How God Sees Us: A Critique of “Original Sin”

I used to struggle greatly with core issue in my walk with God: how did God think about me?  When I came to mind, what were his impressions and thoughts of me?  When the Bible says that he “loves” me, is it the love of someone obligated by a contract, or was it one that held endless emotion, filled with delight and joy in his unique creation?  I couldn’t see it being the latter because I knew myself too well – I was a person like any other – one whose life was filled with mistakes and failures.  How could God delight in me?

So one day I asked him this, and he answered me in a way I couldn’t disagree with; a way that speaks to your heart like only he knows how to do.  It was through this interaction, and many thousands later, that I came to see how God sees me, and by extension, his people, and by extension, all people.  We are all his unique creations, each one of us designed without a duplicate.  When we die, this world will never see one like us again.  To the people who belong to him, he delights in them in a way that transcends my understanding of joy. To the people who do not know him, or who want nothing to do with him, he longs to know them like a lost child – desperate to hold and comfort and love them, a unique and beautiful creation, but has decided to let them make their choice.

This picture of how God sees me and other people, however, did not match up with popular Christian theology.  There’s a lot of talk about the “depravity” of humanity, and how utterly evil and completely corrupt we are.  It doesn’t help that this mindset has a few verses (and I mean few) that appear to support this, such as Jeremiah 17:9 in the King James Version: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”  If our own hearts are by design the worst thing in the universe, there isn’t any way God could want anything to do with us, much less think about us in any positive way, least of all with joy.

This picture of humanity was developed and codified by Christians about  1500 years ago, and came to be known as “original sin.”  Because of Adam’s original sin, we have all been born completely evil in every thought and deed.  More extreme but predictable versions emerged later that said we are completely unable to choose God at all, but God, like a great puppet master, turns on a “God” switch to make some of us evil creatures into good ones.

The motivation behind this picture was straight forward.  Clearly everyone makes mistakes and sins, and there had to be a really good reason why God chose to become human and be tortured to death to reunite us with himself.  So it was decided that to make sure what God did (something that drastic) was justified, all humanity had to be seen not only in a state of being incapable of a perfect sinless life,  but incapable of anything good at all.  If anyone was capable of anything really good, God’s death wasn’t really necessary.

In my bible reading and study, especially in the Old Testament, I have found this picture of humanity to be untrue of how God really thinks of people in regards to sinful and right living, and it certainly is not a picture of how God thinks about me in the real relationship I have with him right now.  So what I wanted to do is to take a serious look at the biblical texts that write extensively about this issue.  I believe it is time to seriously question this doctrine and see if there is a better explanation for why every person struggles with sin and brokenness, and why it was completely necessary for Jesus to die for us so that we might be reunited with God.  What follows is a serious study of key Old and New Testament passages including original language research.  Enjoy!

The reality of mankinds estrangement from God and its unavoidable tendency to sin has never been debated in orthodox Christianity.  However, theories and explanations for how this awful state came into being were numerous and varied; each one failing to produce satisfactory answers to even its most convinced adherents.[1]  Nearly every effort brought as many theological problems as it solved.  From its start, the classic explanation (as developed by Augustine of Hippo) for how mankind became universally sinful brought intense controversy from within the Church, even though the purpose for its formulation was to combat controversy from without (Gnosticism).  This explanation, later codified with modifications by the Church in the patristic period, became known as the doctrine of original sin.

The purpose of this paper is threefold: 1) to describe in detail a modern defense of this doctrine. 2) To critically examine it in light of what scripture (mostly from the Old Testament) reveals about sin and humanity, and 3) ultimately, to humbly propose a modified explanation for mans disastrous condition since the fall of Adam and Eve.  It is important to be clear that the purpose of this critique is not to challenge in any way the reality that man is hopelessly and excessively inclined to sin by nature, but to demonstrate that the doctrine of original sin is inadequate and arguably unbiblical in its attempt to explain this, and the Church is in need of an alternative theory.

A Modern Defense of Original Sin

In mid-18^th century England, the ideas of the European Enlightenment began more than ever to influence the Anglican Church.[2]  It was though the writings of Daniel Whitby and John Taylor that the Christian population began to move away from orthodox Christianity towards a liberal / rational approach to major doctrines.  The biggest blow was dealt by Dr. John Taylor in his influential book The Scripture-Doctrine of Original Sin which eventually came out in three editions.  In it he denounced two major concepts in the classic doctrine of original sin: 1) the guilt of Adams sin was imputed to all his posterity who are then condemned for it either because a) in some mystical way they either participated in it,[3] or b) they legally inherited it,[4] and 2) that as punishment, God gave all men (including unborn children) a sin nature which forces them to only be able to sin all the time but yet still be held accountable for their behavior.  Taylors critique was aimed mainly at the latter theory of legally inherited guilt, which was prevalent at the time.

