Transmitting The Fallen Nature

Really? There are some who will not die.

1 Thessalonians 4:17
Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord.

Why do some argue against that?

Its like a Woke male demanding we deny that he is a male, and must address him as a female, as he demands to be seen.

Some do the same thing with the Word of God.
Its a rebellious streak of negativity of denial.
A refusing to submit to the authority of God's Word...
In essence? Denying reality.


Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds
to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord." 1 Thes 4:17​

It could not be any cleared.....

I believe God puts certain passages in Scripture not only to tell us truth, but also to expose hearts for what they really are.

grace and peace ...............
 
There is no transmission of a fallen nature,
 
The so-called fallen nature is believed to be propagated by fathers. Oh? Then
whence did Eve obtain it?
BY ONE MAN SIN ENTERED INTO THE WORLD AND DEATH BY SIN
How much more reasonable to accept the Bible account of the fall of man and its plan of salvation through Christ! Indeed, the first step to salvation and a righteous standing before God is a recognition of the fact of the fall. It must be acknowledged that as sons of Adam we are by nature under condemnation; condemned, not first of all because of what we have done, but because of what we are. It is not only sins, but sin that would keep us out of heaven—not only what we have done, but what we are constantly prone to do and would do even in heaven were we admitted in our present state. It is impossible to explain the universality of man’s misery, sorrow and—sin, apart from the fact that Adam, as head of the race, transmitted a sinful nature to all his posterity. All the Word of God, from Genesis to Revelation, bears testimony to this important and basic fact.

In Psalm 51:5 David, acknowledging his (not his mother’s) sin, says:

“Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.”

And in Ephesians 2:3 it is declared that

“…we all…were by nature the children of wrath even as others.”

And this tallies with human experience. Parents, do your children have to be taught to tell lies, steal, do unkind things, etc.? Certainly not. They do all that naturally. You must teach them not to steal, lie and be unkind. But why is it that they so naturally do what is wrong? Simply because they are your children! They were born with sinful natures as you were.

“By ONE man sin entered into the world, and death by sin… through the offence of ONE many be dead…the judgment was by ONE to condemnation…by ONE man’s offence death reigned…by the offence of ONE judgment came upon all…by ONE man’s disobedience [the] many were made sinners” (Rom. 5:12,15-19).

It all began with one act of disobedience, after which Adam and Eve fled to hide, not from each other, but from God. As a result all their posterity became totally depraved—“wholly inclined to evil and that continually,” as the Westminster Confession has it. (This does not mean that man can do nothing that is good by comparison with others, but simply that nothing he does can be pronounced good by a perfect and holy God.)

In the reading of our Bibles we have scarcely passed the account of the fall of man when we find that

“God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5).

And in Acts 17:30 we read that “…God…now commandeth all men everywhere to repent.”

This, of course, implies that all men everywhere are sinners.

AND SO DEATH PASSED UPON ALL MEN FOR THAT ALL HAVE SINNED
There is, naturally, the constant effort on the part of fallen man to explain his condition so that the responsibility for it will not rest upon him. Even those who theoretically accept the Bible account of the fall, frequently protest: Why am I to blame? I cannot help it. I was born with a sinful nature.

Such have failed to observe what Romans 5:12 clearly states, that

“death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

But some will object that we have just finished proving that death passed upon all because of the sin of ONE man. Yes, but we were all in that one man when he sinned. We all sinned in Adam. It is too soon forgotten by some that all of us were once in Adam, were part of him, have come from him, and that the sins we are now tempted to commit by our own fallen natures are but the natural fruit of that original sin committed by us all in Adam when he was yet a free moral agent.

The fact that sin and death entered the world through Adam does not excuse us; it but increases and clinches our condemnation for all Adam’s posterity were in Adam when he sinned—“and so death passed upon all men, for that ALL HAVE SINNED.”

so-
Is there original’ sin, meaning men are sinners because of an inherited’ sinful nature passed on by Adam?


The answer is an emphatic Yes, because the Bible specifically teaches this. People (and this includes children) sin because they are sinners. The modern world tries to say people sin because of their environment, but this is contrary to Scripture. The only ones who ever sinned without a sinful nature were Adam and Eve—who also had a perfect environment.
 
The History of original sin.

Augustine and Pelagius

Augustine’s doctrine of Original Sin was born from his attempt to combat the heresy of Pelagianism. The controversy began in Rome when the British monk, Pelagius, opposed Augustine’s prayer: “Grant what you command, and command what you desire”. Pelagius was opposing the idea that the divine gift of grace was necessary to perform the will of God. Pelagius believed that if we are responsible for obeying the commandments of God, then we must all also have the ability to do so without divine aid. He went on to deny the doctrine of Ancestral Sin, arguing that the consequences of Adam’s sin are not passed on to the rest of mankind. Adam’s sin affected Adam alone, and thus infants at birth are in the same state as Adam was before the Fall.

Augustine took a starkly different view of the Fall, arguing that mankind is utterly sinful and incapable of good. Augustine believed that the state of Original Sin leaves us in such a condition that we are unable to refrain from sin. The ‘image of God’ in man (i.e., free will) was destroyed by the Fall. As much as we may choose to do good, our evil impulses pervert our free will and compel us to do evil. Therefore we are totally dependent upon grace.

So far did Augustine take his grim view of the human condition, that he argued not only that the Original Sin effects all of Adam’s descendants, but that each person is guilty of the Original Sin from birth (Original Guilt). Infants are therefore guilty of sin and thus infants who die before baptism, in which (according to Augustine) the guilt of Original Sin is removed, are condemned to perdition and cannot be saved. As if that was not bad enough, Augustine went on to formulate the doctrine of Predestination, which affirms that God has foreordained who will be saved and who will not.

Augustine prevailed and Pelagius was condemned as a heretic by Rome at the Council of Carthage in 418. It seemed that Pelagius’ views were more reprehensible to the Latin Church than the idea of predestination and babies burning in hell – views that the Latin Church was not only willing to tolerate, but even willing to champion as Orthodox doctrine!


St John Chrysostom

Between Augustine and Pelagius there appeared to be no middle-way in the West. A different view, however, was expressed in the East by Augustine’s contemporary, John Chrysostom. The dispute between Augustine and Pelagius had not reached the East, and so Chrysostom’s views were not so agitated by heated disputes and polemics. Were Chrysostom involved in the dispute between Augustine and Pelagius, perhaps his teaching on Ancestral Sin would have prevailed over both Pelagius and Augustine alike, but considering that the sole concern of the Latin Church seemed to be the condemnation of Pelagianism, it is probably more likely that he would have been condemned as semi-pelagian.https://pemptousia.com/2017/02/original-sin-orthodox-doctrine-or-heresy/#_edn1 Whatever the case, Chrysostom’s views on the subject have never enjoyed the attention they deserve, and the heated nature of the dispute in the West meant that the doctrine of ‘Original Sin’ as expounded by Augustine was regarded as the only safeguard against the heresy of Pelagianism.

