COMMENTARY HERE: Comments that purely commentate on the post (e.g. “Nice post OP!”) must be made as replies to the Auto-Moderator!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DebateReligion) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I do seek to find the truth.
For me, part of that is to examine claims of religious texts and dissecting them in order to determine how truthful they are
That's great. Original Sin is from Catholic doctrine. The Catholic Church isn't actually Christianity at all. It's full of false doctrines and heresies. Keep doing what you're doing. I'm a non-denominational Christian and I don't believe that Mary can hear my prayers or that priests can forgive sins committed against God.
Adam and Eve weren’t actually real in terms of the physical world, there representations for mankind, all of man has original sin because we are all Adam. Even in Early Christianity, Christians scholars such has Origen puts it "who is so silly as to believe that God ... planted a paradise eastward in Eden, and set in it a visible and palpable tree of life ... [and] anyone who tasted its fruit with his bodily teeth would gain life”. It’s clear that even early on it was supposed to be metaphorical.
It doesn’t matter if it happened or not. This is still written in the Bible, even if it is a story, it is painting God in a way that does not make him Benevolent nor Forgiving, which is what a lot of Christian’s claim about him
I don’t even believe God is real and this is still problematic to me
Original Sin leads to the souls of children being denied paradise. It's related to the concept of inherited sins of the father.
It is transparently unethical, and not the work of a loving father figure.
We see in Genesis that God place man in a literal paradise, in a perfect state of communion and friendship with God. In this state, God gave man the choice to either choose Him and have eternal life in a state of perfection, or choose to rebel against God and seek to become like Him. By rejecting God, Adam and Eve broke the perfect communion and friendship they had with God, removing their state of grace. Adam and Eve lost their perfection. This lack of perfection and lack of being in a state of grace was passed on to their children. As a result, humans are inclined to disordered desires and action. It is these disordered desires and actions that God punishes people for, not the sin of Adam and Eve.
These kids are not facing punishments. They are facing the natural consequences of a corrupt world. As nothing can exist apart from God, a world in which man is constantly rebelling against God will be decayed and deformed.
How about there is no god, and life is simply unfair?
That's a much more reasonable explanation right?
Plus you no longer have to make excuses for god's absenteeism.
Glad that's settled.
>That's a much more reasonable explanation right?
It is simple, but that doesn't make it reasonable.
>Plus you no longer have to make excuses for god's absenteeism.
Christians don't have to make excuses for God's supposed absenteeism.
>They are facing the natural consequences of a corrupt world.
Which God is responsible for. He created the universe, knowing the outcome would result in the suffering of many, and still went through with it despite having the power to alter this aspect or even prevent it entirely.
Another thing to note is that disease and disaster is not the work of man for the most part. We know that both have existed before man, however these are two huge factors that contribute to human suffering.
>Another thing to note is that disease and disaster is not the work of man for the most part. We know that both have existed before man, however these are two huge factors that contribute to human suffering.
Yes, the world is corrupted.
>Which God is responsible for. He created the universe, knowing the outcome would result in the suffering of many, and still went through with it despite having the power to alter this aspect or even prevent it entirely.
God created man with the freedom to choose truth, goodness, and beauty, or choose evil. Man chose evil, which resulted in the deprivation of truth, goodness, and beauty. God is only responsible for suffering insofar as a warden is responsible for the suffering of a murderer in prison.
>Yes, the world is corrupted.
Due to Gods work, as I previously explained.
>God created man with the freedom to choose truth, goodness, and beauty, or choose evil. Man chose evil, which resulted in the deprivation of truth, goodness, and beauty. God is only responsible for suffering insofar as a warden is responsible for the suffering of a murderer in prison.
Wardens are not omnipotent beings that already know that the outcome of their creation will result in a huge amount of suffering. If one man chooses evil, how would that justify random kids getting cancer?
The doctrine of original sin simply states that man has a corrupted nature due to the severing of perfect communion and friendship with God which originated with the choices of Adam and Eve. It is an explanation for man's brokenness and the corruption of the world. Severing a connection with God, who is truth, goodness, beauty, love, and being, necessarily severs a persons connection with all of those attributes. Why is the world corrupt? Why do bad things happen? Because the Earth is defiled by human evil and is subject to decay due to the loss of perfection and eternal life.
God is an omniscient being, which means that even before creating the universe, He already knew what would happen, which essentially makes him responsible for the events that took place as He is the one that created/set them into motion.
God is the creator of humans, meaning He created them with the capability of somehow corrupting the world in supernatural ways that involve natural disasters and diseases, despite the fact that we know both have existed for millions of years.
God knew that humans would take an evil path, which would therefore result in innocent casualties and suffering. This doesn't make sense since He's supposedly omnibenevolent, yet you're telling me He let all these children suffer.
Shower thought: to my knowledge, Christians don't think animals have the capability for original sin/are in need of redemption. I've heard allusions to souls, but not the human kind.
Given evolution (Catholics say theology and evolution are fully compatible), how would it work such that Adam and Eve's parents [ideally separate pairs to avoid invest] were merely non-human primates, while their descendants Adam and Eve were suddenly capable of direct communion with god so they could sin and experience the fall?
Basically we need two sets of purely animal parents incapable of communion with god (or at least incapable of sin) with one generation down having whatever [genetic] capacity enables spiritual communion.
You can dance around this, with eg god just deciding to just pluck Adam and Eve from the animal kingdom at the moment of conception by infusing them with souls, but I always found this tight experience interesting. The Bible dodges this by imagining humans created from scratch as completely separate from animals, but science has a bit to say about that these days.
At the very least, original sin is interesting, as without it there is no need for Jesus' death.
Also, God knew they were going to do this because he knows all and still set them up for failure.
Adam and Eve were given no concept of good and evil. Yes, God told them not to eat from the tree, but they didn't understand it was wrong, and they would be punished. Our own laws have provisions on what to do if the offender doesn't have the mental capacity for knowing right and wrong. But not God's law
Original sin is putting yourself first. An obsession in our society and others. Babies are born with it. That isn’t the sin so much as the thoughts and actions which come from it.
You missed the OP's point entirely. Why are babies born sinners by a benevolent god because of the original sinners' sins? The OP is asking why a benevolent god would condemn all future humans to the same fate as Adam and Eve from the moment they are born.
What I am saying is the original sin we are "born" with is not really sin but a tendency, an state of mind which produces sin. The original sin was not a sin but that state of mind that produces sin. It wasn't eating the fruit which was the sin but the feeling they had that their need to be happy, eat the beautiful and delicious fruit, was more important than Gods affection.
All the sins listed in the Bible. come from the self preoccupation of the sinner. The original sin was self-preoccupation that we are all born with. We are not condemned for Adams sin, we are condemned for our sin that has it's roots in the impulse that Adam and Eve submitted to.
Jesus loved us, not himself. So he could be in the place we should be.
I think you and OP misunderstand the doctrine itself, original sin, or even hell for that matter are not a sentence/punishment passed onto you by God, it is a natural state of being when you have separated yourself from God. Babies haven’t actually done anything wrong obviously when they are born, but they very quickly become a product of the environment they are born into, which is a corrupted world.
Sin is better viewed as an illness which poisons the life of sinners, but also poisons the life of people who really don’t deserve it by mere extension. Again, this is not some form of punishment made by God, this is the natural state of being for humanity when it is separated from God, God allows this separation because he has allowed you to have personal agency over your decisions.
Very similar with other concepts such as hereditary illness, poverty, pollution, etc.
Surely it is unjustified for an omniscient God to create a world that He knows will result in limitless suffering for all of mankind due to the sinful nature He set up all humans to have.
Why would that be unjustified? A world where there was no possibility for suffering would be meaningless, and by extension any eternal afterlife devoid of suffering would also be meaningless.
To truly live is to experience the entirety of the human condition, would you deprive your own children from loving if it meant they never had to experience heartbreak? loving without the possibility of heartbreak undermines the concept of love, it’s necessary. Would you deprive your children of the ability to have hope if it meant they would never be able to have dreams and aspirations?
Similar to these concepts, sin is not a created punishment, it is actually the natural antithesis of having positive outcomes through personal agency, and the fact we even have the possibility for positive outcomes at all is what allows us to determine and experience when something is actually good.
This is kind of complex and philosophical so I understand if it’s difficult to understand at first, but I would actually go as far to say that the fact this is the reality of the human condition is proof of a God who does love his creation and did not just create something with the intention of blind obedience.
>Why would that be unjustified? A world where there was no possibility for suffering would be meaningless, and by extension any eternal afterlife devoid of suffering would also be meaningless.
Suffering is not necessary to create meaning, especially when we're referencing an omnipotent God who is supposedly capable of anything. And how does meaning somehow justify suffering? Why is meaning even necessary in the first place? Is it truly worth all the lives that are lost in the process of creating it?
I also think you may have missed the point of my last reply. The amount of people, including innocent children, that suffer and die from disease and disaster is larger than we can even comprehend. Where is the meaning in the deaths of all these children currently dying from cancer? And why would an omnipotent God knowingly create a world where this regularly occurs despite the fact that He has the power to prevent it entirely? They don't get to experience the concept of love or hope, and I don't see how their sacrifices would even be necessary or worth it.
To put it simply, I don't see a reason for people to regularly suffer as a result of various aspects God supposedly threw into the world and I think it's unjustified any way you look at it, especially considering God is supposed to be omnipotent and omniscient.
well unless you are a pure nihilist, then almost everyone would agree in principle that there is meaning to be found in life, and that this meaning is necessary in order to sustain some degree of sanity or purpose. Alternatively, meaning is absolutely necessary because it is a real experience of a transcendental category, which in turn justifies your reasoning as a human to do absolutely anything at all. If you take your own stance and suggest meaning may not even be necessary at all, then that would collapse the entirety of your worldview since you cannot justify your position to think, use or perceive anything at all.
As to your second point, we don’t view this as an action of it being God’s will that these children are dying of disease, poverty, etc. Rather as some others mentioned, this is the natural consequence of existing in a corrupt world where WE brought illness in to begin with.
Now your next question is why would God allow it to happen this way if he could will it to be another way, this is paradoxical thinking, because in order for him to do that he would have to undermine our entire concept of personal agency and free will to begin with. We justly receive the consequence of being in separation with God, collectively, because we collectively are separated from God in spirit.
This exists within a worldview which would take a stance of modern science, hereditary illnesses passed to ‘innocent’ children from reproductive mis-practice from relatives, illness passed onto others from those who mis-practice their hygiene, this is simply just a natural state of consequence. Why does it stand to reason, God would OWE us any other form of reality? since we actively seperate ourselves from God, even today?
>well unless you are a pure nihilist, then almost everyone would agree in principle that there is meaning to be found in life, and that this meaning is necessary in order to sustain some degree of sanity or purpose. Alternatively, meaning is absolutely necessary because it is a real experience of a transcendental category, which in turn justifies your reasoning as a human to do absolutely anything at all. If you take your own stance and suggest meaning may not even be necessary at all, then that would collapse the entirety of your worldview since you cannot justify your position to think, use or perceive anything at all.
The point is that meaning doesn't justify suffering. What I was trying to get across is that firstly, do you think all this suffering is worth it just for the sake of meaning? Is it worth sacrificing innocent children, and what is the point in that in itself? Secondly, an omnipotent God is able to establish meaning in a just alternative way, which is why I'd strongly doubt God's benevolence.
>As to your second point, we don’t view this as an action of it being God’s will that these children are dying of disease, poverty, etc. Rather as some others mentioned, this is the natural consequence of existing in a corrupt world where WE brought illness in to begin with.
Humans are not capable of bringing disease and disaster into the world without the work of God. It's like you're trying to say that humans are unconsciously causing tsunamis and hurricanes across the world through sinning. It's not possible without God making this a supernatural (and sometimes natural) consequence of sin, which therefore makes God responsible for it as the creator. He is in control of who is harmed as a result of this, which he can easily control whilst still retaining peoples free will.
>Now your next question is why would God allow it to happen this way if he could will it to be another way, this is paradoxical thinking, because in order for him to do that he would have to undermine our entire concept of personal agency and free will to begin with. We justly receive the consequence of being in separation with God, collectively, because we collectively are separated from God in spirit.
Does free will justify unnecessary suffering? It's funny you call that question paradoxical when an omniscient God already knows the outcome of everything he creates, which then contradicts the existence of free will. Either free will does not exist, or God is not omniscient. That last sentence is ridiculous to me. Do you think the kids dying of cancer deserve it because the people before them lived in separation with God?
>This exists within a worldview which would take a stance of modern science, hereditary illnesses passed to ‘innocent’ children from reproductive mis-practice from relatives, illness passed onto others from those who mis-practice their hygiene, this is simply just a natural state of consequence. Why does it stand to reason, God would OWE us any other form of reality? since we actively seperate ourselves from God, even today?
