Original Sin

[grannymh]

Not knowing the kind of disobedience? The first sin was disobedience-rejection of God’s authority. That’s the whole point. Think you might be nitpicking a bit there.

May I gently point out that the kind of Original Sin necessitates that it could only be committed by the first human in whom all humankind is as one body of one man. (St. Thomas Aquinas, De Malo 4, 1. CCC, 404) This detail is what distinguishes the Original Sin from all the other personal sins of disobedience-rejection of God’s authority.

Moreover, if one refers to the rejection of God’s authority, which is fine, then one has to provide what that authority consists of. This determination of the area of authority can be fascinating since there are some hints that God as Creator may not have authority over creature conditions based on Scripture. (regarding the forgiveness issues)

As I am thinking about all this, it dawns on me that what may look like contradictions in Catholic doctrines are actually misunderstandings of Catholic doctrines caused by various omissions such as the surrounding doctrines of Original Sin plus the basic doctrines of human nature per se.

Obviously, when one avoids the nitty-gritty details of both Original Sin and basic human nature, one’s spirituality is threatened. (CCC, 407-409)

 

[fhansen]

Quotes from fhansen:

So, the way I read this,( and there will be an infinite number of ways of reading this), I am hearing two different voices in that group of words. One is the voice that comes from the conscience, “these things are good, they are acceptable” and the other voice is one that comes from another place that says “these things are awesome, a wonder”. It’s the difference between looking at the grand canyon and looking at a young man opening the door for an old person. All positive, but coming from different places.

Just appreciating the positives of human beings.

All of these words, with the possible exception of “weak” and perhaps “angry”, come directly from the conscience. These are words that we use with the voice of resentment. Do you resent your anger?, your capacity for anger? When you say “angry, contentious folk” and “ego-centric” these are words that label in a negative way. When you behave as these others do, do you also label yourself in this way, do you “write yourself off” as a member of this negative?

No, I don’t require my conscience to be involved in assessing someone as, for example, warmongering or ego-centric-it’s generally pretty obvious, we all know it when we see it, no rocket science necessary. Do you deny these traits exist in humanity?

When I think about it, we actually make pretty good choices. I mean, the choices we make are understandable in the context of our ignorance. Anger is not a matter of choice, at least not in the immediate sense. Anger is a triggered response. When I get angry at someone, my perception of their value is immediately greatly affected. The person is an immediate pile of scum in my eyes. All of us experience this. So, yes, we can make better and better choices, but to do so we have to have better lenses, lenses that we get through forgiveness of others and ourselves.

I’ve never understood the “ignorance is bliss” thing. When wisdom is folly, there is simply not enough wisdom. I can accept ignorance as part of the human condition, but it is a mystery. Temporary blindness, however, is not a mystery. Temporary blindness is actually a benefit to our nature, and I think I have already explained that on this thread. I can explain again, if you like. The people who hung Jesus had a temporary blindness.

Going back to my employee. He will “create his own truth”, in order to make himself look good no matter what. If he makes a mistake, the episode is spun until it was everyone else’s mistake. He believes what is expedient-and really seems to believe it, unaccepting of the possibility of making mistakes-being wrong. He’s blind I can’t make him see-but I also can’t keep running a business this way. And even God I assume, has a point where He lets people create their own hell, where He lets go.

Well, yes, people defend their values. My values are part of who I am. So, when people don’t respect my values, then my conscience kicks in. “Those people are wrong, they are bad.” Of course it is unreasonable, but the conscience can be very unreasonable. This is where awareness is very important, it is a matter of knowing that when I devalue someone or some part of myself in any way, that I feel negative toward anyone or any part of myself, I am living in an illusion. I cannot change the perception that I am in the center of the universe. When my “I”, when my self, extends to every person who has ever lived, then my “ego” includes everyone. Empathy teaches us this very thing. Love teaches us this very thing. The “I” only excludes the people we feel negatively towards.

The problem, fhansen, to me is not our desire to be right, or the idea that “my values (ideas, etc.) are better than yours.” That statement comes from a person’s experiences, whether aware or not, and may be an attempt to be helpful. The problem is that we have this blindness issue that we need to become aware of.

And I believe we create or at least contribute to the blindness issue by preferring to believe what benefits us. We also often end up defending* ourselves*, not our values. Let me give an example. Two elderly gents are arguing the finer points of religion or politics or whatever. In the beginning the discussion is polite, both supporting their positions reasonably enough, As the conversation proceeds, however, a shift subtly occurs. Each is feeling threatened in their respective positions, but actually each is feeling threatened personally. The debate becomes heated. The pain of losing-of being found to be wrong -takes over. The men are no longer defending the truth; they’re defending themselves. Can you identify at all with them? If so, have you wondered why you might have those feelings? When we think of it, why would it be reasonable to care even for a moment whether or not you, personally are right or wrong, rather than, perhaps, simply being in the right?

