New Apologetics Our continued response:
Considering that the Bible is a progressive revelation, here is how we address your question:
Exodus 20:5 reads: “For I, the LORD, your God, am a jealous God, inflicting punishment for their fathers’ wickedness on the children of those who hate me, down to the third and fourth generation…”
But a clearer picture of God’s character is revealed in Ezekiel 18:2
“Thus the word of the LORD came to me: Son of man, what is the meaning of this proverb that you recite in the land of Israel: “Fathers have eaten green grapes, thus their children’s teeth are on edge”? As I live, says the Lord GOD: I swear that there shall no longer be anyone among you who will repeat this proverb in Israel. For all lives are mine; the life of the father is like the life of the son, both are mine; only the one who sins shall die.”
If we are reading scripture in an uninformed way, these two verses are simply a contradiction. However, if we understand that God is revealing himself, but that the recipients are limited according to their capacity to receive, then we see a beautiful progression of truth.
Going further (and finally to the point of your question), Paul (in Rom 5:18-19) recognizes that because of the sin of Adam, we are all made sinners:
“In conclusion, just as through one transgression condemnation came upon all, so through one righteous act acquittal and life came to all. For just as through the disobedience of one person the many were made sinners, so through the obedience of one the many will be made righteous.”
Does this contradict Ezekiel 18:2, or is there a much higher revelation here?
Here is what the Church says about it:
“…original sin is called “sin” only in an analogical sense: it is a sin “contracted” and not “committed” – a state and not an act.
… original sin does not have the character of a personal fault in any of Adam’s descendants. [As a result of Adam’s sin, human nature] is wounded in the natural powers proper to it, subject to ignorance, suffering and the dominion of death, and inclined to sin – an inclination to evil that is called concupiscence”. Baptism, by imparting the life of Christ’s grace, erases original sin and turns a man back towards God, but the consequences for nature, weakened and inclined to evil, persist in man and summon him to spiritual battle.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 404-405)
So, we must understand that Paul is not talking about moral fault, but a diminished and disordered condition which afflicts the descendants of Adam, not because of a punishment orchestrated by God, but because of the disruption and damage to the whole order of creation that is caused by sin.
Most fundamentally, the higher revelation here is that Paul saw that we are all interconnected. As we are one body in Christ, so we are one body in Adam. In both of these, the actions of one affect all.
“How did the sin of Adam become the sin of all his descendants? The whole human race is in Adam ‘as one body of one man’. By this ‘unity of the human race’ all men are implicated in Adam’s sin, as all are implicated in Christ’s justice. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 404)
Finally, it is vitally important to realize that the whole problem with sin is not that it makes God angry at us (he is love eternal and unchanging), but that sin hurts *us.* God is against sin because it causes pain to human beings:
“Sin offends God, that is, it saddens him greatly, but only in so far as it brings death to man whom he loves; it wounds his love.” Fr. Cantalamessa, Preacher to the Papal Household
And the sweeping effects of Adam’s sin on the rest of humanity are not the result of a perverse and unjust curse instituted by God, but because we were all created to be in perfect relationship of love, and the effects of Adam’s sin have disrupted right relationally for all of humanity:
“What does original sin mean, then, when we interpret it correctly? Finding an answer to this requires nothing less than trying to understand the human person better. It must once again be stressed that no human being is closed in upon himself or herself and that no one can live of or for himself or herself alone. We receive our life not only at the moment of birth but every day from without–from others who are not ourselves but who nonetheless somehow pertain to us. Human beings have their selves not only in themselves but also outside of themselves: they live in those whom they love and in those who love them and to whom they are ‘present.’ Human beings are relational, and they possess their lives–themselves–only by way of relationship. I alone am not myself, but only in and with you am I myself. To be truly a human being means to be related in love, to be of and for. But sin means the damaging or the destruction of relationality. Sin is a rejection of relationality because it wants to make the human being a god. Sin is loss of relationship, disturbance of relationship, and therefore it is not restricted to the individual. When I destroy a relationship, then this event–sin–touches the other person involved in the relationship. Consequently sin is always an offense that touches others, that alters the world and damages it. To the extent that this is true, when the network of human relationships is damaged from the very beginning, then every human being enters into a world that is marked by relational damage. At the very moment that a person begins human existence, which is a good, he or she is confronted by a sin-damaged world. Each of us enters into a situation in which relationality has been hurt. Consequently each person is, from the very start, damaged in relationships and does not engage in them as he or she ought. Sin pursues the human being, and he or she capitulates to it.”–Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger
December 22, 2012 at 6:58pm · Like ·
3
