lord as a substitution for us can only be justified morally if we really were that bad.
Erm... or needed a sacrifice or a ransom paid.
I don't see how only PSA is relevant to original sin.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sure. As I say, it's possible to understand these things in various ways. I suspect it depends largely on which tradition within Christianity we've been steeped in.
If we are Western and Augustinian then we are going to be predisposed to interpreting David's prayers of contrition in a way that fits our theology.
If we were Orthodox then we might be less inclined to interpret it in that way.
We all approach these things through filters and lenses. There is no way around that.
In a way, I wish some Christians would be honest about that in terms of their reading of Scripture, instead of insisting that their interpretation is the "right" way of reading Scripture.
The interesting question, is why is the doctrine so compelling that makes some Christians insistent that it's absolutely correct. I don't think a Protestant view of original sin, in either its Calvinist or Wesleyan interpretations, can be separated from PSA. Basically, the punishment effected on our Lord as a substitution for us can only be justified morally if we really were that bad.
Erm... or needed a sacrifice or a ransom paid.
I don't see how only PSA is relevant to original sin.
Because PSA insists that the problem is guilt, guilt from original sin.
Punishment is related guilt,
cure is related to illness,
pardon of debt is related to debt.
Original sin in the western model is not that we just suffer the consequences of Adam's sin (the patristic and orthodox view), it is that we are plainly guilty in the same way that Adam is guilty.
Only PSA sees the cross as God punishing His Son, a penal theology necessitates a theology of guilt.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
A PSA understanding of the atonement does, historically, have its roots in Augustinian theology - so there is a connection.
That doesn't mean that Augustine and Anselm and their successors in mediaeval Western Catholicism understood the atonement in the same way as contemporary evangelicals.
I can see how a form of ransom theory can be compatible with Original Sin. The Fathers seem to have held to various forms of that, but they didn't necessarily hold to an Augustinian view of Original Sin.
On the literalism thing, I'm not sure it's the case that RCs understand the 'chalice' reference in the Missal as literally as Mudfrog seems to suggest.
On the use of the Psalms to bolster doctrinal points, it strikes me that all Christian traditions use elements from the Psalms to make Christological points, something that has NT precedent of course.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
:
quote:
On the use of the Psalms to bolster doctrinal points, it strikes me that all Christian traditions use elements from the Psalms to make Christological points, something that has NT precedent of course.
I read last week of a new book which argues that the foundation of the doctrine of the deity of Christ is that early Christians read the Psalms as an inner dialogue between Father and Son within the Godhead.
I would be interested in reading how the author deals with Psalm 51 and Christ being the penitent.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
Because PSA insists that the problem is guilt, guilt from original sin.
Punishment is related guilt,
cure is related to illness,
pardon of debt is related to debt.
Original sin in the western model is not that we just suffer the consequences of Adam's sin (the patristic and orthodox view), it is that we are plainly guilty in the same way that Adam is guilty.
Only PSA sees the cross as God punishing His Son, a penal theology necessitates a theology of guilt.
But a theology of guilt doesn't necessitate a theology of penalty.
[ 06. January 2017, 23:11: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Wesley was steeped in Patristics of course. But then, so was Calvin, although with somewhat different conclusions.
Must depend on how large a part Augustine plays in your tea ball. For some people he's the Alpha and Omega of patristics. There was a shipmate just a month or two ago claiming that anybody who didn't acknowledge Augustine as the third coming was a hypocrite and a liar and a poor judge of whisky.
Not saying Calvin was quite so simple-minded.
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Righteous does not equal sinless.
Doesn't it?
quote:
1. in the broad sense, the state of him who is such as he ought to be, righteousness ; the condition acceptable to God
Yes, a condition acceptable to God - which can only be by grace and forgiveness. If I am acceptable to god it is because I have been justified, not because I have any inherent righteousness.
By grace are ye saved, through faith; and this not of yourselves, it is the gift of God lest any man should boast.
?
That does not explain why Luke would point out three righteous people at the beginning of his gospel.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
OK, look at the verse in which Zacharias and Elizabeth are described as righteous:
quote:
And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.
Luke 1 v 6
It was their outward behaviour, their law-keeping that was described as righteous and blameless -they evidently kept the ceremonial law as required, they had never broken the 10 commandments, forgotten to tithe, etc, etc, etc.
But that reminds me of another man:
quote:
touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless.
Galatians 3 v 6
Yet he also recognised that inwardly he was far from righteous:
quote:
This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.