 

[fhansen]

Sounds miserable. Perhaps your employees are even more miserable. Your manager is out of control of his behavior, and perhaps needs some kind of security that you cannot provide. He has unmet needs, and he is trying to satisfy them in ways that are counter-productive. I see a control issue. Everyone has the desire to be in control of his environment, his destiny. It is a God-given appetite. In addition, his conscience, his personal rulebook, is perhaps being violated by his employees, and he is not taking the steps to forgive them. He may, for example, sense that the employees are disrespecting him, which would be very understandable on their part, but also makes his job even more difficult. To me, something big has to change that mess.

Evolutionary psychologists have recently done studies on anger. First of all, in the workplace, anger has been proven to actually benefit the person who angers often. People learn to walk on their tiptoes around the person with a “short fuse”, and so people who anger quickly, though not liked, do get their way. The anger-behavior is subconsciously rewarded in this way, and becomes habitual. In addition “attractive” people are more likely to have their anger rewarded at a young age, and also learn a greater sense of entitlement. Cute kids get to have their way more than the less-cute, that’s the sad truth.

I am not saying that anger itself is completely controllable. Anger is a triggered response. It often takes some counseling to learn to control it, it takes some “anger management”, which might be the ticket for your employee. Will he ever be able to overcome the negative feelings his employees have for him? Typically, people only forgive when they see repentance. Your manager would have to exercise some real humility and repentance to gain their respect.

In the mean time, I bet the employees really wished you’d get rid of that guy. When he lashes out in anger, your own anger is triggered; I am hearing that you also need some control over the whole situation, and he is not honoring your requests. Sounds frustrating.

(continued)

Thank you, Very astute assessment

 

[vames]

Should there be no consequence for evil? To put it another way, considering the worst acts that human sin perpetrates: rape, torture, etc, should that behavior be allowed to continue for eternity? Should God not desire perfection even as He allows gross imperfection to play out it’s hand- for the time being? And if He’s patient and kind, giving us the time and forgiveness to change, suffering Himself in this world to show He’s not unaware of ours, or too arrogant to experience what His own creation experiences, and then removing/squashing the power of death by the resurrection, then how do you say there’s no second chance? Isn’t that what this life is, in a sense? Didn’t He prove what we all want to be sure of: that our existence, that creation, is worth it after all, in spite of temporary suffering?

I didn’t talk at all about our real life, because I don’t think at all about suffering and death as punishments for something that our first ancestors did. And I fully agree that creation and life are worthy in spite of temporary suffering. I was only talking about the ancient way of explaining suffering and death as expressions of a divine revenge. Some people say: a certain man was struck by cancer, so it means he deserved it for his sins or for the sins of his family; a country is struck by a big earthquake, so it means that God punished it because of the immorality of its citizens or that God wants to warn mankind that His patience with us is growing thin and the end of the world is nearing. This logic is the intellectual heritage of Genesis and other ancient texts about angry deities punishing humans for various acts of rebellion.

Such texts tried to explain why there is suffering and death in the world and blamed it on the rebellion of one, two or a group of people or lesser gods who wanted to dethrone those deities or to steal something from them (the secret of immortality or other useful knowledge). None of these trespassings had to do with “the worst acts that human sin perpetrates: rape, torture, etc”, but with the normal wish of every man to better the conditions of his life. The discovery of fire, of cures for diseases, of means to prolong his life, of the secrets of nature. And those deities weren’t omniscient and almighty, so the rebels could deceive them or at least make them feel threatened, so the deities got angry and felt the need to punish people so as to protect themselves.

What was the reaction of God in the text of Genesis 3? Adam and Eve were kicked out of Eden and the entrance was barricaded, because “man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil and now he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”. The offended God of Genesis never allowed them back and the curse was never lifted (mortality of people and all living creatures, diseases, pains of childbirth, “thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you” etc). So indeed there was no second chance, if we follow the Genesis scenario. But we know that OUR GOD is not like those limited and harsh deities who punished humans for being humans. Our God is omniscient and almighty, so He couldn’t and can’t feel threatened and offended by humans behaving like humans.

 

[grannymh]

What may be difficult to recognize in the third chapter of Genesis is the basic “creation” significance that there can be only one almighty God, the Maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible. (From the Creed professed in the Catholic Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on Sunday.) One God is one of the points in Genesis 3: 22.