Chrysostom, while claiming that all human beings are made in the image of God, believed that the Ancestral Sin brought corruptibility and death not only to Adam but to all his descendants, weakening his ability to grow into God’s likeness, but never destroying God’s image (free will). Chrysostom is a major voice within a consensus of Greek patristic writers who interpret the Fall as “an inheritance essentially of mortality rather than sinfulness, sinfulness being merely a consequence of mortality”.[ii] Chrysostom’s position is echoed, for example, by St Athanasius the Great and St Cyril of Alexandria, who claimed that we are not guilty of Adam’s sin, though we inherit a corrupted nature; but our free will remains intact. This Greek patristic interpretation is founded upon Romans 5:12: “As sin came into the world through one man, and through sin, death, so death spread to all men because all men have sinned”[iii]. John Meyendorff explains how the deficient Latin translation of the text may have contributed to such a stark difference in the Latin interpretation of the Ancestral Sin:

‘In this passage there is a major issue of translation. The last four Greek words were translated in Latin as in quo omnes peccaverunt (“in whom [i.e., in Adam] all men have sinned”), and this translation was used in the West to justify the guilt inherited from Adam and spread to his descendants. But such a meaning cannot be drawn from the original Greek’.[iv]

St Cyril of Alexandria explained the passage in this way:

“How did many become sinners because of Adam?… How could we, who were not yet born, all be condemned with him, even though God said, ‘Neither the fathers shall be put to death because of their children, nor the children because of their fathers, but the soul which sins shall be put to death’? (cf. Deut. 24:18) … we became sinners through Adam’s disobedience in such manner as this: he was created for incorruptibility and life, and the manner of existence he had in the garden of delight was proper to holiness. His whole mind was continually beholding God; his body was tranquil and calm with all base pleasures being still. For there was no tumult of alien disturbances in it. But because he fell under sin and slipped into corruptibility, pleasures and filthiness assaulted the nature of the flesh, and in our members was unveiled a savage law. Our nature, then, became diseased by sin through the disobedience of one, that is, of Adam. Thus, all were made sinners, not by being co-transgressors with Adam,… but by being of his nature and falling under the law of sin… Human nature fell ill in Adam and subject to corruptibility through disobedience, and, therefore, the passions entered in”.[v]


St John Cassian

The East paid little attention to Augustine, and this was largely due to language barriers. For the Eastern Christians, serious theologians wrote in Greek, and they paid little heed to Latin writers. What opposition did come from the East came from some Eastern Orthodox theologians who, for one reason or another, found themselves living in the West. Amongst the most prominent was St John Cassian. St John opposed Augustine on four major points:

1) There were clearly instances where people had come to God of their own volition, who, while called by Christ and aided by divine grace, chose to change their ways (e.g. Matthew, Paul, Zacchaeus). Therefore, it is not grace alone that saves us, but also man’s willingness to repent.

2) After the Fall, Adam and his descendants retained a knowledge of good, and an impulse, however weakened, to pursue good. Man was not, as Augustine claimed, utterly depraved and incapable of good after the Fall.

3) The ‘Image’ of God in man is sick, but not dead. The divine image is in need of healing, but this healing requires synergy (the co-operation of man’s will with divine grace).

4) God wishes all to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth, so those who are not saved reject salvation against His will. Predestination should be understood as foreknowledge and not as foreordination.

The West condemned St John Cassian’s views as semi-pelagian, but for the Orthodox, Cassian is one of the foremost exponents of the Orthodox doctrine of theosis.[vi] His views were supported also by Theodoret of Antioch:

“There is need of both our efforts and divine aid. The grace of the Spirit is not vouchsafed to those who make no effort, and without grace our efforts can not collect the prize of virtue”.


The Ancestral Sin and Baptism


Augustine’s view of Original Sin was the reason also for his justification of infant baptism. Believing that babies are born guilty of sin, he argued that baptism was necessary for the babies’ salvation. He saw the innocence of infants purely in terms of their being physically too weak to commit sin, but equally guilty as adults of Adam’s sin.

The Greek Fathers, having a different view of the Fall and the Ancestral Sin, interpreted the purpose of infant baptism in another way, different in important respects from the familiar Augustinian and Reformed interpretations of the West. The Greek Fathers believed that newborn infants are innocents, wholly without sin. While infants inherit a human nature which, in its wholeness, is wounded by the Ancestral Sin, weakening the will and making each person prone to sin, they are innocent of sin nonetheless. In the fourth of his catechetical homilies on baptism, St John Chrysostom states, “We do baptise infants, although they are not guilty of any sins”. For the Greek Fathers, baptism, above all else, is an acceptance by the Church and entrance of the baptised person into the redeemed and sanctified Body of Christ, the beginning of a life spent in spiritual combat and instruction in holiness on the deepening journey to the Kingdom of God.

Considering the stark contrast between the Orthodox doctrine of the Ancestral Sin and the Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin, and the different understanding of baptism that these doctrines lead to, is it not surprising that some Orthodox speak of baptism in Augustinian terms – of the forgiveness of Original Sin – especially considering that the Orthodox service for baptism makes not a single reference to it? The closest we come to mention of the Ancestral Sin (Πρωπατρορικό ἁμάρτημα) in baptism is in the first prayer of the Service for the Making of a Catechumen (which was originally completely separate from the service of Baptism): “Remove far from him/her that ancient error” (παλαιά πλάνη). If one of the main purposes of baptism was the forgiveness of Original Sin, surely it would be worth mentioning in the baptism service! But the idea of ‘Original Sin’ being “forgiven” is nowhere to be found in the Greek Fathers or in the hymns and prayers of the Orthodox Church. For it is an idea which is alien to Greek Patristic thought. The Ancestral Sin is a condition, primarily of mortality and corruptibility, which needs healing, an inherited ‘illness’ which means that free will – or ‘the Image of God’ as the Greek Fathers preferred to put it – though kept intact, is in need of divine grace in order to progress along the path to attaining God’s ‘likeness’, the path to theosis or ‘deification’.


Conclusion


Bearing in mind the significant differences between the Orthodox and the Augustinian views of ‘Original Sin’, it surprises me that some Orthodox Christians are so quick to employ the term, claiming that the Orthodox Church holds to the doctrine of ‘Original Sin’, and qualifying this simply by saying that it does not embrace the doctrine of ‘Original Guilt’. I do not think that this is adequate for expounding the Orthodox position on Original Sin. Although Augustine was recognised as a saint by the Orthodox Church,[vii] it has never accepted his teaching on Original Sin. If what I have written above is correct, then the Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin is wholly un-Orthodox, and it led, I believe, to a whole series of heresies in the Latin Church, such as Predestination, Purgatory, Limbo and the Immaculate Conception. We Orthodox would do well to distance ourselves from the well-known Augustinian position on Original Sin by employing a less familiar term: Ancestral Sin. It is not merely a case of semantics. For an erroneous understanding of this doctrine has serious repercussions for our understanding of sin and the Fall, for grace and free will, for baptism, the human condition and man’s deification. In short, how we understand the Ancestral Sin has direct implications for our whole soteriology – our understanding of the salvation of man and the world.https://pemptousia.com/2017/02/original-sin-orthodox-doctrine-or-heresy/

hope this helps !!!
 
More church history and augustines gnostic influence upon the church with its many heresies. The Reformers bought into those heresies hook, line and sinker.

There are major similarities and yet subtle differences between Augustinianism and Gnosticism. While the Gnostics said that man’s nature was sinful and corrupt and that man didn’t have a free will because man was created by an inferior god, Augustine agreed with the Gnostics that man’s nature was sinful and corrupt and that man did not have a free will, but he said that God made it that way on account of Adam’s sin. While the Gnostics said that flesh was sinful and therefore Christ did not have a flesh, Augustine said that concupiscence in the flesh was sinful and that this sin was hereditary or transmitted from parent to child through the physical passions of intercourse, but that Jesus avoided this hereditary sin by being conceived without physical passion and being born of a virgin. Therefore, Augustine agreed with the Gnostics in principle, but he differed from them inexplanation. In this way, Augustinian theology was a modified Manichaeism or a semi-Gnosticism.