1 Tim 1 v 15
Add that to his testimony in Romans 7 v 15 - 20
quote:
15 I do not understand what I do; for I don't do what I would like to do, but instead I do what I hate. 16 Since what I do is what I don't want to do, this shows that I agree that the Law is right. 17 So I am not really the one who does this thing; rather it is the sin that lives in me. 18 I know that good does not live in me—that is, in my human nature. For even though the desire to do good is in me, I am not able to do it. 19 I don't do the good I want to do; instead, I do the evil that I do not want to do. 20 If I do what I don't want to do, this means that I am no longer the one who does it; instead, it is the sin that lives in me.
... and yo can see that the righteousness that was ascribed to Zechariah by Luke, and ascribed to himself by Paul was mere law-keeping and not personal heart-righteousness.
They all needed forgiveness by the grace of God.
And finally, if Zechariah was indeed righteous in the way you are claiming, why as an observant Torah-keeping Jew (and a priest at that) would he have cleansed himself ritually and made sacrifice?
Surely the righteous would not need such cleansing.
[ 07. January 2017, 10:36: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Eh?
Again, putting those verses together that way only makes sense if you have an evangelical hermeneutic. I'm not knocking that but it would be perfectly feasible to interpret those verses in Luke very differently.
This is the point I'm making about the lenders we wear. The Gospel account in and of itself says nothing about a difference between outward observance and inward heart conviction.
The whole point of Romans is Paul establishing that Gentiles can be justified on the basis of grace and faith, same as Israel - because ultimately the whole thing is the gift of God.
It's the whole thing about the Gentiles who don't have the Law being 'a law unto themselves'.
I don't see the need for a dualist dichotomy here. God accepted Cornelius's prayers and actions but he still had to hear the Gospel.
I'm not into filleting and segmenting these things into bite-size sound-bite chunks. That way lies Dispensationalism.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Doh! lenses not 'lenders'.
Of course, the whole tenor of Christ's teaching was about the need for inward conviction and for sincerity in religious observance.
No-one is doubting that nor suggesting we save ourselves by our own works or efforts.
But to combine those verses in an 'evangelical' way is no more neutral than RCs reading their particular ecclesiology or sacramental understanding back into the pages of the NT.
We both do it. We all do it.
Whether we are evangelical Protestants or sacramentalists. We all 'churchify' the scriptures. How can we not do so?
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
It's not an 'evangelical hermeneutical' interpretation at all - I honestly don't see what the problem is.
The bottom line is this: we sin because we are sinners; we don't become sinners by doing wrong things.
Neither do we become righteous by doing good things.
[ 07. January 2017, 11:21: Message edited by: Mudfrog ]
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
There are righteous people in the scriptures (both Old and New Testament e.g. Noah, Elizabeth, Zechariah, Simeon) and Jesus tells us he came to save not the righteous but sinners so a blanket qualification that we are all sinners is not technically correct according to scripture.
I think the damaging thing about the doctrine of original sin historically is that it has emphasised the negative too much and forgotten that we were created Good and in God's image.
Christianity affirms both the glory and the fallenness of humanity IMO and experience confirms that.
Evensong, I don't think that's a legitimate exegesis. It's treating scripture as though it were not just a legal document, but a single one as well.
If I've got you right, you are saying that because in some places, some people are described as 'righteous', that means that all can't have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God - because O look, here we have found some people who are described using a word which elsewhere might imply that they could not have done.
That also wouldn't fit your final conclusion, with which I 100% agree about both the glory and the fallenness of humanity, and how that fits our experience. You'd otherwise be saying that there were certain people who were just glorious and not fallen.
If that were so, presumably Simeon would not have needed to hope for the Messiah, or be inspired to have seen God's salvation.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
I'm suggesting it's a both/and thing, Mudfrog.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
:
What comes through to me in this discussion on Original Sin is the question why I or others should incur the wrath of God for something I cannot avoid. It looks suspiciously like being punished for being human. That sentiment is reinforced if one believes, as I do, that selfishness and sinning by humans is an unavoidable product of the evolutionary process. Furthermore, I have great difficulty in understanding why the mighty God as presented in Job, for example, should be so sensitive and offended by my failings that he should threaten me with hell. It just doesn’t add up, especially if he is a God of justice, let alone love.