Obviously, Adam grasped the point of one God, his Creator, in Genesis 3:10. The literary style uses the juxtaposition of harmony in the relationship between the Creator and the creature Adam in chapters one and two with Adam’s fear in chapter three. This alerts the reader to the seriousness of Adam’s disobedience.

Original Sin is Adam’s free choice to dissolve the relationship between humanity and Divinity. Adam chose to believe Satan’s lie (Genesis 3: 4-5) about becoming another god equal or better than the Creator.(CCC, 396-399) Genesis 3: 22 recognizes both the “lie” of Satan and Adam’s yielding to temptation. Therefore, since there cannot be two Gods, the* impostor* Adam suffers the consequence explained in Genesis 2: 15-17.

This is another overlooked teaching of the Catholic Church from paragraph 404 of the universal Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition.
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. … But we do know by Revelation that Adam had received original holiness and justice not for himself alone, but for all human nature.

As one gathers the missing information about Original Sin, one begins to understand that the reality of the “punishment” is actually Adam removing himself and his descendants from the grace-filled presence of the One God. God, as the Creator, expresses the consequences in Genesis 3: 14-24.

Yet, God did not abandon humankind to its natural fate of Original Sin. God so loved humankind that He immediately announces a promised Messiah. (Genesis 3: 15; John 3:16; CCC 410-411 and cross-references in the margin.) This love of God for Adam and humankind is what we should take home. Our spirituality can be seen as returning God’s love with our own love and our own desire to choose God.

 

[vames]

[/INDENT]As one gathers the missing information about Original Sin, one begins to understand that the reality of the “punishment” is actually Adam removing himself and his descendants from the grace-filled presence of the One God. God, as the Creator, expresses the consequences in Genesis 3: 14-24.

One can also gather the informations about Original Sin that aren’t missing. Any research starts with the facts, not with the speculations, right? And the text of Genesis 3 is crystal clear: God became angry and cursed two utterly powerless creatures.

“I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing;
in pain you shall bring forth children,
yet your desire shall be for your husband,
and he shall rule over you.”

“Cursed is the ground because of you;
in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life;
thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;
and you shall eat the plants of the field.
By the sweat of your face
you shall eat bread
until you return to the ground,
for out of it you were taken;
you are dust,
and to dust you shall return.”

“‘See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever’ - therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from which he was taken. He drove out the man; and at the east of the garden of Eden he placed the cherubim, and a sword flaming and turning to guard the way to the tree of life.”

Could the God of Genesis have opted for a lesser punishment or for not punishing Adam and Eve at all? Of course.
Could God have opted for not punishing all their descendants (Jewish and Muslims, who use the same Bible, conceive a less vengeful God - they believe that each child is born pure and each soul is responsible only for his own sins)? Of course.
Could God have refrained at least from punishing all the innocent animals and plants? Of course.
And yet we praise this ultra-vengeful God of Genesis and claim that He is good, loving, forgiving. So how are we different from those ancient people who believed in legends about capricious deities who killed people (yes, the Flood = genocide was a common theme in those mythologies) and demanded sacrifices just to preserve their fragile self-esteem?

 

[grannymh]

One can also gather the informations about Original Sin that aren’t missing. Any research starts with the facts, not with the speculations, right? And the text of Genesis 3 is crystal clear: God became angry and cursed two utterly powerless creatures.

Good idea to gather more information about the statement in bold, "God became angry and cursed two utterly powerless creatures.

I have some information facts, according to the Catholic Church, regarding both God and Adam that I would like to share. For convenience, this information is in the form of questions. I am interested in any comments. It is everyone’s personal choice to share or not share information regarding these two starter questions. Thank you.

To begin.

1. Rocks, in themselves, can be considered utterly powerless. Was Adam a rock? If not, what creature was he?
2. Is there a difference between a creature and God the Creator? And is there a similarity between a creature and God the Creator?

By the way, I do not do Noah because the Catholic Church does not consider him, or anyone in his family, as the first human person.

Also, the scientific method often starts with speculations that serve as hypotheses. A famous speculation was that humans could fly. Granted it took a long time for humans to invent the first flying machine; but now look at where humans are flying. Those who live in my neighborhood know that pigs do not fly.

 

[vames]

1. Rocks, in themselves, can be considered utterly powerless. Was Adam a rock? If not, what creature was he?
2. Is there a difference between a creature and God the Creator? And is there a similarity between a creature and God the Creator?