This drew immediate condemnation by notable authors such as Isaac Watts and David Jennings, but later by more notable figures such as John Wesley from the Armenian side and Jonathan Edwards from the Calvinist one.  As history would show, Calvinism, especially in the United States, took a heavy blow because it could not sufficiently defend itself against Taylors attacks and began a slow descent into liberalism.[5] Arminianism, however, under the guidance and critique of John Wesley against Taylor held substantial weight in two notable ways:  The strictly Arminian concept of prevenient grace countered the argument that God was responsible for mans sinful nature because the Atonement of Christs death allowed all men to possess the free choice to choose God (as opposed to all other areas of choice which were under the total dominion of sin.)  The efficacy of the Atonement also provided a counter to Taylors second main critique regarding the unfair imputation of guilt to Adams descendants for something he alone did.  Although Wesley believed that all men legally inherited the guilt and punishment of Adams first sin, he believed that the Atonement removed that guilt and its punishment so that all men, including infants, would only be condemned for their actual sins.[6]

Prevenient grace aside, Wesley still strove to defend the Calvinist Federalist[7] version of the doctrine of original sin to underscore why God was justified in condemning all humanity and did so in his treatise The Doctrine of Original Sin Explained and Vindicated.[8]  The following are his main propositions in describing it:

I.      Man was originally made righteous and holy

II.      That righteousness was lost by the first sin

III.      Thereby, man incurred death of every kind (spiritual and physical) for”

IV.      Adam was the sin of a public person, one whom God had appointed to represent all his descendants.

V.      Hence, all these from birth are children of wrath, void of all righteousness, and propense to sin of all sorts.

VI.      This is an indispensable, irrefutable doctrine foundational to Christianity.[9]

It is important to note that in his efforts to rationally justify the doctrine of original sin from biblical texts understood in light of an Augustinian interpretation of Romans 5:12-21, Wesley, like Jonathan Edwards, was unable to rationally explain or resolve serious issues with the doctrine.  Most notable of these is the very serious problem that if Christ was fully human, he must, by the theory of original sin, inherit a depraved sinful nature.  To put it simply, the doctrine of the Trinity and the humanity of Jesus stand in direct contradiction to the doctrine of original sin and needs creative extra-biblical philosophy to justify it.[10] The second is the glaring problem that the Federal or Realistic theories of the imputation of Adams guilt on his descendants is not alluded to or acknowledged in any way in the Old Testament narrative, wisdom, prophetic, or poetic literature.  What is affirmed very clearly is the fact of the universality of sin, but not its explanation.  It is the purpose of the next section to further clarify this position.

It is one thing to asset to a doctrine as a mystery and must be believed by faith because it is clearly affirmed in the Bible.  Such is true, for example, of the universality of sin “ that mankind has a natural inclination to sin, both in his outward actions and in his inner thoughts and desires. It is not clearly explained in the Bible how this came to be.  The Churchs classic explanation does not need to be assented to as an unknowable mystery that defies explanation because it is in fact a human explanation that found its roots in the patristic period.[11]  Therefore it stands to reason that if another proposal can be found that more completely explains the mystery of the universality of sin and helps to alleviate conflicts with other biblical doctrines (such as the full humanity of Christ),  we should at least consider it.[12]

Original Sin in the Old Testament

The clearest reference to the concept of imparted sin is found in the New Testament in Romans 5:12-21.  However, to examine this passage first would be to exegetically jump the gun.  Pauls theology stems from a picture of God and his activity as revealed in the Old Testament.  One should assume that he would not contradict the authority scripture of his day, so his statements should be read as subordinate and in conformity with what is found there.  It is for this reason we now turn to the Old Testament to find clues about Gods system of the interaction of sin and humanity to better understand the basis of Pauls picture of Christs redeeming work in Romans 5.

Corporate Solidarity

The concept of corporate solidarity involves the idea that all individuals of a social group are somehow responsible for the actions of their representatives.[13]  In the case of a family, the representative is the father; in the case of a nation; its king or leaders; in the case of the entire human race, Adam himself.  What is important to understand is that in the Old Testament there is a difference between how God treats people groups according to their representatives actions and how God holds individuals responsible for their personal actions in regards to punishment or reward.  In the case of God punishing or visiting the sins upon a people group because of the actions of their representatives, Gods activity involves allowing the consequences of that activity to be applied to individuals of that group.  It is important to note that the consequences of corporate guilt, when visited upon individuals experientially, are not to be mistaken for reward or punishment for personal actions.  When the wicked experience blessing in the land because a king is godly, it does not mean they are credited as righteous any more than the curses experienced by the righteous because of a wicked king mean they are assigned guilt and are deemed wicked.  Both parties (either wicked or righteous) are simply experiencing the reality of corporate solidarity depending on the actions of their representatives.

It is also important to note that God, in his sovereignty, can control the consequences of corporate solidarity on the individuals of a group. Exod. 20:5 (and Deut. 5:9, 7:9) seems to imply that punishment caused by a fathers sins will be experienced specifically by those who hate me in his descendants.  While it is true that the fall of Jerusalem was a result of God punishing the nation of Israel for generations of past and present sin, Jeremiah was treated very well by the Babylonians under the orders of Nebuchadnezzar himself (Jer 39:11-14).

As opposite from corporate punishment for representative action stands individual guilt for individual action. In this case, Gods activity involves assigning guilt and demanding punishment for that individual alone.  In both cases, both the suffering of the consequences of social sin, or the punishment of individual sin, God determines the details and the timing.

The rules for how God deals with corporate entities and individuals are for the most part clearly articulated in the Old Testament, both in the laws and in narratives describing their application.  This area of study is very large, so for the purposes of this paper, we will be concentrating on passages and narratives that may give us clues to the concept of guilt in both the context of corporate solidarity and in the scope of the individual.