Consider the following facts:

  • All of the Early Christians, before Augustine, believed in man’s free will and denied man’s natural inability.
  • The Gnostics in the days of the Early Church believed in man’s natural inability and denied man’s free will.
  • Augustine was a Gnostic for many years, in the Manichaeism sect, and converted to the Church out of Gnosticism.
  • After joining the Church and being appointed a Bishop, Augustine began to deny the free will of man and to affirm the natural inability of man
  • The Church, under Augustine’s influence, began to believe in the natural inability of man, which it never before held to, but which it formerly would refute.
What can we conclude by these facts except that when Augustine converted to Christianity out of Gnosticism, he brought with him some Gnostic doctrine? His views on human nature and free will were never held by the Early Church, but were held by the Gnostics. How can we possibly account for the fact that all of Christianity held to the freedom of the human will while only the Gnostic’s taught a corrupted and sinful nature, until Augustine joined the Christian Church out of Gnosticism? It seems abundantly clear that Augustine departed from the theology of the Early Church and remained in agreement with the Gnostics on the issue of human nature and free will. Church doctrine and theology has been infiltrated and polluted with Gnostic heresies. The Church went wrong at the time of Augustine. Christian theology violently crashed like a train, falling off the tracks, and has continued to charge and move forward on the wrong path and in the wrong direction ever since.

The greatest contributors to modern Christian theology have been Augustine, Luther, and Calvin. Augustine was influenced by Manichaean thought and Luther and Calvin were influenced by Augustinian thought. Therefore, it is no surprise that Augustine denied free will as the Manichaeans did, and Luther and Calvin denied free will as Augustine did. The Manichaeans influenced Augustine and Augustine in turn influenced Luther and Calvin.

There is no dispute over the fact that Luther and Calvin were influenced by Augustine. Luther was even an Augustinian monk. William Carlos Martyn said about Luther, “The study of the Bible and of Augustine theology… lead him to the Redeemer.”[59] In his historical account of Luther, Johann Heinrich Kurtz said, “Luther zealously studied the Bible, along with the writings of Augustine…”[60] Principal Tullock said that Luther “nourished himself upon Scripture and St. Augustine…”[61] Robert Dale Owen said, “Calvin’s ‘Institutes’ are based on Augustine’s ‘City of God’”[62] Thomas H. Dyer said in his biography of John Calvin, “The doctrine of predestination, which is generally regarded as that of which principally characterizes Calvin, is in fact that of St. Augustin…”[63] Oliver Joseph Thatcher explains why, “In theology he [Calvin] was a close follower of St. Augustine. His influence was to revivify the ideas of St. Augustine and, joining them to the main ideas of the Reformation, embody them in the Church he organized.”[64] The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics said, “Luther… Zwingli and Calvin, with minor divergences, agree in reverting to St. Augustine on the main issuesand in the supposed interests of evangelical piety…”[65] Luther referred to Augustine thirteen times in his book “The Bondage of the Will”[66], and twenty four times in the “Works of Martin Luther.”[67] John Calvin referred to Augustine two hundred and sixty five times in his “Institutes on Christian Religion.”[68]

Since Luther and Calvin were both students of Augustine and learned much of their theology from him, it is not surprising to find the remains of the Gnostic view of human nature in their theological writings. Martin Luther said, “…man has lost his freedom, and is forced to serve sin, and cannot will good… he sins and wills evil necessarily…”[69] He said, “Sin in his nature and of himself he can do nothing but sin.”[70] John Calvin said that man does not have a “free will” in the sense that “he has a free choice of good and evil,”[71] but denied this all together. Calvin paraphrases Augustine saying, “…nature began to want liberty the moment the will was vanquished by the revolt into which it fell… by making a bad use of free will, lost both himself and his will… free will having been made a captive, can do nothing in the way of righteousness… man at his creation received a great degree of free will, but lost it by sinning.”[72] The Christian Spectator said, “Augustine, and Calvin, and all of the reformers, taught the bondage, or moral impotence of the will.”[73] While the Early Church wrote about “the freedom of the will,” Martin Luther wrote an entire book called “The Bondage of the Will.” This shows a clear departure from the views of early Christianity.
 
continued :

Luther defended his position against free will by saying, “Augustine… is wholly on my side…”[74] Calvin, like Luther, appealed to Augustine to support and defend his position. Calvin said, “Let us now hear Augustine in his own words, lest” Calvin be charged with “being opposed to all antiquity…”[75] Calvin tried to dismiss the charge of being opposed to the Early Church by saying, “Augustine hesitated not to call the will a slave…”[76] Charles Partee said “In his teaching on total depravity and bondage of the will Calvin is essentially following Augustine and Luther and not creating a so-called Calvinistic doctrine.”[77]

While Calvin tried to say that he was not “opposed to all antiquity” when it came to free will, what he meant was that he was not opposed to Augustine. Augustine was the only exception. He was opposed to all of the Early Church fathers before Augustine on this topic. John Calvin said, “…all ancient theologians, with the exception of Augustine, are so confused, vacillating, and contradictory on this subject, that no certainty can be obtained from their writings…”[78] Calvin believed that men like Clement of Rome and Ignatius, who personally knew the Apostles, did not understand the Epistles of the Apostles; while Augustine, who did not know the Apostles, apparently did understand them. Calvin admitted, “It may, perhaps, seem that I have greatly prejudiced my own view by confessing that all of the ecclesiastical writers, with the exception of Augustine, have spoken too ambiguously or inconsistently on this subject, that no certainty is attainable from their writings.”[79]

The reason that John Calvin rejected all ancient theologians and dismissed all of their writings on this matter, except for Augustine, is because all ancient theologians affirmed the freedom of the will in their writings, except for Augustine. Gregory Boyd said, “This in part explains why Calvin cannot cite ante-Nicene fathers against his libertarian opponents…. Hence, when Calvin debates Pighuis on the freedom of the will, he cites Augustine abundantly, but no early church fathers are cited.”[80] That is why George Pretyman said, “…the peculiar tenets of Calvinism are in direct opposition to the Doctrines maintained in the primitive Church of Christ…” This we have clearly seen, but he also said, “…there is a great similarity between the Calvinistic system and the earliest [Gnostic] heresies…”[81]

The Reformers sought to return the Church to early Christianity, but actually brought it back to early heresies, because it stopped short at Augustine. The Reformers did not go far back enough. Rather than returning the Church to early Christianity, the Reformation resurrected Augustinian and Gnostic doctrines. The Methodist Quarterly Review said, “At the Reformation Augustinianism received an emphatic re-enforcement among the Protestant Churches.”[82] The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics said, “…it is Augustine who gave us the Reformation. For the Reformation, inwardly considered, was just the ultimate triumph of Augustine’s doctrine… the Reformation came, seeing that it was, on its theological side, a revival of Augustinianism…”[83] The Reformation was to a great extent a resurrection or revival of Augustinian theology and a further departure and falling away from Early Christianity.