A rock, a dog and Adam are equally powerless before a transcendent, almighty God. An almighty God can destroy the whole world, without any rock, dog or man being able to escape or stop Him. In this thread, you have emphasized the insurmountable distance between the supernatural, infinite Creator and the natural, finite creature, explaining that many misunderstandings about OS have to do with ignoring this distance - i.e. when people use the relationship between parents and children to explain the relationship between the Creator and A&E.

According to the first account of Genesis, the similarity between the Creator and creatures is that both exist and are “very good”. About man, this account of Genesis says that “God created humankind in his image**, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them”. (No male made from the dust of the ground, no female made later from a male rib.) God blessed them and gave them a real, unconditioned gift: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” (No separate Eden with a forbidden tree in the midst of it and no warning that “in the day that you eat of it you shall die”.)

Speculations are very useful as starting points when we lack facts. In this case, we have the text of Genesis. A text is a text, so it can support more than one interpretation - like when Jewish and Muslims say that the descendants of Adam and Eve aren’t born in a state of sin or when Protestants speak about total depravity.

**The CCC interprets it by saying that man is “the only creature on earth that God has willed for its own sake” and that man alone “is called to share, by knowledge and love, in God’s own life”. The Jewish interpretation, from what I saw, is that God endowed humans with certain natural drives, among them the aspiration towards mastery, so man’s dominion over other creatures is a reflection of God’s lordship.

 

[fhansen]

I didn’t talk at all about our real life, because I don’t think at all about suffering and death as punishments for something that our first ancestors did. And I fully agree that creation and life are worthy in spite of temporary suffering. I was only talking about the ancient way of explaining suffering and death as expressions of a divine revenge. Some people say: a certain man was struck by cancer, so it means he deserved it for his sins or for the sins of his family; a country is struck by a big earthquake, so it means that God punished it because of the immorality of its citizens or that God wants to warn mankind that His patience with us is growing thin and the end of the world is nearing. This logic is the intellectual heritage of Genesis and other ancient texts about angry deities punishing humans for various acts of rebellion.

Such texts tried to explain why there is suffering and death in the world and blamed it on the rebellion of one, two or a group of people or lesser gods who wanted to dethrone those deities or to steal something from them (the secret of immortality or other useful knowledge). None of these trespassings had to do with “the worst acts that human sin perpetrates: rape, torture, etc”, but with the normal wish of every man to better the conditions of his life. The discovery of fire, of cures for diseases, of means to prolong his life, of the secrets of nature. And those deities weren’t omniscient and almighty, so the rebels could deceive them or at least make them feel threatened, so the deities got angry and felt the need to punish people so as to protect themselves.

What was the reaction of God in the text of Genesis 3? Adam and Eve were kicked out of Eden and the entrance was barricaded, because “man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil and now he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”. The offended God of Genesis never allowed them back and the curse was never lifted (mortality of people and all living creatures, diseases, pains of childbirth, “thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you” etc). So indeed there was no second chance, if we follow the Genesis scenario. But we know that OUR GOD is not like those limited and harsh deities who punished humans for being humans. Our God is omniscient and almighty, so He couldn’t and can’t feel threatened and offended by humans behaving like humans.

I really believe that much of the language of Genesis is highly symbolic. We need to know the intention of the author. And I think the story of creation and man’s act of disobedeince seeks to address the reason for sin- moral evil-as we come to be puzzled by its very existence in our world, rather than simply to explain physical suffering/evil, which it also addresses as you point out. It means to tell us how creation and it’s creator can still be good while so much suffering and maliciousness exist here-and what the reason for human-caused evil is. And, the more I ponder the idea and nature of an “innocence lost”, it makes sense to me that something in this world is “not as it should be”; moral evil has a sort of transcendent quality from that perspective. And, if things were different originally, or even if we only perceived * them differently in our innocence (Adam & Eve didn’t yet “know” they were naked), either way life became a struggle due to man’s separation from God-and that’s the main message IMO. Not from man being bad* so much as the natural consequence of a division or rupture which occurred within man, a separation from the “ground of reality” that I believe we can observe in ourselves and our world today.

 

[vames]

I really believe that much of the language of Genesis is highly symbolic. We need to know the intention of the author. And I think the story of creation and man’s act of disobedeince seeks to address the reason for sin- moral evil-as we come to be puzzled by its very existence in our world, rather than simply to explain physical suffering/evil, which it also addresses as you point out.