Laws & Narratives Involving Individual Sin & Punishment

Regarding how God views the relationship between a mans sin and his descendants is discussed in Deut 24:16: Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor children put to death for their fathers; each is to die for his own sin.  A good example of how Israelites followed this correctly is in in 2 Kings 14:6 regarding Amaziahs treatment of his fathers assassins children – Yet he did not put the sons of the assassins to death, in accordance with what is written in the Book of the Law of Moses where the LORD commanded: Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor children put to death for their fathers; each is to die for his own sins.  God also acts in accordance with his law on at least two accounts: Korahs children were not killed for their fathers rebellion (Num 26:11) as mentioned in Num 16.  Achan is stoned to death but his family is left to witness in Joshua 7:25.[14]

Laws & Narratives Involving Corporate Sin & Punishment

Regarding Gods treatment of the individuals depending on the actions of their corporate representatives, we find four very similar laws using nearly identical Hebrew wording that talk about God punishing (paqad) (or visiting?) the sins (awon)[15] of the father on 3 or 4 generations of children, but blessing those who love him and keep his commands to a thousand generations. (Exod 20:5-6, 34:5-7, Num 14:18, Deut 5:9-10, and also found repeated in Jer 32:18 with different wording.)  The Hebrew word used here for punishing (paqad) is one of the hardest words to translate,[16] and unfortunately it is a theologically important one found numerous times in the Bible (302 times).  Out of these times a majority of instances mean to count, number, muster, or assign people.  The second most common usage (and the one of interest to this study) is translated to punish but can also mean to bless, and in one case is used in the same verse with both meanings! (Zec 10:3).  The best attempt to make sense of this verb in terms of God and humanity would be the activity of bringing a moral entity to accounting or reckoning”to actively deal with someone or a group in some way based on ones moral actions.[17]  Surprisingly, in a survey of all 45 instances of the NIVs translation of paqad to mean punish, the context is always involving corporate punishment of a people group for the activity of its representatives or of the majority (who for some reason are rarely mentioned as being involved in punishment itself), and is never used in the context of God punishing an individual for their own sins alone.

If this is how paqad is used in every instance, then an important point should be made regarding corporate solidarity from and Old Testament perspective: it cannot mean punishment or blessing based on the individuals actions; there is no imputed righteousness or guilt involved.[18]  According to the 4 verses of father-generation punishment, children are punished for their fathers sins to the third or fourth generation.[19] How could God punish the children of a man who committed a capital sin?  If his guilt was transferred to them and the punishment is death, there would be no resulting generations to be punished.  Furthermore, without contradicting Deut. 24:16, how can a mans descendants be punished by death for a crime their father committed?  To say that punishment in a corporate sense entails imputed guilt would cause these laws to contradict each other.  The most reasonable solution is to understand that Gods punishment towards the individuals of a people group are not based on imparted merit or guilt, but instead involve allowing the consequences of those actions to be felt and experienced by them instead.[20]

If there were still any confusion over the imputation of guilt in corporate solidarity, God in Ezekiel 18 puts the matter completely to rest.[21]  The exiles were angry and despairing of their state because of their common understanding of transgenerational sin and divine retribution as captured in the quoted proverb that introduces this section: The fathers eat sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.(Ezek 18:2).  God does not agree and sets out to demonstrate with three cases on how he determines a persons guilt or righteousness.  Below is a portion of the passage regarding two of these test cases”the righteous son of a sinful man and the wicked man who became righteous:

Yet you ask, ‘Why does the son not share the guilt of his father?’ Since the son has done what is just and right and has been careful to keep all my decrees, he will surely live.  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. The righteousness of the righteous man will be credited to him, and the wickedness of the wicked will be charged against him.  ²¹ But if a wicked man turns away from all the sins he has committed and keeps all my decrees and does what is just and right, he will surely live; he will not die.  ²² None of the offenses he has committed will be remembered against him. Because of the righteous things he has done, he will live.  ²³ Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?

It is quite clear that a person is responsible before God for their own actions”either wicked or righteous, and God in response will credit them with righteous or condemn them as wicked, and ultimately allow them to die or to live.  When comparing Exod 20:5-6 and Deut 24:16, it becomes apparent that this is not an individual-centric evolution of Gods approach to sin from an earlier transgenerational version as some scholars theorize,[22] but rather has been Gods way of dealing with sin from the beginning.

Sin Nature According to the Old Testament

Ezekiel 18 provides insights not only into Gods perspective that inherited guilt doesnt exist, but also his perspective of human nature.  What makes a man wicked or another righteous?  What are the consequences, apart from the Israelite law, for sin?

Righteousness & Wickedness as Behavioral & Thought Patterns

According to Ezekiel 18, a person is judged and deemed righteous or wicked by God not by individual moral actions by themselves, but by a sustained pattern.[23]  Wickedness involves a pattern of unrepentant sin both in thought and in action.  Righteousness[24] is a pattern of sustained behavior and thought in accordance with Gods laws and his ways, but is a term with complex meaning and assumptions,[25] and presumes a relationship with him.[26]

Individual moral actions that stand in opposition to the overall moral pattern of a persons life do not change a persons status in Gods eyes.  A momentary good moral action committed by a wicked person does not make them righteous, nor does an individual evil action make a righteous person wicked; its the pattern of their life that takes shape after this action that makes the difference.  A righteous person will return to God and renew their relationship after their sin and repent,[27] and the wicked person will continue in their wickedness after their good action is done.

As is clear in this passage as well as in the entire book of Jeremiah (and most other prophetic literature), the moral patterns of people can change.  A wicked man may become righteous, and the righteous man may become wicked.  To say a person is wicked and cannot change or a righteous persons credits protect them from wickedness annuls the main theme of Jeremiah (and most of the prophets), which is the pleading of God for the wicked to return (bwv) to him.  According to Ezekiel, Mans moral nature is one that God considers fluid and changeable, operating under the influences of a persons free will in reaction to Gods revelation in their lives.[28]  A persons internal moral and spiritual state is defined by God as conforming to a general moral pattern of either wickedness or righteousness, which can change at any moment a decision in the oppose direction occurs.  No one is sinless,[29] but anyone is capable of repenting and returning to God.