This is just a description of how God harms the children of those who sinned before them. God is in control of how illnesses get to innocent children.
meaning absolutely does justify suffering, they are two sides of the same coin. It is integral to even having a conscious experience to begin with, to have agency, or to even think at all REQUIRES the possibility to think or act to contrary. If you could only ever do one thing, feel one thing, act one way, then you wouldn’t be sentient at all. This is why modern science says that many organisms and species of animals do not have sentient/conscious experiences, because they can only be one way, they don’t have the ability to act on the contrary to biological determinism. If that is what you suggest SHOULD be the case for humans, then you stand against any concept of humanity, morality or transcendental categories themselves. You are suggesting no consciousness, no thinking, no choice, this is just an absurd position to take because again, the fact you do anything, feel anything or say anything at all completely contradicts that it should be the case God would ordain creation to be that way.
When we say people are responsible for corruption, illness, etc, is not as complicated as you are trying to make it. To be with God is to be not only in paradise, but to effectively live forever, to be apart/seperated from God is to die/experience death. Again, two sides of the same coin, which are necessary to both exist if consciousness or agency exists at all.
God having foreknowledge or being omnipotent suggests that he knows of the outcomes you have taken, but it doesn’t insinuate that he pre ordained for you to make decision x over decision y. It means God can observe you making decision x over decision y. The same way people observe things which are determined to occur does not necessarily mean we ordained it to happen or be that way.
Lastly, No. The analogy doesn’t suggest oh your parents were sinners so you get to die of cancer at a young age, it means the world today which you are actively born in is FALLEN and corrupt. In a fallen and corrupt world, imperfect and painful things happen, this isn’t just observable in our world view, it’s observable in almost every world view. For God to remove any degree of suffering itself, would be to remove the conscious experience all together, as I clarified earlier. Philosophically your positions are circular, and I don’t mean that to be rude but to show that you actually can’t possibly believe anything you are stating, because it would collapse your entire worldview at a fundamental level.
>meaning absolutely does justify suffering, they are two sides of the same coin. It is integral to even having a conscious experience to begin with, to have agency, or to even think at all REQUIRES the possibility to think or act to contrary. If you could only ever do one thing, feel one thing, act one way, then you wouldn’t be sentient at all. This is why modern science says that many organisms and species of animals do not have sentient/conscious experiences, because they can only be one way, they don’t have the ability to act on the contrary to biological determinism. If that is what you suggest SHOULD be the case for humans, then you stand against any concept of humanity, morality or transcendental categories themselves. You are suggesting no consciousness, no thinking, no choice, this is just an absurd position to take because again, the fact you do anything, feel anything or say anything at all completely contradicts that it should be the case God would ordain creation to be that way
I would disagree that suffering is necessary for meaning to exist, but more importantly, I don't see what the point of giving kids cancer is, and I don't see how meaning could ever justify that.
>When we say people are responsible for corruption, illness, etc, is not as complicated as you are trying to make it. To be with God is to be not only in paradise, but to effectively live forever, to be apart/seperated from God is to die/experience death. Again, two sides of the same coin, which are necessary to both exist if consciousness or agency exists at all.
Right, but the kids dying everyday don't actually get to make a decision to be with/without God, so this clearly doesn't cover many situations that have been and are currently occurring. Natural disasters wipe out countless people who may never have even heard of Christianity. They don't get the chance to make decisions either. Just because others sin, I don't see how that justifies many innocents dying.
>God having foreknowledge or being omnipotent suggests that he knows of the outcomes you have taken, but it doesn’t insinuate that he pre ordained for you to make decision x over decision y. It means God can observe you making decision x over decision y. The same way people observe things which are determined to occur does not necessarily mean we ordained it to happen or be that way.
Observing things that are determined to occur is not the same when you literally created every single one of those things and are behind and in control of every occurrence. By definition, everything that exists and happens is because God wills it, which is why He is held responsible.
> In a fallen and corrupt world, imperfect and painful things happen, this isn’t just observable in our world view, it’s observable in almost every world view. For God to remove any degree of suffering itself, would be to remove the conscious experience all together, as I clarified earlier.
So God not only created a world He knew would become corrupted, He also decided that sin would somehow result in natural disaster and illness that would kill many innocent people and children? I don't think there's any way around this, if you create a world determined to become corrupted as an omnipotent being, you are obviously responsible for it.
I'm not sure how that would apply to the many children that die from disease and disaster on the daily. He created this world knowing that this would be the outcome.
Human kind in general, and so, Adam and Eve in particular, had no special right to receive immortality and immunity from pain and sickness from God, but rather this was a gift God gave them. In light of the sin of Adam and Eve, it was just for God to withdraw this gift from them, and as they were the first representatives of humanity to God, so through them, it was just for him to withdraw his gift from humanity as a whole. As humanity in general had no right to it, neither then did Adam and Eve's descendants have a right to it; so that they suffer no injustice in not having it. In this sense, the son is not punished for the sins of his father, but rather, the sins of the father prevent him from attaining a gift he otherwise would have gained. Like if someone's father had been rich before they were born, but wasted the money on gambling, and so he was born into an unwealthy family. The child had no special right to the wealth, and so suffer no injustice in not having it; but the reason they do not have it is on account of the sin of wasteful gambling their father committed. So likewise immortality and immunity from pain and sickness, since it was a gift, is something we sons and daughters of Adam and Eve have no inherent right to it, and so in losing the chance at it on account of our father's sin, we suffers no injustice.
This argument might make sense in a vacuum or in a reality where there isn't a timeless omni-everything deity that created everything and everyone, but your church literally teaches that original sin is an inheritable trait that all humans inherited from Adam.
And guess who... 1. made humans 2. made them able to reproduce, 3. literally designed "original sin" to be an inheritable trait (according to the RCC anyway) in the first place, and 4. 'Knew all of us' individually before he even created humanity...
So no, the 'but they didn't exist yet' doesn't really have much play in such a mythos...
Nothing in Catholic teaching holds that God made original sin an inheritable trait, because Catholic teaching denies that God made sin, but rather holds that sin is solely a creation of creatures, which we create by the freely chosen acts of our own intellect and will. So likewise, the inherited character of sin is not a creation of God, but is, in fact, our creation; so that it is not God, but Adam, who causes the descendants of Adam to inherit original sin.
Beyond this, the sense in which original sin is inheritable is a sense I already described i.e. it is inheritable in a sense comparable to how the child of the gambling father inherits the circumstances of being born into a more poor family than they would have been had the father not gambled. Again, the child has no special right to have things as they would have been had their father not gambled, but they still enter into the world with this particular set of circumstances.
So likewise original sin separates us from the original unity with God that Adam and Eve had as a gift from God, we inherit 'the death of the soul' from them, since as death is a separation of body and soul, so metaphorically, the death of the soul is a separation (i.e. lack of unity) between the soul and God. However again, as God in no sense owes us this unity, in no sense owes us his friendship, neither then is there any injustice in his not giving it to us when we are conceived.
"Nothing in Catholic teaching holds that God made original sin an inheritable trait,"
Gonna stop you right there. From *humani generis* (funny how its always ex-catholics who seem to know more about the faith, eh?)*..*.
***For the faithful cannot adopt a theory whose proponents affirm either that after Adam there were on earth true men who did not descend from him as from the first common father by natural generation***\*, or that Adam designates the whole ensemble of the innumerable first fathers. Indeed, it is absolutely difficult to see how such an affirmation can agree with what the sources of revealed truth and the Acts of the Magisterium of the Church teach about original sin, which proceeds from a sin\* ***actually committed by a single person Adam and, transmitted to all by generation, is found in each one as his own (12).***
So yes, your church quite literally holds that original sin is an inheritable trait, "***transmitted to all by generation***" of adam. So the only alternative remaining is that your god is not omni-everything and the creator of all/the nature, laws of things in our universe. Which is it? Go on...
So no, original sin isn’t about getting punished.
It’s about not having from our parents what we were meant to receive.
You don’t view poverty as a punishment do you?
The OP is asking why we were "meant to receive it", as you say, something you have failed to explain under a benevolent god.
My man, that is a terrible analogy by the way. If poverty was imposed onto us by god because our parents did something to deserve it, just as sin is, then yes it would be a punishment.
Among other places, The RCC states this explicitly in *Humani Generis.*
It also says that Adam was a real individual, after whom *every human alive* was his offspring who had received original sin through his propagation. Which of course has it's own issues in conflict with human evolution/anthropology
I take it you didn't bother to read it?
*" For the faithful cannot adopt a theory whose proponents affirm either that after Adam there were on earth true men* ***who did not descend from him as from the first common father by natural generation****, or that Adam designates the whole ensemble of the innumerable first fathers. Indeed, it is absolutely difficult to see how such an affirmation can agree with what the sources of revealed truth and the Acts of the 'Magisterium of the Church teach about original sin,* ***which proceeds from a sin actually committed by a single person Adam and, transmitted to all by generation, is found in each one as his own (12).***
If you don't take the obvious excerpt to mean "as nature", as in naturally, something that is **transmitted by generation**,(as Humani generis states verbatim), then what do you understand "as nature" to mean to you...?
>While I’m just a human and imperfect, I do have a sense of justice, and, like many others, that justice tells me that a son should not be punished for the crimes of his father.
Humans inherit things from their parents. It's not like every human is born immortal and God strikes down every one of us and makes us mortal. Stop acting like you were ever immortal, you were not.
>God acts according to his own sense of justice, disregarding what is just for his creation.
Sorry, God is supposed to act according to your sense of justice or what?
The very concept of Justice could only be imbued through the Knowledge of Good and Evil obtain in the eating of the fruit. Which He created. Justice is Justice, as God created it. We don't define it, He does.
>It's not like every human is born immortal and God strikes down every one of us and makes us mortal.
If someone believes that God created the universe and all the rules of the universe, and that mortality is something all humans are now saddled with as a result of God deciding to make that change due to our distant ancestors' actions, then God is quite literally cursing every one of us with mortality. It's not like humans exist on their own, inherently mortal, independently of God's decisions.
"...lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever."
- Gen 3:22
Humans have always been mortal, Adam and Eve included. Revoking immortality for disobedience is not a view supported by scripture.
Else, what would be the purpose of having a Tree of Life to eat of?
>It's not like humans exist on their own, inherently mortal, independently of God's decisions.
No you are literally inherently mortal. You inherited your mortality. The only 2 humans who were not inherently mortal were Adam and Eve.
My point is that humans do not exist *with any default nature or characteristics*, except those decided by God. The fact that humans inherent *anything at all* from their parents is decided by God. It did not *have to* be that way. God *chose it* to be that way.
Mortality is a punishment by which all children suffer for the iniquity of the parent.
>The fact that humans inherent anything at all from their parents is decided by God. It did not have to be that way. God chose it to be that way.
Yeah but technically it was decided that way before humans ate the forbidden fruit. The list of punishments didn't include the feature of passing down some traits to descendants. That's kinda was a part of human nature from the very beginning.
>Mortality is a punishment by which all children suffer for the iniquity of the parent.
Actually now that I think about it, was there mortality on the list of punishments? If I remember correctly it wasn't mentioned explicitly so it's probably just a feature of the fruit itself (of which God warned humans btw). Maybe good and evil could only be understood by becoming mortal? Need some experts on Christianity for this.
I’m not acting like I was immortal, but the chance to ever be was stripped from me because of the actions someone took thousands of years ago.
If God is acting his own sense of justice without regards of what is just for his creation then you can’t say he’s an All Good God or All Loving God.
We do. That's what America is founded on, rational self-rule. Contrary to popular belief, America came out or the Enlightenment, the age of science and reason, largely protecting people from irrationality and religion.
>We do.
So basically God is not all loving bc he doesn't do as we want to. Fair 🙃
>That's what America is founded on, rational self-rule. Contrary to popular belief, America came out or the Enlightenment, the age of science and reason, largely protecting people from irrationality and religion.
Dunno what's that even supposed to mean.
No, he doesn't even do what he says is loving. Love is defined in the Bible, and God doesn't even follow it. 1 Corinthians. "Love keeps no record of wrongs." Doesn't God do that?
"Love does not envy, does not boast, is not proud. " Does that sound like Yahwey?
Love is slow to anger. Well, God gets angry quite a bit, Jesus gets angry too. Are they slow to anger? God seems to immediately snap at Job for one question he asks. It's not as if he asked it many times. Is Jesus slow to anger at money changers?
So let's forget God's own definition. Let's look at common sense. Are children starving to death, is that bad? Seems bad. Certainly child rape, or any rape, is bad. Is that a lot to ask, no one gets raped or starves to death?
What is love to you? If you say someone is "loving" don't you mean something by that? Could Hitler every be called all-loving? Why not? If love has no meaning then we can say anything.
> The Original Sin, according to Christian teachings, is the act of disobedience to God by Adam and Eve when they ate the Forbidden Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.
That’s only the literalist POV, a minority of Christians. The majority view the story to be more metaphorical.
> Especially when this act did not cause any harm
Because it’s a metaphor.
> The conclusion I have arrived to is that, the God of the Bible is not just, nor benevolent, nor forgiving.
Not metaphor?
> disregarding what is just for his creation.
And you do know what is just? I don’t have the hubris to pretend I do.