The only way I can make sense of God’s attitude to sin, original and otherwise, is that he is moved not by defending his amour propre but by the destructive consequences of sin both for the perpetrator and the totality of creation. Judgement is not a matter of condemnation but of diagnosis, and the sentence a matter of healing not punishment. I find it significant that when Jesus announced his ministry in Luke’s gospel it was to declare a jubilee, liberty to captives and sight to the blind, in contrast to the condemnatory tone of the Baptist. Similarly, St Paul emphasises the corruptive influence of (original) sin in order to arrive at the conclusion “for as in Adam all die, so in Christ will all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:22), which, one might note, has more than a whiff of universalism. Let me quote Isaac Watts again: “Where he displays his healing power/ Death and the curse are known no more/ In him the tribes of Adam boast/ More blessings than their father lost.”
The doctrine of original sin gives a realistic understanding of human limitations, making me sceptical of utopian personal and social solutions, and makes me more understanding and forgiving of human failings; but at the same time it points to the Christian hope offered by the continuing work of the New Adam.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Funnily enough, I had the words of that Isaac Watts hymn running through my mind as I read through the discussion earlier.
I'd stop short of universalism, mind, but do believe that there's a recapitulation thing going on through the Incarnation and atonement.
The scriptures do strongly indicate though, that we are all under a curse, all under condemnation and deserving of wrath - but I don't see any indication that God condemns us simply for being human. As the Orthodox liturgy puts it, He is good and 'a friend of Man' (is humanity).
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
Remember the predominant model of salvation in the Orthodox understanding is sickness/cure.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
In Salvation Army hymnody we also have a few references to 'cure':
When Shall I Come Unto The Healing Waters?
and
Lord, Here Today My Great Need I Am Feeling
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Sure, as I've said, the Wesleyan tradition is the one the Orthodox tend to feel is the Protestant strand that resonates most closely with their own position on these things, whilst acknowledging areas of difference of course.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Sure, as I've said, the Wesleyan tradition is the one the Orthodox tend to feel is the Protestant strand that resonates most closely with their own position on these things, whilst acknowledging areas of difference of course.
What people might not realise is that whilst TSA describes itself as Protestant, we are neither Pentecostal nor Reformed (capital R).
We come from the Catholic Tradition via Anglicanism and then Methodism.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
What people might not realise is that whilst TSA describes itself as Protestant, we are neither Pentecostal nor Reformed (capital R).
We come from the Catholic Tradition via Anglicanism and then Methodism.
All Protestant churches come from the Catholic Tradition. Pretty much by definition. And I don't think anybody who knows a pittance about the Salvation Army doesn't realize its relationship to Methodism.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
I can see why the Salvation Army would wany to position itself as a distinctive movement or strand within Protestantism or indeed the Western Christian traditions more broadly, though, Mudfrog.
I'm not convinced they are as distinctive as they like to make out, but they are distinctive certainly. Essentially, of course, they are a subset of the Wesleyan Holiness tradition with a few distinctive practices. I don't think they represent any kind of 'Third way' if you like between Pentecostalism on the one hand and the Big R Reformed on the other as I'm not sure things break down in as binary a way as that, but I can see why they might want to occupy that space.
It all depends how on perspective. From.an Orthodox point of view I'd imagine Protestantism and Catholicism represent two sides of the same coin and perhaps there are some groups that form the milled edge in between ...
Some Anglicans would claim to do that, of course. I'm not sure about the Lutherans. They are as rare as hen's teeth here in the UK.
That doesn't mean I dismiss or play down the importance of the Salvation Army. They have had significant impact. But they are a subset of a subset of a subset.
But we are veering away from Original Sin ...
However, the clue to the Salvationist emphasis is in their title, of course. What they say on the label. They are all about saving souls and they do take an holistic approach to that. However we cut it though, that emphasis is bound to involve some kind of stress on humanity'd lost and fallen state, and the remedy in Christ, so it's hardly surprising that they are going to emphasise Original Sin, even if that doesn't necessarily mean they are going to adopt a kind of TULIP schema as the Big R Reformed tradition did.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
It all depends how on perspective. From.an Orthodox point of view I'd imagine Protestantism and Catholicism represent two sides of the same coin and perhaps there are some groups that form the milled edge in between ...
Yes. Indeed, as you of all people no doubt realize already, that's exactly the phrase we use. The more cynical among us will add, "and the Pope was the first Protestant."
As to what's between the two sides, if anything, we don't much care, except as a matter of politesse between individuals.
[ 07. January 2017, 22:27: Message edited by: mousethief ]
Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
. and yo can see that the righteousness that was ascribed to Zechariah by Luke, and ascribed to himself by Paul was mere law-keeping and not personal heart-righteousness.
