{"id":184,"date":"2009-01-30T08:25:42","date_gmt":"2009-01-30T08:25:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-25.html"},"modified":"2009-01-30T08:25:42","modified_gmt":"2009-01-30T08:25:42","slug":"comment-of-the-day-25","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/tonyjones\/2009\/01\/comment-of-the-day-25.html","title":{"rendered":"Comment of the Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

Why does a close examination of the doctrine of Original Sin<\/a> matter? Because it is the “foundation” upon which much other Western doctrine is based. Scott M, take it away:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Hmmm. Part of the problem may be that we
\nhave fixed names for these characters, ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’. In truth, if
\nit is used as a proper name, ‘Adam’ is not so used until Chapter 4.
\nBefore then, the references are to ‘ha-adam’. (Pardon me for any
\ninaccuracies. I’m hardly a language expert.) The ‘little ground'(?) and
\nelsewhere the man and the woman. We also totally miss in translation
\nthe play on words.<\/p>\n

I’ve never found it particularly important to the story whether or
\nnot there were two specific people involved. By the time we start
\ngetting a family narrative in Chapter 4, we see when Cain is exiled
\nthat there seem to be plenty of others outside his family for him to be
\nworried about. Chapters two and three have a pretty different feel to
\nthem. And referencing ‘the man’ and ‘the woman’ fairly generically
\nseems to me a good stand-in for referencing humanity. (In that sense, I
\ndo think it is paradigmatic, though probably not the word I would
\nchoose.)<\/p>\n

However, we are born into a world which has been damaged by eikons
\nof the Creator reflecting other than that Creator into it and by eikons
\ntrying to become the eikon of something else. In that sense, we inherit
\nthe consequences of sin. However, just as the Resurrection is not
\nmerely some historical event (though it must be that), but indeed the
\ncenter of reality — including time, so too I don’t see ‘sin’ as a
\npurely linear, historical progression. We do not just affect ourselves
\nwith our ‘sin’ or those we directly touch. Rather, in ways we do not
\nsee we affect all reality, of necessity including time. So we are born
\n‘in Adam’ and indeed inevitably participate with Adam. In that sense,
\nwe are all Adam. Nothing less seems to make sense of either Scripture
\nor Jesus to me. So to say that creation is affected by our sin does not
\nto me imply a time when it was not so affected simply because we did
\nnot yet exist in a linear progression of time.<\/p>\n

I think there are many problems with the Western doctrine of
\noriginal sin. But not least among those problems is the fact that it
\neffectively trivializes the true problem. I think that’s why the
\nResurrection has, for the last thousand years in the West, become
\nincreasingly adjunct, often little more than a add-on, and from there a
\nshort step to unnecessary. I saw that very clearly a few years ago
\nreading an SBC publication (the denomination to which I suppose I
\n‘belong’). There were a lot of articles talking about and defending the
\nResurrection. But when it came to describing the ‘why’ or what it
\nmeant, the most they could say was that it ‘proved the Father had
\naccepted the payment of the Son.’ I was stunned. I suppose I still am.<\/p>\n

As I’ve tried to say, there’s a lot more at stake in how you view
\nthis question than is immediately evident. It sends shoots everywhere.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Why does a close examination of the doctrine of Original Sin matter? Because it is the “foundation” upon which much other Western doctrine is based. Scott M, take it away: Hmmm. Part of the problem may be that we have fixed names for these characters, ‘Adam’ and ‘Eve’. 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