Gnosticism, Augustinianism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism have much in common. Augustinianism, Lutheranism, and Calvinism teach Gnostic views of human nature and free will but under a different name. It’s the same old Gnosticism in a new wrapper. Other doctrines also seem to have originated in Gnosticism, from Basilianism, Valentianism, Marcionism, and Manichaeism, such as the doctrines of easy believism, individual predestination, constitutional regeneration, a sinful nature or a sinful flesh, eternal security or once saved always saved, and others. But no Gnostic doctrine has spread so widely throughout the Church, with such great acceptance as the doctrine of man’s natural inability to obey God.

This view has been held in both Catholic and Protestant Churches, taught by both Arminian and Calvinist theologians. Augustine taught many false doctrines such as the sinless life of Mary, praying to the dead, persecuting heretics, infant damnation, infant baptism, baptismal regeneration, etc. Yet it is his false teaching in regards to human nature and free will that has spread beyond the Catholic Church into the Protestant realm.

Consider these facts that have been shown:

  • Augustine’s mind was highly influenced by the teachings of Manichaeism on the topic of human nature and free will; and in his views on the subject, he clearly departed from the views of the Early Church.
  • The minds of Martin Luther and John Calvin were highly influenced by the teachings of Augustine on the topic of human nature and free will and admitted to departing from the views of the Early Church.
  • The greatest contributors to modern theology have been Augustine, Luther, and Calvin.
Isn’t it abundantly clear that Gnostic doctrine has infected the Church? The Gnostic doctrine of the bondage of the will, or the doctrine of man’s natural inability to obey God, has crept into the Church through a “Trojan horse” and has been masquerading as Christianity ever since. It has survived the centuries through Augustinian, Lutheran, and Calvinistic theology. These groups have preserved and promoted the doctrine of natural inability. This belief has spread like a dangerous plague, finding acceptance in many denominations and churches, but what it is not what orthodox Christianity believed.’https://crosstheology.wordpress.com/augustine-gnostic-heretic-and-corruptor-of-the-church/

hope this helps !!!
 
The History of original sin.

Augustine and Pelagius

Augustine’s doctrine of Original Sin was born from his attempt to combat the heresy of Pelagianism. The controversy began in Rome when the British monk, Pelagius, opposed Augustine’s prayer: “Grant what you command, and command what you desire”. Pelagius was opposing the idea that the divine gift of grace was necessary to perform the will of God. Pelagius believed that if we are responsible for obeying the commandments of God, then we must all also have the ability to do so without divine aid. He went on to deny the doctrine of Ancestral Sin, arguing that the consequences of Adam’s sin are not passed on to the rest of mankind. Adam’s sin affected Adam alone, and thus infants at birth are in the same state as Adam was before the Fall.

Augustine took a starkly different view of the Fall, arguing that mankind is utterly sinful and incapable of good. Augustine believed that the state of Original Sin leaves us in such a condition that we are unable to refrain from sin. The ‘image of God’ in man (i.e., free will) was destroyed by the Fall. As much as we may choose to do good, our evil impulses pervert our free will and compel us to do evil. Therefore we are totally dependent upon grace.

So far did Augustine take his grim view of the human condition, that he argued not only that the Original Sin effects all of Adam’s descendants, but that each person is guilty of the Original Sin from birth (Original Guilt). Infants are therefore guilty of sin and thus infants who die before baptism, in which (according to Augustine) the guilt of Original Sin is removed, are condemned to perdition and cannot be saved. As if that was not bad enough, Augustine went on to formulate the doctrine of Predestination, which affirms that God has foreordained who will be saved and who will not.

Augustine prevailed and Pelagius was condemned as a heretic by Rome at the Council of Carthage in 418. It seemed that Pelagius’ views were more reprehensible to the Latin Church than the idea of predestination and babies burning in hell – views that the Latin Church was not only willing to tolerate, but even willing to champion as Orthodox doctrine!


St John Chrysostom

Between Augustine and Pelagius there appeared to be no middle-way in the West. A different view, however, was expressed in the East by Augustine’s contemporary, John Chrysostom. The dispute between Augustine and Pelagius had not reached the East, and so Chrysostom’s views were not so agitated by heated disputes and polemics. Were Chrysostom involved in the dispute between Augustine and Pelagius, perhaps his teaching on Ancestral Sin would have prevailed over both Pelagius and Augustine alike, but considering that the sole concern of the Latin Church seemed to be the condemnation of Pelagianism, it is probably more likely that he would have been condemned as semi-pelagian.https://pemptousia.com/2017/02/original-sin-orthodox-doctrine-or-heresy/#_edn1 Whatever the case, Chrysostom’s views on the subject have never enjoyed the attention they deserve, and the heated nature of the dispute in the West meant that the doctrine of ‘Original Sin’ as expounded by Augustine was regarded as the only safeguard against the heresy of Pelagianism.

Chrysostom, while claiming that all human beings are made in the image of God, believed that the Ancestral Sin brought corruptibility and death not only to Adam but to all his descendants, weakening his ability to grow into God’s likeness, but never destroying God’s image (free will). Chrysostom is a major voice within a consensus of Greek patristic writers who interpret the Fall as “an inheritance essentially of mortality rather than sinfulness, sinfulness being merely a consequence of mortality”.[ii] Chrysostom’s position is echoed, for example, by St Athanasius the Great and St Cyril of Alexandria, who claimed that we are not guilty of Adam’s sin, though we inherit a corrupted nature; but our free will remains intact. This Greek patristic interpretation is founded upon Romans 5:12: “As sin came into the world through one man, and through sin, death, so death spread to all men because all men have sinned”[iii]. John Meyendorff explains how the deficient Latin translation of the text may have contributed to such a stark difference in the Latin interpretation of the Ancestral Sin:

‘In this passage there is a major issue of translation. The last four Greek words were translated in Latin as in quo omnes peccaverunt (“in whom [i.e., in Adam] all men have sinned”), and this translation was used in the West to justify the guilt inherited from Adam and spread to his descendants. But such a meaning cannot be drawn from the original Greek’.[iv]

St Cyril of Alexandria explained the passage in this way:

“How did many become sinners because of Adam?… How could we, who were not yet born, all be condemned with him, even though God said, ‘Neither the fathers shall be put to death because of their children, nor the children because of their fathers, but the soul which sins shall be put to death’? (cf. Deut. 24:18) … we became sinners through Adam’s disobedience in such manner as this: he was created for incorruptibility and life, and the manner of existence he had in the garden of delight was proper to holiness. His whole mind was continually beholding God; his body was tranquil and calm with all base pleasures being still. For there was no tumult of alien disturbances in it. But because he fell under sin and slipped into corruptibility, pleasures and filthiness assaulted the nature of the flesh, and in our members was unveiled a savage law. Our nature, then, became diseased by sin through the disobedience of one, that is, of Adam. Thus, all were made sinners, not by being co-transgressors with Adam,… but by being of his nature and falling under the law of sin… Human nature fell ill in Adam and subject to corruptibility through disobedience, and, therefore, the passions entered in”.[v]


St John Cassian

The East paid little attention to Augustine, and this was largely due to language barriers. For the Eastern Christians, serious theologians wrote in Greek, and they paid little heed to Latin writers. What opposition did come from the East came from some Eastern Orthodox theologians who, for one reason or another, found themselves living in the West. Amongst the most prominent was St John Cassian. St John opposed Augustine on four major points:

1) There were clearly instances where people had come to God of their own volition, who, while called by Christ and aided by divine grace, chose to change their ways (e.g. Matthew, Paul, Zacchaeus). Therefore, it is not grace alone that saves us, but also man’s willingness to repent.