You are exegeting Luke via Paul here.
I'm totally with you that we use scripture to interpret scripture but using Luke to interpret Luke would be the better way to do that.
If Luke believes those he points out are righteous are not really righteous, why would he point them out? He says nothing about them "not really being righteous".
[ 08. January 2017, 09:55: Message edited by: Evensong ]
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Evensong:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
. and yo can see that the righteousness that was ascribed to Zechariah by Luke, and ascribed to himself by Paul was mere law-keeping and not personal heart-righteousness.
You are exegeting Luke via Paul here.
I'm totally with you that we use scripture to interpret scripture but using Luke to interpret Luke would be the better way to do that.
If Luke believes those he points out are righteous are not really righteous, why would he point them out? He says nothing about them "not really being righteous".
They are 'righteous' according to Luke's own parameters and definition from the one verse. It's all about the law.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Well yes, Mousethief. I don't know why I put 'I'd imagine' as I know all too well that this is what the Orthodox say as it's been said to me many, many times over the last two decades!
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
:
Gamaliel, I don't believe that TSA is a Third Way on its own. It's part of the Wesleyan tradition which is, I believe that Third Way in British Reformation History.
You have Catholicism that either remained as the developing Roman Catholic Church.
But you then have the Reformed Catholic Church that we call Anglicanism (And let's add the Lutherans alongside them in Europe).
Then you have the Calvinists and Puritans who became Baptists and Presbyterians, etc. They're on the other side.
In the middle you have Wesley who, coming out of High Church Anglicanism added stuff like Catholic and Orthodox Piety to Moravian thinking and that Zinzendorf bloke.
Out of him came directly Booth's Salvation Army, influenced also by the Palmers and a little bit by Finney from the US.
So, if you have Anglican/Lutheran/Episcopalian on the right, Calvinist/Baptist/Reformed on the left, you have Wesleyanism in the middle.
We might not be a full TULIP but we are certainly T
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
More to the point, though, on the issue of people being 'righteous' or 'unrighteous' and whether righteousness is conferred in some kind of 'forensic sense' or 'legal fiction' and so on - us being 'declared righteous' because of Christ's finished work on the Cross and so on ...
Well, I can certainly see where those ideas come from in scripture, but there are plenty of material - particularly in the Gospels - that don't appear to fit that neat schema.
This is what I mean by all of us 'churchifying' or reading back into the NT whatever our ecclesiology or soteriology happens to be. Sure, we don't make it all up and then go looking for verses to 'prove' it - that's not how these things work ...
But I do think there is a two-way thing going on whereby we become convinced of something or other and then start to see it everywhere in scripture or else try to make things fit ...
I'd suggest that we all do that - the RCs, the Dispensationalists, the Reformed, the Pentecostals, the ...
At least with the RCs and the Orthodox there is the sense that they recognise what they are doing and that they are working within a Tradition / tradition ... not trying to make out that their particular interpretation isn't a tradition (small t) in any sense at all but simply what the plain-meaning of scripture teaches ...
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
:
Sorry - cross-posted with Mudfrog ...
Yes, I get all that and I don't dispute that the Wesleyan tradition is a Third Way in British Reformation history. I'm afraid I'd understood you to mean that it's a Third Way per se - alongside Protestantism and Catholicism. That claim has been made for Pentecostalism, of course.
So I apologise for that.
It's also a tradition I have a lot of time for, so I am not knocking it - but neither do I want to over-emphasise its importance, but rather set it in its rightful place alongside the other strands.
As far as Wesley's High Church Anglicanism goes, a lot of Anglicans back then were 'High' in the Church and King sense - there were High Church Calvinists too. We have to be careful not to regard pre-Oxford Movement 'High Church' Anglican in an overly sacramental or ritualised sense. I'm sure you are up to speed on all of that.
So, if Wesley was aware of Orthodox and RC emphases, then so were his fellow High Church Anglicans who may have differed from him on the freewill/predestination issue.
As I've said elsewhere, Calvin was pretty steeped in Patristics too - although he made no bones about the fact that he preferred Augustine to Chrysostom and Jerome and other Church Fathers.
I'm not convinced that Wesley added 'Catholic and Orthodox piety' so much as he brought with him an understanding of the more sacramental approaches of those Traditions as well as an awareness of some of their spiritual disciplines.
He was also influenced by the Puritans and I'd suggest that his methodical approach came from there as much as anywhere else.