Fully agreed; being a symbolical story about the origins of suffering and death, Genesis has to deal with the origins of evil, because moral evil (sin) is one of the sources of suffering. What I tried to say is that a creature, by its very condition of being created, individuated, can be only imperfect, which of course is not badness. Only God is perfect, limitless, omniscient, almighty - a creature is by default imperfect, limited, with a limited mind and limited powers. That’s why any theory that postulates original perfection of man can’t actually explain sin, even if we introduce an external factor (the serpent). Either you’re perfect, have a perfect mind, a perfect will, so you can’t be tempted and can do only good things, or you’re not perfect, so you can be tempted and can do good and bad things. And original innocence can lead us only so far, because innocence doesn’t mean moral perfection, but lack of knowledge, lack of experience with the world, freedom from guilt or sin through being unacquainted with evil. A&E and all the children are innocent, but not perfect. Probably some people thought that if we recognize the inherent imperfection of man, we offend God, but it was God who gave us the capacity to grow up and evolve, the freedom to do good and bad things, the capacity to learn from our sins and to seek perfection despite of our creaturely limitations.

 

[grannymh]

A rock, a dog and Adam are equally powerless before a transcendent, almighty God. An almighty God can destroy the whole world, without any rock, dog or man being able to escape or stop Him. In this thread, you have emphasized the insurmountable distance between the supernatural, infinite Creator and the natural, finite creature, explaining that many misunderstandings about OS have to do with ignoring this distance - i.e. when people use the relationship between parents and children to explain the relationship between the Creator and A&E.

According to the first account of Genesis, the similarity between the Creator and creatures is that both exist and are “very good”. About man, this account of Genesis says that “God created humankind in his image**, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them”. (No male made from the dust of the ground, no female made later from a male rib.) God blessed them and gave them a real, unconditioned gift: “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” (No separate Eden with a forbidden tree in the midst of it and no warning that “in the day that you eat of it you shall die”.)

Speculations are very useful as starting points when we lack facts. In this case, we have the text of Genesis. A text is a text, so it can support more than one interpretation - like when Jewish and Muslims say that the descendants of Adam and Eve aren’t born in a state of sin or when Protestants speak about total depravity.

**The CCC interprets it by saying that man is “the only creature on earth that God has willed for its own sake” and that man alone “is called to share, by knowledge and love, in God’s own life”. The Jewish interpretation, from what I saw, is that God endowed humans with certain natural drives, among them the aspiration towards mastery, so man’s dominion over other creatures is a reflection of God’s lordship.

Thank you sincerely for your response. I continue to learn about the different interpretations of the first three chapters of Genesis.

The first question from post 577.
Rocks, in themselves, can be considered utterly powerless. Was Adam a rock? If not, what creature was he?

The second question from post 577.
Is there a difference between a creature and God the Creator? And is there a similarity between a creature and God the Creator?

Regarding question 1.
Yes, in a basic sense a rock, a dog and Adam “are equally powerless before a transcendent, almighty God.” However, Adam is not a rock. We need to look at Adam as he is. Adam is a creature with intellect and will which does give him the very unique power to accept or reject God here on planet earth. One of the major misunderstandings about Adam is the
non-acceptance of Adam as a fully complete human person.

As for question 2.
I am not understanding your reference to “insurmountable distance” since I have not considered “distance” per se in this thread. I have pointed to the “difference” between the creature Adam and the Creator God. The first “difference” is usually the difference between the status of Adam and the status of God, the difference between humanity and Divinity, the difference between creature and Creator.

If we switch to distance, with Sanctifying Grace there is no distance between the person and God. As for similarity between a creature and God the Creator, we see creatures and creation reflecting the existence of God. The intelligibility of the universe has been considered a primitive demonstration of a supernatural Creator. Your reference to humankind being created in the image of God is what makes humans similar to God–not the same as God. Because of our rational spiritual soul, we are considered a spiritual being who is called to share in God’s own life. This is truly awesome!

My last comments refer to the two versions of creation and to the different interpretations. While “a text is a text,” it is actually the protocol of the visible Catholic Church on earth which determines which information in the first three chapters of Genesis leads to Catholic doctrines based on Divine Revelation. This protocol involves years of studying Scripture, tradition, Early Church Fathers, saints, encyclicals, other related doctrines, letters, liturgy, poetry and hymns – in other words, everything which pertains to a doctrine under consideration by a major ecumenical Church Council. Guided by the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, Divine Revelation becomes more explicit.

Therefore, in the history of the Catholic Church not all verses in the first three chapters of Genesis have been automatically transformed into Catholic doctrines. However, many of the verses, while not doctrines per se, do contribute and do support actual doctrines.

Thank you.