Righteousness & Total Depravity

With a better understanding of the concept of righteousness, we cant help but note other passages existing in the Old Testament that seem to contradict this by suggesting that no one can be righteous.  Often times this interpretation is sought innocently”in order to reconcile a perceived interpretation of a Pauline New Testament text with and Old Testament complement.  Many have been proposed as proofs for the reality of the total depraved nature of humanity, but for the sake of brevity, we can only review some of the more prominent OT passages.[30]

A primary text traditionally seen as supporting natural depravity is found in Jeremiah 17:9-10: The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure or, according to the KJV rendering, desperately wicked. Who can understand it? I the LORD search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve.[31] The word translated deceitful (‘aqob) is only found in one other place in the Hebrew Bible, and that is in Isaiah 40:9 describing a road that is hard to traverse, and is situated in a parallel poetic structure with a synonymous word meaning rough ground.  Even more useful to a clearer understanding is the LXXs translation of deep instead of deceitful and does not contain the wording for beyond cure or wicked (KJV).   A translation of deceitful and wicked does not seem to fit with the sense of the parallel clause of who can understand it? and the LORD searches the heart and examines the mind to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve.  This assumes a mans deeds could be rewarded, which is not possible for a heart that is deceitful and desperately wicked.  In light of these text-critical and contextual observations, it would be safe to propose an alternative translation of The mind is impossible to fathom above all else. Who can understand it?  This is more in line with other wisdom literature, such as Prov. 20:5, 21:2, and 24:12 and uses the Greek word from the LXX.

In the Psalms, a couple of verses can be found that seem to suggest sinfulness from birth or before.  The most obvious one is Psalm 51:5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. (NIV)  But we cannot use a strict literal interpretation here since we are dealing with a poetic literary genre.  The most likely interpretation is that David is saying poetically through hyperbole[32] that his sin was not a recent thing, but is something hes dealt with since his youth.  A similar and more obvious usage of hyperbole following the theme of sinful from birth is found in Psalm 58:3: Even from birth the wicked go astray; from the womb they are wayward and speak lies.[33]  It would be hard to take this literally.  Even if we were to read these passages as literal proof of sinful behavior in the womb, we would need to consider these concepts when compared with positive birth or pre-birth psalms that suggest righteousness, such as Psalm 22:10: From birth I was cast upon you; from my mother’s womb you have been my God. and Psalm 71:6: From birth I have relied on you; you brought me forth from my mother’s womb. I will ever praise you.  All these passages taken together suggest a more accurate poetic description of something that has taken place for a long time in a persons life and goes back to their early years.

Another notable Psalm that has been a famous proof text for the doctrine of total depravity (Psalm 14) is famous because if its use by Paul in Romans 3:10-18.[34]  As mentioned earlier, one cannot begin an interpretation of Romans without first considering the original context of Psalm 14 with the appropriate hermeneutical approach.  The context limits the scope of who all is to the people who devour Gods people as though eating bread (v.4), and rightly must mean the audience introduced in the first verse,[35] the fools (lb’n”).  This is a description of a person who is sinister and intentional in his ignorance, and when combined in a group with similar people, has the capacity to oppress the righteous.[36]  Later in this chapter we see that God frustrates and worries this group because he is present with the target of their schemes”the company of the righteous.  If it is true that the sons of men and the all who have turned aside are referring to the entire human race, we cannot have a company of righteous as their target, because it is clear that this group has a target of people they are oppressing other than themselves.  For this line of thinking to even make sense, we need to see two separate groups, the author being one of the suffering righteous.  Furthermore, to avoid taking this psalm as a holistic normative picture of humanity, we need to understand it in relation to Psalm 8:2-5:

²From the lips of children and infants you have ordained praise because of your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger. ³ When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, ⁴ what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him? ⁵ You made him a little lower than God and crowned him with glory and honor.

Taken together, we can see a more realistic picture of mankind.  It is not one who has a completely depraved nature from birth, but rather one that exists on an individual level in a freely chosen moral state of either wickedness or righteousness, but was intended all along to be righteous”honorable and glorious; being made a little lower than God.  There is no hint in this passage of an original righteousness that was lost, only a present reality in the form of righteous people.

 Life and Death as Consequences for Righteous or Wicked Moral Patterns

What is the ultimate consequence for the guilt of personal wickedness or the credit of righteousness?  According to Ezekiel (and also Prov 19:11), it is death for the former and life for the latter.  Upon close inspection however, it is not clear what these terms mean.  The Hebrew or the Greek words used do not offer up any nuance other than plain meaning of physical life or death in their OT usage.  The author of Ecclesiastes tells us that death is the fate of all men, both for the fool and the wise (Ecc 2:14-16).  What we cannot do here in Ezekiel 18 is apply a proverb literature hermeneutic that would lead to an interpretation of this being a general rule of thumb that has exceptions.[37] If the righteous inherit physical life and the wicked physical death, we have in integrity problem: the Old Testament is filled with examples of righteous men suffering and dying, and is a major theme of discouragement and frustration in the Psalms.  Likewise, it is apparent that wicked men at times live long prosperous lives (Like Manasseh in 2^nd Kings 21:1).  If we cannot see this verse as proverbial, then we must seek a different understanding of what life and death mean.