2) After the Fall, Adam and his descendants retained a knowledge of good, and an impulse, however weakened, to pursue good. Man was not, as Augustine claimed, utterly depraved and incapable of good after the Fall.

3) The ‘Image’ of God in man is sick, but not dead. The divine image is in need of healing, but this healing requires synergy (the co-operation of man’s will with divine grace).

4) God wishes all to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth, so those who are not saved reject salvation against His will. Predestination should be understood as foreknowledge and not as foreordination.

The West condemned St John Cassian’s views as semi-pelagian, but for the Orthodox, Cassian is one of the foremost exponents of the Orthodox doctrine of theosis.[vi] His views were supported also by Theodoret of Antioch:

“There is need of both our efforts and divine aid. The grace of the Spirit is not vouchsafed to those who make no effort, and without grace our efforts can not collect the prize of virtue”.


The Ancestral Sin and Baptism


Augustine’s view of Original Sin was the reason also for his justification of infant baptism. Believing that babies are born guilty of sin, he argued that baptism was necessary for the babies’ salvation. He saw the innocence of infants purely in terms of their being physically too weak to commit sin, but equally guilty as adults of Adam’s sin.

The Greek Fathers, having a different view of the Fall and the Ancestral Sin, interpreted the purpose of infant baptism in another way, different in important respects from the familiar Augustinian and Reformed interpretations of the West. The Greek Fathers believed that newborn infants are innocents, wholly without sin. While infants inherit a human nature which, in its wholeness, is wounded by the Ancestral Sin, weakening the will and making each person prone to sin, they are innocent of sin nonetheless. In the fourth of his catechetical homilies on baptism, St John Chrysostom states, “We do baptise infants, although they are not guilty of any sins”. For the Greek Fathers, baptism, above all else, is an acceptance by the Church and entrance of the baptised person into the redeemed and sanctified Body of Christ, the beginning of a life spent in spiritual combat and instruction in holiness on the deepening journey to the Kingdom of God.

Considering the stark contrast between the Orthodox doctrine of the Ancestral Sin and the Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin, and the different understanding of baptism that these doctrines lead to, is it not surprising that some Orthodox speak of baptism in Augustinian terms – of the forgiveness of Original Sin – especially considering that the Orthodox service for baptism makes not a single reference to it? The closest we come to mention of the Ancestral Sin (Πρωπατρορικό ἁμάρτημα) in baptism is in the first prayer of the Service for the Making of a Catechumen (which was originally completely separate from the service of Baptism): “Remove far from him/her that ancient error” (παλαιά πλάνη). If one of the main purposes of baptism was the forgiveness of Original Sin, surely it would be worth mentioning in the baptism service! But the idea of ‘Original Sin’ being “forgiven” is nowhere to be found in the Greek Fathers or in the hymns and prayers of the Orthodox Church. For it is an idea which is alien to Greek Patristic thought. The Ancestral Sin is a condition, primarily of mortality and corruptibility, which needs healing, an inherited ‘illness’ which means that free will – or ‘the Image of God’ as the Greek Fathers preferred to put it – though kept intact, is in need of divine grace in order to progress along the path to attaining God’s ‘likeness’, the path to theosis or ‘deification’.



Conclusion


Bearing in mind the significant differences between the Orthodox and the Augustinian views of ‘Original Sin’, it surprises me that some Orthodox Christians are so quick to employ the term, claiming that the Orthodox Church holds to the doctrine of ‘Original Sin’, and qualifying this simply by saying that it does not embrace the doctrine of ‘Original Guilt’. I do not think that this is adequate for expounding the Orthodox position on Original Sin. Although Augustine was recognised as a saint by the Orthodox Church,[vii] it has never accepted his teaching on Original Sin. If what I have written above is correct, then the Augustinian doctrine of Original Sin is wholly un-Orthodox, and it led, I believe, to a whole series of heresies in the Latin Church, such as Predestination, Purgatory, Limbo and the Immaculate Conception. We Orthodox would do well to distance ourselves from the well-known Augustinian position on Original Sin by employing a less familiar term: Ancestral Sin. It is not merely a case of semantics. For an erroneous understanding of this doctrine has serious repercussions for our understanding of sin and the Fall, for grace and free will, for baptism, the human condition and man’s deification. In short, how we understand the Ancestral Sin has direct implications for our whole soteriology – our understanding of the salvation of man and the world.https://pemptousia.com/2017/02/original-sin-orthodox-doctrine-or-heresy/

hope this helps !!!

The History of original sin.
BY ONE MAN SIN ENTERED INTO THE WORLD AND DEATH BY SIN
How much more reasonable to accept the Bible account of the fall of man and its plan of salvation through Christ! Indeed, the first step to salvation and a righteous standing before God is a recognition of the fact of the fall. It must be acknowledged that as sons of Adam we are by nature under condemnation; condemned, not first of all because of what we have done, but because of what we are. It is not only sins, but sin that would keep us out of heaven—not only what we have done, but what we are constantly prone to do and would do even in heaven were we admitted in our present state. It is impossible to explain the universality of man’s misery, sorrow and—sin, apart from the fact that Adam, as head of the race, transmitted a sinful nature to all his posterity. All the Word of God, from Genesis to Revelation, bears testimony to this important and basic fact.

In Psalm 51:5 David, acknowledging his (not his mother’s) sin, says:

“Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.”

And in Ephesians 2:3 it is declared that

“…we all…were by nature the children of wrath even as others.”

And this tallies with human experience. Parents, do your children have to be taught to tell lies, steal, do unkind things, etc.? Certainly not. They do all that naturally. You must teach them not to steal, lie and be unkind. But why is it that they so naturally do what is wrong? Simply because they are your children! They were born with sinful natures as you were.

“By ONE man sin entered into the world, and death by sin… through the offence of ONE many be dead…the judgment was by ONE to condemnation…by ONE man’s offence death reigned…by the offence of ONE judgment came upon all…by ONE man’s disobedience [the] many were made sinners” (Rom. 5:12,15-19).

It all began with one act of disobedience, after which Adam and Eve fled to hide, not from each other, but from God. As a result all their posterity became totally depraved—“wholly inclined to evil and that continually,” as the Westminster Confession has it. (This does not mean that man can do nothing that is good by comparison with others, but simply that nothing he does can be pronounced good by a perfect and holy God.)

In the reading of our Bibles we have scarcely passed the account of the fall of man when we find that

“God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5).

And in Acts 17:30 we read that “…God…now commandeth all men everywhere to repent.”

This, of course, implies that all men everywhere are sinners.

AND SO DEATH PASSED UPON ALL MEN FOR THAT ALL HAVE SINNED
There is, naturally, the constant effort on the part of fallen man to explain his condition so that the responsibility for it will not rest upon him. Even those who theoretically accept the Bible account of the fall, frequently protest: Why am I to blame? I cannot help it. I was born with a sinful nature.

Such have failed to observe what Romans 5:12 clearly states, that

“death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

But some will object that we have just finished proving that death passed upon all because of the sin of ONE man. Yes, but we were all in that one man when he sinned. We all sinned in Adam.

It is too soon forgotten by some that all of us were once in Adam, were part of him, have come from him, and that the sins we are now tempted to commit by our own fallen natures are but the natural fruit of that original sin committed by us all in Adam when he was yet a free moral agent.

The fact that sin and death entered the world through Adam does not excuse us; it but increases and clinches our condemnation for all Adam’s posterity were in Adam when he sinned—“and so death passed upon all men, for that ALL HAVE SINNED.”