 

[fhansen]

Fully agreed; being a symbolical story about the origins of suffering and death, Genesis has to deal with the origins of evil, because moral evil (sin) is one of the sources of suffering. What I tried to say is that a creature, by its very condition of being created, individuated, can be only imperfect, which of course is not badness. Only God is perfect, limitless, omniscient, almighty - a creature is by default imperfect, limited, with a limited mind and limited powers. That’s why any theory that postulates original perfection of man can’t actually explain sin, even if we introduce an external factor (the serpent). Either you’re perfect, have a perfect mind, a perfect will, so you can’t be tempted and can do only good things, or you’re not perfect, so you can be tempted and can do good and bad things. And original innocence can lead us only so far, because innocence doesn’t mean moral perfection, but lack of knowledge, lack of experience with the world, freedom from guilt or sin through being unacquainted with evil. A&E and all the children are innocent, but not perfect. Probably some people thought that if we recognize the inherent imperfection of man, we offend God, but it was God who gave us the capacity to grow up and evolve, the freedom to do good and bad things, the capacity to learn from our sins and to seek perfection despite of our creaturely limitations.

Actually I think original innocence is a good definition of the perfection proper to any of God’s created beings-whether it be a dog or a human. The difference is that, having no free will, dogs can’t compromise their innocence. We all have a perfection proper to our natures, issuing from God. Man is imperfect compared to God only in a relative sense-yes, we cannot possess ultimate perfection-we can only have only that which is given to us. So why did Adam sin? Or why was he dissatisfied with what he had? Had he possessed the perfect wisdom of God it should be the case that he could never make the mistake of thinking he could be God. He was given knowledge of God’s wisdom in some manner-the command of God regarding the harmfulness of disobedience probably being an innate knowledge. But that wisdom came from God, not Adam, and as with any moral command our free will gives us the possibility to ignore it. In any case I still don’t know why Adam sinned. He wanted to be “like God”, and God wanted Adam to be like Himself, but Adam apparently thought it could only be done if he were apart from God, not in accordance with God, maybe intuiting that there can actually only be one God. I’m still not sure what that means-but I see an awful lot of people playing god in my world today-and I see a lot of harm done by it, so it makes sense to me that this scenario isn’t normal or beneficial. I think man’s imperfection today is in thinking he can be god-or even in not being sure whether or not he is-and therefore unsure about the very existence of God. And therefore an aspect of man’s perfection-or justice- would be to acknowledge the existence of God (to believe in Him) and then to acknowledge his obligation to obey Him.

 

[vames]

I am not understanding your reference to “insurmountable distance” since I have not considered “distance” per se in this thread. I have pointed to the “difference” between the creature Adam and the Creator God. The first “difference” is usually the difference between the status of Adam and the status of God, the difference between humanity and Divinity, the difference between creature and Creator.

By insurmountable distance I meant radical difference of status. There is an insurmountable distance between an infinite Creator and a finite creature. God has an infinite power over A&E and decides their fate without them being able to negotiate, protest, defend themselves, retaliate, rival or threaten God.

Not all verses in the first three chapters of Genesis have been automatically transformed into Catholic doctrines because they are inconvenient and don’t fit the image of an omnibenevolent and omnipotent God. To believe that God is loving, we have to ignore Genesis 3:16. To believe that God is almighty, we have to ignore 3:22-24. But if both accounts of Genesis are included in the Bible because they are revealed texts that should be taken seriously, what should we do with such passages? Aren’t they “true” as well? If we have to believe in a literal Adam and Eve, should we pretend that God didn’t curse women with the pains of childbirth and that God didn’t feel threatened by A&E when He kicked them out and barricaded the entrance of Eden?

 

[vames]

So why did Adam sin? Or why was he dissatisfied with what he had? Had he possessed the perfect wisdom of God it should be the case that he could never make the mistake of thinking he could* be *God.

IMO Adam and Eve weren’t necessarily dissatisfied with what they had; they were just curious to find out more, to discover and enjoy something that was naturally appealing to any human being. “The woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise”. Eve and Adam decided to eat only after they looked at the tree and liked it, not before.

So I think the natural appeal of the tree must have been much more convincing than the promise “you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (who thought how is to be like God, if they were creatures who spent all their time eating from trees and keeping the garden?) or than the threat “neither shall you touch it, lest you die” (who thought what death means, if nobody has ever died in Eden?). This disobedience of the innocent is typical. Tell a child not to touch a beautiful toy or a delicious cake placed within his reach, give him philosophical warnings and see how he reacts.