And yes, I'd see the Wesleyan and Wesleyan Holiness emphases as they subsequently developed as small r reformed - with more small c Catholic and small o Orthodox emphases than might be found in some Big R Reformed traditions. But even that is too simplistic, the Big R Reformed folk can be far more 'realised' in their understanding of the Eucharist than the more pietistic and revivalist folk.
As Jengie Jon has often reminded us, the Arminian reaction against hard-line Calvinism - which, arguably led in turn to Calvinism becoming more hardline at Dort - was itself a subset of Big R Reformed theology.
There are fuzzy bits and overlaps all ways round. These things don't neatly divide into segments like an orange or tangerine.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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I'd hardly say that Wesleyanism is more Catholic than the C of E. What does it mean to say he "added" Catholic piety to his CoE inheritance?
Posted by SusanDoris (# 12618) on
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quote:
Originally posted by David Goode:
It's clearly allegorical. Surely no one believes it is factual.
Agreed!
Posted by SusanDoris (# 12618) on
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Seeing this topic referred to in Perg, I thought I'd have a look - and, on a grey and gloomy Sunday afternoon have enjoyed reading through this very interesting discussion.
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I'd hardly say that Wesleyanism is more Catholic than the C of E. What does it mean to say he "added" Catholic piety to his CoE inheritance?
No, I think what Mudfrog meant was that elements of Catholic piety filtered into Wesleyanism from John Wesley's High Church Anglicanism.
Which is based on a misunderstanding, I would say, of what it meant to be a High Church Anglican back in the 18th century.
One could argue that the Moravians were 'Catholic' in their piety to some extent as Count Zinzendorf's hymns and prayers are full of images and meditations on the sufferings and wounds of Christ - to an embarrasing extent by modern standards.
A Methodist historian once told me that Moravian and later Methodist hymnody contained the first post-Reformation meditations on the wounds and sufferings of Christ - and were very reminiscent of some aspects of 15th century Roman Catholicism.
One could argue that the similarity is more coincidental rather than direct, but there is an almost medieval emphasis on the blood and sufferings of Christ that emerges around the time of the revivals of the mid-1700s that you don't get among the 17th century Puritans or the Carolingian Divines and so on.
We have to be careful how we handle some of these terms.
17th century Anglican divines such as Lancelot Andrewes and the poet Treharne had views that wouldn't be out of place in an Orthodox setting - and they remain popular with Orthodox clergy I know - as do some of the writings of the medieval mystics such as Richard Rolle.
But that doesn't mean that they were on the same page as the Orthodox on every issue.
The poet George Herbert can be read in a mildly Calvinist sense as well as in a 'High Church' sense.
Wesley wrote some very eirenic letters to Roman Catholics and there was also the bizarre incident where he tried to absorb some Apostolic Succession from an visiting Orthodox priest (or bogus bishop?) which he could then pass onto his lay-preachers ...
Historians argue about what exactly was going on there. Who knows? The guy was pretty mercurial.
As I've heard Bishop Kallistos Ware say in relation to the incident, 'One could say that Wesley was acting in accordance with Anglican principles as he would have regarded the Orthodox Church in 18th century terms as some kind of sister-church that was non-Roman, but as for the Orthodox Bishop - what did he think he was doing?'
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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Gamaliel, I am very interested to read of the "meditations on the wounds and sufferings of Christ - (that) were very reminiscent of some aspects of 15th century Roman Catholicism..."
Might I offer a couple of Salvation Army songs that you might feel are in the same mould?
O Love Upon a Cross Impaled
and
Silent and Still I Stand Before That Weeping Tree
These are very deep and almost mystic; and both of them written by an SA General in the twentieth century, not the nineteenth let alone the 15th!.
Host note: corrected typo
[ 08. January 2017, 21:13: Message edited by: Moo ]
Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on
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Sure, but whenever he was writing he'd have been drawing on earlier material, whether post or pre-Reformation.
I'll try to find some references. Zinzendorf's hymnody on these points can be embarrassing by modern standards.
E P Thompson, author of 'The Making Of The English Working Class' couldn't stand Methodism and thought the emphasis on the blood and wounds of Christ were psycho-sexual and somewhat sick.
That might tell us more about him than early Methodism.
FWIW, I do find something icky about some mediaeval meditations on the suffering of Christ and some of the more exotic understandings of the 'blood of Christ' that can be found in the outer reaches of Pentecostalism and among some charismatics.