In light of this, it seems that life and death, when seen as the consequences of a persons moral pattern, are best understood in a spiritual sense.[38]  Life means fellowship with God; an existence of spiritual vitality experienced in a way that a person was meant to be.[39] Death means the opposite”an experience of life apart from God filled with darkness, confusion, wrong choices, and suffering.  Some passages in the Bible assume death as occurring or as a state of being while a person is actually alive (e.g. Prov. 5:23, 23:13-14, 8:36).[40]

Cultic Practices & Sin

Regarding temple or cultic practices involving sin, we do not see any ritual to remove some taint in mankinds nature in the Old Testament law. We do have a series of temple sacrificial regulations for unintentional sins that are committed, as well as the offerings given on behalf of the entire nations unintentional sins on the Day of Atonement.[41]  Intentional sins were a matter between a person and God, forgiven by God when a person repents and returns to him.[42]  However, none of these temple sacrifices or rituals change the status of a person before God “ participating in a religious festival, a temple ritual, or any other cultic practice does not change the righteous or wicked status of a person.   In the Old Testament, religious ritual had no efficacy to remove sin or make a person righteous in Gods eyes.  Instead, this has always been a matter of the heart between God and a person.[43]

Old Testament Conclusions on Original Sin

Proverbs 20:9 says: Who can say, ˜I have kept my heart pure; I am clean and without sin?  Also, we find in Proverbs 21:2: All a man’s ways seem right to him, but the LORD weighs the heart.  Out of these two verses, we have a picture of the human condition:  Regardless of a persons righteous or wicked state, no one can claim to be pure and without sin, and even worse, no one can know for sure if they are currently doing something wrong that they dont realize.  All men suffer from a strong inclination to sin, and are by nature ignorant, even of some of their own sinful thoughts or behaviors.  How does God respond to this state of men?  He imparts spiritual death on those who consistently do not respond to him or obey him, and spiritual life and his presence on those who do.  God does not change the spiritual status of wicked or righteous based on a single moral action, but on a pattern of moral behavior.  God expects that men have the ability to choose to turn away from their sins and return to him, and they can do so simply by responding to his revelation in obedience and to seek him in a relationship in a consistent manner.

What we do not see is Gods intent for mans eternal destiny in terms of his spiritual status.[44]  The Old Testament saint who was righteous relied on God to sustain him with his blessing of life, and put his hope in him for whatever came afterward.  The concept of the total depravity of a persons will is completely absent.  The concept that all a persons moral actions and thoughts may contain elements of sin seems to be true, but it does not count against them in terms of a judgment of spiritual life or death, nor does any single act count for or against them in terms of a right or wrong standing (righteous or wicked) before God.  It is the pattern of moral actions and thoughts and a sustained relationship that counts. The concept of inherited guilt and subsequent punishment is absent in Gods system of judgment and is clearly denounced.  However, it is clear that in nuanced way, God does allow the effects and consequences of a persons sin to adversely affect the people around them, including people both in the present and in the future.  When a family or nation suffers the consequences of the sin of their representatives, the individual of that group is never considered wicked in Gods eyes as a result.  In no way is it possible through participation in the cultic sacrificial system, religious rite or ritual, holy days, or festivals to change ones status with God or change the status of their sin through a mysterious efficaciousness inherent in the act itself. The vehicle of Gods grace for righteous people who sin is always though an act of free will stemming from the heart to return and repent.

Original Sin & the New Testament (Romans 5:12-21)

With a firmer understanding of mans nature and an understanding of Gods perspective of corporate solidarity and individual sin from the Old Testament, we can now turn to Pauls treatment of the old and new Adam in Romans 5:12-21.  Shown below is a helpful chart of the activities associated with the old and new Adam:

Old Adam	New Adam (Christ)
v.12-14: Summary and introduction to the analogy: Though Adam, sin entered the world, and death entered the world from sins presence, and men who sin receive this death.  Important note: sin and death were not a result of breaking the Sinai covenant laws.
v.15: Many died because of the sin of one man.	Many will receive the gift that came by Gods grace though Christ.
v.16: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation.	The gift followed many sins and brought justification.
v.17: Through the sinful choices of Adam, death reigns	Though the work of Christ, the abundant provision of grace and the gift of righteousness, life reigns in those who receive it.
v.18: The result of Adams one sin was condemnation for men.	The result of one righteous action of Christ was justification and life for all men.
v.19: Through the disobedience of Adam, many were made sinners.	Through the obedience of Christ, many will be made righteous.
v.20: The law was added so that sin might increase	With the increase of sin comes the increase of grace.
v.21: Sin reigns in death.	Grace reigns through righteousness, and righteousness brings eternal life though Jesus Christ.

Paul in this section is trying to help his readers understand that Christs work on the cross has been accomplished by comparing the current condition of mankind with what has been made possible through Christ.  This is done using an analogy of the old Adam representing in a very loose way Adam of the Garden of Eden, and Christ representing himself.  We should take a view of Adam as being a corporate representative of the human race, not as the sole person responsible for the fall of mankind (Eve is equally responsible for that). As with all analogies or other similar literary techniques (metaphors, parables, etc.) it is an important principle in hermeneutics that we not stretch it too far, but must focus on the main point of similarity and not be caught up in the details.

v.12-14 Summary and Analogy Introduction.[45]  Adam is singled out as one of the representatives of the human race that best suits Pauls analogy as a contrast to Christ, (as opposed to Eve).  This is not unusual”the representatives of a nation, the king (and sometime a nations god), is singled out when God is referring to judging or punishing a nation, especially in Jeremiah (Jer 25:12, 36:30-31, 46:25, 49:8, 50:18, 51:44).  It should be understood that the king was not solely responsible for the actions of a nation, but as its representative, he is mentioned.