A&E could have decided to refrain from eating only if they had a real knowledge about what made God to issue such an interdiction (if God is good and this tree is good, *why *I am forbidden to eat?) and a real knowledge about the harmfulness of disobedience (if God is good and this tree is good, how can anything bad proceed from it?). The fact that they lacked such knowledge is obvious if we look at their behavior after being caught - none of them experiences any repentance motivated by the love of God, but just the elementary shame of being caught, complete with the naive need to pass the blame.

I think it’s a refreshing thought that God doesn’t require us to stay innocent like small children or dogs, but to learn from the knowledge of moral good and moral evil, so as to become able to choose to do good things. For human beings there is no other path towards perfection. We aren’t left alone along this path and aren’t rejected if we make mistakes as we grow up. Because God is our Father.

 

[simpleas]

I am using an older version of the New American Bible. When I was younger, the Jerusalem Bible was considered more expressive. However, the meanings would be the same. Using the two Bibles will certainly be informative.

I am looking at Genesis 6: 5-13. It looks like verses 11-13 is the summary. When I look at the difference between the who and the what, I am reminded that Genesis 1:31 is a confirmation that the who, either God or man*,* is good but that the what can be bad.

I will wait for your findings.

Gen 1:31 - God sees all he created to be good.

But…

Gen 6 5-13 - God sees all the violence on the earth and regrets making man, but some thing special about Noah and his family pleases God and so he wishes to save man. And does so through Noah.

So God must have been alittle angry at Adam and Eve, because much corruption had a hold of his creatures thus making him sorry for creating us at that point.

 

[simpleas]

Good idea to gather more information about the statement in bold, "God became angry and cursed two utterly powerless creatures.

I have some information facts, according to the Catholic Church, regarding both God and Adam that I would like to share. For convenience, this information is in the form of questions. I am interested in any comments. It is everyone’s personal choice to share or not share information regarding these two starter questions. Thank you.

To begin.

1. Rocks, in themselves, can be considered utterly powerless. Was Adam a rock? If not, what creature was he?
2. Is there a difference between a creature and God the Creator? And is there a similarity between a creature and God the Creator?

**By the way, I do not do Noah because the Catholic Church does not consider him, or anyone in his family, as the first human person. **
Also, the scientific method often starts with speculations that serve as hypotheses. A famous speculation was that humans could fly. Granted it took a long time for humans to invent the first flying machine; but now look at where humans are flying. Those who live in my neighborhood know that pigs do not fly.

In bold :
By the way, I do not do Noah because the Catholic Church does not consider him, or anyone in his family, as the first human person.

Just to say I don’t think Noah and his family were the first people, but that Adam and Eve are. What I was trying to say was if God distroyed all humans apart from Noah and his family then this sounds like the second chance, but with the OS still upon them…

 

[grannymh]

It is sadness to watch the subtle attacks against the goodness of the Creator at the beginning of human history. Regardless of all the personal opinions, which are publically presented, the lessons of Catholicism, regarding the ultimate goal of humanity, remain in stone.

True spirituality has the goal of bringing us closer and closer to our Creator so that we share in His life here on earth (Sanctifying Grace) and eternally in the presence of the Beatific Vision.

True spirituality benefits from correct knowledge of our origin which includes the fact that Original Sin has serious consequences. We do have the natural innate power to overcome those consequences through our participation in the Catholic Sacraments and in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Regardless of how the Sacrament of Reconciliation and Conscience are downgraded or misinterpreted, the Catholic Church remains true to the* conditions* for maintaining our relationship with our Creator.

 

[OneSheep]

No, I don’t require my conscience to be involved in assessing someone as, for example, warmongering or ego-centric-it’s generally pretty obvious, we all know it when we see it, no rocket science necessary. Do you deny these traits exist in humanity?

It depends on how one uses the words. If I mean “people often choose war”, and am making a simple observation without judging the people, that there is no negative feeling toward those who choose war, then my conscience is not involved. If I say that a person is “ego-centric” with disdain in my voice, I am essentially saying that some act by the person triggered anger or some other negative emotion in me, and my characterization is coupled with seeing the person in some kind of negative way. That is the voice of my conscience. The conscience reaction is not a “willed” thing, we don’t say to ourselves and decide “I am going to react negatively to that”.