Posted by Anglican_Brat (# 12349) on
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Perhaps this article can shed some light:
http://religionnews.com/2017/01/13/author-jesus-didnt-believe-in-original-sin-and-neither-should-we/
I wonder if the issue of original sin arose because we find it hard to deal with people who are either wonderfully good or terribly evil.
Original sin's attraction is the notion that all humans are essentially same, sinful, in need of God's grace.
If we imagine Augustine and Pelagius debating today, we might find Pelagius saying something like "Look at Mother Teresa, if you are not perfect like she is, it's your own fault, and God has every right to judge you for failing at your duty to be a good person."
Augustine might respond "We all can't help ourselves, we don't always do the good we want to do, our will is fundamentally damaged, we need God's grace to restore and perfect us before we can do good."
I think original sin can be a good doctrine if it reminds us of our reliance on divine grace and love. It's not all good however, if it's meant to demean or diminish our humanity.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Anglican_Brat:
I think original sin can be a good doctrine if it reminds us of our reliance on divine grace and love. It's not all good however, if it's meant to demean or diminish our humanity.
I wholeheartedly agree with you on that!
We must not diminish our value, our 'loved' status.
God did't sent his Son because he hated the world was cross with the world or despised the world; he sent his Son because he loved the world - could see what was worthy of love and, indeed, rescue.
Original sin does not mean and has never meant tat humankind is utterly evil or without merit.
Original sin simply means that for whatever reason (explained by myth or not) we stand condemned. I can't even say that it is God who is condemning us at this stage; bit what I can say is that God SO loves us that he sent his Son to be the means by which we can be fully rescued.
Original sin within is evident to those of us who have tried to not be sinners.
But it doesn't make us worthless.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Original sin does not mean and has never meant tat humankind is utterly evil or without merit.
Original sin simply means that for whatever reason (explained by myth or not) we stand condemned. I can't even say that it is God who is condemning us at this stage; bit what I can say is that God SO loves us that he sent his Son to be the means by which we can be fully rescued.
Why would God care if somebody else was condemning us? Our condemnation only matters if it's by God.
Posted by Mudfrog (# 8116) on
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Original sin does not mean and has never meant tat humankind is utterly evil or without merit.
Original sin simply means that for whatever reason (explained by myth or not) we stand condemned. I can't even say that it is God who is condemning us at this stage; bit what I can say is that God SO loves us that he sent his Son to be the means by which we can be fully rescued.
Why would God care if somebody else was condemning us? Our condemnation only matters if it's by God.
Nonsense; that's what redemption is all about: releasing someone from the control of another. Of course God cares about who is condemning, accusing, imprisoning, etc.
Justice is an attribute of God - he is just, of course. Our condemnation is brought upon ourselves, we are accused by Satan (the accuser).
It's not the only reason for our need of redemption, cleansing, forgiving, healing, ransoming.
The atonement is not all about getting rid of condemnation; but it has to be there somewhere.
The other models of atonement deal with other situations that deal with our lack of oneness with God.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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I mean, why should anybody else's condemnation have any control over us, let alone over God? My next-door neighbor says "I don't like your kid." Fine. You don't like my kid. You don't have to. There's no need for me to do anything about it. Certainly not to die.
Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on
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Mudfrog quote:
Original sin simply means that for whatever reason (explained by myth or not) we stand condemned.
Condemned by whom? Not God, surely? Is it not bizarre to suggest that a just God would condemn a sinner for a condition for which he/she is not responsible? As John 3:17 reminds us: "God sent not his son into the world to condemn the world but to save it."
I mostly agree with Anglican_Brat's response of Augustine to Pelagius:
quote:
If we imagine Augustine and Pelagius debating today, we might find Pelagius saying something like "Look at Mother Teresa, if you are not perfect like she is, it's your own fault, and God has every right to judge you for failing at your duty to be a good person."
Augustine might respond "We all can't help ourselves, we don't always do the good we want to do, our will is fundamentally damaged, we need God's grace to restore and perfect us before we can do good."
I would, however, disagree that we are incapable of doing good without being perfected, but that we cannot be restored/ saved and perfected without God's restoring and sanctifying Grace. Perhaps the phrase "before we can do good" could have e been omitted, as it seems to contradict the earlier observation "we don't always do the good we want to."
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
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quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
I mean, why should anybody else's condemnation have any control over us, let alone over God? My next-door neighbor says "I don't like your kid." Fine. You don't like my kid. You don't have to. There's no need for me to do anything about it. Certainly not to die.
Crickets.
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