Guess we are in disagreement on this too brother-no worries.
 
BY ONE MAN SIN ENTERED INTO THE WORLD AND DEATH BY SIN
How much more reasonable to accept the Bible account of the fall of man and its plan of salvation through Christ! Indeed, the first step to salvation and a righteous standing before God is a recognition of the fact of the fall. It must be acknowledged that as sons of Adam we are by nature under condemnation; condemned, not first of all because of what we have done, but because of what we are. It is not only sins, but sin that would keep us out of heaven—not only what we have done, but what we are constantly prone to do and would do even in heaven were we admitted in our present state. It is impossible to explain the universality of man’s misery, sorrow and—sin, apart from the fact that Adam, as head of the race, transmitted a sinful nature to all his posterity. All the Word of God, from Genesis to Revelation, bears testimony to this important and basic fact.

In Psalm 51:5 David, acknowledging his (not his mother’s) sin, says:

“Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me.”

And in Ephesians 2:3 it is declared that

“…we all…were by nature the children of wrath even as others.”

And this tallies with human experience. Parents, do your children have to be taught to tell lies, steal, do unkind things, etc.? Certainly not. They do all that naturally. You must teach them not to steal, lie and be unkind. But why is it that they so naturally do what is wrong? Simply because they are your children! They were born with sinful natures as you were.

“By ONE man sin entered into the world, and death by sin… through the offence of ONE many be dead…the judgment was by ONE to condemnation…by ONE man’s offence death reigned…by the offence of ONE judgment came upon all…by ONE man’s disobedience [the] many were made sinners” (Rom. 5:12,15-19).

It all began with one act of disobedience, after which Adam and Eve fled to hide, not from each other, but from God. As a result all their posterity became totally depraved—“wholly inclined to evil and that continually,” as the Westminster Confession has it. (This does not mean that man can do nothing that is good by comparison with others, but simply that nothing he does can be pronounced good by a perfect and holy God.)

In the reading of our Bibles we have scarcely passed the account of the fall of man when we find that

“God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen. 6:5).

And in Acts 17:30 we read that “…God…now commandeth all men everywhere to repent.”

This, of course, implies that all men everywhere are sinners.

AND SO DEATH PASSED UPON ALL MEN FOR THAT ALL HAVE SINNED
There is, naturally, the constant effort on the part of fallen man to explain his condition so that the responsibility for it will not rest upon him. Even those who theoretically accept the Bible account of the fall, frequently protest: Why am I to blame? I cannot help it. I was born with a sinful nature.

Such have failed to observe what Romans 5:12 clearly states, that

“death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

But some will object that we have just finished proving that death passed upon all because of the sin of ONE man. Yes, but we were all in that one man when he sinned. We all sinned in Adam.

It is too soon forgotten by some that all of us were once in Adam, were part of him, have come from him, and that the sins we are now tempted to commit by our own fallen natures are but the natural fruit of that original sin committed by us all in Adam when he was yet a free moral agent.

The fact that sin and death entered the world through Adam does not excuse us; it but increases and clinches our condemnation for all Adam’s posterity were in Adam when he sinned—“and so death passed upon all men, for that ALL HAVE SINNED.”

Guess we are in disagreement on this too brother-no worries.
those passages are about adults sinning- David was conceived in sin ie his parents were sinners, he was not a sinner in the womb.

we are guilty of sin when we sin, not before. we do not have sin passed down from our parents as these scriptures teach.

Ezekiel 18:4
For everyone belongs to me, the parent as well as the child—both alike belong to me. The one who sins is the one who will die

Ezekiel 18:20
“The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son.”

Deuteronomy 24:16
Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor children for their fathers; each is to die for his own sin.

2 Kings 14:6
Yet he did not put the sons of the murderers to death, but acted according to what is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, where the LORD commanded: "Fathers must not be put to death for their children, and children must not be put to death for their fathers; each is to die for his own sin."

Jeremiah 31:30
Instead, each will die for his own iniquity. If anyone eats the sour grapes, his own teeth will be set on edge.
 
we are guilty of sin when we sin, not before. we do not have sin passed down from our parents as these scriptures teach.
An Age of Accountability
Here are a few verses that seem to allow for, as we call it, an age of accountability. In Deuteronomy 1:39, Moses is reminding the adults that they would not enter into the land of Canaan due to their persistent rebellion against the Lord, but he has something interesting to say about the young children. Moses states, “And as for your little ones…who today have no knowledge of good or evil, they shall go in there. And to them I will give it and they shall possess it.”

It is recognized in this verse that the young children were not held responsible for decisions they had not made; they were covered by the mercy of God and would be allowed to enter Canaan one day.

It is no secret in the Bible that ALL are born sinners (Psa. 51:5; 58:3; Prov. 22:15; Rom. 5:18), but Isaiah 7:16 seems to suggest that there is an age where a young child is not held eternally accountable. It says, “For before the boy knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good….”

So, it seems there comes a point in a young person’s life that, instead of just acting on the sin nature, he makes a willful decision to do what is wrong.

Jeremiah 19:4 states, “Because they have forsaken Me and made this an alien place, because they have burned incense in it to other gods whom neither they, their fathers, nor the kings of Judah have known, and have filled this place with the blood of the innocents.” The “innocents” here are the children that were sacrificed to Baal (see II Ki. 21:6; Jer. 19:5). These murdered children are considered innocent by God, thereby indicating they would not face judgment from God. These slain children are also said to be God’s children (Ezek. 16:20-21).*

The Lord, in the last few verses of Jonah, chastises Jonah because he cared more for a plant that lasted one day than the deliverance of Nineveh consisting of “persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand” (Jonah 4:11). This insinuates that, amongst the vast wickedness of the people of Nineveh, there were those who were too immature or without the mental reasoning to know their right from their left, let alone truly know good from bad.

Additionally, David mourned heavily when his son was dying, but it was a different story after his son died. David’s strange behavior was attributed to the fact that his son could not come back, but David would one day be with him (II Sam. 12:23). Some have said that David is just saying that he will join his son in the grave, but what hope is there in that? David believed in an afterlife, and that he would enjoy it with his young son.

Young Children in the Gospels
Then there is Jesus’ treatment of young children in the Gospels. He points to the child as examples of those to whom the kingdom of heaven belongs (Matt. 19:14). He also made this statement regarding children: “For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of My Father Who is in heaven” (Matt. 18:10).

This verse has caused people to go beyond its intent and erroneously talk about guardian angels, so we need to be just as careful not to create doctrines on shaky premises. However, it does seem to point to an innocence and unique care for children.

God is Gracious, Righteous, and Holy
So, while I think the Scriptural proof points to the mercy of God being extended to young children, the best comfort I can still give is to point you to the good, gracious, righteous, holy God Who will always do what is just.

It is no secret in the Bible that ALL are born sinners (Psa. 51:5; 58:3; Prov. 22:15; Rom. 5:18)

51:5 This verse may go with Ps. 51:1-4. It is not an excuse but the terrible reality of the fallen human condition (cf. Gen. 8:21; 1 Kgs. 8:46; Job 14:1-4; 15:14; 25:4; Ps. 58:3; Pro. 20:9; Isa. 48:8; Rom. 3:9-18,23; Eph. 2:3; all express the reality of the fall of mankind in Genesis 3.