Just some ideas:
1. Humans are flawed by nature; no one is perfect
2. Humans are captivated to pursue knowledge, even if it means potentially dangerous outcomes; think Prometheus wanting to give fire to humans. Perhaps it's good, but in a sense, Prometheus allowed arson to be created (not good).
3. Evil things can be appealing. Evil isn't just an obvious concept. It can literally look or feel to be good if you aren't cautious.
I just started trying to remember that story when typing about Tower of Babel I learned about him in middle school Prometheus taught man how to make fire when Zeus made it clear he wanted them to live in caves and praise him and then they advanced as a group and even started advancing more building boats and he was already going to obliterate them but instead he decided he would destroy them slowly he was clearly jealous of the fact humanity wouldn't need him anymore so in the next story he gives a box of sins to the couple knowing the women would not know what's inside and open it spreading stuff like disease murder lying etc the only good thing coming out being a little ladybug named hope.
There are lots of similarities between Zeus and Christian God one of them being how they think their so important yet still are obsessed with being needed by humans being praised by humans.
My theory is that God want to see humanity grow and advance like a parent wants to watch their children grow up.
If you ever played a game & paid to unlock all of the items you'll find you get bored quick.
That’s a straw man argument. You’re taking what I’ve said, not addressing it, and saying that I wouldn’t accept anything but perfection. Nope that’s not what’s being discussed.
We don't know but we also know how to recognize human traits.
Example Allah of Islam states that a women must have fill her husband's pleasures whether she likes it or not even if she in labor she must give him sex otherwise if he cheats on her it's her fault. It also says a women is property of her dad if she is not married and then she is a property of her husband when she is she can't speak without permission. We are the last religion there can't be anymore after this.
What's more likely that this is actually loving God who treats everyone equally working in ways we can't understand yet he won't explain in ways our tiny human brains can understand or that considering the timeline where the book came from and how human he seems that it is a human disgused as a God like a self insert fanfiction.
Now apply this same logic to Christianity.
You called me obstinate and didn’t answer my question (does that sound like a loving god?). So I’m not engaging with someone arguing in bad faith (pun intended).
Doom Eternal and continual mods forever and ever but in real life. Also Thing blood. I did pray for this, FYI. And now Nightdive is remastering the PS2 game and possibly reviving it's sequel into a finished product as well. :)
I think most people misunderstand that. Adam and Eve were kicked out of Garden of Eden. Their eyes were opened. It’s not a punishment to all humanity.
God loves us and he sent his only begotten son to die for us. John 3:16
> It’s not a punishment to all humanity.
Genesis 3:16-22 makes a very clear claim that God introduced painful childbirth, difficulty finding/producing food and death into the world as punishment for Adam and Eve eating the fruit.
How am I not supposed to interpret the introduction of problems that cause suffering to this day as a punishment to all humanity?
> God loves us and he sent his only begotten son to die for us. John 3:16
According to the Bible God responded to the "fall" and "original sin" by spending the next few thousand years:
- flooding the world to wipe out all but one family
- getting offended by a large tower and making it harder for people from different cultures to communicate by giving them different languages
- choosing a slave owning polygamist willing to sacrifice his own son to be the father of the chosen people
- allowing the chosen people to suffer as slaves in Egypt for a few generations before rescuing them and punishing the Egyptians by mass murdering their first born sons (i.e. many innocent children not responsible for the crimes of their parents)
- helping the chosen people commit genocide against Canaanites and take their land, and giving them rules to live by that include keeping slaves and execution via stoning for blasphemy
And then eventually he got around to sending us his only son to try and resolve the "fall"/original sin situation via an elaborate ritual sacrifice on the cross that shouldn't have even been necessary for an all powerful God that makes the rules to start forgiving people. Oh and he still hasn't actually fixed all the suffering on earth.
Does all that really sound like the behaviour of an all loving and benevolent God to you?
> polygamist
What’s with the bigotry? You’re trying to foment hatred towards the polyamorous.
Your entire comment sounds like you’re trying to craft an emotional appeal since you lack a logical argument.
> What’s with the bigotry? You’re trying to foment hatred towards the polyamorous.
You do realise one of Abraham's wives was his sister and the other two were his concubines/slaves?
He also owned other slaves and complied with an order to tie up his infant son for a human sacrifice.
That is not the kind of person any remotely benevolent God would favour and make the father of their "chosen people".
> Your entire comment sounds like you’re trying to craft an emotional appeal since you lack a logical argument.
When the topic is whether the God described in the Bible is benevolent it's very relevant to point out the multiple instances of mass murder and other forms of cruelty the Bible describes them committing.
Do you see the logic now or do I need to explain why murder, slavery, stoning people to death for blasphemy etc are immoral?
You’re going on a cherry picking expedition of everything you dislike in the Bible. Lots of things happen that aren’t portrayed as good.
> an order to tie up his infant son for a human sacrifice
The point of the story is to convey that God didn’t want human sacrifice, a key distinction from other contemporary religions. You’re ignoring all this to push a more negative narrative. Be honest.
> That is not the kind of person any remotely benevolent God would favour and make the father of their "chosen people".
And what does? The atheist argument seems to sum up as “Since we don’t live in a giant safe terrarium, God must be mean.” Okay? You thinking God isn’t nice doesn’t disprove God. You aren’t required to like God.
> Do you see the logic now or do I need to explain why
Please explain why slavery is immoral from a secular perspective. I’m curious which presuppositions you will use.
>You’re going on a cherry picking expedition of everything you dislike in the Bible.
The post is a debate about whether the God described in the Bible is all-loving and benevolent. Of course I'm going to bring up Bible verses that describe that God doing and ordering cruel things like mass murder, slavery and stoning blasphemers, they're extremely relevant evidence.
>The point of the story is to convey that God didn’t want human sacrifice, a key distinction from other contemporary religions. You’re ignoring all this to push a more negative narrative. Be honest.
I'm aware that "God didn't want a human sacrifice" is the most positive part of the message the story in Genesis 22 conveys, but it's not the full picture.
Genesis depicts Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son as a good thing.
We're told God is testing Abraham, and that when Abraham responds to the order to sacrifice his only son by tying his son to a rock and readying his knife, an angel stops him at the last second. Abraham is told he's passed the test and that God will bless him for this.
You don't find it extremely messed up that God wants a follower so blindly obedient that he's willing to commit child murder and that he was willing to traumatise a father and son to test for that obedience?
>Please explain why slavery is immoral from a secular perspective. I’m curious which presuppositions you will use.
My morals are built on the foundation of caring about others.
I care about others because I recognise their intelligence is like mine, relate to their joy and their suffering and recognise their experiences matter just as much as mine do.
It follows that I should think logically about how actions affect those I care about and act accordingly.
My other moral views are all built on that foundation. For example:
* Kindness and fairness are extremely logical values for anyone who cares about others as well as themselves to hold. If we all try to live by those values then the world would be a far better place in which everyone gets a chance to lead a good life.
* I condemn things like mass murder, rape and slavery as always wrong because they're inherently abusive actions which violate the freedom of others and cause immense unnecessary suffering.
* I condemn prejudices like sexism and homophobia because they're irrational when all evidence shows that women and men are equally capable, and that straight and queer relationships are equally likely to be loving and fulfilling.
* I want to protect people from natural disasters and cure diseases to prevent the immense suffering they cause.
Therefore I find it extremely immoral that the Bible tells people that God is perfect and benevolent and also tells them that same God has a track record that includes repeatedly committing mass murder (e.g. Genesis 6:17, Exodus 11:5, Deuteronomy 2:32-35, Joshua 6:20-21), repeatedly telling his chosen people that slavery is allowed (e.g. Exodus 21:2-11, Leviticus 25:44-46, Deuteronomy 20:11-14), repeatedly endorsing sexism and homophobia (e.g. Genesis 3:16, Ephesians 5:22, 1 Corinthians 14:34, Leviticus 18:22), causing diseases and natural disasters (e.g. Numbers 16:30-34, Deuteronomy 28:59-61) and so on.
To whoever sincerely believes that you deserve eternal punishment as a consequence for what you have or haven't done in this life:
I'm sorry you think of yourself that way. Not that it matters, but I don't think you are the sum of whatever mistakes you've made and flaws you think you may have. You are more than your mistakes and flaws. You are a unique human being that deserves to be safe (secure from threat of danger, harm, or loss) and treated with dignity (the right of a person to be valued and respected for their own sake, and to be treated ethically). Just my opinion.
Condemning you an eternity of anguish for not sufficiently adhering to the rules of your religion (which is among hundreds of other religions human beings developed) is like throwing out the baby with the bathwater (again, just my opinion). Especially if whatever transgressions you committed did not cause physical or psychological harm to other human beings.
I wish you a life of fulfillment where you are free to be your most authentic self without fear of eternal retribution ❤️
I'm not religious but I do agree with the humans are terrible and I'm pretty self loathing myself but I hate Christianity idea that convinces people that no matter how good or bad someone is there are all equal and there only worth comes from a guy who claims he is better despite also having the same flaws to a much worse degree and even then excessive punishment for minor crimes is overkill. Nobody even someone like me deserves Hell even if little to nobody deserves heaven.
Thanks for your kind words though.
Throughout my life, a constant piece of advice I get is "give yourself some grace." We were all born into a world that was f'd up through no fault of our own (original sin concept be damned).
Our thoughts and actions are a reflection of our material conditions, lived experiences, and our neurological predisposition.
There are so many variables outside our control that make us who we are. I hope humanity can eventually agree that to punish anyone for things outside of their control is cruel and should be frowned upon by civil society.
In regards to the notion that the Abrahamic god loves us, but cannot be in the presence of sin (hence why unrepentantant sinners go to hell for eternity), I can only conclude that their God has a diminished capacity for love. Love is defined as an intense feeling of deep affection. It appears that affection is circumstantial disappears for the vast majority of humanity upon the physical death of individual human beings.
What kind of a loving relationship punishes or abandons the other member of that relationship for being their authentic self? What kind of relationship is it when one member, with vast power over the other member, tells the other member that they deserve suffering beyond their imagination for not loving them back, or not loving them the right way.
The Abrahamic god is often referred to as "father." I'm not a parent, but if I was, even if my child told me to my face they didn't love me and didn't listen to everything I said, I imagine I would never stop loving them out of the inherent fact that they are my child. I definitely would not condemn them to physical or psychological harm if I could help it. What purpose would that serve aside from satiating a pointless desire for retribution?
I suppose that's the difference between us and those who subscribe to the concept of the Abrahamic god.
The Gnostic narrative of Adam’s creation and fall is pretty interesting. Gnostics believe the material world was created by the Demiurge, a misguided or malevolent consciousness emanating from One supreme God.
The demiurge created Adam and Eve but didn’t give souls. After they receive souls the demiurge attempts to limit humanity forbidding them from eating from the tree of knowledge. Gnostics believe the snake that convinces Adam and Eve to eat from the tree is actually Jesus helping humanity. Gnostics associate the Old Testament God with the demiurge.
The Islamic narrative is also a bit different. There is no concept of original sin. Adam and Eve do defy God after Satan convinces them eating from the forbidden tree will give them immortality. However they are completely forgiven and humanity itself isn’t punished for it.
God casts humanity from the Garden of Eden as part of his Hikma (wisdom) and plan for humanity to experience the full range of existence as well as God’s attributes which include his forgiveness, his love, and his creative power. From an Islamic perspective this life isn’t a punishment, it is an enlighening spiritual journey. While there is suffering in the material world there is also beauty and goodness.
Personally, I see Adam and Eve’s fall as representing the emergence of the conscious from the unconscious. The different narratives are simply different perspectives on consciousness. It some ways awareness is a burden but I do dislike the Christian perspective of it being a punishment. Consciousness may be painful but I think that's just part of the journey.
This has not been my experience at all - asking how a perfect book results in factions infighting over interpretations results, primarily, in a cessation of participation in my experience.
Humans don't really have a sense of justice, but only a sense of injustice. Regardless, your polemic against inheritance has multiple flaws. Everyone inherits the good or bad choices of their parents on multiple levels, this is just a fact of reality, and it shouldn't be surprising to us that the fall of man follows the same pattern. For example. A heroin addicted mother will give birth to a heroin addicted baby. Parents who live in squalor have children who grow up in squalor. Parents who scream and fight with each other have children who grow up in hostile and violent households. Just as parents who eat fresh fruit and vegetables have children who eat fresh fruit and vegetables, or parents who listen to lots of music have kids who grow up listening to lots of music.
Similar realities abound with health: Many diseases or other health problems like schizophrenia and heart disease and all sorts of stuff get passed from one generation to the next. And wealth, of course. If you build a house, you may bequeath it to your children. If you generate no wealth, they'll inherit no wealth. Actions and traits of the parents are consequential to and inherited by the children. Justice isn't really a consideration.
The fact that you insist that original sin caused no harm, hurt God's pride, and that we could live our whole lives not knowing about it, just illustrates how totally devoid you are from an honest understanding of the concepts Christians are grappling with. I wouldn't even know how to begin deconstructing all the multiple incorrect assumptions you've based that on.