In the practice of Non-Violent Communication, the first step is to “observe without judging”, which reflects gospel values. The first step is actually the hardest step. We judge constantly, so in order to make an observation without the conscience involved, one has to recognize when he has judged, and then forgive, or at least temporarily let go of, the judgment. It is very difficult, it takes practice. As a matter of fact, you might think about reading the book on NVC as a means of dealing with your manager, and give him a copy too. Lots of people use NVC in the workplace. It’s a real eye-opener. It takes a lot of self-discipline, though. NVC has been a means to reconciliation in a lot of situations. I am not very “good” at it, and the book is not gospel, I “cherry-pick”. Some Pax Christi groups in Northern Ca have used the book in their sessions.

Going back to my employee. He will “create his own truth”, in order to make himself look good no matter what. If he makes a mistake, the episode is spun until it was everyone else’s mistake. He believes what is expedient-and really seems to believe it, unaccepting of the possibility of making mistakes-being wrong. He’s blind I can’t make him see-but I also can’t keep running a business this way. And even God I assume, has a point where He lets people create their own hell, where He lets go.

I don’t believe God ever lets go of people. He holds us in the palm of His hand while we suffer, not knowing what we are doing. God can “make me” see. When I had suffered enough, I was very receptive. Because we are human, we are all receptive once we have suffered enough.

 

[OneSheep]

quotes from fhansen:

And I believe we create or at least contribute to the blindness issue by preferring to believe what benefits us. We also often end up defending* ourselves*, not our values. Let me give an example. Two elderly gents are arguing the finer points of religion or politics or whatever. In the beginning the discussion is polite, both supporting their positions reasonably enough, As the conversation proceeds, however, a shift subtly occurs. Each is feeling threatened in their respective positions, but actually each is feeling threatened personally. The debate becomes heated. The pain of losing-of being found to be wrong -takes over. The men are no longer defending the truth; they’re defending themselves. Can you identify at all with them? If so, have you wondered why you might have those feelings? When we think of it, why would it be reasonable to care even for a moment whether or not you, personally are right or wrong, rather than, perhaps, simply being in the right?

I absolutely love your example. Let’s say two old gents are talking about abortion. One does not value the unborn, and sees the “goodness” of freedom, the right to be born to parents who love them, and the “right” of a woman to choose. He sees many social ills due to the opposite approach, including over-population and environmental destruction. The other old gent has a pro-life approach, and sees the act of abortion itself as a social ill, because he values the life of the unborn. It is likely that the first step is that the two come to recognize each other as belonging to a different group, that is, ingroup-outgroup thinking is involved. The second step is that somewhere along the way, one of the gents judges the other person’s point of view, saying or implying that it is “stupid” or whatever, which immediately triggers the same effect in the other gent. (“turning the cheek” is another one of those choices, like forgiveness, which are a means of dealing with our nature). Now, they are not only in each other’s outgroup, but they are also labeled negatively by each other, and the other’s value as a human is diminished. They may see each other as enemies of the common good, and worse. The anger and resentment is coupled with a blindness; their empathy is blocked. It is time to forgive or at least “turn the cheek”, changing the emotional setting, but they are not thinking about forgiveness, they are in punishment mode.

So, to me, the problem is not the righteousness, nor the attachment to values. The problem is that we judge without immediately forgiving. Do you see something else going on in the “subtle shift”? Would the conversation ever get violent if the conscience wasn’t there saying “you dissed me, and you deserve punishment”?

Certainly some dominance behavior is involved, but a tennis game is all about dominance, and no one gets angry at someone else, nor does it get personal, until someone violates someone else’s personal rulebook (or does not take ownership of their own errors or lack of skill).

Do you see what I’m saying? It all looks natural to me. No doubt, the human has a long way to go on repentance. And, we have a lot of forgiving to do in this world. There are a lot of prejudices to erase, and we can certainly be a lot more aware of the workings of our consciences, including the misperceptions about people’s value that adjoin our resentment, anger, and other such emotional reactions. I have searched long and hard for the counterexample to “natural”, and I cannot find one.

What Adam and Eve did was understandable and forgiveable in the context of our functional, wonderful, beautiful nature.

Did I miss something?

 

[fhansen]

I don’t believe God ever lets go of people. He holds us in the palm of His hand while we suffer, not knowing what we are doing. God can “make me” see. When I had suffered enough, I was very receptive. Because we are human, we are all receptive once we have suffered enough.

Yes, that’s an interesting insight about the value of suffering. We can be quite obstinate-no judgement intended. And this sort of relates to my thoughts on human self-righteousness-a seeming pre-condition for man IMO, a tendency or preference for believing we’re right *prior to * or without regard to a consideration of the actual truth of the matter. This can support the doctrine of OS IMO, as it provides a reason for our blindness, a condition which precedes it IOW. Pride distances us from truth, while humility provides the means to approach and align ourselves with it.