It is true that most rabbis emphasized the origin of sin as Genesis 6. The Apostle Paul is the NT author who focuses on Genesis 3 as the source of sin and its consequences).

For me the theological issue is the sinfulness of children before the age of moral responsibility. Calvinism has emphasized the total depravity of mankind, in all areas, from birth to death.

I am more drawn to the concept of informed human volition.[ Age of accountability-Bar Mitzvah] This means that until a child knows he/she is breaking God's laws, they are not!

Sin involves open-eyed rebellion! We are sinners in Adam/Eve (cf. Rom. 5:12-21) and also we choose to sin. Both are true!

Thanks for the two page history what the Church Fathers wrote re Original hamartia-I read what stands written-Perfect Tense-and not what the fathers have written.
 
Last edited:
Sin is the negation of law, righteousness, faith, and the whole purpose of man's creation. It was introduced into the world by Adam through the temptation of Eve by the Devil. Sin is universal in its embrace so far as mankind is concerned, and its end is death. John 3:16 teaches that without eternal life, men must perish. Hell is a misused and misunderstood term.

2. Scriptural Grounds
'Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law' (1 John 3:4).

'All unrighteousness is sin' (1 John 5:17).

' ... whatsoever is not of faith is sin' (Rom. 14:23).

' ... all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God' (Rom. 3:23).

' ... the wages of sin is death' (Rom. 6:23).

' ... by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin' (Rom. 5:12).

'He that committeth sin is of the Devil' (1 John 3:8).

3. An Examination Of The Scriptures On The Question Of Sin And Its Punishment.
There are three passages of Scripture that categorically assert the nature of sin:

Sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4).

Sin is unrighteousness (1 John 5:17).

Sin is anything not of faith (Rom. 14:23).

Sin is the negative of law, righteousness, and of faith. Scripture defines sin, in the first instance, by what it is NOT. God alone is positive; evil is only able to deny, refuse, obstruct, and disobey. It is darkness and death, the negatives of light and life.

There is a further negative in Romans 3:23, where sin is defined as 'coming short' of the Glory of God. 'Coming short' is the essential meaning of the most important word translated as 'sin' in the Scriptures, viz., Hebrew: Chata.

'Seven hundred chosen men lefthanded; every one could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss' (chata sin) (Judg. 20:16).

Hamartano, the New Testament equivalent, is derived from two words meaning 'failure to attain or to arrive.' This tragic failure, this missing of the mark by man, has entailed all the terrible aftermath of guilt and shame. The failure that marks initial sin is soon followed by deadly ignorance and alienation from the life of God (Eph. 4:18); life and its activities become purposeless toil; vanity, iniquity, deformity, deceit, ruin, and death make up the tale. These words are not strung together at random or for effect; they are but a summary of the words used in Scripture to describe sin.

So far as man is concerned, sin is universal.

'There is none righteous, no, not one ... all the world ... guilty before God ... all have sinned' (Rom. 3:10, Rom. 3:19, Rom. 3:23).

Scripture declares that sin is of the Devil, who "sinneth from the beginning," and that sin is abhorrent to the holiness of God.

Shalom
 
Sin is the negation of law, righteousness, faith, and the whole purpose of man's creation. It was introduced into the world by Adam through the temptation of Eve by the Devil. Sin is universal in its embrace so far as mankind is concerned, and its end is death. John 3:16 teaches that without eternal life, men must perish. Hell is a misused and misunderstood term.

2. Scriptural Grounds
'Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law' (1 John 3:4).

'All unrighteousness is sin' (1 John 5:17).

' ... whatsoever is not of faith is sin' (Rom. 14:23).

' ... all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God' (Rom. 3:23).

' ... the wages of sin is death' (Rom. 6:23).

' ... by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin' (Rom. 5:12).

'He that committeth sin is of the Devil' (1 John 3:8).

3. An Examination Of The Scriptures On The Question Of Sin And Its Punishment.
There are three passages of Scripture that categorically assert the nature of sin:

Sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4).

Sin is unrighteousness (1 John 5:17).

Sin is anything not of faith (Rom. 14:23).

Sin is the negative of law, righteousness, and of faith. Scripture defines sin, in the first instance, by what it is NOT. God alone is positive; evil is only able to deny, refuse, obstruct, and disobey. It is darkness and death, the negatives of light and life.

There is a further negative in Romans 3:23, where sin is defined as 'coming short' of the Glory of God. 'Coming short' is the essential meaning of the most important word translated as 'sin' in the Scriptures, viz., Hebrew: Chata.

'Seven hundred chosen men lefthanded; every one could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss' (chata sin) (Judg. 20:16).

Hamartano, the New Testament equivalent, is derived from two words meaning 'failure to attain or to arrive.' This tragic failure, this missing of the mark by man, has entailed all the terrible aftermath of guilt and shame. The failure that marks initial sin is soon followed by deadly ignorance and alienation from the life of God (Eph. 4:18); life and its activities become purposeless toil; vanity, iniquity, deformity, deceit, ruin, and death make up the tale. These words are not strung together at random or for effect; they are but a summary of the words used in Scripture to describe sin.

So far as man is concerned, sin is universal.

'There is none righteous, no, not one ... all the world ... guilty before God ... all have sinned' (Rom. 3:10, Rom. 3:19, Rom. 3:23).

Scripture declares that sin is of the Devil, who "sinneth from the beginning," and that sin is abhorrent to the holiness of God.

Shalom
if you really believe in original sin and all are born guilty is adam being sinful/ sinners from conception/birth then all who die in infancy are without hope, dead in their sin with no Savior. You cannot have it both ways as they say- having your cake and eating it too. :)

For the only way for one to be saved is the gospel, believing in Christ atonement for their sins. That is an impossibility for an infant, toddler, little child. They must be condemned in their sins for as they teach Gods justice must be met, God demands justice.

You see this is the giant dilemma one has when it comes to original sin, guilt and justice. There is no way around this if one is being honest and consistent.

Its the whole reason infant baptism was developed as a loophole to save infants and children. It was their get out of jail free card since they were to young to believe and trapped in adams guilt, sin nature, sinners from birth mentality.

The fact is one becomes guilty of sin, a sinner when they sin. I posted several passages clearly teaching this was true under the LAW in the OT. The child is not guilty for the parents sin, they are guilty only when they sin and become a sinner. Sin is not passed down from parent ( adam ) to their progeny. That is gnosticism, augustinianism, paganism.

hope this helps !!!
 
if you really believe in original sin and all are born guilty is adam being sinful/ sinners from conception/birth then all who die in infancy are without hope, dead in their sin with no Savior. You cannot have it both ways as they say- having your cake and eating it too. :)

I just want to point out two things about this argument.

1. It's a fallacy of argument from the consequences, "I just don't like the consequences of something therefore it can't be true."

2. It's a non sequitor, since Scripture does not tell us how infants are saved, and there may be means of vicarious faith applied to them.

For the only way for one to be saved is the gospel, believing in Christ atonement for their sins. That is an impossibility for an infant, toddler, little child. They must be condemned in their sins for as they teach Gods justice must be met, God demands justice.

It is not written in Scripture how infants are saved, at least not super clearly, so this is a non sequitor.

You see this is the giant dilemma one has when it comes to original sin, guilt and justice. There is no way around this if one is being honest and consistent.

I personally believe infants are saved through the faith of their family and church; another consideration is that Christ applies his own faith to all infants, this is a logical possibility.