The outcome of Adams sin was the existence of death in the world.[46]  From our previous examination of life and death as effects of righteousness and sin respectively, it seems most likely that Paul is talking about the introduction of spiritual death into the world “ a separation from God on a personal and societal level.  Paul is saying that anyone who sins receives this spiritual death.  However, this must be understood carefully”while it is true everyone sins, not everyone will die because of their sins (Ezek 18:21-22) But if a wicked man turns away from all the sins he has committed and keeps all my decrees and does what is just and right, he will surely live; he will not die.  None of the offenses he has committed will be remembered against him. Because of the righteous things he has done, he will live.  What Paul is doing is introducing the problem before hinting at the solution, a solution, it can be argued, that has always been in place since the first sin of Adam and Eve.  But Paul does not hint at this here.  What we dont see here, as others have before inserted into this text, is an inherited sinful nature imparted to all men from their parents.[47]

According to Paul, another interesting aspect of this death is that it is not necessarily caused by a transgressing any of the Israelite laws.  This confirms the scope of this discourse to not only a Jewish audience since Mt. Sinai, but the entire human race.  This death is caused by sin, but not by the law.  From our previous examination of righteousness apart from the Israelite covenantal law, in its very base sense, this is referring to ignoring God and refusing to walk with him, such as in the examples of Cain and his descendants.[48]  The opposite is seen in the examples of the sons of Seth, Enoch, Noah, and Abraham.  Paul will later go on to show that it was their faith that made them righteous (Romans 4, Gal 3, Heb 6, 11).  Faith here has nothing to do with believing in God”that is a presupposition in the lives of all mentioned above”it has to do with an active relationship and obedience to whatever revelation God gives a person, and most likely, a willingness to repent if one has done something against what God has said not to do.

Pauls picture involves progressive revelation.  First we have a general picture.  We are told of a gift that comes from Jesus, the new man.  What gift are we talking about?  As his analogy unfolds, so does his increased description of what the gift is, similar to Gods progressive revelation in history.

v.15 Many died because of Adams sin / Many will receive the gift because of Christ  This is most likely talking about the consequences of Adams sin as felt by his descendants.  This is the reality of sin”it affects the people in a persons sphere of influence (see Gods explanation of what will happen as a result of Davids sin in 2^nd Sam 11:10-12).  Paul is Christological-centric in his analogy.  He starts to build up what Jesus is really doing by introducing the concept of a gift that stands in contrast to death which Adam introduces.  Although many suffered death though sin, many more will receive this mysterious gift.

v.16 On sin was followed by judgment, and judgment, condemnation / Many sins followed by the gift, and the gift brings justification.  Here Paul focuses on the consequences of sin using legal terminology.  The Greek word used for justification here is only used two times in the New Testament (in these verses alone), but is the noun form of the verb is used more frequently to mean to legally declare righteous, exactly what God is doing in Ezek 18:22.  Just as one sin introduced death into the world, so it also introduces judgment and condemnation.  But God has always had a solution.  In the Old Testament, it was embracing the relationship with God through repentance and returning to him.  Here we see in the new man that the gift brings justification.  Somehow this gift is the means by which God can forgive a sinful man in Ezek 18:22 and evidently is crucial to enabling him to walk with righteous people since the beginning.

v.17 Death reigns because of the sin Adam / Now life reigns because of the gift of righteousness.  Here we are seeing a reappearance of the already well-established Old Testament concept of death for sin and life for righteousness.  This is nothing new, except we are now beginning to see how it is that God was able to declare righteous people righteous since Adam somehow though the work of Jesus Christ.  In is in this part of the analogy that we first see Paul revealing a little more about the gift, which is life.  As mentioned before, the Old Testament definition of life as a result of righteousness is most likely referring to spiritual life.

v.18 The result of Adams one sin was condemnation for all men / The result of Jesus one act of righteousness was righteousness for all men.  What is highlighted here is the cause and effect of sin and righteousness in these two men.  The effect of Adams sin was the introduction of condemnation for all men in way that does not contradict v.12-14.[49] The effect of the new mans one act of righteousness was the introduction of justification and life for all men.  In both clauses, the for all men is extremely important.  It means that either condemnation or righteousness is available for all men with the assumption being that a choice between the two is made.

v.19 Through Adams disobedience, many were made sinners / Through Jesus obedience many will be made righteous.  Here the specific quality of disobedience inherent in sin is highlighted, as is obedience to God a quality of righteousness.  The being made sinners or righteous is not saying that it is something forced; it is referring to the act of God legally assigning a status to a person after they have already made choices or decisions that result in an overall pattern (to be made righteous or wicked).  The making is a result of a persons moral patterns, not the effect of a sinful nature.  To take this view and apply it to the second clause would be to say that Jesus makes or forces people to be righteous, which is clearly not the case.  People are righteous because they choose to be and it becomes a pattern.