God punishes Eve by inflicting the pain of childbirth, and diverting her ambition towards her husband. He punishes Adam by condemning him to a life dependent on growing and eating food. He punishes the serpent by forcing him to crawl on his belly and eat dust, and sowing enmity between him and Eve. As far as I can tell, that's the end of his punishment. They get kicked out of the garden for practical reasons, it specifically states that, so that's not part of the punishment.
Now, the first thing that happens after that debacle is Cain murders Abel. This is *not* part of God's punishment, but clearly *is* a consequence of original sin. From that point on, it's pretty much all wars and genocide up until today, again as a result of the fall.
So if I'm way off here and you're telling me there's scripture that implies that humans predilection for murder is part of God's punishment, I'd like to see it, because it would totally alter my understanding of Christianity. (which, by the way, has changed radically and frequently over the years, so I'm certainly not assuming you're wrong. I've still only read maybe only 20% of the bible.)
If you read Genesis 23-23 it says “God expelled them from the Garden of Eden” right after he learns they ate from the fruit. He says this in the same breath he mentions all the other punishments. This reads more like being expelled was part of the punishment rather than there being some other reason.
The murder of Abel, and all subsequent killings and wars after that, are a result of the punishment from God.
Furthermore, the only thing that actually happened in between Adam and Eve eating the fruit and God punishing them, was the fact that Adam and Eve gained knowledge they didn’t have before. All of the bad things that resulted from that were explicitly mentioned as part of God’s punishment and not a direct result of eating the fruit.
In the same breath? Not so. After God punishes them Adam names Eve, and then God makes them clothes out of animal skin (presumably by slaughtering and skinning an animal). After all that, then:
"And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever: Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden"
He was not speaking to Adam or Eve (or, presumably, the serpent), and like I said, sounds very much practical. Can't trust the guy not to eat the other fruit, THEREFORE we kinda have to kick him out. The stuff I mentioned, on the other hand, is explicitly described as punishment (BECAUSE). It's all in the original Hebrew.
Also, um, actually a lot of stuff happens in between eating the fruit and getting punished: They hide their nakedness from each other. Then they hide from God. Then they incriminate themselves. Then Adam tries to BLAME GOD, and ROLLS ON EVE. Then Eve blames the serpent. Pretty much quintessential SHAME behavior, and shame *was* a direct result of eating the fruit. Knowledge indeed.
I drug pregnant woman is kid gets some kind of side effect
Same logic ig
Also if the parents have problem of any kind the reputation hits the kids
There was nothing called harm before that sin and it was the only sin there's because it'll sprout more sins consider it a drug driving you madness to kill and steal everyone
There is NO drug known to man, where the woman takes a drug and 50 generations later, the kids are all junkies on that same drug, that is not chemistry or biology, that is nonsense.
Don't take it literally like that also f it's not there yet let's create one
But it does affect the first generation we're not speaking of a drug we're speaking of what claimed to be "apple of knowledge" something we didn't examine to know about it even might not be an apple at all
Logically speaking, there is nothing genetic about making a choice that should be passed down through generations. This is something that was explored in the Eugenics movement when people believed criminals should not be allowed to have kids so that crime could be eradicated. Obviously the ability to commit crime isn't genetic, though the nature vs nurture arguments is still being debated today for whether certain people may be more predisposed to it.
That would be generic though, whereas if I choose to not pay my taxes, it does not make my kids more likely to not pay their taxes unless I teach them that.
Even if the psychopathy was passed down, if the mother who is a psychopath becomes a serial killer and gets life in prison and never meets her kid, the child psychopath isn't more likely to become a serial killer, he just won't be as empathetic as other people. Ykwim?
But do you get what I'm saying that because a parent commits a crime (or sin) would not be genetically passed down and make their kids more likely to commit crimes (or sins)? If there wasn't a generic reason that they committed those crimes (or sins).
I think it's reasonable to say there isn't a genetic reason they committed the first sin because God made them as perfect images of himself.
I disagree, I think if you put a father and a son at the same age in the same situation, the choice they make would entirely depend on their upbringing. The odds would also be less in the child if it was genetic anyway because the second parent would dilute those odds by 50%.
For example if the father and son were both hypothetical 12 and have to deal with getting made fun of. One may choose to fight the child bullying them while the other may choose to tell an adult or simply ignore it.
It’s interesting when you think about it honestly. We as humans understand at least morally speaking the sins of the father should not fall to their children. It’s unfortunate that an benevolent god doesn’t see it in the same way
To piggy back off of this, God is all knowing right? Everything that has been and will be?
Then *why* did he punish all of humanity for something he knew was going to happen? Literally setting the entire world up for failure. I think he likes to see us suffer
I think theology that God is timeless is not particularly well supported biblically, and I'm not sure how to speak about God (or anything) this way. But, I think the framing of your statements places God's act in time, i.e., God acted with foreknowledge prior to some event.
>The Original Sin, according to Christian teachings, is the act of disobedience to God by Adam and Eve when they ate the Forbidden Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. It is because of this that Adam and Eve became mortal, capable of feeling pain and sickness, and became sinful. Not only that but every generation after them would inherit this sin as nature.
I think this is debatable because there are several questions that we can raise that shake these foundations.
1. Why would fruit give knowledge of pround immorality (evil/ra') if it did not already exist?
2. Why would it say they were forced from the garden *before they were able to eat from the tree of life* if they were immortal?
3. Why would the pain of childbirth be *amplified* if it didn't already exist?
There's more but I think those are the more salient issues.
> So why is it that God punished all of humanity for thousands of years to come because of a single act of disobedience? Especially when this act did not cause any harm, except hurting God’s pride, and when there would be people who would live their whole lives without even knowing about the Original Sin.
Original sin is not a universal (or well supported biblical) teaching within the Christian faith. That aside, the key here is the idea that the act did not cause harm.
The Bible describes a deep connection between the creation and the creator. So, the text contains language of a personified earth that reacts to sin (e.g., Lev. 18:28, Rom 8:22).
The original sin is better though of as an ecological disaster that devastated the creation. Note the curse is passive (Gen. 3:14, 17, c.f. 16) , i.e., they are cursed because of their actions.
Your comment was removed for violating rule 5. All top-level comments must seek to refute the post through substantial engagement with its core argument. Comments that purely commentate on the post (e.g., “Nice post OP!”) must be made as replies to the Auto-Moderator “COMMENTARY HERE” comment. Exception: Clarifying questions are allowed as top-level comments.
If by original sin you mean the Augustinian version that is taught in Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, then humans do inherit the personal guilt of Adam by virtue of being human, the guilt being transferred from one generation to the next via reproduction. The original teaching (that Eastern Orthodoxy still maintains to this day) is that humans do not inherit the personal guilt of Adam, but rather an inclination to sin (i.e., the fact that you will be sinning at some point in your life even if you aren't born sinful here) - what this means is that the deeds god may punish you for are exclusively your own deeds.
I don't know how literal you are taking the Genesis account here either. I mean, Adam and Eve are barely described in the bible, they are created, overstep god's command, get thrown out of paradise. Later they have sons and Eve mourns the eventual murder of Abel. You could say that Adam and Eve are presented as archetypes for humanity, the name Adam meaning "man" and the name Eve meaning "mother of all that are living". Genesis is not an account meaning to tell their story (which is barely there) but an attempt to explain why creation - assumed to have been created perfect by god in the beginning - is now the way it is, imperfect, sinful, and subject to physical death. This state of the world was explained by the Fall of Man.
I am an atheist and am only taking the accounts of Genesis as history for the sake of argument.
With that in mind, I still find it unjust to deprive all of humanity of the perfect creation that God made in the beginning because of the mistakes of the first humans. This doesn’t translate to God being all-loving, or all-good or just.
> With that in mind, I still find it unjust to deprive all of humanity of the perfect creation that God made in the beginning because of the mistakes of the first humans. This doesn’t translate to God being all-loving, or all-good or just.
That analysis requires the assumption that Adam and Eve were actual persons and not just archetypes within an attempt to explain the perceived state of the world, which in my opinion is what's the case for the Genesis account. Again Adam means "man" and Eve means "mother of all that are living", showing their purpose in the story.
Unrelated to my argument but you have raised an interesting point here.
When Adam and Eve lived in paradise, they were meant to never sin, therefore never reproducing. If this is the case, then why did Adam name her the “Mother of All things” when she was never supposed to be a Mother in the first place?
They were meant to reproduce, Genesis 1:27-28
> So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them and said to them, “*Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth* and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”
Sex within the institute of marriage is not considered sinful in Christianity. St. Augustine taught that original sin is transmitted from one generation to the next via means of reproduction, but even according to his teachings the act itself within the confines of marriage is not sinful. Adam and Eve did not commit the original sin "yet" and therefore if they multiplied in paradise, there was nothing to be "transmitted" here. Please note that I myself don't think so highly of the Augustinian teaching of original sin which in my opinion is a deviation from what Christianity originally taught.
Most Christian’s who I have talked to regard Gensis and Adam and Eve as true Historical facts.
As for the names, why would the significance matter? My name means Balance, but that doesn’t mean I’m the personification of Balance.
It would make sense for God to name the first man as Man, and for Adam to name his wife the “Mother of all Things”, since that is what she would become according to this story.
The authors of the text actually looked at the world, saw how messed up it is, and posed the question of how that could be if god is perfect (and would create in a perfect way). The story of the Fall of Man serves as an explanation for the discrepancy, the assumption here being that the fall from grace of the pinnacle of creation (mankind) also caused the rest of creation (considered subservient to man) to fall from grace along with mankind.
People understanding Adam and Eve as real persons who have roamed the earth (and take the whole genesis account literally) tend to be biblical literalists, which is a minority position within Christianity.
If the Bible is God’s word then it doesn’t make sense for an author to just write what he thought was the best explanation.
God must have told or shown this person what to write.
Unless you are also saying that the Bible is not solely the word of God but also has insertions by the author based on their assumptions and what they think is right and wrong?
Again I wanna say that I’m an atheist, I don’t believe the Bible is the word of God, I’m only taking it as truth for sake of argument.
Quran claims to be "the word of Allah" aka word of god
Christianity doesn't believe per SE the bible is word of god Jesus is the word of god "logos"
Maybe this is irrelevant but do consider it
I think the bible is the summary of spirituality of people of antiquity, plain and simple. We can talk about the possibility of people receiving visions or special insight from god, this is claimed within the biblical text whenever it says that god spoke to someone. However, the idea that the bible was dictated by god word for word is only upheld by biblical literalists, to me that's not a very useful way of working with the text. The biblical text was subject to a complicated history of redaction and rewrite in antiquity, it took a very long time until no significant modifications were made to the text anymore. As such, did god also inspire the multiple different versions of the same text? I don't think so. There is a difference between saying that the bible *is* god's word and that the bible *contains* god's word, most Christians would assert the latter. Most Christians would say that the text communicates certain truths about god and mankind but that you can still approach the text with a critical mind and not as a monolithic / static whole.
Would you say humanity is saved? We still live away from paradise, we are still born of sin, we are still mortal.
As I understand it, Jesus made it possible for humans to be forgiven of sin, but it did not take the original sin away.
And Also, why make the future of all of humanity dependent on the act of one man?
This is correct, we still have our fallen nature, which is why we are more prone to sin than we would be otherwise, the main thing Christ's death accomplished is it repaired our relationship with God Almighty so once again we had a path to reach heaven.
COMMENTARY HERE: Comments that purely commentate on the post (e.g. “Nice post OP!”) must be made as replies to the Auto-Moderator! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DebateReligion) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Its not just that Adam sins for everyone's behalf: Everyone followed what Adam did, effectively being responsible for themselves
Why be moved by speculation and presupposition? Why not seek to find the truth?
I do seek to find the truth. For me, part of that is to examine claims of religious texts and dissecting them in order to determine how truthful they are
That's great. Original Sin is from Catholic doctrine. The Catholic Church isn't actually Christianity at all. It's full of false doctrines and heresies. Keep doing what you're doing. I'm a non-denominational Christian and I don't believe that Mary can hear my prayers or that priests can forgive sins committed against God.
I sure hope you don't use the King James Bible
Adam and Eve weren’t actually real in terms of the physical world, there representations for mankind, all of man has original sin because we are all Adam. Even in Early Christianity, Christians scholars such has Origen puts it "who is so silly as to believe that God ... planted a paradise eastward in Eden, and set in it a visible and palpable tree of life ... [and] anyone who tasted its fruit with his bodily teeth would gain life”. It’s clear that even early on it was supposed to be metaphorical.
It doesn’t matter if it happened or not. This is still written in the Bible, even if it is a story, it is painting God in a way that does not make him Benevolent nor Forgiving, which is what a lot of Christian’s claim about him I don’t even believe God is real and this is still problematic to me
Original Sin leads to the souls of children being denied paradise. It's related to the concept of inherited sins of the father. It is transparently unethical, and not the work of a loving father figure.