Something you people who argue like this don't seem to realize is that, your own position runs into injustice problems, since you are essentially arguing with the applied premise that somehow this is unjust or unloving, when of course, that is also a non sequitor, because you are clinging to an idolatrous soul-driven emotional definition of love that puts the creation over the Creator itself. It's the same kind of logic that denies eternal conscious torment as "unloving."

But now if babies are auto-saved, then all abortions are the most effective and God-pleasing evangelistic efforts the world has ever known, since it guarantees all their salvation, when many of them would end up in hell. And all babies who die and get the free heaven pass, leave behind people who have to face the tremendous temptations and trials of sin and this fallen world, where they have constant opportunity to become embittered, confused and compromised.

So auto-saving babies runs into just as severe injustice problems as auto-damning them, and the implied argument underneath is that God is somehow unjust for allowing a sin nature.

Its the whole reason infant baptism was developed as a loophole to save infants and children. It was their get out of jail free card since they were to young to believe and trapped in adams guilt, sin nature, sinners from birth mentality.

The Cross, as defined by Scripture, is already consider a "loophole" by those who are self-righteous and want to earn their way to heaven.

The fact is one becomes guilty of sin, a sinner when they sin. I posted several passages clearly teaching this was true under the LAW in the OT.

Having a sin nature automatically produces sinful attitudes and dispositions, so this is not contradictory. If only a deliberate volitional choice to violate the child's holy and pure and righteous nature initiates the first sin, then the Bible is lying to us when it says "all have sinned." Millions upon millions of children are perfectly pure this current moment and have not chosen to corrupt their perfection yet.

The child is not guilty for the parents sin, they are guilty only when they sin and become a sinner. Sin is not passed down from parent ( adam ) to their progeny. That is gnosticism, augustinianism, paganism.

And yet you can never explain why babies literally take the consequences for their parents' sins by dying.

When the Scripture clearly tells us that no one dies for another person's sins, and we all die for our own sins.

And babies die.

But since you don't like what the Scripture is saying, you change what it says to the opposite by saying it doesn't apply anymore.
 
I just want to point out two things about this argument.

1. It's a fallacy of argument from the consequences, "I just don't like the consequences of something therefore it can't be true."

2. It's a non sequitor, since Scripture does not tell us how infants are saved, and there may be means of vicarious faith applied to them.



It is not written in Scripture how infants are saved, at least not super clearly, so this is a non sequitor.



I personally believe infants are saved through the faith of their family and church; another consideration is that Christ applies his own faith to all infants, this is a logical possibility.

Something you people who argue like this don't seem to realize is that, your own position runs into injustice problems, since you are essentially arguing with the applied premise that somehow this is unjust or unloving, when of course, that is also a non sequitor, because you are clinging to an idolatrous soul-driven emotional definition of love that puts the creation over the Creator itself. It's the same kind of logic that denies eternal conscious torment as "unloving."

But now if babies are auto-saved, then all abortions are the most effective and God-pleasing evangelistic efforts the world has ever known, since it guarantees all their salvation, when many of them would end up in hell. And all babies who die and get the free heaven pass, leave behind people who have to face the tremendous temptations and trials of sin and this fallen world, where they have constant opportunity to become embittered, confused and compromised.

So auto-saving babies runs into just as severe injustice problems as auto-damning them, and the implied argument underneath is that God is somehow unjust for allowing a sin nature.



The Cross, as defined by Scripture, is already consider a "loophole" by those who are self-righteous and want to earn their way to heaven.



Having a sin nature automatically produces sinful attitudes and dispositions, so this is not contradictory. If only a deliberate volition choice to violate the child's hole and pure and righteous nature initiates the first sin, then the Bible is lying to us when it says "all have sinned." Millions upon millions of children are perfectly pure this current moment and have not chosen to corrupt their perfection yet.



And yet you can never explain why babies literally take the consequences for their parents sins by dying.

When the Scripture clearly tells us that no one dies for another person's sins, and we all die for our own sins.

And babies die.

But since you don't like what the Scripture is saying, you change what it says to the opposite by saying it doesn't apply anymore.
Nope in your systematic they must face Gods wrath and justice,punishment for being dirty, rotten guilty little sinners from birth. God does not show partiality/favoritism when it comes to sin. All are condemned.

The reality is your reasoning/argument/position is being exposed and used against you and revealing your own inconsistencies with the false doctrine of TD and original sin.

I was once under the same belief as you for decades until my eyes were opened to the many fallacies, inconsistencies, contradictions found in scripture exposing those two doctrines.

hope this helps !!!
 
In the biblical model babies are exempt since they are incapable of placing their faith in the gospel repentance and confessing sin. That’s how one is saved period as per dozens upon dozens of passages in the N.T.

So God doesn’t condemn infants, children because they are not sinners.

TD and OS must create infant baptism to save them or deny those twin doctrines which condemns all from birth as rebellious sinners guilty in Adam. There is no way getting around it with all your loopholes you have make to fit in that system. They are oxymorons.

Hope this helps !!!
 
There is no transmission of a fallen nature, a sin nature that originated with augustine. Lets see what God declares about sin.

Augustine simply coined the phrase! Its in the Bible.


Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin,
and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned." Romans 5:12​

Keep in mind. Adam was not the first sinner. Eve was.

Yet, it was through Adam that sin entered (transmission) the world (all mankind). Why?

The woman's ovum does not transmit the sin nature in reproduction. The man's sperm is the culprit of transmission.

That is why Jesus could have no human father in his conception. And, that is why Jesus was without sin.

And, that is why it was prophesied that the Messiah would come through the seed - "ovum" - of the woman! (Gen 3:15)

The sin nature is genetic. Its in the body it resides... "the flesh."

grace and peace ................
 
The sin nature is genetic. Its in the body it resides... "the flesh."

I would not see the physical as the source of transmission nor in any way sinful.

Paul used "the flesh" to represent the sinful side of human beings.

It is spiritual DNA passed on—and certainly the virgin birth speaks to federal headship.
 
So God doesn’t condemn infants, children because they are not sinners.
Infants are one thing. They still have a sin nature from birth.

Children only until the age of "accountability" does God not condemn.

Look at the children that Elisha had sinned against him... 2 Kings 2:23-25


From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out
of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!”
He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord.
Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys. And he went on
to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.




Until children are able to discern the difference between good and evil, and be ready to want to do something about it, God will not condemn.
 
Infants are one thing. They still have a sin nature from birth.

Children only until the age of "accountability" does God not condemn.

Look at the children that Elisha had sinned against him... 2 Kings 2:23-25


From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out
of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!”
He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord.
Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys. And he went on
to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.




Until children are able to discern the difference between good and evil, and be ready to want to do something about it, God will not condemn.
That contradicts the age of accountability
 
Nope in your systematic they must face Gods wrath and justice,punishment for being dirty, rotten guilty little sinners from birth. God does not show partiality/favoritism when it comes to sin. All are condemned.

Non sequitur.

That would mean YOU have to face God's wrath since you're a dirty, rotten guilty little sinner.

:)

The reality is your reasoning/argument/position is being exposed and used against you and revealing your own inconsistencies with the false doctrine of TD and original sin.

Non sequiturs only expose the lack of logical ability in those who use them.

I was once under the same belief as you for decades until my eyes were opened to the many fallacies, inconsistencies, contradictions found in scripture exposing those two doctrines.

Calvinism is different than Classical Arminianism.

So that's a big "no."

You did NOT believe the same.
 
Back
Top Bottom