v.20 The law brought an increase in sin / This increase in sin brought an increase in grace.  We now switch from a subject of Adam to the law.  God introduced the law (in the Sinai covenant) in order that people might see more clearly his moral nature and goodness, but the effect was that people were without excuse”now that Gods desire for how mankind should behave is known in greater detail, a person is guilty of sinning were they were not before.  With an increase in knowledge of the law comes the inevitable increase in breaking it (this is a clear reference to the universal sin condition of humanity as mentioned in 1 Kings 8:46 and Proverbs 20:9), but with Gods introduction of the law, comes his grace to forgive those who commit their lives to keeping it but fail to do so perfectly.  Basically, fuller revelation of God brings with it greater responsibility, with greater responsibility brings an evitable greater propensity to make mistakes.  Thankfully, God does not unfairly judge the righteous who know him and his was better more severely (with the same amount of grace and no more than their ignorant righteous counterparts), but provides more than adequate grace for them too.  It is the wicked who have an increased knowledge of Gods ways that are to be judged more severely.

v.21 Just as sin reigned in death / Grace may reign through righteousness by bringing eternal life.  The culmination of analogy of Adam/law and Christ/grace is completed with a surprise ending of the fullest picture of what the gift of Christ is: eternal life.  This is a powerful enhancement of the Old Testament concept of a complete and whole life (or a spiritual + physical life). The righteous person in the Old Testament may not have known it, but the reward for righteousness was made possible by the work of Jesus Christ, and consisted not only of a vibrant life connected to God in this life before physical death occurs, but one that never ceases even after they physically die!

Just as sinful choices are the reason for spiritual death, eternal life is brought about though the righteous status of men given to them by God though his grace for their freely chosen overall pattern of right moral behavior and thought life.  Men do not have righteousness on their own, nor can they generate it and give it to God, it is a status freely given to men.

New Testament Conclusions on Original Sin based on Romans 5:12-21

In our overview of Pauls analogy of Adam and Christ, the law and grace, there doesnt appear to be any contradiction of the Old Testaments notion of the impartation of a status of righteousness or wickedness based on a persons moral pattern in life.  There also appears to be no contradiction in the consequences of life or death for these moral patterns, only a new understanding that the life inherited by the Old Testament righteous person is actually eternal and does not just end with physical death.  It does appear that Paul is treating Adam as a representative head of the human race (deliberately not choosing Eve for the sake of a closer analogy with Christ), and with that, embraces the biblical concept of corporate punishment for a representatives sin in terms of consequences, not inherited guilt or punishment for that guilt.

If a person tries to understand these verses without knowledge of Gods working in the Old Testament, two major misunderstandings inevitably arise: a misunderstanding of the concept of condemnation and a misunderstanding on what death really is.  Condemnation is Gods act of declaring someone wicked.  Judgment is a legal decision, condemnation the specific form of judgment.  In both a court of law and in the ways of God, a person is judged on account of their pre-existing actions, not on their nature.  When we read in verse 18 that the result of one sin was condemnation for all men, we must first of all not see of all men.  Secondly, we must understand that condemnation is known to follow as a result of a judgment of a persons freely chosen actions that have occurred before the judgment was given.  This unmentioned step is assumed here, but a person unfamiliar with the legal system and how God worked in the Old Testament will miss this.

Secondly, it would be a mistake to think of death mentioned in this discourse as meaning only physical death.  This is not the case as was examined earlier in the Old Testament passages where a constant witness was that spiritual death was a result of a pattern of unrepentant sin, or a state of wickedness and deliberate alienation from God.  To put it more clearly, physical death has nothing to do with to the issues of sin, righteousness, wickedness, and their consequences.

A New Theory for the Universal Existence of Sin

Though the previous discussion, every proposition that John Wesley felt was essential to the doctrine of original sin have been demonstrated to be at the very least, doubtfully biblical, at worst, the result of a complete misunderstanding or neglect of the Old Testament foundations presupposed in Romans 5:12-21:

I.      Man was originally made righteous and holy

II.      That righteousness was lost by the first sin

III.      Thereby, man incurred death of every kind (spiritual and physical) for”

IV.      Adam was the sin of a public person, one whom God had appointed to represent all his descendants.

V.      Hence, all these from birth are children of wrath, void of all righteousness, and propense to sin of all sorts.

To be fair, however, a direct examination of the first two propositions was not done, and is something that will be done presently.

The Truths That Need Explanation

In order to introduce a new theory, we need to describe what truths we are trying to explain that are noted but not explained in the Bible.  There are two major portions that need to be taken into account and cannot be compromised:  1) All humans sin, both knowingly and unknowingly and 2) that God though Jesus died in order to make people righteous who continually sought to follow and obey him but still sinned (from all times past and future).

A New Proposal

The old explanation for why everyone sins was based on the idea that God somehow invested each new person with (or allowed the impartation of) an evil nature that condemned them to eternal death without any action on their part.  Since this concept has hopefully been shown to be unbiblical and without any Old Testament foundation, a new explanation is needed that would assume that Adam and Eve had the same human nature that we do today without modification.

What is hopefully clear from our previous study is that Adam and Eve were not created righteous or holy by nature; righteousness (or holiness) has nothing to do with a persons nature but everything to do with a pattern of right behavior that God thereby credits as righteous.[50]  When they fell, this did not mean that by one action their state of righteousness was changed to wickedness any more than David was considered wicked after his sin with Bathsheba.  What has always been the case with all people is the pattern, not the individual moral action. If Adam and Eve turned back to God and repented and restored their relationship with him like David did, then they would continue to be righteous, regardless of the consequences of their actions.