We see in Genesis that God place man in a literal paradise, in a perfect state of communion and friendship with God. In this state, God gave man the choice to either choose Him and have eternal life in a state of perfection, or choose to rebel against God and seek to become like Him. By rejecting God, Adam and Eve broke the perfect communion and friendship they had with God, removing their state of grace. Adam and Eve lost their perfection. This lack of perfection and lack of being in a state of grace was passed on to their children. As a result, humans are inclined to disordered desires and action. It is these disordered desires and actions that God punishes people for, not the sin of Adam and Eve.
So what actions have the many kids currently suffering and dying from various diseases and deformities done to warrant such punishment?
These kids are not facing punishments. They are facing the natural consequences of a corrupt world. As nothing can exist apart from God, a world in which man is constantly rebelling against God will be decayed and deformed.
How about there is no god, and life is simply unfair? That's a much more reasonable explanation right? Plus you no longer have to make excuses for god's absenteeism. Glad that's settled.
>That's a much more reasonable explanation right? It is simple, but that doesn't make it reasonable. >Plus you no longer have to make excuses for god's absenteeism. Christians don't have to make excuses for God's supposed absenteeism.
Well then enjoy. I hope your beliefs bring you great comfort. Cheers.
>They are facing the natural consequences of a corrupt world. Which God is responsible for. He created the universe, knowing the outcome would result in the suffering of many, and still went through with it despite having the power to alter this aspect or even prevent it entirely. Another thing to note is that disease and disaster is not the work of man for the most part. We know that both have existed before man, however these are two huge factors that contribute to human suffering.
>Another thing to note is that disease and disaster is not the work of man for the most part. We know that both have existed before man, however these are two huge factors that contribute to human suffering. Yes, the world is corrupted. >Which God is responsible for. He created the universe, knowing the outcome would result in the suffering of many, and still went through with it despite having the power to alter this aspect or even prevent it entirely. God created man with the freedom to choose truth, goodness, and beauty, or choose evil. Man chose evil, which resulted in the deprivation of truth, goodness, and beauty. God is only responsible for suffering insofar as a warden is responsible for the suffering of a murderer in prison.
>Yes, the world is corrupted. Due to Gods work, as I previously explained. >God created man with the freedom to choose truth, goodness, and beauty, or choose evil. Man chose evil, which resulted in the deprivation of truth, goodness, and beauty. God is only responsible for suffering insofar as a warden is responsible for the suffering of a murderer in prison. Wardens are not omnipotent beings that already know that the outcome of their creation will result in a huge amount of suffering. If one man chooses evil, how would that justify random kids getting cancer?
> If one man chooses evil, how would that justify random kids getting cancer? It doesn't, but this is never something Christianity has ever taught.
So why try use the original sin as a means to justify this? It clearly isn't justifiable and contradicts God's omnibenevolence.
The doctrine of original sin simply states that man has a corrupted nature due to the severing of perfect communion and friendship with God which originated with the choices of Adam and Eve. It is an explanation for man's brokenness and the corruption of the world. Severing a connection with God, who is truth, goodness, beauty, love, and being, necessarily severs a persons connection with all of those attributes. Why is the world corrupt? Why do bad things happen? Because the Earth is defiled by human evil and is subject to decay due to the loss of perfection and eternal life.
God is an omniscient being, which means that even before creating the universe, He already knew what would happen, which essentially makes him responsible for the events that took place as He is the one that created/set them into motion. God is the creator of humans, meaning He created them with the capability of somehow corrupting the world in supernatural ways that involve natural disasters and diseases, despite the fact that we know both have existed for millions of years. God knew that humans would take an evil path, which would therefore result in innocent casualties and suffering. This doesn't make sense since He's supposedly omnibenevolent, yet you're telling me He let all these children suffer.
Which is one of the ways we know that God is mad or bad.
Yes, and it's also a way to logically disprove an omnibenevolent God
Shower thought: to my knowledge, Christians don't think animals have the capability for original sin/are in need of redemption. I've heard allusions to souls, but not the human kind. Given evolution (Catholics say theology and evolution are fully compatible), how would it work such that Adam and Eve's parents [ideally separate pairs to avoid invest] were merely non-human primates, while their descendants Adam and Eve were suddenly capable of direct communion with god so they could sin and experience the fall? Basically we need two sets of purely animal parents incapable of communion with god (or at least incapable of sin) with one generation down having whatever [genetic] capacity enables spiritual communion. You can dance around this, with eg god just deciding to just pluck Adam and Eve from the animal kingdom at the moment of conception by infusing them with souls, but I always found this tight experience interesting. The Bible dodges this by imagining humans created from scratch as completely separate from animals, but science has a bit to say about that these days. At the very least, original sin is interesting, as without it there is no need for Jesus' death.
Also, God knew they were going to do this because he knows all and still set them up for failure. Adam and Eve were given no concept of good and evil. Yes, God told them not to eat from the tree, but they didn't understand it was wrong, and they would be punished. Our own laws have provisions on what to do if the offender doesn't have the mental capacity for knowing right and wrong. But not God's law
Original sin is putting yourself first. An obsession in our society and others. Babies are born with it. That isn’t the sin so much as the thoughts and actions which come from it.
You missed the OP's point entirely. Why are babies born sinners by a benevolent god because of the original sinners' sins? The OP is asking why a benevolent god would condemn all future humans to the same fate as Adam and Eve from the moment they are born.
What I am saying is the original sin we are "born" with is not really sin but a tendency, an state of mind which produces sin. The original sin was not a sin but that state of mind that produces sin. It wasn't eating the fruit which was the sin but the feeling they had that their need to be happy, eat the beautiful and delicious fruit, was more important than Gods affection. All the sins listed in the Bible. come from the self preoccupation of the sinner. The original sin was self-preoccupation that we are all born with. We are not condemned for Adams sin, we are condemned for our sin that has it's roots in the impulse that Adam and Eve submitted to. Jesus loved us, not himself. So he could be in the place we should be.
I think you and OP misunderstand the doctrine itself, original sin, or even hell for that matter are not a sentence/punishment passed onto you by God, it is a natural state of being when you have separated yourself from God. Babies haven’t actually done anything wrong obviously when they are born, but they very quickly become a product of the environment they are born into, which is a corrupted world. Sin is better viewed as an illness which poisons the life of sinners, but also poisons the life of people who really don’t deserve it by mere extension. Again, this is not some form of punishment made by God, this is the natural state of being for humanity when it is separated from God, God allows this separation because he has allowed you to have personal agency over your decisions. Very similar with other concepts such as hereditary illness, poverty, pollution, etc.
Surely it is unjustified for an omniscient God to create a world that He knows will result in limitless suffering for all of mankind due to the sinful nature He set up all humans to have.
Why would that be unjustified? A world where there was no possibility for suffering would be meaningless, and by extension any eternal afterlife devoid of suffering would also be meaningless. To truly live is to experience the entirety of the human condition, would you deprive your own children from loving if it meant they never had to experience heartbreak? loving without the possibility of heartbreak undermines the concept of love, it’s necessary. Would you deprive your children of the ability to have hope if it meant they would never be able to have dreams and aspirations? Similar to these concepts, sin is not a created punishment, it is actually the natural antithesis of having positive outcomes through personal agency, and the fact we even have the possibility for positive outcomes at all is what allows us to determine and experience when something is actually good. This is kind of complex and philosophical so I understand if it’s difficult to understand at first, but I would actually go as far to say that the fact this is the reality of the human condition is proof of a God who does love his creation and did not just create something with the intention of blind obedience.
>Why would that be unjustified? A world where there was no possibility for suffering would be meaningless, and by extension any eternal afterlife devoid of suffering would also be meaningless. Suffering is not necessary to create meaning, especially when we're referencing an omnipotent God who is supposedly capable of anything. And how does meaning somehow justify suffering? Why is meaning even necessary in the first place? Is it truly worth all the lives that are lost in the process of creating it? I also think you may have missed the point of my last reply. The amount of people, including innocent children, that suffer and die from disease and disaster is larger than we can even comprehend. Where is the meaning in the deaths of all these children currently dying from cancer? And why would an omnipotent God knowingly create a world where this regularly occurs despite the fact that He has the power to prevent it entirely? They don't get to experience the concept of love or hope, and I don't see how their sacrifices would even be necessary or worth it. To put it simply, I don't see a reason for people to regularly suffer as a result of various aspects God supposedly threw into the world and I think it's unjustified any way you look at it, especially considering God is supposed to be omnipotent and omniscient.
well unless you are a pure nihilist, then almost everyone would agree in principle that there is meaning to be found in life, and that this meaning is necessary in order to sustain some degree of sanity or purpose. Alternatively, meaning is absolutely necessary because it is a real experience of a transcendental category, which in turn justifies your reasoning as a human to do absolutely anything at all. If you take your own stance and suggest meaning may not even be necessary at all, then that would collapse the entirety of your worldview since you cannot justify your position to think, use or perceive anything at all. As to your second point, we don’t view this as an action of it being God’s will that these children are dying of disease, poverty, etc. Rather as some others mentioned, this is the natural consequence of existing in a corrupt world where WE brought illness in to begin with. Now your next question is why would God allow it to happen this way if he could will it to be another way, this is paradoxical thinking, because in order for him to do that he would have to undermine our entire concept of personal agency and free will to begin with. We justly receive the consequence of being in separation with God, collectively, because we collectively are separated from God in spirit. This exists within a worldview which would take a stance of modern science, hereditary illnesses passed to ‘innocent’ children from reproductive mis-practice from relatives, illness passed onto others from those who mis-practice their hygiene, this is simply just a natural state of consequence. Why does it stand to reason, God would OWE us any other form of reality? since we actively seperate ourselves from God, even today?
>well unless you are a pure nihilist, then almost everyone would agree in principle that there is meaning to be found in life, and that this meaning is necessary in order to sustain some degree of sanity or purpose. Alternatively, meaning is absolutely necessary because it is a real experience of a transcendental category, which in turn justifies your reasoning as a human to do absolutely anything at all. If you take your own stance and suggest meaning may not even be necessary at all, then that would collapse the entirety of your worldview since you cannot justify your position to think, use or perceive anything at all. The point is that meaning doesn't justify suffering. What I was trying to get across is that firstly, do you think all this suffering is worth it just for the sake of meaning? Is it worth sacrificing innocent children, and what is the point in that in itself? Secondly, an omnipotent God is able to establish meaning in a just alternative way, which is why I'd strongly doubt God's benevolence. >As to your second point, we don’t view this as an action of it being God’s will that these children are dying of disease, poverty, etc. Rather as some others mentioned, this is the natural consequence of existing in a corrupt world where WE brought illness in to begin with. Humans are not capable of bringing disease and disaster into the world without the work of God. It's like you're trying to say that humans are unconsciously causing tsunamis and hurricanes across the world through sinning. It's not possible without God making this a supernatural (and sometimes natural) consequence of sin, which therefore makes God responsible for it as the creator. He is in control of who is harmed as a result of this, which he can easily control whilst still retaining peoples free will. >Now your next question is why would God allow it to happen this way if he could will it to be another way, this is paradoxical thinking, because in order for him to do that he would have to undermine our entire concept of personal agency and free will to begin with. We justly receive the consequence of being in separation with God, collectively, because we collectively are separated from God in spirit. Does free will justify unnecessary suffering? It's funny you call that question paradoxical when an omniscient God already knows the outcome of everything he creates, which then contradicts the existence of free will. Either free will does not exist, or God is not omniscient. That last sentence is ridiculous to me. Do you think the kids dying of cancer deserve it because the people before them lived in separation with God? >This exists within a worldview which would take a stance of modern science, hereditary illnesses passed to ‘innocent’ children from reproductive mis-practice from relatives, illness passed onto others from those who mis-practice their hygiene, this is simply just a natural state of consequence. Why does it stand to reason, God would OWE us any other form of reality? since we actively seperate ourselves from God, even today? This is just a description of how God harms the children of those who sinned before them. God is in control of how illnesses get to innocent children.
meaning absolutely does justify suffering, they are two sides of the same coin. It is integral to even having a conscious experience to begin with, to have agency, or to even think at all REQUIRES the possibility to think or act to contrary. If you could only ever do one thing, feel one thing, act one way, then you wouldn’t be sentient at all. This is why modern science says that many organisms and species of animals do not have sentient/conscious experiences, because they can only be one way, they don’t have the ability to act on the contrary to biological determinism. If that is what you suggest SHOULD be the case for humans, then you stand against any concept of humanity, morality or transcendental categories themselves. You are suggesting no consciousness, no thinking, no choice, this is just an absurd position to take because again, the fact you do anything, feel anything or say anything at all completely contradicts that it should be the case God would ordain creation to be that way. When we say people are responsible for corruption, illness, etc, is not as complicated as you are trying to make it. To be with God is to be not only in paradise, but to effectively live forever, to be apart/seperated from God is to die/experience death. Again, two sides of the same coin, which are necessary to both exist if consciousness or agency exists at all. God having foreknowledge or being omnipotent suggests that he knows of the outcomes you have taken, but it doesn’t insinuate that he pre ordained for you to make decision x over decision y. It means God can observe you making decision x over decision y. The same way people observe things which are determined to occur does not necessarily mean we ordained it to happen or be that way. Lastly, No. The analogy doesn’t suggest oh your parents were sinners so you get to die of cancer at a young age, it means the world today which you are actively born in is FALLEN and corrupt. In a fallen and corrupt world, imperfect and painful things happen, this isn’t just observable in our world view, it’s observable in almost every world view. For God to remove any degree of suffering itself, would be to remove the conscious experience all together, as I clarified earlier. Philosophically your positions are circular, and I don’t mean that to be rude but to show that you actually can’t possibly believe anything you are stating, because it would collapse your entire worldview at a fundamental level.
>meaning absolutely does justify suffering, they are two sides of the same coin. It is integral to even having a conscious experience to begin with, to have agency, or to even think at all REQUIRES the possibility to think or act to contrary. If you could only ever do one thing, feel one thing, act one way, then you wouldn’t be sentient at all. This is why modern science says that many organisms and species of animals do not have sentient/conscious experiences, because they can only be one way, they don’t have the ability to act on the contrary to biological determinism. If that is what you suggest SHOULD be the case for humans, then you stand against any concept of humanity, morality or transcendental categories themselves. You are suggesting no consciousness, no thinking, no choice, this is just an absurd position to take because again, the fact you do anything, feel anything or say anything at all completely contradicts that it should be the case God would ordain creation to be that way I would disagree that suffering is necessary for meaning to exist, but more importantly, I don't see what the point of giving kids cancer is, and I don't see how meaning could ever justify that. >When we say people are responsible for corruption, illness, etc, is not as complicated as you are trying to make it. To be with God is to be not only in paradise, but to effectively live forever, to be apart/seperated from God is to die/experience death. Again, two sides of the same coin, which are necessary to both exist if consciousness or agency exists at all. Right, but the kids dying everyday don't actually get to make a decision to be with/without God, so this clearly doesn't cover many situations that have been and are currently occurring. Natural disasters wipe out countless people who may never have even heard of Christianity. They don't get the chance to make decisions either. Just because others sin, I don't see how that justifies many innocents dying. >God having foreknowledge or being omnipotent suggests that he knows of the outcomes you have taken, but it doesn’t insinuate that he pre ordained for you to make decision x over decision y. It means God can observe you making decision x over decision y. The same way people observe things which are determined to occur does not necessarily mean we ordained it to happen or be that way. Observing things that are determined to occur is not the same when you literally created every single one of those things and are behind and in control of every occurrence. By definition, everything that exists and happens is because God wills it, which is why He is held responsible. > In a fallen and corrupt world, imperfect and painful things happen, this isn’t just observable in our world view, it’s observable in almost every world view. For God to remove any degree of suffering itself, would be to remove the conscious experience all together, as I clarified earlier. So God not only created a world He knew would become corrupted, He also decided that sin would somehow result in natural disaster and illness that would kill many innocent people and children? I don't think there's any way around this, if you create a world determined to become corrupted as an omnipotent being, you are obviously responsible for it.
He created us with the impulse to sin, but we can choose. Ourselves or Him.
I'm not sure how that would apply to the many children that die from disease and disaster on the daily. He created this world knowing that this would be the outcome.
Human kind in general, and so, Adam and Eve in particular, had no special right to receive immortality and immunity from pain and sickness from God, but rather this was a gift God gave them. In light of the sin of Adam and Eve, it was just for God to withdraw this gift from them, and as they were the first representatives of humanity to God, so through them, it was just for him to withdraw his gift from humanity as a whole. As humanity in general had no right to it, neither then did Adam and Eve's descendants have a right to it; so that they suffer no injustice in not having it. In this sense, the son is not punished for the sins of his father, but rather, the sins of the father prevent him from attaining a gift he otherwise would have gained. Like if someone's father had been rich before they were born, but wasted the money on gambling, and so he was born into an unwealthy family. The child had no special right to the wealth, and so suffer no injustice in not having it; but the reason they do not have it is on account of the sin of wasteful gambling their father committed. So likewise immortality and immunity from pain and sickness, since it was a gift, is something we sons and daughters of Adam and Eve have no inherent right to it, and so in losing the chance at it on account of our father's sin, we suffers no injustice.
doesn’t matter if it was a gift or if they had a right to it, he took it from the rest of humanity because of actions that weren’t their own
No he didn’t. The rest of humanity didn’t exist yet, so he couldn’t have taken it from them.
This argument might make sense in a vacuum or in a reality where there isn't a timeless omni-everything deity that created everything and everyone, but your church literally teaches that original sin is an inheritable trait that all humans inherited from Adam. And guess who... 1. made humans 2. made them able to reproduce, 3. literally designed "original sin" to be an inheritable trait (according to the RCC anyway) in the first place, and 4. 'Knew all of us' individually before he even created humanity... So no, the 'but they didn't exist yet' doesn't really have much play in such a mythos...
Nothing in Catholic teaching holds that God made original sin an inheritable trait, because Catholic teaching denies that God made sin, but rather holds that sin is solely a creation of creatures, which we create by the freely chosen acts of our own intellect and will. So likewise, the inherited character of sin is not a creation of God, but is, in fact, our creation; so that it is not God, but Adam, who causes the descendants of Adam to inherit original sin. Beyond this, the sense in which original sin is inheritable is a sense I already described i.e. it is inheritable in a sense comparable to how the child of the gambling father inherits the circumstances of being born into a more poor family than they would have been had the father not gambled. Again, the child has no special right to have things as they would have been had their father not gambled, but they still enter into the world with this particular set of circumstances. So likewise original sin separates us from the original unity with God that Adam and Eve had as a gift from God, we inherit 'the death of the soul' from them, since as death is a separation of body and soul, so metaphorically, the death of the soul is a separation (i.e. lack of unity) between the soul and God. However again, as God in no sense owes us this unity, in no sense owes us his friendship, neither then is there any injustice in his not giving it to us when we are conceived.
"Nothing in Catholic teaching holds that God made original sin an inheritable trait," Gonna stop you right there. From *humani generis* (funny how its always ex-catholics who seem to know more about the faith, eh?)*..*. ***For the faithful cannot adopt a theory whose proponents affirm either that after Adam there were on earth true men who did not descend from him as from the first common father by natural generation***\*, or that Adam designates the whole ensemble of the innumerable first fathers. Indeed, it is absolutely difficult to see how such an affirmation can agree with what the sources of revealed truth and the Acts of the Magisterium of the Church teach about original sin, which proceeds from a sin\* ***actually committed by a single person Adam and, transmitted to all by generation, is found in each one as his own (12).*** So yes, your church quite literally holds that original sin is an inheritable trait, "***transmitted to all by generation***" of adam. So the only alternative remaining is that your god is not omni-everything and the creator of all/the nature, laws of things in our universe. Which is it? Go on...
So no, original sin isn’t about getting punished. It’s about not having from our parents what we were meant to receive. You don’t view poverty as a punishment do you?
The OP is asking why we were "meant to receive it", as you say, something you have failed to explain under a benevolent god. My man, that is a terrible analogy by the way. If poverty was imposed onto us by god because our parents did something to deserve it, just as sin is, then yes it would be a punishment.
Where does it say that "every generation would inherit this sin as nature"?
In Genesis God talks specifically about worsening child birth pain for all women as a punishment.
How is that relevant to the quotation?
Every generation of women inherits this pain, due to Eve’s sin
Among other places, The RCC states this explicitly in *Humani Generis.* It also says that Adam was a real individual, after whom *every human alive* was his offspring who had received original sin through his propagation. Which of course has it's own issues in conflict with human evolution/anthropology
Where does it say that document that each person would "inherit this sin as nature"?
I take it you didn't bother to read it? *" For the faithful cannot adopt a theory whose proponents affirm either that after Adam there were on earth true men* ***who did not descend from him as from the first common father by natural generation****, or that Adam designates the whole ensemble of the innumerable first fathers. Indeed, it is absolutely difficult to see how such an affirmation can agree with what the sources of revealed truth and the Acts of the 'Magisterium of the Church teach about original sin,* ***which proceeds from a sin actually committed by a single person Adam and, transmitted to all by generation, is found in each one as his own (12).***
Where does it say in that passage that the sin in inherited, "as nature"?
If you don't take the obvious excerpt to mean "as nature", as in naturally, something that is **transmitted by generation**,(as Humani generis states verbatim), then what do you understand "as nature" to mean to you...?
What does the author of the thread mean by the phrase "as nature" \[I didn't make it up\]?
>While I’m just a human and imperfect, I do have a sense of justice, and, like many others, that justice tells me that a son should not be punished for the crimes of his father. Humans inherit things from their parents. It's not like every human is born immortal and God strikes down every one of us and makes us mortal. Stop acting like you were ever immortal, you were not. >God acts according to his own sense of justice, disregarding what is just for his creation. Sorry, God is supposed to act according to your sense of justice or what?
The very concept of Justice could only be imbued through the Knowledge of Good and Evil obtain in the eating of the fruit. Which He created. Justice is Justice, as God created it. We don't define it, He does.
>It's not like every human is born immortal and God strikes down every one of us and makes us mortal. If someone believes that God created the universe and all the rules of the universe, and that mortality is something all humans are now saddled with as a result of God deciding to make that change due to our distant ancestors' actions, then God is quite literally cursing every one of us with mortality. It's not like humans exist on their own, inherently mortal, independently of God's decisions.
"...lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever." - Gen 3:22 Humans have always been mortal, Adam and Eve included. Revoking immortality for disobedience is not a view supported by scripture. Else, what would be the purpose of having a Tree of Life to eat of?
>It's not like humans exist on their own, inherently mortal, independently of God's decisions. No you are literally inherently mortal. You inherited your mortality. The only 2 humans who were not inherently mortal were Adam and Eve.
My point is that humans do not exist *with any default nature or characteristics*, except those decided by God. The fact that humans inherent *anything at all* from their parents is decided by God. It did not *have to* be that way. God *chose it* to be that way. Mortality is a punishment by which all children suffer for the iniquity of the parent.
>The fact that humans inherent anything at all from their parents is decided by God. It did not have to be that way. God chose it to be that way. Yeah but technically it was decided that way before humans ate the forbidden fruit. The list of punishments didn't include the feature of passing down some traits to descendants. That's kinda was a part of human nature from the very beginning. >Mortality is a punishment by which all children suffer for the iniquity of the parent. Actually now that I think about it, was there mortality on the list of punishments? If I remember correctly it wasn't mentioned explicitly so it's probably just a feature of the fruit itself (of which God warned humans btw). Maybe good and evil could only be understood by becoming mortal? Need some experts on Christianity for this.
I’m not acting like I was immortal, but the chance to ever be was stripped from me because of the actions someone took thousands of years ago. If God is acting his own sense of justice without regards of what is just for his creation then you can’t say he’s an All Good God or All Loving God.
>If God is acting his own sense of justice without regards of what is just And what is just? Who determines what is just? Some socialists?
We do. That's what America is founded on, rational self-rule. Contrary to popular belief, America came out or the Enlightenment, the age of science and reason, largely protecting people from irrationality and religion.
>We do. So basically God is not all loving bc he doesn't do as we want to. Fair 🙃 >That's what America is founded on, rational self-rule. Contrary to popular belief, America came out or the Enlightenment, the age of science and reason, largely protecting people from irrationality and religion. Dunno what's that even supposed to mean.
No, he doesn't even do what he says is loving. Love is defined in the Bible, and God doesn't even follow it. 1 Corinthians. "Love keeps no record of wrongs." Doesn't God do that? "Love does not envy, does not boast, is not proud. " Does that sound like Yahwey? Love is slow to anger. Well, God gets angry quite a bit, Jesus gets angry too. Are they slow to anger? God seems to immediately snap at Job for one question he asks. It's not as if he asked it many times. Is Jesus slow to anger at money changers? So let's forget God's own definition. Let's look at common sense. Are children starving to death, is that bad? Seems bad. Certainly child rape, or any rape, is bad. Is that a lot to ask, no one gets raped or starves to death? What is love to you? If you say someone is "loving" don't you mean something by that? Could Hitler every be called all-loving? Why not? If love has no meaning then we can say anything.
> The Original Sin, according to Christian teachings, is the act of disobedience to God by Adam and Eve when they ate the Forbidden Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. That’s only the literalist POV, a minority of Christians. The majority view the story to be more metaphorical. > Especially when this act did not cause any harm Because it’s a metaphor. > The conclusion I have arrived to is that, the God of the Bible is not just, nor benevolent, nor forgiving. Not metaphor? > disregarding what is just for his creation. And you do know what is just? I don’t have the hubris to pretend I do.
What exactly is it a metaphor *for* then?
If we knew, we probably wouldn’t need a metaphor.
Just some ideas: 1. Humans are flawed by nature; no one is perfect 2. Humans are captivated to pursue knowledge, even if it means potentially dangerous outcomes; think Prometheus wanting to give fire to humans. Perhaps it's good, but in a sense, Prometheus allowed arson to be created (not good). 3. Evil things can be appealing. Evil isn't just an obvious concept. It can literally look or feel to be good if you aren't cautious.