Beside the question of righteousness or wickedness, why is it that Adam and Eve and the rest of humanity struggle so badly with sin? The answer to this puzzle has its source in the God-given free will of men.  The reason free will may not have been considered in greater detail may stem from a superficial understanding of what it must mean to be truly morally free.  In order for people to be free to embrace Gods blessing of life, the alternative had to be worthwhile and appealing, both before it was experienced (sinful desire) and after it was embraced (rebellion).  For a person to be truly free and not a robot, by necessity they need the capacity to desire something other than what God desires and the ability to be satisfied in some way with living apart from and in opposition to God.

What may look like God setting up the original couple for disaster by allowing a dissenting serpent and a forbidden tree easily accessible in the middle of the Garden of Eden could instead be seen as absolutely necessary.  In order for people to truly love and respond to God, they must be truly free.  But not only do people desire wrong choices and find them to some degree satisfying when experienced, they are not always aware that they are making wrong choices in the first place, or that they have wrong motives behind them. God did not make man perfectly knowledgeable in what is right and wrong, or with a perfect awareness of their motives.  If this is the necessary nature of man in order to be truly free, it has a terribly high potential for disaster, but it cannot be said that they are totally depraved and without the ability to ever do a right action or demonstrate a pattern of right choices that pleases God.

Figure 1: The Unnatural (unbalanced) Man who is dead.

Nevertheless, it seems that the cards are stacked against humanity (see Fig.1), and it is the proposal of this paper that such a condition is in fact, by design.  It tells us that the design of a human being is for freedom, but its limitation demands a balance, a missing element in their internal construction.  No one by their own strength can be perfectly moral because they are inevitably drawn to morally wrong choices and are at times too limited to understand that they are even sinning at all.  It seems that a human being was all along designed to be in a relationship with God, the missing influencing element. Gods presence in a persons life tips the internal scales from a hopeless entanglement with wrong choices to one that enables an escape from ignorance through the guidance of Holy Spirit and the strength to resist sin.   But this balancing element must too be chosen, for all human relationships exist because they freely choose to maintain, dissolve, or temporarily ignore them.  This understanding of the human heart can be understood in light of our ultimate destiny “ to live a life in an unhindered, perfect relationship with God.[51]

 

Figure 2: The intended design of man “ deemed by God as good “ and fully alive

God provides the balance to true freedom; his presence enables a free person to have the knowledge and strength to follow him that flows from real by-directional communication and continued relationship (see Fig. 2).  The sin that comes from being truly free is forgiven by God to those who choose to follow him and respond positively to whatever revelation they have from him.  Gods provision allows time for him to slowly teach and guide the people who love him to becoming more like himself.

So what is the purpose of Christs necessary death within this proposed system that has no magic bullet of a completely corrupt sin nature that needs forgiveness?  According to this new proposal, it is completely impossible to not sin, even with the presence of God in a persons life.  Since no one is without sin and we are made free to choose to sin, we are all ultimately responsible for our wrong moral choices.  Although God is our judge, he is also our creator who wanted free men rather than morally perfect automatons, and thus planned all along to enable righteous men and women to be set free from the penalty of their sins though the punishment (paqad) of his own son.  Christ, like us, was a descendent of Adam who suffered the consequences of the sinful choices not of just humanitys representatives, but of the race in its entirety.  What seemed an unfair design (the reality of corporate solidarity) was ultimately the system though which God redeemed us.  We who are righteous, when we suffer the consequences of living in a morally corrupt society, should remember we are in good company.

Radical Freedom and the Humanity of Christ

If the proposal of radical freedom is the cause of universal sin and its remedy rests in its intended design to be in a relationship with God, then we have the foundation (however tentative) for how Jesus could be sinless and be fully human.

1. Man was made free, and thus given a nature prone to sin.
2. God designed mankind to live a full life though a relationship with him.
3. A relationship with God grows closer over time.
4. The closer a person draws to God, the more like God they become, and the more they can resist sin.

Therefore, if a person has spent an eternity with God and has a perfect relationship, they could operate without sin.  No man has spent an eternity with God, or has a perfect relationship, except for Christ himself.  Because of Jesus perfect relationship with God (from eternity past), God was able to perfectly communicate, guide, and teach him so that he could freely choose to not sin.

Corporate Solidarity and a Radically Free Nature

If we are to understand the nature of a human being as designed from the ground up for true freedom, we can extend this model to see a macrocosmic structure of a social consciousness. In the previous diagrams, we can see how the conscious (external to a person in that it is not a persons true self) is an influence on a persons moral actions.  However, what a person thinks is right or wrong should not be necessarily thought of as coming from God, but could also come from cultural morality, which is a mixture of good and evil, stemming from the sum-total of the influential in a society upon an individual.  In a society where we have a series of representatives in our lives all possessing a self-destructive nature, either balanced with or without God depending on the representatives individual choice in the matter, we can see how we will be influenced (see Fig 3).

 

 

Figure 3: Corporate solidarity, influence shells, and lines of influence.  Shown here is an example of a godly society where an individual is influenced by the personal relationships of social groups influential men and women around them.

Corporate solidarity is by design an integral part of the way humans beings were designed internally expressed macrocosmically in society.  In a society where the majority of a persons societal representational influences (family, church, state, etc.) are primarily governed by people with a relationship with God, a person will benefit.  In the case where a person lives in a society where the representatives of influence exercise their free will without God, the opposite will occur- a person will be cursed with an excessive influence of evil and self-destruction.  Corporate solidarity was meant to work both ways.  You cannot have it only one way “ the blessing of a godly society can only be possible if the curses are possible too.  It is not a cruelty, but the gracious working of a loving God in a system of radical human freedom.

 

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Footnotes