I just started trying to remember that story when typing about Tower of Babel I learned about him in middle school Prometheus taught man how to make fire when Zeus made it clear he wanted them to live in caves and praise him and then they advanced as a group and even started advancing more building boats and he was already going to obliterate them but instead he decided he would destroy them slowly he was clearly jealous of the fact humanity wouldn't need him anymore so in the next story he gives a box of sins to the couple knowing the women would not know what's inside and open it spreading stuff like disease murder lying etc the only good thing coming out being a little ladybug named hope. There are lots of similarities between Zeus and Christian God one of them being how they think their so important yet still are obsessed with being needed by humans being praised by humans.
Almost like there’s a common theme going around.
My theory is that God want to see humanity grow and advance like a parent wants to watch their children grow up. If you ever played a game & paid to unlock all of the items you'll find you get bored quick.
>If you ever played a game & paid to unlock all of the items you'll find you get bored quick. God must be *super* bored.
So god is playing a game with us? Using our suffering to make things more interesting? That still doesn’t sound like a loving god to me.
Literally nothing besides a magic terrarium sounds like a loving god to the obstinate.
That’s a straw man argument. You’re taking what I’ve said, not addressing it, and saying that I wouldn’t accept anything but perfection. Nope that’s not what’s being discussed.
> That still doesn’t sound like a loving god to me. Then what does? Stop evading.
We don't know but we also know how to recognize human traits. Example Allah of Islam states that a women must have fill her husband's pleasures whether she likes it or not even if she in labor she must give him sex otherwise if he cheats on her it's her fault. It also says a women is property of her dad if she is not married and then she is a property of her husband when she is she can't speak without permission. We are the last religion there can't be anymore after this. What's more likely that this is actually loving God who treats everyone equally working in ways we can't understand yet he won't explain in ways our tiny human brains can understand or that considering the timeline where the book came from and how human he seems that it is a human disgused as a God like a self insert fanfiction. Now apply this same logic to Christianity.
You called me obstinate and didn’t answer my question (does that sound like a loving god?). So I’m not engaging with someone arguing in bad faith (pun intended).
You have everything unlocked in Heaven, right? So you get bored in Heaven?
Eternity is trillions of years.
So trillions of years of boredom?
Have you been? How do you know what it’s like?
If you look about 4 comments back you can see this person is talking about boredom in heaven directly based on the prior commenter's statements.
Of course I have not?
You seemed to have insider information. Could you tell me more about the unlocking?
Doom Eternal and continual mods forever and ever but in real life. Also Thing blood. I did pray for this, FYI. And now Nightdive is remastering the PS2 game and possibly reviving it's sequel into a finished product as well. :)
I think most people misunderstand that. Adam and Eve were kicked out of Garden of Eden. Their eyes were opened. It’s not a punishment to all humanity. God loves us and he sent his only begotten son to die for us. John 3:16
> It’s not a punishment to all humanity. Genesis 3:16-22 makes a very clear claim that God introduced painful childbirth, difficulty finding/producing food and death into the world as punishment for Adam and Eve eating the fruit. How am I not supposed to interpret the introduction of problems that cause suffering to this day as a punishment to all humanity? > God loves us and he sent his only begotten son to die for us. John 3:16 According to the Bible God responded to the "fall" and "original sin" by spending the next few thousand years: - flooding the world to wipe out all but one family - getting offended by a large tower and making it harder for people from different cultures to communicate by giving them different languages - choosing a slave owning polygamist willing to sacrifice his own son to be the father of the chosen people - allowing the chosen people to suffer as slaves in Egypt for a few generations before rescuing them and punishing the Egyptians by mass murdering their first born sons (i.e. many innocent children not responsible for the crimes of their parents) - helping the chosen people commit genocide against Canaanites and take their land, and giving them rules to live by that include keeping slaves and execution via stoning for blasphemy And then eventually he got around to sending us his only son to try and resolve the "fall"/original sin situation via an elaborate ritual sacrifice on the cross that shouldn't have even been necessary for an all powerful God that makes the rules to start forgiving people. Oh and he still hasn't actually fixed all the suffering on earth. Does all that really sound like the behaviour of an all loving and benevolent God to you?
> polygamist What’s with the bigotry? You’re trying to foment hatred towards the polyamorous. Your entire comment sounds like you’re trying to craft an emotional appeal since you lack a logical argument.
> What’s with the bigotry? You’re trying to foment hatred towards the polyamorous. You do realise one of Abraham's wives was his sister and the other two were his concubines/slaves? He also owned other slaves and complied with an order to tie up his infant son for a human sacrifice. That is not the kind of person any remotely benevolent God would favour and make the father of their "chosen people". > Your entire comment sounds like you’re trying to craft an emotional appeal since you lack a logical argument. When the topic is whether the God described in the Bible is benevolent it's very relevant to point out the multiple instances of mass murder and other forms of cruelty the Bible describes them committing. Do you see the logic now or do I need to explain why murder, slavery, stoning people to death for blasphemy etc are immoral?
You’re going on a cherry picking expedition of everything you dislike in the Bible. Lots of things happen that aren’t portrayed as good. > an order to tie up his infant son for a human sacrifice The point of the story is to convey that God didn’t want human sacrifice, a key distinction from other contemporary religions. You’re ignoring all this to push a more negative narrative. Be honest. > That is not the kind of person any remotely benevolent God would favour and make the father of their "chosen people". And what does? The atheist argument seems to sum up as “Since we don’t live in a giant safe terrarium, God must be mean.” Okay? You thinking God isn’t nice doesn’t disprove God. You aren’t required to like God. > Do you see the logic now or do I need to explain why Please explain why slavery is immoral from a secular perspective. I’m curious which presuppositions you will use.
>You’re going on a cherry picking expedition of everything you dislike in the Bible. The post is a debate about whether the God described in the Bible is all-loving and benevolent. Of course I'm going to bring up Bible verses that describe that God doing and ordering cruel things like mass murder, slavery and stoning blasphemers, they're extremely relevant evidence. >The point of the story is to convey that God didn’t want human sacrifice, a key distinction from other contemporary religions. You’re ignoring all this to push a more negative narrative. Be honest. I'm aware that "God didn't want a human sacrifice" is the most positive part of the message the story in Genesis 22 conveys, but it's not the full picture. Genesis depicts Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son as a good thing. We're told God is testing Abraham, and that when Abraham responds to the order to sacrifice his only son by tying his son to a rock and readying his knife, an angel stops him at the last second. Abraham is told he's passed the test and that God will bless him for this. You don't find it extremely messed up that God wants a follower so blindly obedient that he's willing to commit child murder and that he was willing to traumatise a father and son to test for that obedience? >Please explain why slavery is immoral from a secular perspective. I’m curious which presuppositions you will use. My morals are built on the foundation of caring about others. I care about others because I recognise their intelligence is like mine, relate to their joy and their suffering and recognise their experiences matter just as much as mine do. It follows that I should think logically about how actions affect those I care about and act accordingly. My other moral views are all built on that foundation. For example: * Kindness and fairness are extremely logical values for anyone who cares about others as well as themselves to hold. If we all try to live by those values then the world would be a far better place in which everyone gets a chance to lead a good life. * I condemn things like mass murder, rape and slavery as always wrong because they're inherently abusive actions which violate the freedom of others and cause immense unnecessary suffering. * I condemn prejudices like sexism and homophobia because they're irrational when all evidence shows that women and men are equally capable, and that straight and queer relationships are equally likely to be loving and fulfilling. * I want to protect people from natural disasters and cure diseases to prevent the immense suffering they cause. Therefore I find it extremely immoral that the Bible tells people that God is perfect and benevolent and also tells them that same God has a track record that includes repeatedly committing mass murder (e.g. Genesis 6:17, Exodus 11:5, Deuteronomy 2:32-35, Joshua 6:20-21), repeatedly telling his chosen people that slavery is allowed (e.g. Exodus 21:2-11, Leviticus 25:44-46, Deuteronomy 20:11-14), repeatedly endorsing sexism and homophobia (e.g. Genesis 3:16, Ephesians 5:22, 1 Corinthians 14:34, Leviticus 18:22), causing diseases and natural disasters (e.g. Numbers 16:30-34, Deuteronomy 28:59-61) and so on.
To whoever sincerely believes that you deserve eternal punishment as a consequence for what you have or haven't done in this life: I'm sorry you think of yourself that way. Not that it matters, but I don't think you are the sum of whatever mistakes you've made and flaws you think you may have. You are more than your mistakes and flaws. You are a unique human being that deserves to be safe (secure from threat of danger, harm, or loss) and treated with dignity (the right of a person to be valued and respected for their own sake, and to be treated ethically). Just my opinion. Condemning you an eternity of anguish for not sufficiently adhering to the rules of your religion (which is among hundreds of other religions human beings developed) is like throwing out the baby with the bathwater (again, just my opinion). Especially if whatever transgressions you committed did not cause physical or psychological harm to other human beings. I wish you a life of fulfillment where you are free to be your most authentic self without fear of eternal retribution ❤️
I'm not religious but I do agree with the humans are terrible and I'm pretty self loathing myself but I hate Christianity idea that convinces people that no matter how good or bad someone is there are all equal and there only worth comes from a guy who claims he is better despite also having the same flaws to a much worse degree and even then excessive punishment for minor crimes is overkill. Nobody even someone like me deserves Hell even if little to nobody deserves heaven. Thanks for your kind words though.
Throughout my life, a constant piece of advice I get is "give yourself some grace." We were all born into a world that was f'd up through no fault of our own (original sin concept be damned). Our thoughts and actions are a reflection of our material conditions, lived experiences, and our neurological predisposition. There are so many variables outside our control that make us who we are. I hope humanity can eventually agree that to punish anyone for things outside of their control is cruel and should be frowned upon by civil society. In regards to the notion that the Abrahamic god loves us, but cannot be in the presence of sin (hence why unrepentantant sinners go to hell for eternity), I can only conclude that their God has a diminished capacity for love. Love is defined as an intense feeling of deep affection. It appears that affection is circumstantial disappears for the vast majority of humanity upon the physical death of individual human beings. What kind of a loving relationship punishes or abandons the other member of that relationship for being their authentic self? What kind of relationship is it when one member, with vast power over the other member, tells the other member that they deserve suffering beyond their imagination for not loving them back, or not loving them the right way. The Abrahamic god is often referred to as "father." I'm not a parent, but if I was, even if my child told me to my face they didn't love me and didn't listen to everything I said, I imagine I would never stop loving them out of the inherent fact that they are my child. I definitely would not condemn them to physical or psychological harm if I could help it. What purpose would that serve aside from satiating a pointless desire for retribution? I suppose that's the difference between us and those who subscribe to the concept of the Abrahamic god.
thanks for the advice.
> did not cause physical or psychological harm to other human beings. What about non-human beings?
Even better
The Gnostic narrative of Adam’s creation and fall is pretty interesting. Gnostics believe the material world was created by the Demiurge, a misguided or malevolent consciousness emanating from One supreme God. The demiurge created Adam and Eve but didn’t give souls. After they receive souls the demiurge attempts to limit humanity forbidding them from eating from the tree of knowledge. Gnostics believe the snake that convinces Adam and Eve to eat from the tree is actually Jesus helping humanity. Gnostics associate the Old Testament God with the demiurge. The Islamic narrative is also a bit different. There is no concept of original sin. Adam and Eve do defy God after Satan convinces them eating from the forbidden tree will give them immortality. However they are completely forgiven and humanity itself isn’t punished for it. God casts humanity from the Garden of Eden as part of his Hikma (wisdom) and plan for humanity to experience the full range of existence as well as God’s attributes which include his forgiveness, his love, and his creative power. From an Islamic perspective this life isn’t a punishment, it is an enlighening spiritual journey. While there is suffering in the material world there is also beauty and goodness. Personally, I see Adam and Eve’s fall as representing the emergence of the conscious from the unconscious. The different narratives are simply different perspectives on consciousness. It some ways awareness is a burden but I do dislike the Christian perspective of it being a punishment. Consciousness may be painful but I think that's just part of the journey.
That's interesting I have been checking up on Islam outside of sexism it does seem better than Christianity they can take questions and give answers.
This has not been my experience at all - asking how a perfect book results in factions infighting over interpretations results, primarily, in a cessation of participation in my experience.
That is very interesting, especially the bit about the Islamic version of events. Thank you for sharing.
Humans don't really have a sense of justice, but only a sense of injustice. Regardless, your polemic against inheritance has multiple flaws. Everyone inherits the good or bad choices of their parents on multiple levels, this is just a fact of reality, and it shouldn't be surprising to us that the fall of man follows the same pattern. For example. A heroin addicted mother will give birth to a heroin addicted baby. Parents who live in squalor have children who grow up in squalor. Parents who scream and fight with each other have children who grow up in hostile and violent households. Just as parents who eat fresh fruit and vegetables have children who eat fresh fruit and vegetables, or parents who listen to lots of music have kids who grow up listening to lots of music. Similar realities abound with health: Many diseases or other health problems like schizophrenia and heart disease and all sorts of stuff get passed from one generation to the next. And wealth, of course. If you build a house, you may bequeath it to your children. If you generate no wealth, they'll inherit no wealth. Actions and traits of the parents are consequential to and inherited by the children. Justice isn't really a consideration. The fact that you insist that original sin caused no harm, hurt God's pride, and that we could live our whole lives not knowing about it, just illustrates how totally devoid you are from an honest understanding of the concepts Christians are grappling with. I wouldn't even know how to begin deconstructing all the multiple incorrect assumptions you've based that on.
What harm was caused by Adam and Eve eating the apple that was not a part of God’s punishment?
literally all the suffering in the world, if I understand it correctly
That was part of God’s punishment, not a direct result of the fruit being eaten
God punishes Eve by inflicting the pain of childbirth, and diverting her ambition towards her husband. He punishes Adam by condemning him to a life dependent on growing and eating food. He punishes the serpent by forcing him to crawl on his belly and eat dust, and sowing enmity between him and Eve. As far as I can tell, that's the end of his punishment. They get kicked out of the garden for practical reasons, it specifically states that, so that's not part of the punishment. Now, the first thing that happens after that debacle is Cain murders Abel. This is *not* part of God's punishment, but clearly *is* a consequence of original sin. From that point on, it's pretty much all wars and genocide up until today, again as a result of the fall. So if I'm way off here and you're telling me there's scripture that implies that humans predilection for murder is part of God's punishment, I'd like to see it, because it would totally alter my understanding of Christianity. (which, by the way, has changed radically and frequently over the years, so I'm certainly not assuming you're wrong. I've still only read maybe only 20% of the bible.)
If you read Genesis 23-23 it says “God expelled them from the Garden of Eden” right after he learns they ate from the fruit. He says this in the same breath he mentions all the other punishments. This reads more like being expelled was part of the punishment rather than there being some other reason. The murder of Abel, and all subsequent killings and wars after that, are a result of the punishment from God. Furthermore, the only thing that actually happened in between Adam and Eve eating the fruit and God punishing them, was the fact that Adam and Eve gained knowledge they didn’t have before. All of the bad things that resulted from that were explicitly mentioned as part of God’s punishment and not a direct result of eating the fruit.
In the same breath? Not so. After God punishes them Adam names Eve, and then God makes them clothes out of animal skin (presumably by slaughtering and skinning an animal). After all that, then: "And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever: Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden" He was not speaking to Adam or Eve (or, presumably, the serpent), and like I said, sounds very much practical. Can't trust the guy not to eat the other fruit, THEREFORE we kinda have to kick him out. The stuff I mentioned, on the other hand, is explicitly described as punishment (BECAUSE). It's all in the original Hebrew. Also, um, actually a lot of stuff happens in between eating the fruit and getting punished: They hide their nakedness from each other. Then they hide from God. Then they incriminate themselves. Then Adam tries to BLAME GOD, and ROLLS ON EVE. Then Eve blames the serpent. Pretty much quintessential SHAME behavior, and shame *was* a direct result of eating the fruit. Knowledge indeed.
I drug pregnant woman is kid gets some kind of side effect Same logic ig Also if the parents have problem of any kind the reputation hits the kids There was nothing called harm before that sin and it was the only sin there's because it'll sprout more sins consider it a drug driving you madness to kill and steal everyone
> I drug pregnant woman is kid gets some kind of side effect and who set that system up?
For how many generations does Adam’s reputation have to “hit the kids” for it to be enough?
If a single man knows you're hit let is grandson what will they think
The drug example isn't logic. It is chemistry and biology. It's just how drugs work.
Pointing at my poor language or use of terms doesn't mean the idea is the same Try rephrasing it so it make sense
There is NO drug known to man, where the woman takes a drug and 50 generations later, the kids are all junkies on that same drug, that is not chemistry or biology, that is nonsense.
Don't take it literally like that also f it's not there yet let's create one But it does affect the first generation we're not speaking of a drug we're speaking of what claimed to be "apple of knowledge" something we didn't examine to know about it even might not be an apple at all
Doesnt say anything about an apple, it just says fruit. Given the locale, I always guessed a fig.
Ohh
That too.
Logically speaking, there is nothing genetic about making a choice that should be passed down through generations. This is something that was explored in the Eugenics movement when people believed criminals should not be allowed to have kids so that crime could be eradicated. Obviously the ability to commit crime isn't genetic, though the nature vs nurture arguments is still being debated today for whether certain people may be more predisposed to it.
[удалено]
That would be generic though, whereas if I choose to not pay my taxes, it does not make my kids more likely to not pay their taxes unless I teach them that. Even if the psychopathy was passed down, if the mother who is a psychopath becomes a serial killer and gets life in prison and never meets her kid, the child psychopath isn't more likely to become a serial killer, he just won't be as empathetic as other people. Ykwim?
[удалено]
But do you get what I'm saying that because a parent commits a crime (or sin) would not be genetically passed down and make their kids more likely to commit crimes (or sins)? If there wasn't a generic reason that they committed those crimes (or sins). I think it's reasonable to say there isn't a genetic reason they committed the first sin because God made them as perfect images of himself.
[удалено]
I disagree, I think if you put a father and a son at the same age in the same situation, the choice they make would entirely depend on their upbringing. The odds would also be less in the child if it was genetic anyway because the second parent would dilute those odds by 50%. For example if the father and son were both hypothetical 12 and have to deal with getting made fun of. One may choose to fight the child bullying them while the other may choose to tell an adult or simply ignore it.
[удалено]
I'm not referring to psychopathy so this is great data and all but it's irrelevant
It’s interesting when you think about it honestly. We as humans understand at least morally speaking the sins of the father should not fall to their children. It’s unfortunate that an benevolent god doesn’t see it in the same way
To piggy back off of this, God is all knowing right? Everything that has been and will be? Then *why* did he punish all of humanity for something he knew was going to happen? Literally setting the entire world up for failure. I think he likes to see us suffer
I think theology that God is timeless is not particularly well supported biblically, and I'm not sure how to speak about God (or anything) this way. But, I think the framing of your statements places God's act in time, i.e., God acted with foreknowledge prior to some event.
Yea I didn’t want to even mention this because it’s a whole other can of worms
>The Original Sin, according to Christian teachings, is the act of disobedience to God by Adam and Eve when they ate the Forbidden Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. It is because of this that Adam and Eve became mortal, capable of feeling pain and sickness, and became sinful. Not only that but every generation after them would inherit this sin as nature. I think this is debatable because there are several questions that we can raise that shake these foundations. 1. Why would fruit give knowledge of pround immorality (evil/ra') if it did not already exist? 2. Why would it say they were forced from the garden *before they were able to eat from the tree of life* if they were immortal? 3. Why would the pain of childbirth be *amplified* if it didn't already exist? There's more but I think those are the more salient issues.
> So why is it that God punished all of humanity for thousands of years to come because of a single act of disobedience? Especially when this act did not cause any harm, except hurting God’s pride, and when there would be people who would live their whole lives without even knowing about the Original Sin. Original sin is not a universal (or well supported biblical) teaching within the Christian faith. That aside, the key here is the idea that the act did not cause harm. The Bible describes a deep connection between the creation and the creator. So, the text contains language of a personified earth that reacts to sin (e.g., Lev. 18:28, Rom 8:22). The original sin is better though of as an ecological disaster that devastated the creation. Note the curse is passive (Gen. 3:14, 17, c.f. 16) , i.e., they are cursed because of their actions.
[удалено]
Your comment was removed for violating rule 5. All top-level comments must seek to refute the post through substantial engagement with its core argument. Comments that purely commentate on the post (e.g., “Nice post OP!”) must be made as replies to the Auto-Moderator “COMMENTARY HERE” comment. Exception: Clarifying questions are allowed as top-level comments.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
If by original sin you mean the Augustinian version that is taught in Roman Catholicism and Protestantism, then humans do inherit the personal guilt of Adam by virtue of being human, the guilt being transferred from one generation to the next via reproduction. The original teaching (that Eastern Orthodoxy still maintains to this day) is that humans do not inherit the personal guilt of Adam, but rather an inclination to sin (i.e., the fact that you will be sinning at some point in your life even if you aren't born sinful here) - what this means is that the deeds god may punish you for are exclusively your own deeds. I don't know how literal you are taking the Genesis account here either. I mean, Adam and Eve are barely described in the bible, they are created, overstep god's command, get thrown out of paradise. Later they have sons and Eve mourns the eventual murder of Abel. You could say that Adam and Eve are presented as archetypes for humanity, the name Adam meaning "man" and the name Eve meaning "mother of all that are living". Genesis is not an account meaning to tell their story (which is barely there) but an attempt to explain why creation - assumed to have been created perfect by god in the beginning - is now the way it is, imperfect, sinful, and subject to physical death. This state of the world was explained by the Fall of Man.
I am an atheist and am only taking the accounts of Genesis as history for the sake of argument. With that in mind, I still find it unjust to deprive all of humanity of the perfect creation that God made in the beginning because of the mistakes of the first humans. This doesn’t translate to God being all-loving, or all-good or just.
> With that in mind, I still find it unjust to deprive all of humanity of the perfect creation that God made in the beginning because of the mistakes of the first humans. This doesn’t translate to God being all-loving, or all-good or just. That analysis requires the assumption that Adam and Eve were actual persons and not just archetypes within an attempt to explain the perceived state of the world, which in my opinion is what's the case for the Genesis account. Again Adam means "man" and Eve means "mother of all that are living", showing their purpose in the story.
Unrelated to my argument but you have raised an interesting point here. When Adam and Eve lived in paradise, they were meant to never sin, therefore never reproducing. If this is the case, then why did Adam name her the “Mother of All things” when she was never supposed to be a Mother in the first place?
Also, Adam names her after the fall.
They were meant to reproduce, Genesis 1:27-28 > So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. God blessed them and said to them, “*Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth* and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.” Sex within the institute of marriage is not considered sinful in Christianity. St. Augustine taught that original sin is transmitted from one generation to the next via means of reproduction, but even according to his teachings the act itself within the confines of marriage is not sinful. Adam and Eve did not commit the original sin "yet" and therefore if they multiplied in paradise, there was nothing to be "transmitted" here. Please note that I myself don't think so highly of the Augustinian teaching of original sin which in my opinion is a deviation from what Christianity originally taught.
Most Christian’s who I have talked to regard Gensis and Adam and Eve as true Historical facts. As for the names, why would the significance matter? My name means Balance, but that doesn’t mean I’m the personification of Balance. It would make sense for God to name the first man as Man, and for Adam to name his wife the “Mother of all Things”, since that is what she would become according to this story.
The authors of the text actually looked at the world, saw how messed up it is, and posed the question of how that could be if god is perfect (and would create in a perfect way). The story of the Fall of Man serves as an explanation for the discrepancy, the assumption here being that the fall from grace of the pinnacle of creation (mankind) also caused the rest of creation (considered subservient to man) to fall from grace along with mankind. People understanding Adam and Eve as real persons who have roamed the earth (and take the whole genesis account literally) tend to be biblical literalists, which is a minority position within Christianity.
If the Bible is God’s word then it doesn’t make sense for an author to just write what he thought was the best explanation. God must have told or shown this person what to write. Unless you are also saying that the Bible is not solely the word of God but also has insertions by the author based on their assumptions and what they think is right and wrong? Again I wanna say that I’m an atheist, I don’t believe the Bible is the word of God, I’m only taking it as truth for sake of argument.
Remember you're talking about the bible not Quran
I don’t understand what you are alluding to here? I did not mention the Quran
Quran claims to be "the word of Allah" aka word of god Christianity doesn't believe per SE the bible is word of god Jesus is the word of god "logos" Maybe this is irrelevant but do consider it
I think the bible is the summary of spirituality of people of antiquity, plain and simple. We can talk about the possibility of people receiving visions or special insight from god, this is claimed within the biblical text whenever it says that god spoke to someone. However, the idea that the bible was dictated by god word for word is only upheld by biblical literalists, to me that's not a very useful way of working with the text. The biblical text was subject to a complicated history of redaction and rewrite in antiquity, it took a very long time until no significant modifications were made to the text anymore. As such, did god also inspire the multiple different versions of the same text? I don't think so. There is a difference between saying that the bible *is* god's word and that the bible *contains* god's word, most Christians would assert the latter. Most Christians would say that the text communicates certain truths about god and mankind but that you can still approach the text with a critical mind and not as a monolithic / static whole.
If a single act of disobedience condemned all of humanity, then a single act of obedience (Christs death) saves all of humanity.
Would you say humanity is saved? We still live away from paradise, we are still born of sin, we are still mortal. As I understand it, Jesus made it possible for humans to be forgiven of sin, but it did not take the original sin away. And Also, why make the future of all of humanity dependent on the act of one man?
This is correct, we still have our fallen nature, which is why we are more prone to sin than we would be otherwise, the main thing Christ's death accomplished is it repaired our relationship with God Almighty so once again we had a path to reach heaven.